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LORD. BYRON, 




INCLUDING 




K\w Sbumwcggetr ^ocwa. 




ALSO 




A SKETCH OF HIS LIFE. 




BY J. 137. LAKE. 




COMPLETE IN ONE VOLUME. 




PHILADELPHIA: 




LIPPINCOTT, GRAMBO & CO. 




185 3. 







CONTENTS. 



LIFCOF LORD hvROX. 
HOURS car IDLENESS. 

On leaving Newstead Abbey - 

Epitaph un a Friend * * 

/» Fragment - ------- 

The Tear - - - - 

An Occasional Prologue - - - . 

On ibe Death ni Mr. Fox ----- - - 

Stanzas to a Lady -------- 

To M**« 

'J'. i \\ uman --- ----- 

J\. m. a <;. - - - 

Bonn ..... ... 

To ** 

To Mary ------ 

Daimetaa _.._._ - . 

To Marion 

Oscar ot Alva ----- - - 

To Hie Duke of D. - - - - - • 

Translations and Imitations. 

Adrian's Address to Ins Soul, when dying 

Translation 

(Translation from Catullus - - - - ,- 

JJVansIation of the Epitaph on Virgil and Tibuiius 

/Translation limn Catullus 

-Imitated Prom Catullus - - 

Translation Frrnii Anaoreon - - - 

Ode III - - - - 

Fraa.nent From the Prometheus Vinctus - 
The Episode of Nisus and Euryalus - 
Translation from the Medea of Euripides 

Fugitive 1'iecrs. 

Thoughts suggested by a College Examination 

To ibe Earl of *** 

Granta, a Medley 

Lachin y Gair -------- 

To Romance --------- 

Elegy on Newstead Abbey ------ 

To E. N. L. Esq. 

To — 

Stanzas- ---------- 

Lilies written beneath an Elm in the Churchyard of Har- 
row on Ibe Hill. -------- 

The death of Calmar and Orla ------ 

CRITIUUE extracted from the Edinburgh Review, Xo 
29, fur January, 1SU8 ------- 

ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS - 

Postscript -------- jjjf 1 - 

CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE - - 

Notes 

THE GIAOUR 

Notes --------- 

THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS - - - - 

Notes --------- 

THE CORSAIR - - ... - 

Notes 

LARA 

Note --------- 

THE CURSE OF MINERVA - - - - 

Notes 

THE SIEGE OF CORINTH - - - 

Notes --------- 

PARISINA 

Notes --------- 

-THE PRISONER OF CHILLOX - - - 

Notes 

BEPPO 

N - 

-MAZITPA 

MANFRED - - - .... 

Notes - - 

MA I! I NO FALIERO 

Notes --------- 

Appendix -------- 

8ARDANAPALU3 

Notes - - ...... 



THE TWO FOSCARI 

Appendix - - - 



se ] OAIN 

lb oWERNER 

il" 'I'ili: DEFORMED TRANSFORMED 

lb. 



HEAVEN AND EARTH 



ib! THE PROPHECY OF DANTE 

,b ;j Notes 

il, '1 HE ISLAND - - - 

.'M Appendix - . - 

's/THE AGE OF BRONZE - - 
jjj .Till'. VISION OF, JUDGMJiNT 
jjLMORGANTE MAGGIoRE - 

*5&VALTZ 

„ I Notes 



ib.iTHE LAMENT OP TASSO - 

ib. 

ib. HEBREW MELODIES. 



34 



She walks in beauty - - - - 
•Tin' b irp the monarch minstrel swept 
If thai high world - - - . 
The wild gazelle - - - - 
Oh I weep for those - - . - 
On Jordan's hanks - - - - 
Jephtha's daughter - - - - 
Oti! snatch'd away in beauty's bloom 
My soul is dark - - - - 

I .,nt thee wei p - 
Thy days are done 
Son- ol Saul before his last battle 



327 

3/>4 

3fil 
384 
•)•-'? 
445 
457 
4 lid 
4T.4 
4Tti 
4-*i 
187 
405 

503 

505 

506 



..fH 
5U9 

lb 
ib. 



an 



" All is vanity, saith the preacher" - - - - 

When coldness wraps this suffering clay - 

Vision of Belshazzar ------- 

Sou of the sleepless 

Were my bosam as false as thou deem'stit to be - 
Herod's lament for Murininne ----- 

( In lie- day of the dpslruciion of Jerusalem by Titus 
I'.i Hi, rivers of Bab) Ion we sat down and wept - 
The di siiiietuin of Sennacherib - - - . 
From Job .... 



ib. 
lb. 

ib. 
ib. 
oil 
ib. 
ib. 

lb. 

5ia 

ib. 
ib. 
ib. 
ib. 
513 



2o MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte 



513 

- 38j ^-Monody on the death of the Rich! Hon R. B. Sheridan 514 

515 
516 
5ia 
519 
520 



1'Jii 



.The Irish Avatar 

The Dream - 

<)de (to Venice) 

Lines w/ittcn in an Alburn ------ 

Romance muy dojoroso del siiio y tnma de Alhama - 
A very mournful Ballad on the Biege and conquest of 

Alhama - - - - - 

Snnetio di Vittorelli. with translation - 
Stanzas « rillen in passing the Ambraeinn Gulf 
composed in a thunder-storm near mount Pin- 

dos 

,To *** 

Lines written at Athens - - - - - . - 

written beneath a picture ------ 

— — written alter swimming from Sestos to Abydos 
Zcir; fioT' ri'H" d}<iTW ------ 

ion of a Greek war song - - - - 

Translation of a Romaic song ------ 

Oil Parting -------- 

ToThyraa - - 

B'nrwis 

ToThyian 

i Euthanasia --- ----- 

Stanzas ------ ... 



On a cornplian hparl which was broken - - - - 

To n y ii'hful friend - 

To ****** ---------- 

I 'rom i bo Portuguese -------- 

h in pin, in r< ply lo " friend ------ 

\d ■-. spoken al the opening of Druty-lanc Theatre 



Translation of a Romaic loyfi sons - - 



ib. 

Ib. 

ib. 

5a 

ib. 

i£ 
534 
ib 



/'n being ask'd what wis the "origin of love" 

' Remember him, etc. 

Line* inscribed noon a cup fnrmnd from a skull 
On the death of Sil Peloi Parker Ban - 



,b 
MO 

ib. 
531 

ib. 

ib 

ib 



IV 



CONTENTS. 



Ti> a fmlv v. 
Prom ii,. Turin. I, 
arvra 



5TB 

■ H. 



i um«ni ..i ■ Nt wfoundland <!<«g 
i 

I'.-lfl.l I. 'Ii)' R.IUI ------ 

Will' ii' ------ 

|..i inurfic ------- 






French) 

rn . 
I 

Ir.nu tin- 



•nncl 



• ii. hi r 'I'i.iiii il.. I 
French) - - - - 



ih. 
ib. 
ill. 
5 i 

1 



l.'Aiinlii' rii rAiniiur nuns Ail™ 

3on - 

nn John X't.irns of Southwell 

- - - - 
I .. M -. ••' - - • 

,\ I...M Bung 

- 



ink leaf of " The Pleasun i of Memory ib. 

• 



Churchill'* Grave 



- ib. 

- 541 

- i i. 

- ib. 






to*** mi leaving England - - - - 

Mr. Hodgson ....... 

: B •■'. .:' I hchomenus 

l nee 

Mi II il--.ii 

I liurluw r i I'ii. ins ------ 



ninsMl 

Ffiieim to Thomas Moore - 

TI ■ Di vilV Drive - 

Addition il Bmnz u to Ihi I Ide lo Nspoli on I 

I. nil) - - 

lor Music - 

intended in he recited m the Caledonian Meet 



743 

', r. 
ib 

.-. 
ih 
,i. 
:i 
,h 

ih 

,!, 

:;: 
741 

ib 
ih 

.Ii 
.Ii 
Ti- 
ll, 

ib 
741 

ih 
741 



I'lM-ll.-V - - 

A i-k.i'-li t'rrim prnn'.. life - - - - - 
Ryronm in < '. Elgin *■ 
Mr. Mom 

" i in ih is day I complete my tliir ly-si xili fear" 

LITl'ni to-*»* »»*•• OH BOWLES'S STRIC- 

TUBE8 ON POPE 512 

A PB VGMENT 553 

PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES 553 

DON JUAN 561 

Notes "U4 

HINTS PROM HORACE 711 

ADDITIONS TO THE HOURS OF IDLENESS. 

On a ilif-int view of iho Village ami School of Harrow 

ontheHUI 

Ti, It. 

To Eddjlcston 

Reply to - .in' Verses of J. M. B. rigot, r.^q. - - in. 
To the sighing Btrepbon ------- ,-j:t 

To MissPigot - - - - - - - - - ih. 

Lines written in Letters of an Italian Nun and an l 

sh Gentleman 724 

The Cornelian - - - ib. 

On ih.- Death of n Young Lady ih. | 

ma ib. 

To M. S. O. .--- .... ,-j., 

To Caroline ---- ... . jb. 

To Caroline- - - .'■•• 

To Caroline - - ■- ■ 

The First Kiss of Love ... - - - ib. | 

nutil'ul Quaker m. ; 

To Lesl ia - - <-• ' 

Linen addressed lo a Young Lady i*.. 

The l.i' Adieu if. 

Translation from Horace • - - - 726 



- Ty 

ib. 

ih. 



On the Prince Regent's r rains the Picture of Sarah, 

Countess of Jersey, to Mrs. Mee - - - - - 

To Beishazzar 

lhal ll.ii" i* Happiness ------ 

Lines intended for the opening of "Tbeaiegeef Cornth" 
Fxiracl from an unpublished Poem - - - - - 

To Augusta 

To Thomas Moore ....... 

lo the river Po - - 

i ieorae jhc Fourth ------ 

Franc, sea .>i Rimini - ------- 

■ . l.i who best can understand them 
I ii iountess ol Blessington - 

written on the Kuan between Florence and Pisa 
Impromptu ---------- 

To a Vain I. iily --------- 

I' irew ell lo the Muse - - - 

To Anne ---------- 

'I'., the jama ---------- 

To the \ui nor of a Sonnet ------ 

• a Pan 

To an Oak at Ncwstead - •*- 

I', dication lo Don Juan ------- 

Dr. Plagiary - . - - 
Oh never talk again to me ------ 

I to Malta 

I ; r-. in. in in the Deed of Reparation - - 

Who kill'd John Keats 

9 mg for the Lui dues 

Ti.,- CI i 1 gave - - 

Epitaph for Joseph Blackett 

S> we'll t-'n no more n roving ------ 

Lines on hearing that Lady Byron was ill - - - 

'I'ii *S* - - - 

Martial, Lib. I. Epig. I. 



To Dives --------- 

und in a Summer-House at Hales Owen ■ 
Fn ri ihi I i ench ------' 

Ni » Duet 



Fugitive Pieces 

Answer to Verse* sent by a Friend - - - - - 72f 

Oi, i Change ol Masters at a great public School - "'-'• 

■ en. his lb. 

A n-wer to a I'lH'in written by Montgomery - - -733 

To the Rev. .1. T. Becher 734 

To MissChawurth |h. 

Remembrance --------- ib. 

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

The Blues 735 

The Third Act of Manfred, in its orig.nal shape. - - 738 
To my dear Mary Anno - - - - - - "741 

To Miss Chaworth - ib. 

Fragment lb. 

The Prayer of Nature ih. 

Ou It" *M-?s Harrow 742 



Epigrams ------- 

The Conquest ------ 



from the French of Rulhierea - 
T Mi Murray ------ 

i m Ml Murray to Dr. Pplidori 
I m-'l.- p. Mr. Murray - - - - 



To Tim mas Moore 

Stanzas 

1 r William Pitt - - - - 
On hi Wedding-day - - - - - 
Fpigram ------- 

my Hall - - 

------- 

Tu Ml Mnrra 



I .. Ml JIurrBy - - - 

in a Hindoo Air - - - - - 
i in the birth of John William Rizzo Hoppner 
Stanzas -.--.--. 



75; 

ib 

ib 

ib 
7a 

ib 

ib 

ib 
75c 

ib. 
759 

ib 

ih 

ib 
760 

ib 

ib 

ib 
7til 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ib. 

ih. 

ib. 

ib. 

762 

ib 

ih. 

703 

ih. 

ib 

ih. 

ib 

ib. 

ib. 

ih. 

ib 
7ti4 

ib 

ib 



Kixt JLitt of JLovXf 2$grou. 

BY J. W. LAKE. 



O'er ihe harp, from curliest years beloved, 
He threw bis fingers hurriedly, and tones 
Of melancholy beauty died away 
Upon its strings of sweetness. 



It was reserved for the present age to pro- 
cucc on# distinguished example of the Musis 
laving descended upon a bard of a wounded 
spirit, and lent her lyre to tell afflictions of 
no ordinary description; afflictions originating 
probably in that singular combination of feel- 
ing \\ itli imagination which has been called 
the poetical temperament, and which has so 
often saddened the days of those on whom it 
has been conferred. If ever a man was enti- 
tled to lay claim to that character in all its 
strength and all its weakness, with its un- 
bounded range of enjoyment, and its exquisite 
sensibility of pleasure and of pain, that man 
was Lord Byron. Nor does it require much 
time, or a deep acquaintance with human na- 
ture, to discover why these extraordinary 
powers should in so many cases have con- 
tributed more to the wretchedness than to the 
happiness of their possessor. 

The " imagination all compact," which the 
greatest poet who ever lived has assigned as 
the distinguishing badge of his brethren, is in 
every case a dangerous gift. Ft exaggerates, 
indeed, our expectations, and can often bid 
its possessor hope, where hope is lost to reason; 
but the delusive pleasure arising from these 
visions of imagination, resembles that of a 
child whose notice is attracted by a fragment 
of glass to which a sunbeam has given mo- 
mentary splendour. He hastens to the spot 
with breathless impatience, and finds that the 
object of his curiosity and expectation is 
equally vulgar and worthless. Such is the 
man of quick and exalted powers of imagina- 
tion : his fancy over-estimates the object of 
his wishes; and pleasure, fame, distinction, 
are alternately pursued, attained, and despised 
when in his power. Like the enchanted fruit 
in the palace of a sorcerer, the objects of his 
admiration lose their attraction and value as 
Boon as they are grasped by the adventurer's 
hand ; and all that remains is regret for the 
time lost in the chase, and wonder at the hal- 
lucination under the influence of which it was 
undertaken. The disproportion between hope 
and possession, which is felt by all men, is thus 
doubled to those whom nature has endowed 
with the power of gilding a distant prospect 
by the rays of imagination. 

We think that many points of resemblance 
may 1 *« ■ traced between Byron and Rousseau. 
Both are distinguished by the most anient and 
vivid delineation of intense conception, and 

ibyadeep ensibibtj of passion rather than of 
affection. Both too, by this double power, 

'have held a dominion over the sympathy of 
a 2 



their readers, far beyond the rar^e of those 
ordinary feelings which are usirdlv excited 
by the mere efforts of genius. The impression 
of this interest slill accompanies the perusal 
of their writings; but there is another interest, 
of more lasting and far stronger pow ei . •■■ bich 
each of them possessed,— which lies in Ihe 
continual embodying of the im!i\ idual charac- 
ter, it might almost "be said of the very person 
of the writer. When we speak or think of 
Rousseau or Byron, we are net conscious of 
speaking or tnmking of an author. We have 
a vague but impassioned remembrance of men 
of surpassing genius, eloquence, and pou er, — 
of prodigious capacity both of misery and 
happiness. We feci as if we had transiently 
met such beings in real life, or had known 
them in the dim and dark communion of a 
dream. Each of their works presents, in suc- 
cession, a fresh idea of themselves ; and, while 
the productions of other great men stand out 
from them, like something they have created, 
theirs, on the contrary, are images, pictures 
busts of their living selves, — clothed, do doubt, 
at different times, in different drapery, and 
prominent from a different back-ground,— but 
uniformly impressed with the same form, and 
mien, and lineaments, and not to be mistaken 
for the representations of any other of the 
children of men. 

But this view of the subject, though univer- 
sally felt to be a true one, requires perhaps a 
little explanation. The personal character of 
which we have spoken, it should be under- 
stood, is not altogether that on which the seal 
of life has been set, — and to which, therefore, 
moral approval or condemnation is ne< 
rily annexed, as to the language or conduct 
of actual existence. It is the character, so to 
speak, which is prior to conduct, and yet 
open to good and to ill, — the constitution of 
the being in body and in soul. Each of these"" 
illustrious writers has, in this light, filled his 
works with expressions of his own character,, 
— has unveiled to the world the secrets of his 
own being, the mysteries of the framing of 
man. They have gone down into those depths 
which every man may sound for tiimself, 
though not for another; and they bave made 
disclosures to the world of what thej beheld 
and knew there — disclosures that bave corn 
m. ;inled and forced a profound and universal 
sympathy, by proving that all mankind, the 
troubled and the untroubled, the loft) and the- 
low, the strong* s1 and the frailest, are linked 
together by the bonds of a common but ill 
scrutablc nature. 



r, 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



Thus, each of these wayward and richly- 
gifted spirits made himself the object of pro- 
found interest to the world, and tiiat too dur- 
ing periods of society when ample food was 
r\ ery where spread abroad for the meditations 
and passions of men. 

Although of widely dissimilar fortunes and 
birth, a close resemblance in their passions 
and llicir genius may be traced too between 
Byron and Robert Burns. Their careers 
wire short and glorious, and they both perish- 
c ! in the" rich summer of their life and BOng," 
and in all the splendour of a reputation more 
likely to increase than diminish. One was a 
peasant, and the other was a peer; but nature 
is a great leveller, and makes amends for the 
in|uries of fortune by the richness of her 
benefactions: the genius of Burns raise 1 him 
to a level with the nobles of the land; by na- 
t'.ir, if not by birth, he was the peer of Byron. 
Tiny both rose by the force of their genius, 
and both tell by the strength of their passions; 
one wrote from a love, and the other from a 
scorn of mankind ; and they both sung of the 
emotions of their own hearts, with a vehe- 
mence and an originality which few have 
equalled, and none surely have surpassed. 

The versatility of authors who have been 
able to draw and support characters as differ- 
ent from each other as from their own, has 
given to their productions the inexpressible 
charm of variety, and has often secured them 
from that neglect which in general attends 
what is technically called mannerism. But it 
was reserved for Lord Byron (previous to his 
D >n Ju in) to present the same character on 
the public stage again and again, varied only 
ov the exertions of that powerful genius, 
i searching the springs of passion and 
of feeling in their innermost recesses, knew 
how to combine their operations, so that the 
interest was eternally varying, and never 
abated, although the most important person 
of the drama retained the same lineaments. 

" But that noble tree will never more bear 
fruit or blossom ! It has been cut down in its 
Btrength, and the past is all that remains to us 
of Byron. That voice is silent for ever, which, 
bursting so frequently on our ear, was often 
heard with rapturous admiration, sometimes 
with regret, but always with the deepest in- 
terest." — Yet the impression of his works still 
remains vivid and strong. The charm which 
cannot pass away is there, — life breathing in 
dead words — the stern grandeur — the intense 
power and energy — the fresh beauty, the un- 
dimmed lustre — the immortal bloom, and ver- 
dure, and fragrance of life, all those still are 
(here. But it was not in these alone, it was in 
that continual impersonation of himself in his 
writings, by which he was for ever kept 
brightly before the eyes of men. 

It might, at first, seem that his undisguised 
revelation of feelings and passions, which the 

becoming pride of human nature, jealous of 
its own dignity, would in general desire to 
hold in unviolated silence, could have pro- 
duee I in the public mind only pity, sorrow, 
or repugnance. But in the case of men of 
real genius, like Byron it is otherwise : they 



are not felt, while we read, as declaiations 
published to the world, but almost as secrets 
whispered to chosen ears. Who is there that 
fci[^ for a moment, that the voice which 
reaches the inmost recesses of his heart is 
speaking to the careless multitudes around 
him? Or if we do so remember, the words 
seem to pass by others like air, and to find 
their way to the hearts for whom they were 
intended; kindred and sympathetic spirits, 
who 'liscern and own that secret language, 
of which the privacy is not violated, though 
spoken in hearing of the uninitiated, because 
it is not understood. A great poet may ad- 
dress the whole world, in the language of 
i n tensest passion, concerning objedts of which 
rather than speak face to face with any one 
human being on earth, he would perish in his 
misery. For it is in solitude that he utters 
what is to be wafted by all the winds of heaven: 
there arc, during his inspiration, present with 
him only the shadows of men. He is not 
daunted, or perplexed, or disturbed, or repel- 
led, by real, living, breathing features. He 
can updraw just as much of the curtain as he 
chooses, that hangs between his own solitude 
and the world of life. He there pours his soul 
out, partly to himself alone, partly to the ideal 
abstractions and impersonated images thai 
float around him at his own conjuration; and 
partly to human beings like himself, moving 
in the dark distance of the e\ cry-day world. 
He confesses himself, not before men, but 
before the spirit of humanity; and he thus 
fearlessly lays open his heart, assured that 
rrajurc never prompted unto gen ins that which 
will not triumphantly force its wide way into 
the human heart. 

We have admitted that Byron has depicted' 
much of himself, in all his heroes; but when! 
we seem to see the poet shadowed out in all' 
those states of disordered being which his 
Childe Harolds, Giaours, Conrads, Laras, and 
Alps exhibit, we are far from believing that 
his own mind has gone through those states 
of disorder, in its own experience of life. We 
merely conceive of it, as having felt within 
itself the capacity of such disorders, and there- 
fore exhibiting itself before us in possibility. 
This is not general, — it is rare with great 

Roets. Neither Homer, nor Shakspeare, nor 
lilton, ever so show themselves in the cha- 
racters which they pourtray. Their poetical 
Eersonages have no references to themselves, 
ut are distinct, independent creatures of 
their minds, produced in the full freedom of 
intellectual power. In Byron, there does not 
seem this freedom of power — there is little 
appropriation of character to events. Charac- 
ter is first, and all in all; it is dictated, com- 
pelled by some force in his own mind — ne- 
cessitating him, — and the events obey. His 
poems, therefore, excepting Don Juan, are 
not full and complete narrations of some one 
definite story, containing within itself a pic- 
ture of human life. They arc merely bold, 
confused, and turbulent exemplifications of 
certain sweeping energies and irresistiblo 
passions; they are fragments of a poet's dark 
dream of life. The very personages, vivid Ij 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



VI 1 



as tliey arc pictured, arc yet felt to be ficti- 
tious, and derive their chief power over us 
from their supposed mysterious connexion 
with the poet himself, and, it maybe added, 
with each other. The law of his mind was to 
embody his peculiar feelings in the forms of 
other men. In all his heroes we recognise, 
though with infinite modifications, the same 
great characteristics : a high and audacious 
; conception of the power of the mind, — an in- 
l tense sensibility of passion, — an almost bound- 
\ less capacity of tumultuous emotion, — a boast- 
ing admiration of the grandeur of disordered 
power, and, above all, a soul-felt, blood-felt 
delight in beauty — a beauty, which, in his 
wild creation, is often scared away from the 
agitated surface of life by stormier passions, 
but which, like a bird of calm, is for ever re- 
turning, on its soft, silvery wings, ere the 
black swell has finally subsided into sunshine 
and peace. 

These reflections naturally precede the 
sketch we are about to attempt of Lord By- 
ron's literary and private life: indeed, they 
are in a manner forced upon us by his poetry, 
i by the sentiments of weariness of existence 
! and enmity with the world which it so fre- 
quently expresses, and by the singular analo- 
gy which such sentiments hold with the real 
incidents of his life. 

Lord Byron was descended from an illus- 
trious line of ancestry. From the period of 
the Conquest, his family were distinguished, 
not merely for their extensive manors in Lan- 
cashire and other parts of the kingdom, but 
for their prowess in arms. John de Byron 
attended Edward the First in several warlike 
expeditions. Two of the Byrons fell at the 
battle of Cressy. Another member of the 
family, Sir John de Byron, rendered good 
service in Bosworth field to the Earl of Rich- 
mond, and contributed by his valour to trans- 
fer the crown from the head of Richard the 
Third to that of Henry the Seventh. This Sir 
John was a man of honour, as well as a brave 
warrior. He was very intimate with his neigh 
hour SirGervase Clifton; and, although By 
ron fought under Henry, and Clifton under 
Richard, it did not diminish their friendship, 
but, on the contrary, put it to a severe test 
Previous to the battle, the prize of which was 
a kingdom, they had mutually promised that 
whichever of them was vanquished, the other 
should endeavour to prevent the forfeiture of 
his friend's estate. While Clifton was bravely 
fighting at the head of his troop, he was struck 
off his horse, which Byron perceiving, he 
quitted the ranks, and ran to the relief of his 
friend, whom he shielded, but who died in his 
arms. Sir John de Byron kept his word : he 
interceded with the king: the estate was pre- 
served to the Clifton family, and is now in the 
possession of a descendant of Sir Gervase. 
_- In the wars between Charles the First and 
the Parliament, the Byrons adhered to the 
* royal cause. Sir Nicholas Byron, the eldest 
brother and representative of the family, was 
an eminent loyalist, who, baring distinguished 
himself in the wars of the Low Countries, 
was appointed governor of Chelsea, in 1642. 



He had two sons, who both died without issue; 
and his younger brother, Sir John, became 
their heir. This person was made a Knight 
of the Bath, at the coronation of Jam€c '.lit 
First. He had eleven sons, most of m,em 
distinguished themselves for their loyah / i.nd 
gallantry on the side of Charles the h rsf 
Seven of these brothers were engaged . ;he 
battle of Marston-moor, of whom four fell in 
defence of the royal cause. Sir John Byron.- 
one of the survivors, was appointed to many 
important commands, and on the 26th of Oc- 
tober, 1643, was created Lord Byron, with a 
collateral remainder to his brothers. On the 
decline of the king's affairs, he was appointed 
governor to the Duke of York, and, in this 
office, died without issue, in France, in 1662; 
upon which his brother Richard, a celebrated 
cavalier, became the second Lord Byron. He 
was governor of Appleby Castle, and distin- 
guished himself at Newark. He died in 1697, 
aged seventy-four, and was succeeded by his 
eldest son William, who married EHzabethy- 
the daughter of John Viscount Chaworth. of 
the kingdom of Ireland, by whom he had live 
sons, all of whom died young, except W illiam, 
whose eldest son, William, was born in 1722, 
and came to the title in 1736. 

William, Lord Byron, passed the early part 
of his life in the navy. In 1763, he was made 
master of the stag-hounds; and in 1765, was 
sent to the Tower, and tried before the House 
of Peers, for killing his relation and neigh- 
bour, Mr. Chaworth, in a duel. — The follow 
ing details of this fatal event are peculiarly 
interesting, from subsequent circumstances 
connected with the subject of our sketch. 

The old Lord Byron belonged to a club, of 
which Mr. Chaworth was also a member. It 
met at the Star and Garter tavern, Pall Mall, 
once a month, and was called the Nottingham- 
shire Club. On the 29th January, 1765, they 
met at four o'clock to dinner as usual, and 
every thing went agreeably on, until about 
seven o'clock, when a dispute arose betwixt 
Lord Byron and Mr. Chaworth, concerning 
the quantity of game on their estates. The 
dispute rose to a high pitch, and Mr. Cha- 
worth, having paid his share of the bill, retired. 
Lord Byron followed him out of the room in 
which they had dined, and, stopping him on 
the landing of the stairs, called to the waiter 
to show them into an empty room. They were 
shown into one, and a single candle being 
placed on the table, — in a few minutes the 
bell was rune, and Mr. Chaworth found mor- 
tally wounded. lie said that Lord Byron and 
he entered the room together. Lord Bvron 
leading the way; that his lordship, in walking 
forward, said something relative to the former 
dispute, on which he proposed fastening the 
door; that on turning himself round from this 
act, he perceived his lordship with his Sword 
half drawn, or nearly so : on which, knowing 
his man, he instantly drew his own, ami made 
a thrusl at him. which he thought had wound- 
ed or killed him; that then, perceiving his 
lordship shorten his sword to return thetbrUbt 
he thought to have parried it with his left hand; 
that he felt the sword enter his body, and go 



vi n 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



foep through his back; thai be struggled, and 
being the stronger man, disarmed bis lordship, 
ami expressed a concern, as under t ho appre- 
hension of having mortally wounded turn: 
thai Lord Byron replied by saying something 
to the like effect, adding at the Bam* time, 
that he hoped "he would now allow him to 
be as brave a man as any in the kingdom •" 

for this offence he was unanimously con- 
^ icted of manslaughter, but, on being brought 
up for jadgraent, pleaded bis prmlejfe as a 
peer, and was, in consequence, nischarged. 
After tins affair be was abandoned by his rela- 
tions, and retired to Newstead Abbey; w here, 
though be lived in a state of perfect exile from 
persons of his own rank, his unhappy temper 
found abundant exercise in continual war 
with his neighbours and tenants, and sufficient 
punishment in their hatred. Oneof his amuse- 
ments was feeding eriekets, which were his 
only companions. lie had made them so tame 
as to crawl over him; and used to whip them 
with a wisp of straw, if too familiar. In this 
forlorn condition he lingered out a long life, 
doing all in his power to ruin the paternal 
man-ion for that other branch of the family 
to which be was aware it must pass at his 
death, all his own children having descended 
before him to the gra* e. 

~*». John, the ne\t brother to William, and born 
in the year after him, that is in 1723, was of a 
very different disposition, although his career 
in life was almost an unbroken scene of mis- 
fortunes. The hardships he endured while 
accompanying Commodore Anson in bis ex- 
pedition to the South Seas, arc well known, 

_from his own highly popular and affecting 
narrative. His only son, born in 1751, who 
•eceived an excellent education, and whose 
father procured for him a commission in the 
guards, was so dissipated that be was known 
liy the name of" mad Jack Byron." He was 
one of the handsomest men of his time; but 
his character was so notorious, that his father 
* is obliged to desert him, an/1 his company 
was shunned by the better oart of society. 
.'n his twenty-seventh year, he seduced the 
Marchioness of Carmarthen, who had been 
but a few years married to a husband with 
whom she had lived in the most happy state, 
until she formed this unfortunate connexion. 
After one fruitless attempt at reclaiming his 
lady, the Marquis obtained a divorce: and a 
marriage was brought about between her and 

her seducer: which, after the most brutal 

conduct on his part, and the greatest misery 
and keenest remorse on hers, was dissolved 
in two years, by her sinking to the grave, the 
victim of a broken heart About three years 
subsequently, Captain Byron Bought to recruit 
his fortunes by matrimony, and bavin 
a conquest of Miss Catherine Gordon, an 
Aberdeenshire heiress (lineally descended 
from ihe Earl of Huntley and the Princess 
Jane, daughter of .lames II. of Scotland,) he 
united bimseKto her. ran through her proper- 
ty in a few years, and, leaving her and her 

only child, the subject of this memoir, in a 
Jestitute and defenceless state, fled to France 



to avoid his creditors, and died at Valencicn. 
ins. in 1791. 

In Captain Medwin's "Conversations o* 
Lord Byron," the following expressions are 
said to have fallen from his lordship, on the 
subject of his unworthy father: — 

" I lost my father when I was only six years 
of age. My mother, when she was in a rage 
with me (and 1 gave her cause enough^} used 
to say, 'Ah! you little dog, you are a Byron 
all over; you are as bad as your father!' It 
was \cry different from Mrs. Malaprop's Bay- 
ing, ' Ah! good dear Mr. Malaprop! I never 
loved him till he was dead.' But, in fact, my 
father was, in his youth, any thing but a 
'Coelebs in search of a wife.' He would have 
made a bad hero for Hannah More. He ran 
out three fortunes, and married or ran away 
with three women : and once wanted a guinea 
that he wrote for: I have the note. He seem- 
ed born for his own ruin, and that of the other 
Bex. lie began by seducing Lady Carmar- 
then, and spent for her four thousand pounds 
a-year; and, not content with one adventure 
of this kind, afterwards eloped with Miss 
Gordon. This marriage was not destined to 
be a very fortunate one either, and I don't 
wonder at her differing from Sheridan's widow 
in the play ; they certainly could not have 
claimed ' the flitch.' " 

George Byron Gordon (for so he was called 
on account of the neglect his father's family 
had shown to his mother) was born at Dover, 
on the 22d of January, 17!)o. On the unnatu- 
ral desertion of his father, the entire care of 
his infant years devolved upon his mother 
who retired to Aberdeen, where she lived in 
almost perfect seclusion, on the ruins of hei 
fortune. Her undivided affection was natu- 
rally concentred in her son, who Mas her 
darling; and when he only went out for ar» 
ordinary walk, she would entreat him, with 
the tear glistening in her eye, to take care of 
himself, as K she had nothing on earth but him 
to live for;" a conduct not at all pleasing to 
his adventurous spirit; the more especially 
as some of his companions, who witnessed the 
affectionate scene, would laugh and ridicule 
him about it. This excessive maternal indul- 
gence, and the absence of that salutary disci- 
pline and control so necessary to childhood, 
doubtless contributed to the formation of the 
less pleasing features of Lord Byron's charac- 
ter. It must, however, be remembered, in 
Mrs. Byron's extenuation, not only that the 
circumstances in which she had been left with 
her son were of a very peculiar nature, but 
also thai a slight malformation of one of his 
feet, and great weakness of constitution, na 
tu rally solicited for him in the heart of a mo 
ther a more than ord nary portion of tender 
ne-s. For these latter reasons, he was not sent 

Very early to school, but was allowed to ex 
pand his lungs, and brace his limbs. Upon the 
mountains of the neighbourhood. This Mas 

evidently the most judicious method for im 

parting strength to his bodily frame: and the 
sequel showed (hat it was far from the worsi 
for giving tone and vigour to his mind. The 



Llrrj OF LORD B\'RON. 



IX 



ravage grandeur of nature around him ; the 
feeling that he was upon hills where 

" Foreign tvrant never trod, 
But Freedom with her faulchion bright, 
Swept the stranger from her sight ;" 

his intercourse with a people whose chief 
amusements consisted in the recital of heroic 
tales of other times, feats of strength, and a 
display of independence, blended with the 
wild supernatural stories peculiar to remote 
and thinly-peopled districts; — all these were 
calculated to foster that poetical feeling innate 
in his character. 

When George was seven years of age, his 
mother sent him to the grammar-school at 
Aberdeen-, where he remained till his removal 
to Harrow, with the exception of some inter- 
vals of absence, which were deemed requisite 
for the establishment of his health. His pro- 
gress beyond that of the general run of his 
class-fellows, was never so remarkable as 
after those occasional intervals, when, in a few 
days, lie would master exercises which, in the 
school routine, it had required weeks to ac- 
complish. But when he had overtaken the 
rest of the class, he always relaxed his exer- 
tions, and, contenting himself with being con- 
sidered a tolerable scholar, never made any 
extraordinary effort to place himself at the 
head of the highest form. It was out of school 
that he aspired to be the leader of every tiling; 
in all boyish games and amusements, he would 
■ he first if possible. For this he was emi- 
nently calculated; quick, enterprising, and 
daring, the energy of his mind enabled him 
to overcome the impediments which nature 
had thrown in his way. Even at that early 
" period (from eight to ten years of age), all his 
sports were of a manly character; fishing, 
shooting, swimming, and managing a horse. 
or steering and trimming the sails of a boat, 
constituted his chief delights, and, to Hie super- 
ficial observer, seemed his sole occupations. 
He was exceedingly brave, and in the ju- 
venile wars of the school, he generally gained 
the victory; upon one occasion, a boy pur- 
sued by another took refuge in Mrs. Byron's 
house : the latter, who had been much abused 
by the former, proceeded to lake vengeance 
m him even on the landing-placcof the draw- 
ing-room stairs, when George interposed in 
his defence, declaring that nobody should be 
ill-used while under his roof and protection. 
Upon tins the aggressor dared him to fight : 
and, although the former was by much the 
stronger of the two, the spirit of young Byron 
was so determined, that after the combat had 
lasted for nearly two hours, it was suspend- 
ed because both the boys were entirely ex- 
hausted. 

A school-fellow of Byron had a very small 
Shetland pony, which his father had bought 
him: and one day they went to the hanks of 
the Don to bathe ; but having only one pony, 
they were obliged to follow the good old prac- 
tice called in Scotland " ride and tie." When 
they came to the bridge over that dark ro- 
mantic stream, Byron bethought him of the 
nrophecy which he has quoted in Don Juan : 
t 



" Brig of Balgounie, black's your wa 1 ; 
Wi' a wife's ar son and a niear's aefoal, 
Doun ye shall fa'." 
He immediately slopped his companion, who 
was then riding, and asked him it' he remem- 
bered the prophecy, saying, that as they were 
both only sons, and as Die pony might be " a 
mare'sae foal," he would rather ride over first; 
because he had only a mother to lament him, 
should the prophecy be fulfilled by the falling 
of the bridge, whereas the other had both a 
father ami a mother to grieve for him. 

It is the custom of the grammar-school at 
Aberdeen, that the boys of all the five classes 
of which it is composed, should be assembled 
for prayers in the public school at eight o'clock 
in the morning; after prayers, a censor calls 
over .the Dames of all, and those who are ab- 
sent are punished. The first time thai Lord 
Byron had come to school after his accession 
to his title, the rector had caused his name to 
be inserted in the censor's book, Georgius 
Dominus de Byron, instead of Georgius Byron 
Gordon, as formerly. The boys, unaccus- 
tomed to this aristocratic sound, set up a loud 
and involuntary shout, which had such an ef- 
fect on his sensitive mind that he hurst into 
tears, and would have fled from the school, 
had he not been restrained by the master. 

An answer which Lord Byron made to a 
fellow scholar, who questioned him as to the 
cause of the honorary addition of " Dominus 
de Byron" to his name, served at that time, 
when he was only ten years of age, to point 
out that lie would be a man who would think, 
speak, and act for himself— who, whatever 
might be his sayings or his doings, his vice? 
or his virtues, would not condescend to tak* 
them at second-hand. This happened on the 
very day after he had been menaced with being 
flogged round the school for a fault which h« 
had not committed; and when the question 
was put to him, lie replied, " it is not my do- 
ing; Fortune was to whip me yesterday for 
what another did, and she has this day made 
me a lord for what another has ceased to do. 
I need not thank her in either case, for 1 have 
asked nothing at her hands." 

On the 17th of May, 17;'!!. William, the fifth 
Lord Byron, 'departed this life at Newstead. 
As the son of this eccentric nobleman had died 
when George was five years old, and as the 
descent both of the titles and estates was to 
heirs male, the latter, of course, succeeded 
his great-uncle. Upon this change of fortune, 
Lord Byron, now ten years of age, was re- 
moved from the immediate care ofn is mother 
and placed as a ward under the guardian-hip 
of the Earl of Carlisle, whose father had mar- 
ried Isabella, the sister of the preceding Lord 
Byron. In one or two points of chart rtei 
this great-aunt resembled the ban!: she also 
wrote beautiful poetry, and after adorning the 
gay and fashionable world for many years, she 

left it without any apparent cause, and with. 
perfect indifference, and in a great measure 

secluded herself from society. 

The young nobleman's guardian decided 
that he should receive the usual education 
given to England's titled sons, and that lie 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



should, in the first instance, be sent to the 
public school at Harrow. He was accbrd- 
inglj placed there under the tuition of the 
Rev. Dr. Drury, to whom he has testified his 
gratitude in a note to the fourth canto of 
Childe I larold, in a manner which does equal 
ir tu the tutor and the pupil \ i 
me .hi! of circumstances so unforeseen 
■ rapid, would have been hazardous to 
any bov, mil it was doubly so to one of Byron's 
ardentmind and previous habits. Taken al 
once from the society of boys in bumble life, 
and placed among youths of his own newly- 
acquired rank, with means of gratification 
which to him must have appeared considera- 
ble, it is by no means surprising that he Bhould 
bai c been betrayed into <\ cry Bort of extrav- 
ce: none of them appear, however, to 
have been of a very culpable nature. 

" Though he was lame," says one of his 
school-fellows, "he was a greal loveroftports. 
and preferred hockey -to Horace, relinquished 
even Helicon for ' duck-puddle,' and gave up 
the best poet that ever wrote Irani Latin for 
a game of cricket on the common. He was 
nol remarkable (nor was he ever) for his learn- 
ing, but he was always a clever, plain-spoken. 
and undaunted bovt 1 have seen him fight by 
the hour like a Trojan, and stand up against 
the disadvantage of his lameness with all the 
spirit of an ancient Combatant. ' Don't you 
remember your battle with Pitl ?' (a brewer's 
son] said I to him in a letter (for I had wit- 
! ii). bul it Beems that he had forgotten 
it. ' You are mistaken, I think,' said he in 
reply; 'it must have been with Rice-Pud- 
Vlorgan, or Lord Joceiyn,or one of the 
Douglases, or George RaynsTord, or PryCe 
(with whom I had two Conflicts), or with Moses 
Moore [the clod), or with somebody else, and 
not with Pitt; for with all the above-named, 
and other worthies of the fist, had I an inter- 
change of black eyes and bloody noses, at 
various and sundry periods; however it may 
have happened for all that.' " 

The annexed anecdotes arc characteristic : 

The hoys at Harrow had mutinied, and in 
their wisdom had resolved to set fire to the 
scene of all their ills and troubles— the school- 
rum ii : Byron, however, was against the mo- 
tion ; and by pointing out to the young rebels 
the names of their fathers on the walls, he 
prevented the intended conflagration. This 
early specimen of his power over the passions 
of bis school-fellows, his lordship piqued him- 
self not a little upon. 

Byron long retained a friendship for several 
of his Harrow school-fellows; Lord Clare was 
one of his constant correspondents; Scroope 
Davies was also one of his chief companions, 
before his lordship went to the continent. 
This gentleman and Byron once lost all their 
money at "chicken hazard," in one of the 
hells of St. .James's, and the next morning 
Davies sent for Byron's pistols to shoot him- 
»elf with; Byron sent a note refusing to give 
them, on the ground that they would be for- 
feited as a deodand. This comic excuse had 
Ihe desired effect. 

Byron, whilst living at New6tcad during 



the Harrow vacation, saw and became en 
amouired of Miss Chaworth : she is the Mary 
of his poetry, and hi- beautiful " Dream" re- 
lateB lu theii loves. Miss Chaworth was older 
than his lordship by a few year-, was I iuDt 
and volatile, and though, no doubt, highlj Bat 
tered by his attachment, yel she treated oui 
poet U sb as an anient lover than as a youngei 
brother. She v. as punctual to the assignations 
which took place at a gate dividing the grounds 
of the Byrons frOm the Chaworths, ami ac- 
cepted his letters from the confidants: but hoi 
answer-, it is 'aid. were written with more ot 
the caution of coquetry than the romance ol 
•■ hive's young dream':" she gave him, how 
e\ er, her picture, but her hand was reserved 
far another. 

It was somewhat remarkable that Lord 
Byron and .Miss Chaworth should both have 

been \\;\<\r\- the guardianship of Mr. White. 
This gentleman particularly wished that his 
ward- should he married together; but Miss 
C, as young ladies generally do in such cir- 
cumstances, differed from him, and was re- 
solved t:> please herself in the choice of a 
husband. The celebrated Mr. M., commonly 
known by the name of Jack M., was at this 
time quite the rage, and MissC. was not subtle 
enough to conceal the penchant she had for 
this jack-a-danrify; and though Mr. W. took 
her from one watering-place to another, still 
the lover, like an evil spirit, followed, find 
at last, being somehow more persuasive than 
the " child of song," he carried off the lady 
to the great grief of Lord Byron. The mar 
however, was not a happy one; ihn 
parties soon separated, and Mrs. M. after- 
wards proposed an interview with her former 
lover, which, by the advice of his sister, he 
declined. 

From Harrow Lord Byron was removed, 
and entered of Trinity College, Cambridge ; 
there, however, be did not mend his manners, 
nor hold the sages of antiquity in higher es- 
teem than when under the command of his 
reverend tutor at Harrow. He was above 
studying the poetics, and held the rules of the 
Stagyrife in as little esteem as in after-life he 
did the "invariable principles" of the Rev. 
Mr. Bowles. Beading after the fashion of the 
studious men of Cam, was to him a bore, and 
he held a senior wrangler in the greatest con- 
tempt. Persons of real genius are seldom 
candidates for college prizes, and Byron left 
" the silver cup" for those plodding characters 
who, perhaps, deserve them, as the guerdon 
of the unceasing labour necessary to over- 
come the all but invincible natural dullness 
of their intellects. Byron, instead of reading 
what pleased tutors, read what pleased him- 
self, and wrote what could not fail to disph ase 
those political weathercocks. He did not ad- 
mire their system of education ; and they, as 
is the case with most scholars, could admire 
no other. He took to quizzing them, and no 
one likes to be laughed at; doctors frowned, 
and fellows fumed, and Byron at the age of 
nineteen left the university without a degree. 

Among other moans which he adopted to 
show his contempt for academical honours 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



xi 



he kept a young bear in his room for some 
time, which he told all his friends lie was train- 
ing up for a fellowship ; but, however much 
the fellows of Trinity may claim acquaintance 
with the " ursa major," they were by no means 
desirous of associating with his lordship's eleve. 
When about nineteen years of age, Lord 
Byro:i bade adieu to the university, and took 
up his residence at Newstead Ahbey. Here 
his pursuits were principally those of amuse- 
ment. Among others, he was extremely fond 
of the water. In his aquatic exercises he had 



rate character, who is never mentioned by the 
neighbouring peasants without a significant 
shake of the head, might have returned and 
recognised every thing about him, except 
perhaps, an additional crop of weeds. There 
still slept that old pond, into which he is said 
to have hurled his lady in one of his fits of 
fury, whence she was rescued by the gardener, 
a courageous blade, who was the lord's mas- 
ter, and chastised him for his barbarity. There 
still, at the end of the garden, in a grove of 
oak, two towering satyrs, he with his goat and 



Geldom any other companion than a large club, and Mrs. Satyr with her chubby cloven 



Newfoundland dog, to try whose sagacity and 
fidelity, he would sometimes fall out of the 
boat, as if by accident, when the dog would 
seize him, and drag him ashore. On losing 
this dog, in the autumn of 1808, he caused a 
monument to be erected, with an inscription 
commemorative of its attachment. (See page 
532 of this edition.) 

The following descriptions of Newstead's 
hallowed pile will be found interesting: 

This abbey was founded in the year 1170, 
by Henry II., as a priory of Black Canons, 
and dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It con- 
tinued in the family of the Byrons until the 
time of the late lord, who sold it first to Mr. 
Claughton for the sum of 140,000/., and on 
that gentleman's not being able to fulfil the 
agreement, and thus paying 20,000/. of a for- 
feit, it was afterwards sold to another person, 
and most of the money vested in trustees for 
the jointure of the Hon. Mrs. Byron. The 
greater part of the edifice still remains. The 
present possessor, Major Wildman, is, with 
genuine Gothic taste, repairing this beautiful 
specimen of architecture. The late Lord 
Byron repaired a considerable part of it ; 
but, forgetting the roof, he had turned his at- 
tention to the inside, and the consequence 
was, that in a few years, the rain paying a 
visit to the apartments, soon destroyed all 
those elegant devices which his lordship had 
contrived. His lordship's own study was a 
neat little apartment, decorated with some 
good classic busts, a select collection of books, 
an antique cross, a sword in a silt case, and, 
at the end of the room, two finely polished 
skulls on a pair of light fancy stands. In the 
garden, likewise, was a great number of these 
skulls, taken from the burial-ground of the 
abbey, and piled up together; but afterwards 
they were recommitted to the earth. A writer, 
who visited it soon after Lord Byron had sold 
it, says : " In one corner of the servants' hall 
lay a stone cotfin, in which were fencing 
gloves and foils, and on the walls of the ample 
but cheerless kitchen was painted in large let- 
ters, ' Waste not — want not.' During the mi- 
nority of Lord Byron, the abbey was in the 

possession of Lord G , his hounds, and 

divers colonies of jackdaws, swallows, and 
starlings. The internal traces of this Goth 
were swept away ; but without, all appeared 
as rude and unreclaimed as he could have left 
it. With the exception of the dog's tomb, a 
conspicuous and elegant object, I do not re- 
collect the slightest trace of culture or im- 
orovement. The late lord, a stern and despe- 



footed brat, placed on pedestals at the inter 
sections of the narrow and gloomy pathways, 
struck for a moment with their grim visages, 
and silent shaggy forms, the fear into your 
bosom which is felt by the neighbouring pea- 
santry at ' th' oud laird's devils.' I have fre- 
quently asked the country people near New- 
stead, what sort of man his lordship (our Lord 
Byron) was. The impression of his eccentric 
but energetic character was evident in the; 
reply, ' He 's the devil of a fellow for comical 
fancies. He flogs th' oud laird to nothing; but 
he 's a hearty good fellow for all that.' " 

Walpole, who had visited Newstead. gives, 
in his usual bitter, sarcastic manner, the fol- 
lowing account of it : 

" As I returned I saw Newstead and Al- 
thorpe; I like both. The former is the very 
abbey. The great east window of the church 
remains, and connects with the house ; the 
hall entire, the refectory entire, the cloister 
untouched, with the ancient cistern of the 
convent, and their arms on it : it has a p 
chapel quite perfect. The park, which is still 
charming, has not been so much unprofaned. 
The present lord has lost large sums*, and paid 
part in old oaks, five thousand pounds' worth 
of which have been cut near the house. En 
revanche, he has built two baby forts, to pay 
his country in cast'.es for damage done to the 
navy, and planted a handful of Scotch firs, 
that look like ploughboys dressed in old family 
liveries for a public day. In the hall is a very 
good collection of pictures, all animals. The 
refectory, now the great drawing-room, is full 
of Byrons : the vaulted roof remaining, but 
the windows have new dresses making for 
them by a Venetian tailor." 

This is a careless but happy description of 
one of the noblest mansions in England, and 
it will now be read with a far deeper interest 
than when it was written. Walpole saw the 
seat of the Byrons, old, majestic, and venera- 
ble ; but he saw nothing of that magic beauty 
which fame sheds over the habitations of ge 
nius, and which now mantles every turret of 
Newstead Abbey. He saw it when decay 
was doing its work on the cloister, the refec- 
tory, and the chapel, and all its honours seemed 
mouldering into oblivion. He could not know 
that a voice was soon to go forth from those 
antique cloisters, that should be heard through 
all future ages, and cry, ' Sleep no more to all 
the house.' Whatever may be its future fate, 
Newstead Abbey must henceforth be a memo- 
rable abode. Time may shed its wild flower* 
on the walls, and let the fox in upon the coirt- 



XII 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



yard and the chambers; il ma\ eren pass into 
the hands of unlettered pride, «>r plebeian 

ace : but it has been the mansion of ;i 
; ty poet. Its name is associated with glo- 
ries that cannot perish, and will go down to 

it) in one of tin' proudest pages of our 

annul-. 

Lord Byron showed, even in liis earliesl 

, thai nature had added to the advan- 

of high descent the richest gifts of genius 

anil of fancy. His own talc is partly told in 

tu<> lines of Lara: 

" fiefl 1>\ his •.ire, too vouncr smli loss to know, 
I himself, that In, ...',_■.• of woe." 

His first literary adventure, and its fate, arc 
well remembered. The poems which he pub- 
lished in Ins minority had, indeed, those faults 
of conception and diction which are insepara- 
ble from jui emle attempts, and in particular 
may rather be considered as imitative of what 
had caught the car and fancy of the youthful 
author, than as exhibiting originality of con- 
on and expression. It was hive the first 
essay of the sini:iiiL T -bird. Catching at and imi- 
tating the QOteS Of its parent, ere hal.it and 
time have given the fulness of tone, confi- 
dence, an. I self-possession which render a-si-t- 

ance unnecessary. Yet though there were 

many, and those not the worst judges, who 

discerned ill his " Hours of Idleness" a depth 

of thought arid felicity of expression which 
promised much at a more mature age, the 
work did not escape the critical la-h of the 
"Scotch Reviewers," who could not resist the 

'unity of pouncing upon a titled poet, 
of Bhowing oil' their own wit. and of seeking 
to entertain their readers with a flippant ar- 

without much respect to the feelings of 
the author, or even to the indications of merit 

which the work displayed. The review was 

real, and excited mirth; the poems were 
neglected, the author was irritated, and took 
his revenge in keen iambics, which, at the 
Same time, proved the injustice of the offend- 
ing critic and the ripening talents of the bard. 
Having thus vented ins indignation against 
the reviewers and their readers-, and put all 
the laughter on Ids side, Lord Pyron went 
abroad, and the controversy was for some 
forgotten. 
It was at Newstcad, just before his coming 
of age, be had planned bis future !ra\els, and 

his original intention included b much larger 
portion of the world than that which be after- 
wards visited. He first thought of Persia, to 
which idea indeed be for a long time adhered. 

lie afterwards meant to sail for India, and bad 

so tar contemplated this project as to write 

for information from the Arabic professor at 
< , and to ask bis mother to inquire 

of a friend who bad lived in India, u bat things 

would be necessary for his voyage. I le formed 
his plan of travelling upon very different 

grounds from those which be afterwards ad- 
vanned. All men should trai el at one time or 
another, be thought, and be bad then no ei.n- 

nexions to prevent him-, when be returned 

he might enter into political life, for which 



travelling would nc4 incapacitate him, and 
he wished to judge of men by experience. 

At length, ui July, i::t)'i, in company with 
John < am ,' lobhoiise, Esq. (w ith whom his ac- 
quaintance commenced at Cambridge), Lord 
Bj ron embarked at Falmouth for Lisbon, and 
thence proceeded, by the southern provinces 
of Spain, to the Mediterranean. The objects 
that he met with as far as Gibraltar seem to 
have, occupied bis mind, to the temporary 
exclusion of his gkoomy and misanthropic 
thoughts; for a letter which be wrote to his 
mother from thence contains no indication of 
them, but, on the contrary, much playful de- 
scription of the scenes through which he had 
passed. At Sei die. Lord Byron lodged in the 
bouse of t\\ o single ladies, one of whom, how- 
ever, was about to be married. Though he 
. d there only three days, she paid him 
the most particular attentions, and, at their 
parting, embraced him with great tenderness, 
cutting off a lock of his hair, and presenting him 
with one of her own. With this specimen of 
Spanish female manners, he proceeded to Ca- 
di/., where various incidents occurred to con- 
firm the opinion he had formed \t Seville of 
the Andabi-iaii belles, and whicl made him 

leave Cadiz with regret, and determine to re- 
turn to it. Lord Byron wrote to his mother 
from Malta announcing his safety, and again 
from Previsa, in November. Upon arriving 
at Yanina, Lord Pyron found that Ali Pacha 
was with his troops in Illyrium, besieging 
Ibrahim Pacha in Berat; but the vizier, hav- 
ing beard that an English nobleman was in 
bis country, bad given orders at Yanina to 
supply him with every kind of accommoda- 
!i .11. \wc of expense. From Yanina, Lord 
Byron went to Tcpalcen. Here lie was lodged 
in the palace, and the next day introduced to 
Ali Pacha, who declared that lie knew him 
to be a man of rank from the smallncss of his 
ears, his curling hair, and his white hands, 
and who sent him a variety of sweetmeats, 
fruits, and other luxuries. In going in a 
Turkish ship of war, provided for him by 
Ali Pacha, from Prc\ isa, intending to sail for 
Patras, Lord Byron was very near being lost 
in but a moderate i_ r ale of wind, from the igno- 
rance of the Turkish officers and sailors, and 
wafl driven on the coast of Suli. An instance 
of disinterested hospitality in the chief of a 
Suliotc village occurred to Lord Pyron, in 
consequence of bis disasters in the .Turkish 
galliot. The honest Albanian, after assisting 
him in his distress, supplying his wants, and 
lodging him and bis suite, refused to receive 
any remuneration. \N hen Lord Pyron pressed 
him to take money, he said : " I wish you to 
love me, not to pay me." At Yanina, on his 
return, be was introduced to Hussien Bey 
and Mahomet Pacha, two young children of 
Ali Pacha. Subsequently, he visited Smyrna 
whence he went in the Salsette frigate t« 
( lonstantinople. 

On the :;d of May. 1810, while this frigate 
was lying at anchor in the Dardanelles, Lord 
Byron, accompanied by Lieutenant Eken- 
head, swam the Hellespont from the European 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



xni 



shore to the Asiatic — about two miles wide. 
The tide of the Dardanelles runs so strong, 
that it is impossible either to swim or to sail 
to any given point. Lord Byron went from 
the castle to Abydos, and landed on the oppo- 
site shore, full tin re miles below his meditated 
place of approach. He had a boat in attend- 
ance all the way; so that no danger could be 
apprehended even if his strength had failed. 
His lordship records, in one of his minor 
poems, that he got the ague by the voyage ; 
but it was well known, that when he landed, 
he was so much exhausted, that he gladly ac- 
cepted the offer of a Turkish fisherman, and 
reposed in his hut for several hours; he was 
then very ill, and as Lieutenant Ekcnhead 
was compelled to go on board his frigate, he 
was left alone. The Turk had no idea of the 
rank or consequence of his inmate, but paid 
him most marked attention. His wife was 
his nurse, and, at the end of five days, he left 
the shore, completely recovered. When he 
was about to embark, the Turk gave him a 
large loaf, a cheese, and a skin filled with 
wine, and then presented him with a few 
paras (about a penny each), prayed Allah to 
bless him, and wished him safe home. His 
lordship made him no return to this, more than 
saying he felt much obliged. But when he 
arrived at Abydos, he sent over his man Ste- 
fano, to the Turk, with an assortment of fish- 
ing-nets, a fowling piece, a brace of pistols, 
and twelve yards of silk to make gowns for 
his wife. The poor Turk was astonished, and 
said, " What a noble return for an act of hu- 
manity!" He then formed the resolution of 
crossing the Hellespont, and, in propria 
persona, thanking his lordship. His wife ap- 
proved of the plan; and he had sailed about 
half way across, when a sudden squall upset 
his boat, and the poor Turkish fisherman 
found a watery grave. Lord Byron was 
much distressed when he heard of the catas- 
trophe, and, with all that kindness of heart 
which was natural to him, he sent to the 
widow fifty dollars, and told her he would 
ever be hei' friend. This anecdote, so highly 
honourable to his lordship's memory, is very 
little known. Lieutenant Hare, who was on 
the spot at the time, furnished the particulars, 
and added that, in the year 1817, Lord Byron, 
then proceeding to Constantinople, landed at 
the same spot, and made a handsome present 
to the widow and her son, who recollected 
the circumstance, but knew not Lord Byron. 
his dress and appearance having so altered 
him. 

It was not until after Lord Byron arrived 
at Constantinople that he decided not to go 
on to Persia, but to pass the following summer 
in the Morea. At Constantinople, Mr. Hob- 
house left him to return to England. On losing 
his companion. Lord Byron went again, and 
alone, over much of the old track which he had 
already visited, and studied the scenery and 
manners, of Greeceespecially, with the search- 
ing eye of a poet and a painter. His mind 
appeared occasionally to have some tendency 
towards a recovery from the morbid state of 
moral apathy which he had previously evinced, 
B 



and the gratification which he manifested on 
observing the superiority, in every respect, of 
England to other countries, proved that patri- 
otism was far from being extinct in his bosoml 
The embarrassed state of his affairs at length': 
induced him to return home, to endeavour to 
arrange them ; and he arrived in the Volage 
frigate on the 2d of July, 1811, having been 
absent exactly two years. His health had not 
suffered by his travels, although it had been 
interrupted by two sharp fevers ; but he had 
put himself entirely on a vegetable diet, and 
drank no wine. 

Soon after his arrival, he was summoned to 
Newstead, in consequence of the serious ill- 
ness of his mother; but on reaching the ab- 
bey, found that she had breathed her last. He 
suffered much from this loss, and from the dis- 
appointment of not seeing her before her death; 
and while his feelings on the subject were still 
very acute, he received the intelligence, lhat 
a friend, whom he highly esteemed, had been 
drowned in the Cam. He had not long before 
heard of the death, at Coimbra, of a school- 
fellow, to whom he was much attached. These 
three melancholy events, occurring within the 
space of a month, had, no doubt, a powerful 
effect on Lord Byron's feelings. 

Towards the termination of his " English 
Bards and Scotch Reviewers," the noble au- 
thor had declared, that it was his intention to 
break off, from that period, his newly-formed 
connexion with the Muses, and that, should 
he return in safety from the " Minarets" of 
Constantinople, the "Maidens" of Georgia, 
and the " Sublime Snows" of Mount Cau- 
casus, nothing on earth should tempt him to 
resume the pen. Such resolutions are seldom 
maintained. In February, Uil'2, the first two 
cantos of " Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" (with 
the manuscript of which he had presented his 
friend Mr. Dallas,) made their appearance, 
producing an effect upon the public, equal to 
that of any work which has been published 
within this or the last century. 

This poem is, perhaps, the most original in 
the English language, both in conception and 
execution. It is no more like Beattie's Min 
strel than Paradise Lost — though the former 
production was in the noble author's mind 
when first thinking of Childe Harold. A great 
poet, who gives himself up free and uncon- 
iined to the impulses of his genius, as Byron 
did in the better part of this singular creation, 
shows to us a spirit as if sent out from the 
hands of nature, to ramie over the earth and 
the societies of men. Even Shakspeare him- 
self submits to the shackles of history and 
society. But here Byron has traversed the 
whole earth, borne 1 along by the « birfwind of 
his own spirit. Wherever a forest frowned, 
or a temple glittered — there he was privi- 
leged to bend his flight. He suddenly Marts 
up from his solitary dream, by the secret foun- 
tain of the desert, and descends at once into 
the tumult of peopled or the silence of de- 
serted cities. Whatever actually lived — had 
perished heretofore — or that had within it a 
power In kindle passion., beeame the ui'thrui 
oi' his all-i mbraciugsong. There are uo unjhe> 



XIV 



LIFE OF LORD BYKnX. 



of time or place to fetter him— and we i1> 

him Iron hill-top t<> mil-top, and from 

to tower, over all the solitude <>!" nature, 

nificence of art. When the 

nts of history seemed t<><> dim and 

I, In- would turn to tin' splendid - 

ive dignified our own day%, and the 
and conquerors of old gave 
plaee l.i those that were yet living in BOV6 
■ exile. Indeed, much of the power 
dern id from this 
He Lived in a sort of sympathy with 
sjblic miiiil — sometimes whoDy distincl 
imetimes acting in opposition to it 
times blending h rth it. but, at all 
. in all his thoughts and actions, bearing 
a reference to the public mind. Ili> spirit 
■ to go bach into the past,— though 
to bring the objects of its love 
to earth in mure beautiful life. The ex- 
istence he painted was— the present. The 
Ls he presented were marked <>nt to him 
>n's actual regards. It was hi^ to 
of all those greal political events which were 
• • of Buch passionate and universal sym- 
pathy, 1 tn t chiefly be spoke our <n\ n (i 
I in ilniiiLrht, language, and p 
I [is trai els wen u If-impelled 

s mind severing itself in lonely roaming 
from all participation in thi which 

it belonged, but rather obeying the general 
notion of the mind of that society. 

indications of a bold, powerful, and 
lal mind, whieh glanced through every 
line of Childe Harold, electrified the 111:1-- of 
re, and placed at once upon Lord By- 
ron's head the garland tor which other mi n 
of genius have toiled long, and winch they 
e. He » as placi d pre-eminenl 
the literal j men of his country, by 
genera] acclamation. Those who had so rigor- 
ously censored hisjuvenile essays, and perhaps 
1 led such another held,'' were the first 
warm homage to his matured efforts ; 
while others, who saw in the sentimepts of 
Childe Harold much to regret and to censure, 
fttltlold their tribute of applause to 
if thought, the power and force of 
1, and the energy of sentiment, 
which animated the " Pilgrimage." Thus, as 
all admired the poem, all were prepared to 
the author with that fame which i- the 
poel - • such fei I- 

of admiration that Lord Byron fully en- 
on thai public stage where, t<> the close 
life, be made so distinguished a figure. 

I 1 ry lliiii^' in his manner, person, and 
satlon, tended to maintain the charm 

which his genius had flung around him; and 

limited to l.i- conversation, far from 

finding that the inspired poet sunk into ordi- 

lity,felt themselves attached to him 

Ij by many noble qualities, but by the 

rious, and -fined, and almost 

rtainf il 

li 1^ well known how » I le the doors 
• ,iety -.ire openi d m London to literary merit, 
far inferior to Lord Byron's, 
an Mli it n 1- only necessary to be honourablj 
distinguished by the public*roice, to mm 



denizen in the first circles. This passport was 
imi necessary to Lord Byron, who possessed 
the hereditary claims of birth and rank. But 
the Interest which his genius attached to his 
presence, and to his conversation, was of a 
nalu re far beyond what these hereditary 
claims could of themselves have conferred. 
and hi- reception was enthusiastic beyond 
any thing imaginable. Lord Byron was not 
one of those literary men of whom it may be 
truly said, miiiHtl pragefUiafamam. A coun- 
tenance, exquisitely modeled to the expres- 
sion of feeling and passion, and exhibiting the 
remarkable contrast of very dark hair and 
eyebrows, with light and expressive eyes, 
presented to the physiognomist the most in- 
teresting Bubjecl for the exercise of his art. 
rThe predominating expression was that of 
deep and habitual thought, which gave way to 
the t rapid play 01 features when he en- 
gaged in interesting discussion; so that a 
brother poet compared them to the sculpture 
of a beautiful alabaster vase, only seen to per- 
fection when lighted up from within. The 
flashes of mirth, gaiety, indignation, or sa- 
iineal dislike, which frequently animated Lord 
Bj inn's countenance, might, during an even- 
ing's con\ er-aiion, lie mistaken by a stranger 
for its habitual expression, so easily and so 
happily was it formed for. them all; but those 
who had an opportunity of studying his fea- 
tures for a length of time, and upon various 
occasions, both of rest and emotion, knew 
thai their proper language was that of melan- 
choly. Sometimes shades of this gloom inter- 
rupted even his gayest and most happy mo- 
iii! 11I-: and Ihe following verses are said to 
have dropped from his pen to excuse a tran- 
-n nt expression of melancholy which over 
clouded the general gaiety. 

" When from the heart where Sorrow sits, 

Her dusky shadow mounts too high, 
Ami o'er the fjnuiging aspect flits, 

And clouds the brow, or fills the eye — 
Heed not the gloom thai soon shall sink, 

My thoughts their dungeon know too well; 
Bark to my breast tin' captives shrink, 

Ami bleed u ithio their silent cell." 

It was impossible to notice a dejection be- 
longing neither to the rank, the age, noi the 
- of this young nobleman, witnout 
feeling an indefinable curiosity to ascertain 
whether it had a deeper cause than habit or 
constitutional temperament. It was obviously 
of a degree incalculably more serious than that 
alluded to by Prince Arthur— 

^ I remember when I was in France, 

Young gentlemen would he as sad as night, 
Only for wantonness 

But, howsoever derived, this, joined to Lord 
Hymn's air of mingling in amusements and 
sports as if he contemned them, and frit that 
his sphere was far above the fashionable and 
frivolous crowd which surrounded him, gave 
a Btrong effect of colouring to a character 
hi ra tse decidedly roman- 
tic. Noble and far descended, the pilgrim of 
distant and Bavage countries, eminent as a 
poet among the first whom Britain has pro 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



duced, and having besides cast around him a 
mysterious charm arising from the sombre 
tone of lus poetry, and the occasional melan- 
choly of his deportment, Lord Byron occu- 
pied the eyes and interested the feelings of all. 
The enthusiastic looked on him to admire, 
the serious with a wish to admonish, and the 
soft with a desire to console. Even literary 
envy, a base sensation, from which', perhaps, 
this age is more free than any other, forgave 
the man whose splendour dimmed the fame of 
his competitors. The generosity of Lord By- 
ron's disposition, his readiness to assist merit 
in distress, and to bring it forward w here un- 
known, deserved ami obtained general re- 
gard; while his poetical effusions, poured forth 
with equal force and fertility, showed at once 
a daring confidence in his own powers, and a 
determination to maintain, by continued ef- 
fort, the high place he had attained in British 
literature. 

At one of the fashionable parties where the 
noble bard was present. His Majesty, then 
Prince Regent, entered the room : Lord By- 
ron was at some distance at the time, but, on 
learning who he was. His Royal Highness 
sent a gentleman to him to desire that he 
would be presented. Of course the presenta- 
tion took place: the Recent expressed his 
admiration of " Childe Harold's Pil<rrima<re," 
and entered into a conversation which sotas- 
cinated the poet, that had it not been for an 
accident which deferred a levee intended to 
have been held the next day, he would have 
gone to court. Soon after," however, an un- 
fortunate influence counteracted the effect of 
royal praise, and Lord Bvron permitted him- 
self to write and speak disrespectfully of the 
Prince. 

The whole of Byron's political career may 
be summed up in the following anecdotes : 

The Earl of Carlisle havin<Fdeclined to in- 
troduce Lord Byron to the House of Peers, 
he resolved to introduce himself, and accord- 
ing;, went there a little before the usual hour 
when he knew few of the lords" would be 
present. On entering, he appeared rattier 
abashed, and looked very pale, but, passim* 
the woolsack, where the Chancellor (Lord 
LddonJ was engaged in some of the ordinary 
routine of the house, he went directly to the 
(able, where the oaths were administered to 
him in the usual manner. The Lord Chan- 
cellor then approached, and offered his hand 
in the most open familiar manner, congratu- 
lating him on his taking possession of his seat. 
Lord Byron only placed the tips of his finders 
in the Chancellor's hand ; the latter returned 
to his seat, and Byron, after lounging a few 
mmutes on one of the opposition benches, re- 
tired. To bis friend, Mr. Dallas, who followed 
him out. he gave as a reason for not entering 
into the spirit of the Chancellor, " that ft 
might have been supposed he would j«,i,i the 
court party, whereas lie intended to have no- 
thing at all fo do with politic-/' 

He only addressed the house three times: 
the first of his speeches was on the Frame- 
Work Bill ; the second in favour of the Cath- 



olic claims, which gave good hopes of bis be- 
coming an orator; "and the other related to a 
petition from Major Cartwright. Byres him- 
self says, the Lords told him " his manner 
was not dignified enough for (hem, and would 
better suit the lower house;" others say, they 
gathered round him while speaking, listening 
with the greatest attention— a sign at any rate 
that he was interesting. He always voted 
with the opposition, but evinced no likelihood 
of becoming the blind partisan of cither side. 
The following is a pleasing instance of the 
generosity, the delicacy, and the umvouiiding 
benevolence of Byron's nature: 

A young lady of considerable talents, but 
who had never been able to succeed in turn- 
ing them to any profitable account, was re- 
duced to great hardships through the misfor- 
tunes of her family. The only pel sons from 
whom she could have hoped for relief were 
abroad, and so urged on, mote by the suffer- 
ings of those she held dear than by her own, 
she summoned up resolution to wait on Lord 
Byron at his apartments in the Albany, and 
ask his subscription to a volume of poems: 
she had no previous knowledge of him except 
from his works, but from the boldness and 
feeling expressed in them, she concluded that 
he must be a man of kind heart and amiable 
disposition. Experience did not disappoint 
her, and though she entered the apartment 
with faltering steps and a palpitating heart, 
she soon found courage to state her request, 
which she did in the most simple and delicate 
manner: he heard it with the most marked 
attention and the keenest sympathy; and 
when she had ceased speaking, he, as if to 
avert her thoughts from a subject which could 
not be but painful to her, began to converse 
in words so fascinating, and bines so gentle, 
that she hardly perceived he had been writ- 
ing, until he put a folded slip of paper into her 
hand, saying it was his subscription, and that 
he most heartily wished her success. " But," 
added he, " we are both young, and the world 
is very censorious, and so if I were to take 
any active part in procuring subscribers to 
your poems, I fear it would do you harm rather 
than imod." The young lady, overpowered 
by the prudence and delicacy of his conduct, 
took her leave, and upon opening in the street 
the paper, which in her agitation she had not 
previously looked at, she found it was a draft 
upon his banker for fifty pounds ! 

The enmity that Byron entertained towards 
the Earl of Carlisle, was owing to two causes: 
the Earl had spoken tather. irreverently of 
the "Hours of Idleness," when Byron ex- 
pected, as a relation, that he would have 
countenanced it. He had moreover refused 
to introduce his kinsman to the House of 
Lords, even, it is said, somewhat doubting his 
right to a seat in that honourable house. 

The Earl of Carlisle was a great admirer 
of the classic drama, and once published a 
sixpenny pamphlet, in which he strenuously 
argued in behalf of the propriety and neces- 
sity of -mall theatres: on the same day that 
this weighty publication appeared he sub- 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



! :i thousand I public 

I o) basion, I!;, ron coo 

ilic follow in^ epigram : 

a thousand pound 
round 
i~ the difference jrou may hit 

III.! Ins Ult." 

I bja antipathy to this relative 

ling Mime hue- in the 

I. nly Holland by 

< arlisle, persuading her to reject 

the BDiiff-box bequeathed to her ! N 

niL r : 

•■!..'; . ri BCt thi 

he immediately wrote the following parody: 

■ ^'ift D ll'TO 

I ■ . • .■ stuff: 

I ■•■ i; ; \ n bora 

r .'Hi your ladyship from taking snuff." 

Sir Luml 'mi bad written a tra- 

called, if wc remember right, "The 

ii.ii- Bride," which was fairly damned 

night : a i took place 

■ i- ratal catastrophe, to which wenl 

John Cam Hnbhouse, sh nun who 

had been ravished by the French army, and 

under the protection of his lordship. 

Dating the unfortunate 

iked, in a very sentimental 

manm . "who is she?" " The M . -- 

terious Bi ide," replied hi- lordship! 

Byron's return from his first tour, Mr. 
Dallas called upon him, and, after the usual 
salutatJQns bad passed, inquired if he w . 

flared with any other work to support the 
■■■ liu-li he bad already acquired. Bj ron 
then delivered for his examination a 
entitled "Hints from Horace," I iritiL- a para- 
phrase of the art of poetry. Mr. Dallas prom- 



then took "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" from 
a trunk, and delivered it to him. Mr. Dallas, 
having read the poem r was in raptures with 
it ; be instantly resolved to do his utmost in 
suppressing the "Hints from Horace." and 
tn bring qui Childe Harold. He urged Byroft) 
to publish this lasl poem ; but he was unwill- 
ing, and preferred to have the " Hints" pub- 
lished. He would not be convinced of the 
great merit of the " < Ibilde," and as some pcr- 
bou bad seen it before Mr. Dallas, and ex- 
i disapprobation, Byron was by no 
mi :m- sure of its kind II CI ption by the world. 
In a short time aftera ards, however, he agi i t a 
to its publication, and requested Mr. Dallas 
not tn deal with Cawthorn, but oiler it toMifc 
I. ■!■ of Albemarle street : be wished a fashion* 
able publisher ; but Miller declined it, chiefly 
on acoouql of the strictures it contained on 
Lord Elgin, whose publisher he was. Long. 
man bad refused to publish the " Satire," and 
Byron would not sutler any of his works to 
come fronitli.it house : the work was there- 
fore carried to Mr. Murray, who then kept a 
shop opposite St. Dunsfans church in Fleet 
street. Mr. Murray had expressed a desire 
to publish for Lord Byron, and regretted that 
Mr. [Alias had not taken the " English Hards 
and Scotch Reviewers" to him; hut this was 

nflrr its SUCCI 

Byron fell into company with Hogg, the 
Ktttick Shepherd, at the Lakes. The ."-hep- 
herd was [standing at the inn-door of Amble- 
side, n hen forth came a strapping young man 
from the house, and off with his hat, and out 
with hi* hand. Hogg did not know him. and, 
appearing :it a dead halt, the other relieved 
him by saying, " Mr. Hogg, I hope you will 
excuse me : my name is Byron, and I cannot 
help thinking that we ought to hold ourselves 
nted. The poets accordingly .shook 
hands immediately, and, while they continued 



ised to superintend the publication of this'? 1 • i '° L;ik, ' s - ,vere hand and glove, drank 
" le that of the satire, and, f^ nous |Y together, and laughed at their brother 



piece ;.s he had don 

Imgly, it was carried to Caw thorn the 
■ Her. and matters arranged ; but Mr. 
D IS, not thinking the poera likelj I 
crease his lord- 1 .; ion, allowed it to 

r in the press. It began thus: 

mgh if Lawrence, hired to "race 
e 
In- .-• r t , till Nature with a blush 
^•' u • it tin underneath Ins brush ? 

Or ihould s.,rn.- linrmerjoin, \'<t them or sale, 
I mi rniaid's tail ; 

• world has- seen) 
ituraa in his graphic spleen 

n iheir faults, could gag Ins grinning frii 
B' i-, like thai picture 

'' lillier lhao .1 nek man's dreams, 

P . without head m li 

1 d his Borrow that his 
ip had wniii n nqthingelse. 1!\ ron then 
told hun that he had occasional! 

in Spenser's measure, relative to 

the ei. entries |,e had \ isited. " They are net 

worth trou di a with," said bis lordship, 



*J ! -" '— *- a« with you:" Z\hri^E££S*S 



bards. On Byron's leaving the Lakes, he sent 
I fogg a letter quizzing the Lakists, which the 
Shepherd was so ritschievous as to show to 

them. 

W hen residing at Mitylene in the veai 

lf>l -'- he portio I eight young girls very l'ibe- 

rallj . and even danced with them at the mar- 
fi :i-t ; be gave a cow to one man, horses 
to another, and cotton and silk to several oirls 
n ho lived by weaving these materials: he~also 
bough) a new hoal for a fisherman who had 
lost bis own in a gale, and he often gave Greek 
testaments to the poor children! 

While at Metaxata, in 1823, an embank- 
ment, ;it which several persons had been en- 
digging, fell in. and buried some of 
them alrvei be has at dinner when he heard 
the accident, and, starting up from the ta- 
ble, ran to the root, accompanied by his phy- 
8iCian,who took a supply of medicines with 
bun. The labourers who were employed to 
extricate their companions, soon became 
alarmed for themselves, and refused to go on, 
vi.Miij. they believed they had dugout all the 
which had been covered by the ruins. 
induce them to 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



continue their exertions, but finding menaces 
in vain, he seized a spade and began to dig 
most zealously ; at length the peasantry joined 
him, and they succeeded in saving two more 
persons from certain death. 

It is stated in the " Conversations," that 
Bvron was engaged in several duels,— that in 
one instance he was himself principal in an 
"affair of honour" with Hobhouse — and would 
have been so in another with Moore, if the 
Bard of Erin's challenge had been properly 
forwarded to him. 

On the 2d of January, 1815, Lord Byron 
married, atScaham,in the county of Durham, 
Anne Isabella, onlv daughter of Sir Ralph 
Millbank (since Noel), Bart. To this lady he 
had made a proposal twelve months before. 
but was rejected : well would it have been for 
their mutual happiness had that rejection been 
repeated. After their marriage, Lord and 
Lady Byron took a house in London; gave 
■■lid dinner-parties; kept separate car- 
- : and, in short, launched into every sort 
of Fashionable extravagance. This could not 
last long; the portion which his lordship had 
received with Miss Millbank (ten thousand 
pounds) soon melted away ; and, at length, an 
execution was actually levied on the furniture 
of his residence. It was then agreed that 
Lady Bvron, who, on the 10th of December, 
1815, bad presented her lord with a daughter, 
should pay a visit to her father till the storm 
was blown over, and some arrangements hail 
been made with their creditors. From that 
visit she never returned, and a separation en- 
sued, for which various reasons have been 
assigned; the real cause or causes, however, 
of that regretted event, are up to this moment 
involved in mystery, though, as might be ex- 
ported, a wonderful sensation was excited at 
the time, and every description of contra- 
dictory rumour was in active circulation. 

Byron was first introduced to Miss Mill- 
bank at Lady 's. In going up stairs he 

stumbled, and remarked to Moore, who ac- 
companied him, that it was a bad omen. On 
entering the room, he perceived a lady more 
simply dressed than the rest sitting on a sofa. 
lie asked Moore if she was a humble com- 
panion to any of the ladies. The latter replied, 
'* She is a great heiress; you 'd better marry 
her. and repair the old place Newstead." 

The following anecdotes on the subject of 
this unfortunate marriage, are given from 
Lord Byron's Conversations, in his own words: 

" There was something piquant, and what 
we term pretty, in Miss Millbank; her fea- 
tures were small and feminine, though not 
regular; she had the fairest skin imaginable; 
her figure was perfect for her height, and there 
was a simplicity, a retired modesty about her, 
which was very characteristic, and formed a 
happy contrast to the cold artificial formality 
and studied stiflfness, which is called fashion : 
sue interested me exceedingly. It is unne- 
cessary to detail the progress of our acquaint- 
ance: I became daily more attached to her. 
and it ended in my making her a proposal that 
was rejected ; her refusal was couched in 
terms that could not offend me. I was besides 
b 2 3 



persuaded that in declining my offer, she was 
governed by the influence of her mother; and 
was the more confirmed in this opinion by her 
reviving our correspondence herself, twelve 
months after. The tenor of her letter was, 
that although she could not love me, she de- 
sired my friendship. Friendship is a dangerous 
word for young ladies; it is love full-fledged, 
and waiting for a fine day to fly. 

" I was not so young when my father died, 
but that I perfectly remember him, and had 
very early a horror of matrimony from the 
sight of domestic broils : this feeling came* 
over me very strongly at my wedding. Some- 
thing whispered me that I was sealing my own 
death-warrant. I am a great believer in pre- 
sentiments ; Socrates' demon was not a fic- 
tion ; Monk Lewis had his monitor; and NaJ 
poleon many warnings. At the last moment, 
I would have retreated if I could have done 
so ; I called to mind a friend of mine, who had 
married a young, beautiful, and rich girl, and 
yet was miserable; he had strongly urged me 
against putting my neck in the same yoke: 
and, to show you how firmly I was resolved to 
attend to his advice, I betted Hay fifty guineas 
to one that I should always remain single. Six 
years afterwards, I sent him the money. The 
day before I proposed to Lady Byron. I had 
no idea of doing so. 

" It had been predicted by Mrs. Williams, 
that twenty-seven was to be a dangerous age 
for me ; the fortune-telling witch was right, — 
it was destined to prove so. I shall never for- 
get the 2d of January! Lady Byron, (Byrn, 
he pronounced it,) was the only unconcerned 
person present ; Lady Noel, her mother, cried ; 
I trembled like a leaf, made the wrong re- 
sponses, and, after the ceremony, called her 
Miss Millbank. 

" There is a singular history attached to the 
ring: the very day the match was concluded, 
a ring of my mother's that had been lost, was 
dug up by the gardener at Newstead. I thought 
it was sent on purpose for the wedding; but 
my mother's marriage had not been a fortu- 
nate one, and this ring was doomed to be the 
seal of an unhappier union still. 

" After the ordeal was over, we set off for a 
country-seat of Sir Ralph's, and I was sur- 
prised at the arrangements for the journey, 
and somewhat out of humour to find a lady's 
maid stuck between me and my bride. It was 
rather too early to assume the husband, so I 
was forced to submit; but it was not with a 
very good grace. 

" I have been accused of saying, on netting 
into the carnage, that I had married Lady 
Byron out of spite, and because she had re- 
fused me twice. Though I was for a moment 
vexed at her prudery, or whatever it may be 
called, if 1 had made so uneavalier, not to say 
brutal, a speech, I am convinced Lady Byron 
would instantly have left the carriage tome 
and the maid, (I mean the lady's): she had 
spirit enough to have done so, and would prop- 
erly have resented the affront. 

"Our honey-moon was not all sunshine; 
it had its clouds ; and Hobhouse has some let- 
ters u bich would serve to explain the rise and 



XVIM 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



f:ill in the barometer ; but it was never down 

:it zero. 

•• \ curious thing happened to roe shorflj 
after the honey-moon, which was very awk- 
ward at the time, but has since amusi 
much. It so happened thai three married 
n were on a wedding visit to my wife, 
(and in the same room at the same time). 
whom I had know n to be all birds of tb 
iii^i. Fancy the scene of confusion that en- 
sue.!. 

Tlie world says I married Miss Millbank 

for her fortune, because she was a great) heir- 
Mi I have ever received, or am likely 
to receive, (and thai has been twice paid back 
too), was 10,0002. My own income at this 
period was small, and somewhat bespoke. 
Newsfead was a very unprofitable estate, and 
brought me in a bare 1500/. a-year; the Lan- 

operfy Was hampered with > lau- 

Buit, which has cost m nd is not yet 

finished. 
M I heard afterwards that Air-. Charlment 

had heel) the means of poisoning Lady No< I's 

mini against me; that she had employed her- 

i I others in watching me in London. 

and had reported having traeed me into a 

house in Portland-Place. There was one act 

unworthy of any one hut SUCh a confidante; 

I allude to the breaking open my writin!_ r - 
(!<-.!<: a book was found iii il thai did no! do 
mu eh credit to my taste in literature, and some 
letters from a married woman, with whom I 
itimate before ray marriage. The 
use thai n as made of the latter was most un- 
justifiable, whatever may be thought of the 
breach of confidence thai led to their discov- 
ery. Lady Byron sent them to the husband 
of the lady, who had the good sense to take 
no notice of their contents. The gravest ac- 
cusation thai has been made against me, is 
that of having intrigued with Mrs. Mardyn in 
my own house, introduced her to my own ta- 
ble, etc. J there never was a more unfounded 

calumny. Being on (he Committee of Drury- 
Lane Theatre, 1 have no doubt that several 
actress* - called on me; but as to Mrs. Mar- 
dyn, who was a beautiful woman, and might 
been a dangerous visitress, 1 was scarcely 
acquainted (to speak) with her. I might even 
make a more serious charge against — — - than 
employing spies to watch suspected amours. 
I had been shut up in a dark street in Lon- 
don, writing 'The Siege of Corinth,' and bad 
refused myself to every one till it was finished. 
1 was surprised one day by a doctor and a 
lawyer almost forcing themselves at the same 
time into my room ; 1 did not know till after- 
wards the real object of their visit. I thought 
ih ii questions singular, frivolous, and some- 
what importunate, if noi impertinent; but 
what should I have thought if I bad known 
that they were sent to provide proofs of my 
insanity? I have no doubt that my answers to 
these emissaries' interrogations were not very 
rational or consistent, for my imagination was 
heated by other things; but Dr. Baillie could 
not conscientiously make me out a cert i 
for Bedlam, and perhaps the lawyer gave a 
more favourable report tJ his employers. The 



doctor Baid afterwards he bad been told that 

1 always looked down when Lady Byron bent 
her i yes on me. and exhibited other symptoms 
equally infallible, particularly those thai n ark 

late kmir's ea-e BO strongly. 1 do not, 

, r, t i\ Lady Byron w ith this transac- 
tion: probahly she was not privy to it; she 
uas the tool of others. I [er moth< r i 
detest, had noi i-- en the dec* ucy to 

conceal it in her own house. Dining one day 
at Sir Ralph's (who was a good sorl of man, 

and of whOBQ you may form some idea. v. hen 

I tell you thai a leg of mutton was always 
Bervedal Ids table, thai he mighl <i\\ the 
oke upon it) 1 broke a tooth, and was fn great 
pain, which [could not avoid showing. 'It 

will do you L'ood.' said Lady Noel ; 
of it !' I gave her a look ! 

"Lady Byron bad good ideas, but could 

ne\ i i- express them; wrote poetry too, but it 

'\ good by accident: her letters were 

a 1, often unintelligible. She 

as il made the dupe of the 

for shi her knowledge of mankind 

infallible. She had got some foolish idea of 

Madame de Stat I's into her head, thai 

v be better known in the 6rs1 hour than 
in ten years. She had the habit of drawing 
people's characters after she had seen them 

Or twice. She wrote pages on i 
about nrrj character, but it was as ui like as 
possible. She was governed by what she 
called fixed rules and principles, squared 
matically. She would have made an 
excellent wrangler at Cambridge. It must 
[, hovi ev« r, that she ga^ e no proof 
of her boast d consistency; first, she refused 
me, then she accepted me, then she separated 
herself from me — so much for consistency. I 

need no* tell you of the obloquy and oppro- 
brium that were cast upon my name when 
our separation was made public : I once made 
a li-t from the journals of the day of the dif- 
ferent worthies, ancient and modern, to whom 
I was compared : I remember a few, Nero, 
Apicius, EpicurUs, Caligula, Heliogabalus, 

Henry the Eighth, and lastly, the . All 

my former friends, even my cousin < 
Ilyron, who bad been brought up with me, 
and whom I loved as a brother, took my wife's 
part: he followed the stream when it was 
strongest against me, and can never expect 
any thing from me: he shall never touch a 
sixpence of mine. I was looked upon as the. 
worst of husbands, the most aDanaoned and 
wicked of men; and my wife as a suffering 
angel, an incarnation of all the virtues and 
perfections of the sex. I was abused in the 

public prints, made the common lalk of pri- 
vate companies, hissed as I went to the House 
of Lords, insulted in the streets, afraid to go 
to the theatre, whence the unfortunate Mrs. 
Mardyu had been driven with insult. The 
Examiner was the only paper thai dared say 
a word in my defence, and Lady Jersey the 
only person in the fashionable world that did 
not look upon nu 1 as a monster." 

" In addition to all these mortifications, my 
affairs were irretrievably involved, and almost 
so as to make me what they wished. • was 






LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



xix 



compelled to part with Newstead, which I 
never could have ventured to sell in my moth- 
er's lifetime. As it is, I shall never forgive 
myself for having done so, though I am told 
that the estate would not bring half as much 
as I got for it : this does not at all reconcile 
me to having parted with the old Abbey. I 
did not make up my mind to this step but from 
the last necessity; I had my wife's portion to 
repay, and was determined to add 10,000/. 
more of my own to it, which I did: I always 
hated being in debt, and do not owe a guinea. 
The moment I had put my atl'airs in train, and 
in little more than eighteen months after my 
marriage. I left England, an involuntary ex- 
ile, intending it should be for ever." 

We shall here avail ourselves of some ob- 
servations by a powerful and elegant critic, 1 
whose opinions on the personal character of 
Lord Byron, as well as on the merits of his 
poems, are, from their originality, candour, 
and keen discrimination, of considerable 
weight. 

" The charge against Lord Byron," says 
this writer, " is, not that he fell a victim to 
excessive temptations, and a combination of 
circumstances, which it required a rare and 
extraordinary degree of virtue, wisdom, pru- 
dence, and steadiness to surmount ; but that 
he abandoned a situation of uncommon ad- 
vantages, and fell weakly, pusillanimously, 
and selfishly, when victory would have been 
easy, and when defeat was ignominious. In 
reply to this charge, I do not deny that Lord 
Byron inherited some very desirable, and even 
enviable privileges in the lot of life which fell 
to his share. I should falsify my own senti- 
ments, if I treated lightly the gift of an an- 
cient English peerage, and a name of honour 
and venerable antiquity ; but without a for- 
tune competent to that rank, it is not 'a bed 
of roses,' nay, it is attended with many and 
extreme difficulties, and the difficulties are 
exactly such as a genius and temper like Lord 
Byron's were least calculated to meet— at any 
rate, least calculated to meet under the pecu- 
liar collateral circumstances in which he was 
placed. His income was very narrow ; his 
Newstead property left him a very small dis- 
posable surplus; his Lancashire property was, 
in its condition, etc., unproductive. A pro- 
fession, such as the army, might have lessened, 
or almost annihilated the difficulties of his pe- 
culiar position ; but probably his lameness 
rendered this impossible. He seems to have 
had a love of independence, which was noble, 
and probably even an intractability; but this 
temper added to his indisposition to bend and 
adapt himself to his lot. A dull, or supple, 
or intriguing man, without a single good 
quality of head or heart, might have managed 
it much better; he mii'lit have made himself 
subservient to government, and wormed him- 
self into some lucrative place; or he might 
have lived meanly, conformed himself stu- 
pidly or enngingly to all humours, and been 



1 Sir Egerton Brvdges, Bart, who has written so 
diffusely and so ably on Lord Bv on's genius and 
character 



borne onward on the wings of society with 
little personal expense. 

" Lord Byron was of another quality and 
temperament. If the world would not con- 
tent] to him, still less would he conform to the 
world. He had all the manly, baronial pride 
of his ancestors, though he had not all their 
wealth, and their means of generosity, hospi- 
tality, and patronage. He had the will, alas ! 
without the power. 

" With this temper, these feelings, this ge- 
nius, exposed to a combination of such un- 
toward and trying circumstances, it would 
indeed have been inimitably praiseworthy if 
Lord Byron could have been always wise, 
prudent, calm, correct, pure, virtuous, and 
unassailable: — if he could have shown all the 
force and splendour of his mighty poetical en- 
ergies, without any mixture of their clouds, 
their baneful lightnings, or their storms : — if 
he could have preserved all his sensibility to 
every kind and noble passion, yet have re- 
mained placid, and unaffected by the attack 
of any blameable emotion ; — that is, it would 
have been admirable if he had been an angel, 
and not a man ! 

"Unhappily, the outrages he received, the 
gross calumnies which were heaped upon him, 
even in the time of his highest favour with the 
public, turned the delights of his very days 
of triumph to poison, and gave him a sort of 
moody, fierce, and violent despair, which led 
to humours, acts, and words, that mutually 
aggravated the ill-will and the offences be- 
tween him and his assailants. There was a 
daring spirit in his temper and his taJ 
which was always inflamed rather than cor- 
rected by opposition. 

" In this most unpropitious state of things, 
every thing that went wrong was attributed 
to Lord Byron, and, when once attributed, 
was assumed and argued upon as an undenia- 
ble fact. Yet, to my mind, it is quite clear, — 
quite unattended by a particle of doubt, — that 
in many things in which he has been the most 
blamed, he was the absolute victim of misfor- 
tune; that unpropitious trains of events (for 
I do not wish to shift the blame on others) led 
to explosions and consequent derangements, 
which no cold, prudent pretender to extreme 
propriety and correctness could have averted 
or met in a manner less blameable than that 
in which Lord Byron met it. 

" It is not easy to conceive a character less 
fitted to conciliate general society by his man- 
ners and habits, than that of Lord Byron. It 
is probable that he could make his address 
and conversation pleasing to ladies, when he 
chose to please; but, to the young dandies of 
fashion, noble and ignoble, he must have been 
very repulsive : as long as he continued to be 
the ton, — the lion, — they may have endured 
him without opening their mouths, because he 
hail a frown and a lash which they were not 
willing to encounter ; but when his hack was 
turned, and they tbbnght it safe, 1 do not 
doubt that they hurst out into full cry ! I havo 
heard complaints of his vanity, his peevish- 
ness, his desire to monopolize distinction, his 
dislike of all hobbies but his own. It is no< 



XX 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



i .able that there may liave been some 

ition for these complaints: I am botfj 
for it it" there was; I regret such littlem 
And then another part of the Btorj is proba- 
bly left untold .- we bear nothing of the provo- 
cations given him ; — sly hints, curve of the 

le looks, treacherous smiles, flings at 
poetry, shrugs at noble authors, slang jokes, 
idiotic bets, enigmatical appointments, and 
boasts of being Benseless brutes! We do not 
hear repeated the jesl of the glory of the Jew . 
that buys the ruined peer's falling castle; the 
d— d good fellow, that keeps the finest stud 
and the hi -t bounds in the country out of the 

BnippingS and odds and ends of Ins contract ; 
and the falnOUS good match that the duke's 

daughter is going to make with Dick Wfgly, 

ID ol" the rich slave-merchant at Liver- 
pool! We do not hear the clever dry jests 
whispered round the table by Mr. . eldest 

son of the new and rich Lord , by young 

.Mr. . only son of Lord , the ex-lords 

\.. B.,and < '.. bobs of the three [rish I nion 
earls, great borough-holders, and the verj 

grave and sarcastic Lord ,*"who believes 

that In' has the monopoly of all the talents, 
and all the political and legislative knowledge 
of the kingdom) and that a poet and a bell- 
man are only lit to be yoked together. 

•• Thus, then, was this illustrious and mighty 
poet driven into exile! Yes. driven! who 
would live in a country in which he had been 
so used, even (hough it was the land of his 
nativity, the land of a thousand nohle ances- 
tor-, the land of freedom, the land where his 
bead had been crowned with laurels, — but 
where his heart had been tortured, where all 
his most generous and most noble thoughts 
had been distorted and rendered ugly, and 
where his slightest errors and indiscretions 
bad been magnified into hideous crimes." 

Lord Hymn's own opinions on the connu- 
bial state are thus related by Captain Parry: — 

"There are," said his lordship, "so many 
undelinable, and nameless, and not-to-bo- 
named causes of dislike, aversion, and disgust, 
in the matrimonial state, that it is always im- 
le for the public, or the best friends of 
the parties, to judge between man and wife. 
Theirs is a relation about which nobody but 
elves can form a correct idea, or have 
any right to Bpeak. As long as neither party 
commits gross injustice towards the other; as 
long as neither the woman nor the man is 
guilty of any offence which is injurious to the 
community; as long as the husband provides 
for his offspring, and secures the public against 
the dangers arising from their neglected edu- 
cation, or from the charge of supporting them; 
by what right does it censure bim for ceasing 
lo dwell under the same roof With a woman, 

who i-, to him, beeail>e he knOWS her. while 

others do not, an object of loathing? Can any 
thing be more monstrous than for the public 
voice to compel individuals who dislike each 
other to continue their cohabitation' This is 
at least the eil'ect of its interfering With a re- 
tationsnip, of which it has no possible- means 
bf judging. It does not indeed drags man to 
a soman's bed by physical force; but it docs 



exert a moral force continually and effectively 
to accomplish the same purpose. Nobody can 
escape tfaia force but those who arc too high, 
or those who are too low. for public opinion to 
reach; or tbbse hypocrites who are, before 
others, the loudest 'in their approbation of the 
empty and unmeaning forms of society, that 
they may securely indulge all their propensi- 
ties' in secret. I bave Buffered amazingly from 
this interference; for though I set it at defi 
ance. I w as neither too h i i_ r 1 1 nor too low to be 
read >d h\ it. and 1 was not hypocrite enough 
to guard myself from its consequences. 

•■ \\ bat do they say of my family affairs in 
England, Parry? My story, I suppose, like 
other minor events, interested the people for a 
day, and was then forgotten?" I replied, no; 
I thought, owing to the very great interest the 
public took in him, it was still remembered 
and talked about. I mentioned that it was 
generally supposed a difference of religious 
sentiment-, between him and Lady Byron had 
caused the public breach. " JN'o, Parry," was 
the reply; "Lady Byron has a liberal mind, 
particularly as to religious opinions; and I 
wish, when I married her, that I had possess- 
ed the same command over myself that I now 
do. Had I possessed a little more wisdom, 
and more forbearance, we might have been 
happy. I wished, when I was first married, 
to have remained in the country, particularly 
till my pecuniary embarrassments were over. 
1 knew the society of London ; I knew the 
characters of many of those who are called 
ladns, with whom Lady Byron would neces- 
sarily have to associate, and I dreaded her 
contact with them. But 1 have too much of 
my mother about me to be dictated to: 1 like 
freedom from constraint; I hate artificial regu- 
lations : my conduct lias always been dictated 
by my own feelings, and Lady Byron was 
quite the creature of rules. She was not per- 
mitted either to ride, or run, or walk, but as 
the physician prescribed. She was not suf- 
fered to go out when 1 wished to go : and then 
the old house was a mere ghost-bouse; 1 
dreamed of ghosts, and thought of them waking. 
It was an existence I could not support." 
Here Lord Byron broke off abruptly, saying, 
" I hate to speak of my family affairs ; though 
I have been compelled to talk nonsense con 
corning them to some of my butterfly visitors, 
glad on any terms to get rid of their importu- 
nities. | long to be again on the mountains. 1 
am fond of solitude, and should never talk non- 
sense if 1 always found plain men to talk to." 

In the spring of IfilG, Lord Byron quitted 
England, to return to it no more. He crossed 
over to France, through which he passed 
rapidly to Brussels, taking in his way a sur- 
vey of the field of Waterloo. ITc then pro- 
ceeded to Coblentz, and up the Rhine to 
Basle, lie passed the summer on the banks 
of the lake of Geneva. "With what enthusi- 
asm he enjoyed, and with what contemplations 
he dwelt among its scenery, his own poetry 
BOOH exhibited to the world, llis third cantoof 
( hilde I larold iiis Manfred, and his Prisoner 
of Chjllon. ■ ere composed at the Cnmpagno 
DictdaH <u Coligny, a mile from Gene\a 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



These productions evidently proved, that 
the unfortunate events which had induced 
Lord Byron to become a voluntary exile from 
his native land, however they might have ex- 
acerbated his feelings, had in no measure chill- 
ed his poetical lire. 

The anecdotes that follow are given as his 
lordship related them to Captain Medwin : 

" Switzerland is a country I have been satis- 
fied with seeing once; Turkey I could live in 
for ever. I never forget my predilections. I 
was in a wretched state of health, and worse 
spirits, when I was at Geneva; but quiet and 
the lake, physicians better than Polidori, soon 
set me up. I never led so moral a life as during 
my residence in that country ; but I gained 
no credit by it. Where there is a mortifica- 
tion, there ought to be reward. On the con- 
trary, there is no story so absurd that they did 
not invent at my cost. I was watched by 
glasses on the opposite side of the lake, and 
by glasses too that must have had very dis- 
torted optics. I was waylaid in my evening 
drives — I was accused of corrupting all the 

{frisettes in the rue Basse. I believe that they 
ooked upon me as a man-monster worse than 
the piqueur." 

"I knew very few of the Genevese. Hentsh 
was very civil to me; and I have a great re- 
spect for Sismondi. I was forced to return 
the civilities of one of their professors by ask- 
ing him, and an old gentleman, a friend of 
Gray's, to dine with me. I had gone out to 
sail early in the morning, and the wind pre- 
vented me from returning in time for dinner. 
I understand that I offended them mortally. 
Polidori did the honours. 

" Among our countrymen I made no new 
acquaintances ; Shelley, Monk Lewis, and 
Hobhouse, were almost the only English peo- 
ple I saw. No wonder ; I showed a distaste for 
society at that time, and went little among the 
Genevese; besides, I could not speak French. 
What is become of my boatman and boat? I 
suppose she is rotten ; she was never worth 
much. When I went the tour of the lake in 
her with Shelley and Hobhouse, she was nearly 
wrecked near the very spot where Saint- 
Preux and Julia were in danger of being 
drowned. It would have been classical to 
have been lost there, but not so agreeable. 
Shelley was on the lake much oftcner than I, 
at all hours of the night and day: he almost 
lived on it; his great rage is a boat. We are 
both building now at Genoa, I a yacht, and 
he an open boat." 

"Somebody possessed Madame de Stacl with 
an opinion of my immorality. I used occa- 
sionally to visit her at Coppct ; and once she 
invited me to a family-dinner, and I found the 
room full of strangers, who had come to stare 
at me as at some outlandish beast in a raree- 
show. One of the ladies fainted, and the rest 
looked as if his satanic majesty had been 
among them. Madame de Stael took the 
liberty to read mo a lecture before this crowd, 
to which 1 only made her a low bow." 

His lordship's travelling equipage was 
rather a singular one, and afforded a strange 
catalogue for the Dogana : seven servants, 



five carriages, nine horses, a monkey, a bull- 
dog and mastiff, two cats, three pea-fowls, and 
some hens, (I do not know whether 1 have 
classed them in order of rank), formed part 
of his live stock; these, and all his books, 
consisting of a very large library of modern 
works, (for he bought all the best that came 
out), together with a vast quantity of furni- 
ture, might well be termed, with C&'sar, " im- 
pediments." 

From about the commencement of the yea. 
1817 to that of 1820, Lord Byron's principal 
residence was Venice. Here he continued to 
employ himself in poetical composition with 
an energy still increasing. He wrote the La- 
ment of Tasso, the fourth canto of Ghilde 
Harold, the dramas of Marino Faliero, and 
the Two Foscari ; Beppo, Mazeppa, and the 
earlier cantos of Don Juan, etc. 

Considering these only with regard to in- 
tellectual activity and force, there can be no 
difference of opinion; though there may be 
as to their degree of poetical excellence, tho 
class in the scale of literary merit to which 
they belong, and their moral, religious, and 
political tendencies. The Lament of Tasso, 
which in every line abounds in the most per- 
fect poetry, is liable to no countervailing ob- 
jection on the part of the moralist. 

In the third canto of the " Pilgrimage," tho 
discontented and repining spirit of Harold 
had already become much softened : 

" Joy was not always absent from his face, 
But o'er it in such scenes would steal with tranquD 
grace." 

He is a being of still gentler mould in the 
fourth canto; his despair has even sometimes 
assumed a smilingness, and the lovely and 
lively creations of the poet's brain arc less 
painfully alloyed, and less suddenly checked 
by the gloomy visions of a morbid imagina- 
tion. He represented himself, from the be- 
ginning, as a ruin; and when we first gazed 
upon him, we saw indeed in abundance the 
black traces of recent violence and convul- 
sion. The edifice was not rebuilt ; but its 
hues were softened by the passing wings of 
Time, and the calm slow ivy had found leisure 
to wreath the soft green of its melancholy 
among the fragments of the decay. In so far 
the pilgrim became wiser, as he seemed to 
think more of ethers', ami with a greater spirit 
of humanity. There was something fiend i-h 
in the air with which he surveyed the first 
scene df bis wanderings; and no proof <>f (lie 
strength of genius wns ever Rxhibited so 
strong and unquestionable as the sudden and 
entire possession of the minds of men by sueh 
a being as he then appeared to be, I fe looked 
upon a bull-fight and a field of battle with no 
variety of emotion. Brutes and men ir*re. 
in bis eyes, the s;nne blind, stupid victims of 
the savage lust of power. He seemed to shut 
bis eyes to every thing of thai citizenship and 
patriotism which ennobles the spirit of the 
soldier, and to delight in scattering the oust 
and ashes of bis derision over all the mosl sa- 
cred resting-places of the soul of man. I'\ et| 
then, we must allow, the original spirit of th' 



X\ll 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



I shman and the poel brake triumphantly, 
;>t tin,.-, through the chilling mist in which it 
had been spontaneously enveloped. In Greece, 

• all, the contemplation of Actium, Sa- 

,. Thermopylae, anfl Plataea, 
subdued the prejudices of bun who had gazed 
unmoved, or With disdain, upon fields of more 

| he nobility of manhood ap- 
peared to delight this moody visitant : and he 
accorded, without reluctance, to the shades 
of long departed heroes that reverent ho 
which, in the strange mixture of envy and 
i wherewith the contemplative so often 
i active men, be bad refused to the liv- 
ing, or to the newly dead. 

Bui there v. (mid be no end of descanting 
on the character of the Pilgrim, nor of the 
moral reflections which it km akens ; we there- 
fore take le-.ue 6f Childe Harold iu his own 

ge: 

• .veil ! a word that must be, and hath been — 
A sound which makes us linger ; — yet, Farewell ! 
Yd ! who have tra. ed the Pilgrim to the so ae 
Which i- hi- last, it' m jrour memories dwell 

wht which once was his, if on ye swell 
lection, no) in vain 
lit- wore his sandal-shoon and scallop-shell; 

* ******* 

' we must now say farewell " for ever.'" 

Manfred was the firsl of Lord Byron's dra- 
poems, and, we think, the finest. The 
of hts genius seems there wrestling w ith 
n-ii of his nature, the srntggle being for 
im of sublimity. Manfred hasalwaysaip- 
.I to us one of the - most genuine creations 
of the noble bard's mind. The melancholy is 
heartfelt: the poet does not here .seem 
iwl his brows, but they drop under the 

it of his thoughts; his int. Meet, t is 

Iv ut work in it. and the stern haughti- 

of the principal character is altogether 

of an intellectual ea-t ■. the conception of this 

Cter is Miltonic. The' poet has made 

him worthy to abide amongst those " palaces 

i.t' nature." those "icy balls," "where forms 
lis the avalanche." .Manfred stands up 
i t the stupendous Bcenery of the poem, 
and is as lofty, towering, and errand ;i s the 
mountains : « hen we picture him in imagina- 
tion, he assumes a shape of height and inde- 
pendent dignity, shining in its own splendour 
>t the snow} summits which be was ac- 
. climb. The passion, too, in this 
composition, is fervid and impetuous, but at 

Hue time deep and full, whieh is not al- 
io Byron's productions ; it is 
ius and Bibcere throughout. The music 
of the language is as solemn and :h touching 
as thai of the « ind coming through the bend- 
if the inaccessible Alpine forests ; 
and the mists and vapours rolling down the 
gullies and ravines that yawn horribly on the 
are not more wild and striking in their 

nance than ale the supernal u r; 

of the poet's fancy, whose magical 
oy is of mighty import, hut is nevertheless 
continually surmounted by the high intellec- 
tual power, invincible will, and intrepid phi- 
Hiophy of .Manfred. 



irsi idea of the descriptive passages of 
this beautiful poem will be easily recognised 
m the following extract from Lord Lyron's 
travelling memorandum hook : 

••Sept. J.'. 1916. Left Thun in a boat, 
whieh earned us the length of this lake in 
three hours. The lake small, but the hanks 
fine— rocks down to the water's edge— landed 
at Newhouse. Passed [nterlachea—entered 

upon a range of scenes heyotid all description 
or pri \ bus conception. Passed a rock bear- 
mi: an inscription— two brothers— one mur- 
dered the other— just the place for it. After 
a variety of windings, came to an enormous 
Pick— arrived at the foot of the mountain (the 
raw)-, glaciers— torrents— one of these 
900 feet i isible descent— lodge at the curate's 
—set out to see the \ alley-— heard an avalanche 
fall, like thunder !— glaciers enorrnousr— storm 
on— thunder and lightning, and hail ! 
all in perfection and beautifu 1 . The torrent 
is iii shape, curving over the rock, like the 
tail of the white horse streaming in the wind 
— pist as might be conceived x\ OUld he that of 

the ■ Pale Horse,' on which Death is mounted 
alypse, It is neither mist nor wa- 
ter, hut a something hctween both; its im- 
hetehl gives it a wave, a curve, a 
spreading here, a condension there — wonder- 
ful — indescribable. 

••Sept. 23. Ascent of the Wingren, the 
Vent d'argerA shining like truth on one side, 
6 ether the clouds rose from the ppposite 
. curling up perpendicular prei i] 
like the foam of' the ocean of hell during a 
ipririg tide ! [t was white and sulphury, and 
imm< asurably deep in appearance. The side 
I •■ruled was of course not of so precipi- 
tous a nature, but on arriving at the summit 
it <• Looked down on the other side upon a boil- 
i of cloud, dashing against the crag on 
which we stood. Arrived at the Grecnder- 
wold; mounted and rode to the higher glacier 
— twilight, but distinct — very fine — glacier 
like a frozen hurricane — starlight beautiful — 
the whole of the day was fine, and. in point 
of weather, as the day in which Paradise was 
made. Passed whole woods of withered pines 
— all withered — trunks stripped, and lifeless — 
done by a single winter." 
Of Lord Byron's tragedies we shall merely 

remark, with reference to the particular na- 
ture of their tragic character, that the effect 
iii all is rather grand, tcrrihle, and ter- 
rific, than mollifying, Bubduing, or pathetic. 
\s dramatic poems, they possess much beauty 
and originality. 

The' BtyJe and nature of the poem of Don 
Juan fones a singularly felicitous mixture of 
burlesque and pathos, of humorous obserya 
lion, and the higher elements of poetical com 
position. Never was the English language 
m'ed into more luxurious stanzas than in 
Don Juan: like the dolphin sporting in its na 
live waves, at ei ery turn, howei er grotesque 
displaying a new hue and a new beauty, so 
the noble author thi re shou a an absolute con- 
trol oxer bis means, and at everj cadence, 
rhyme, or construction, however whimsical 
delights lis xvilh novel and magical assocn 



tions. We wish, we heartily wish, that the 
fine poetry which is so richly scattered through 
the sixteen cantos of this thosl original ami 
most astonishing production, had not been 
mixed op with very much that is equally frivo- 
lous as foolish; and sincerely do we regret^ 
that the alloying dross of sensuality should run 
so freely through the otherwise rich vein of 
the author's verse. 

Whilst at Venice, Byron displayed a most 
noble instance of generosity. The house ofa 
shoemaker, near his lordship's residence in 
St. Samuel, was burnt to the ground, with 
article it contained, and the proprietor 
reduced, with a large family, to the greatest 
indigence and want." When Lord Byron as- 
certained the afflicting circumstance? of thai 
calamity, he not only ordered a new and su- 
perior habitation to be immediately built for 
the sufferer, the whole expense of which was 
borne by his lordship, but also presented the 
unfortunate tradesman with a sum equal in 
value to the whole of his lost stock in trade 
and furniture. 

Lord Byron avoided, as much as possible, 
any intercourse with his countrymen at Ven- 
ice; this seems to have been in a great mea- 
sure necessary, in order to prevent the intru- 
sion of impertinent curiosity. In an appendix 
to one of his poems, written with reference to 
a book of travels, the author of which dis- 
claimed any wish to be introduced to the no 
ble lord, he loftily and sarcastically chastises 
the incivility of such a gratuitous declaration, 
expresses his " utter abhorrence of any con 
tact with the travelling English;'' and thus 
concludes: "Except Lords Lansdowne, Jer- 
sey, and Lauderdale, Messrs. Scott, Ham- 
mond, Sir Humphrey Davy, the late Mr. 
Lewis, W. Bankes, M. Hoppner, Thomas 
Moore, Lord Kinnaird, his brother, Mr. Joy. 
and Mr. Hobhouse, I do not recollect to have 
exchanged a word with another Englishman 
since I left their country, and almost all these 
I had known before. The others, and God 
knows there were some hundreds, who bored 
me with letters or visits, I refused to have any 
communication with ; and shall be proud and 
happy when that wish becomes mutual." 

After a residence of three years at Venice, 
Lord Byron removed to Kavenna, towards the 
close of the year 1819. Here he wrote the 
Prophecy of Dante, which exhibited a new 
specimen of the astonishing variety of strength 
and expansion of faculties he possessed and 
exercised. About the same time he wrote 
Sar lanapalus, a tragedy; Cain, a mystery. 
and Heaven and Earth, a mystery. Though 
there are some obvious reasons Which render 
Sardanapalus unfit for the English sta;;e. it is, 
on the whole, the most splendid spec imen 
which our language affords of that species of 
tra jedy which was the exclusive object of 
Lord Byron's admiration. Cain is one of the 
productions which lias subjected its noble au- 
thor to the severest denunciations, on account 
of the crime of impiety alleged asrainst it: as 
it seems to have a tendency to call in question 
the benevolence of Providence. In answer 
to the loud and general outcry which this pro- 



duction occasioned. Lord Byron observed, in 
a letter to his publisher, " If 'Cain' be blas- 
phemojis, ' Paradise I -osf i> blasphemous, and 
the words of the Oxford genHeman, ' Evil, lie 
thou my good,' are from that very poi m from 
the mouth of Satan ; and is there anything 
more in that of Lucifer in the mystery? 
1 Cain' is nofhihg more than a drama, not a 
piece of argument: if Lucifer and Cain speak 
as the first rebel and first murderer may be 
supposed to speak', nearly all the rest of -the 
personages talk also according to their char- 
acters; and the stronger passions have ever 
been permitted to the drama. I have avoided 
introducing the Deity as in Scripture, though 
Milton does, and riot very wisely either: but 
have adopted his angel as vent to Cain instead, 
on purpose to avoid shocking any feelings on 
the subject, by falling short of what all unin- 
spired men must fall short in, viz. giving an 
adequate notion of the effect of th<- presence 
of Jehovah. The old mysteries introduced 
him liberally enough, and all this I avoided in 
the new one." 

An event occurred at Bavenna during his 
lordship's stay there, which ma.de a deep im- 
pression on him, and to which he alludes in 
the fifth canto of Don Juan. The military 
commandant of the place, who, though sus- 
pected of being secretly a Carbonaro, was 
too powerful a man to be arrested, was 
sinated opposite to Lord Byron's palace. His 
lordship had his foot in the stirrup at the usual 
hour of exercise, when his horse started at 
the report of a gun : on looking up. Lord By- 
ron perceived a man throw down n carbine 
and run away at full speed, and another man 
stretched upon the pavement a t'f\v yards from 
himself; it was the unhappy commandant. A 
crowd was soon collected, but no one ventured 
to offer the least assistance. Lord Byron di- 
rected his servant to lift up the bleeding body, 
and cany it into his palace ; though it was 
represented to him that by doing so he would 
confirm the suspicion, which was already en- 
tertained, of his belonging to the same party. 
Such an apprehension could have no effect on 
Byron's mind, when an act of humanity was 
to be performed ; he assisted in bearing i\\e 
victim of assassination into the bouse, and 
putting him on a bed. He was already dead 
from several wounds : "he appeared to have 
breathed his last without a struggle," said his 
lordship, when afterwards recounting the af- 
fair. "I never saw a countenance so calm. 
His adjutant followed the corpse intotho housej 
I remember his lamentation over him: — 
Povero diavolo! non nvc\ a fatta made, anebe 
ad un cane.' " The Following were the noble 
writer's poetical reflections (in Don Juan] on 
viewing the dead bod '. 

" I gazed (as oft I sazed the smrip) 

To try it" I could wrench aught out of death, 
Which slionM confirm, or shake, or make a faith , 
But it was all a mystery : — here we arc, 

\<.' there we go: — !>nt where? Five bits of lead. 
Or three, or two, or one} ten I very far. 

Ami is this bloo I, theft, I'urniM but to he shed? 
Can every element <>'ir elements mar? 
And air, earth, water, fire, — live, and we dead • 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



\V. whose minds comprehend all things ? — No more : 
Bui let U-; lo the rtory is before.' 1 

That ;i being of such glorious capabilities 
should abstractedly, and without an attempt 
to tbrow the responsibility on a fictitious per- 
owcd such start ling doubts, 
: daring » nich, « hatev%r might tin n have 
been his private opinion, he ought dot to have 
hazarded. 

•• li i- difficult," observes Captain Medwin, 
"to judge, frorp ''"' contradictor nature of 
his writings, what the religious opinions of 
Lord Byron realty were From tneconver- 
Bati 'ii> I held with bim ; on the whole, I am 
inclined to think, that if he were occasionally 
sciptinii, and thought it, as he says in Don 
Juan, 

' A pleasant voyage, perhaps, to float 

Like Pyrrho, in a sea of speculation,' 

yet his wavering never amounted to adishe- 
iii f in [he divine Founder of Christianity. 

"Calling "ii him cue day," continues the 
Captain, "we found him, as. was sometimes 
the case, silent, dull, and Sombre. At length 

he -aid: ■ Here isfa little book somebody has 

Bent me about Christianity, that has made me 
very uncomfortable; the reasoning seems to 
me very strong, the proofs are very stagger- 
ing. I don't think you can answer it. Shelley. 
; I am sure I can't, and what is more, I 
don't wisli it.' 

"Speaking of Gibbon, Lord Byron said: 

'L — B thought the question set at rest 

in the History of the I )e< line and Fall, but I 
am not so easily convinced* It is not a matter 
of volition to unbelieve. Who likes to own 
that he has heen a fool all his life, — to unlearn 
all that he has been taught in his youth, or 
can think that some of the best men that ever 
luted have been fools? I don't know why I am 
considered an unbeliever. I disowned, the 
Other day, that I was of Shelley's school in 
metaphysics, though I admired his poetry: 
nut but what he has changed his mode of 
thinking very much since he wrote the notes 
to "Queen M;di." which I was accused of 
having a hand in. I know, however, that / 
am considered an infidel. My wife and Bister, 
When they joined parties, Bent me prayer- 
books! There was a Mr. ."Unlock, who went 
about the continent preaching orthodoxy in 
politics and religion, a writer el' had sonnets, 
and a lecturer in worse prose. — he tried to 
convert mc to some new sect of Christianity. 
1I(> was a great anti-materialist, and abused 
Locke. 1 

" On anofuei occasion he said : ' I have just 
received a letter from a .Air. Sheppard, in- 
closin ■ for my welfare hv his 

wife, a few days before her death. The letter 
s'ates that he has had the misfortune to lose 
this amiable woman, who had seen me at 
Rain rate, many years a;:o, rambling among 
I lie «di!l-: that she bad heen impressed with a 
M-ii-e of my irretigion from the tenor of rny 
works, and had often prayed fervently For my 
conversion, particularly in her last moments. 
The prayer is beautifully written. I like de- 



votion in women. She must have been a fli 
vine creature. I pity the man who has los' 
her! I shall write tn him by return of the 
Courier, to condole with him, and tell him that 
Mrs. S. need not have entertained any con- 
cern for my spiritual affair?, for that no mar. 
is more of a Christum than I urn, whalevei 
my Writings may have led her and others to 
Suspect.' " 

AVc have ffiven the above extracts from a 
sei.-e of justice to the memory of Lord By- 
ron : they are redeeming and consolatory evi- 
len«es that his heart was far from being 
sheathed in unassailable scepticism, and, as 
such, ought not to be omitted in a preface to 
his works. 

In the autumn of 1821, the noble bard re- 
moved to Pisa, in Tuscany. He took up his 
residence there in the Lanfranchi palace, and 
engagefl in an intrigue with the beautiful 
Guiccioli, wife of the count of that name, 
ui.uli connexion, with more than his usual 
constancy, he maintained for nearly three 
tears, during which period the countess was 
separated from her husband, on an applica- 
tion from the latter to the Pope. 

The following is a sketch of this " fair en- 
chantress," as taken at the time the liaison 
was formed between her and Byron. " The 
countess is twenty-three years of age, though 
she appears no more than seventeen or eigh- 
teen. Unlike most of the Italian women, her 
complexion is delicately fair. Her eyes, 
large, dark, and languishing, are shaded by 
the longest eyelashes in the world, and her 
hair, which is ungathered on her head, plays 
over her falling shoulders in a profusion of 
natural ringlets of the darkest auburn. Her 
figure is, perhaps, too much embonpoint for 
her height ; bul her bust is perfect. Her 
feature- want little of possessing a Grecian 
regularity of outline; and she lias the most 
beautiful mouth and teeth imaginable. It is 
impossible to sec without admiring — to hear 
the Guiccioli speak without being fascinated. 
ITcr amiability and gentleness show them- 
selves in every intonation of her voice, which, 
and the music of her perfect Italian, gives a 
peculiar (harm to every thing she utters, 
(trace and elegance seem component parts 
of her nature. Notwithstanding that she 
•idon b Lord Byron, it is evident that the ex- 
ile and poverty of her aged father sometimes 
affect her spirits, and throw a shade of melan- 
choly on her countenance, which adds to the 
deep interest this lovely woman creates. Her 
conversation is lively withput being learned; 
she has read all the best authors of her own 
and the French language. She often conceals 
what she knows, from the fear of being thought 
to know too much, possibly from being aw are 
thai laud Byron was not fend of blues. He 
is certainly very much attached to her, with- 
out being actually in love. I T is description 
of the Ceorgioni in the Manfrini palace at 
Venice, is meant for the countess. The heau- 
tiful sonnet prefixed to the 'Prophecy of 
Dante' was addressed to her." 

The annexed lines, written by Byron when 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXV 



ne was about to quit Venice to join the count- 
ess at Ravenna, will show the state of his 
feelings at that time : 

" River ' that roflest by the ancient walls 
Where dwells (lie lady of my love, when she 

Walla by the brink, ami there perchance recalls 
A faint and fleeting memory of me : 

" What if thv deep and ample stream should be 
A mirror of my heart, where she may read 

Tlie thousand thoughts I now betray to thee, 
Wild as thy wave, and headlong as thy speed ? 

" What do I say — a mirror of my heart f 

Are not thy waters sweeping, dark, and strong? 

Such as my feelings were ami are, thou art ; 
And such as thou art, were my passions long. 

" Time may have somewhat tamed them; not for ever 
Thou overflow's! thy hanks ; and not for aye 

Thv bosom overboils, congenial river ! 

Thv floods subside, and mine have sunk away — 

" But left long wrecks behind them, and again 
Home on our old unchanged career, we move ; 

Thou teridest wildly onward to the main, 
And I to loving one I should not love. 

" The current I behold will sweep beneath 
Her native walls, and murmur at her feet ; 

Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe 
The twilight air, unharni'd by summer's heat. 

" Site will look on thee ; I have look'd on thee 
Full of that thought, and from that moment ne'er 

Thv waters could I dream of, name, or see, 
Without the inseparable sigh for her. 

" Iler brinht eyes will be imaged in thy stream ; 

Yes, they will meet the wave I gaze on now : 
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream, 

That happy wave repass me in its How. 

" The wave that bears my tears returns no more : 
Will she return by whom that wave shall sweep ? 

Both tread thv banks, both wander on thy shore ; 
I near thy source, she by the dark-blue deep. 

"But that which kcepcth us apart is not 

Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth, 

But the distraction of a various lot, 
As various as the climates of our birth. 

" A stranger loves a lady of the land, 

Burn tar beyond the mountains, but his blood 

Is all meridian, as if never farm'd 

By the bleak wind that chills the polar flood. 

"My blood is all meridian ; were it not, 
1 had not left my clime ; — I shall not be, 

In spite of tortures ne'er to be forgot, 
A slave again of love, at least of thee. 

" "T is vain to struggle — let me perish young — 
Live as I lived, and love as I have loved : 

To dust if I return, from dust I sprung, 
And then at least my heart can ne'er be moved." 

It is impossible to conceive a more unvaried 
life than Lord Byron led at this period in the 
of a few select friends. Billiards, con- 
versation, or reading, filled up the intervals 
till it was time to take the evening-drive, ride, 
ami pistol-practice. 

II' dined at half an hour after sunset, then 
drove to Count Gamba's, the Countess Gliic- 
cioli's father, passed several hours in her so- 
ciety, returned to his palace, and either read 

IThoPo. 
C 4 



or wrote till two or three in the morning; 
occasionally drinking spirils diluted with wa- 
ter as a medicine, from a dread of a nephritic 
complaint, to which he was, or fancied him- 
self. subject> 

While Lord Byron resided at Pisa, a seri- 
ous affray occurred, in which he was person- 
ally concerned. Taking bis usual ride, with 
some friends, one of them was violently jostled 
by a scrjeant-major of hussars, who dashed, 
at full speed, through the midst of the party. 
They pursued and overtook him near the 
Piaggia gate ; but their remonstrances were 
answered only by abuse and menace, and an 
■attempt, on the part of the guard at the gate, 
to arrest them. This occasioned a severe 
scuffle, in which several of Lord Byron's party 
were wounded, as was also the hussar. The 
consequence was. that all Lord Hymn's ser- 
vants (who were warmly attached to him. and 
had shown great ardour in his defence), were 
banished from Pisa; and with them the Counts 
Gamba, father and son. Lord Byron was him- 
self advised to leave it; and as the countess 
accompanied her father, he soon after joined 
them at Leghorn, and passed six weeks at 
Monte Nero. His return to Pisa was occa- 
sioned by a new persecution of the Counts 
Gamba. An order was issued for them to 
leave the Tuscan states in four days ; ana 
after their embarkation for Genoa, the count- 
ess and Lord Byron openly lived together, a* 
the Lanfrancbi palace. 

It was at Pisa that Byron wrote " Werner," 
a tragedy; the "Deformed Transformed," 
and continued his " Don Juan" to the end of 
the sixteenth canto. We venture to intro- 
duce here the following critical summary of 
this wonderful production of genius. 

The poem of Don Juan has all sorts of 
faults, many of which cannot be defended, 
and some of which are disgusting; but it has, 
also, almost every sort of poetical merit : there 
are in it some of the finest passages Lord By- 
ron ever wrote ; there is amazing knowledge 
of human nature in it; there is exquisite hu- 
mour; tliere is freedom, and bound, and vig- 
our of narrative, imagery, sentiment, and style, 
which are admirable ; there is a vast fertility 
of deep, extensive, and original thought ; and 
at the same time, there is the profusion of a 
prompt and most richly-stored memory. The 
invention is lively and poetical ; the descrip- 
tions are brilliant and glowing, yet not over- 
wrought, but fresh from nature, and faithful 
to her colours; and the prevalent character 
of the whole, (bating too many dark spots), 
not dispiriting, though gloomy, not misan- 
thropic, though bitter; and not icpulsive to 
(he visions of poetical enthusiasm, though 
indignant and resentful. 

Lord Byron's acquaintance with Leign 
Hunt, the late editorof the I'.xaininer, origin- 
ated in his grateful feeling for the manner in 
which Mr. Hunt stood forward inhisjustifi 
cation, at a time when the current of public 
opinion ran strongly against him. This feel- 
ing induced him to invite Mr. Hunt to the 
Lanfrancbi palace, where a suite of apart- 
menls were fitted up for him. On his arrival 



X\\ I 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



in the sprin i periodica] publication 

iroiected, under the title of " Tii 
eral, of which limit was to I"' the editor, 
and t" which Lord Byron and Percy Shelley 
(who had been residing for some time on terms 
with his lordship] were to 
.niti'. Three numbers. of the Liberal" 
published in London, when, i" conse- 
quence of the unhappy fate of Mr. Shelley, 
(who perished in the Mediterranean by the 
upsetting of a boat), and of other discouraging 
aces, it was discontinued. 
Byron atten led the funeral of his poet- 
friend; the following description of which, 
by a person who was present, is not without 
interest : — 
•• 18th Vugtlst, 1822, — On (he occasion of 
iy's melancholy fate, I revisited Pisa, 
and pn tbe.daj of rhy arrival, learnl thai Lord 
Byron was gone to th<' sea-shore, to assist in 
perforating the last offices to his friend. W e 
•.it marked by an old and withered 
(runk of a Gr-tree, an I o< ar it. on the 
stood a solitary hut oovered with reeds. The 
situation was well calculated for a poet's grav e, 
A few weeks before, I had ridden with him 
and Lord Byron to this very .spot, which 1 af- 
terwards Visited more than once. In front 
was a Mvunificcnt extent of the blue aqd 
windless Mediterranean, with the isles of Elba 
i i, — Lord Byron's yacht at anchor 

tig: on the other side an almost 
boundless extent of sandy wilderness, uncul- 
ti\ ,il • 1 and uninhabited, here and there inter- 
spersed in tufts with underwood curved by 
(lie sea-breeze, and stunted by 'the barren and 
dry nature' of the soil in which it grew. At 
distances along the coast stood high 
square low ers, for the double purpose of guard- 
ing the coast from smuggling, and enforcing 
the quarantine laws. This yen- was hounded 
by an immense extent of the Italian Alps. 
which are here particularly picturesque from 

oleanic and manifold appearance-, and 
which, being composed of white marble, give 
their summits the appearance of snow. As a 
foreground to this picture appeared as extra- 
ordinary a group. Lord Byron and Trehwnev 

i en standing over the burning pile, 'with 

C»f the soldiers of the guard ; and Leigh 

limit, whose feelings and nerves could not 

carry him through the scene of horror, lying 

rriage, — the four post-horses 

io drop with the intensity of the noon- 

lin. The -1 illness of all around v 
fell by the shrill sell am of a 

curlew, which, perhaps attracted by the body. 

wheeled in such narrow circles round (he 

it migjhjl have been struck with the 

ban I, ■ fearless that it could nol be 

driven away. Looking at the corpse, Lord 
Byron said : — Why, that old black "-ill; 

its form better than that hu- 
man body !' Scarcely n as the ci ren ony con- 
cluded, when Lord Byron, agitated by the 
spectacle he bad " itnessed, tried to di 
in some degree the impression of it by Ids fa- 
vourite recreation. Ho took off his clothes, 
therefore, and swam to the yacht, which was 



riding a tew miles distant. The heat of (he 
vim and checked perspiration threw him into 

a fever, H Inch he fell coming on before h. Id 

the water, and which became more violent 

lei,,,,' he reached Lisa. On his return, he 
immediately took a w arm bath, and the next 

morning was perfectly recovered." 

The enmity between Byron and Souther, 

the poet-laun ate. is as well known as that be- 
tween Pope and C.olley Cibber. '/heir poli- 
tics W< re diametrically opposite, and the n( 1 le 

bard regarded the bard of royalty as a reoe- 
gado from his early principles. It was not, 

however, so much on account of political 
principles that the enmity between Byron ami 
Southey was kept up. The peer, in his satire, 
had handled the epics of the laureate " too 

roughly," apd this the latter deeply resented. 
Whilst travelling on the continent, Southey 
observed Sbelley'fi name in the Album, at 
Mont Anvert, with "A0to$" written after it, 
and an indignant comment in the same lan- 
guage written under it; also the names of some 
of I !y ron's other friends. The laureate, it is 
said, copied the names and the Comment, and, 

on his return to England, reported the whole 
circumstances, and hesitated not to conclude 
Byron of the same principles as his friends. 
In a poem he subsequently wrote, called the 
'• Vision of Judgment," he stigmatized Lord 
Byron as the father of the " Satanic School 
of Poetry." J lis lordship, in a note appended 
to the "Two Foscari," retorted in a. wry se- 
vere maimer, and even permitted himself to 
ridicule Southey's wife, the sister of Cole- 
ridge's wife, they having been at one time 
" two milliners of Bath." The laureate wrote 
an answer to this note in the Courier news- 
paper, which, when Byron saw it. enraged 
him so much, that he consulted with his friends, 
whether or not he ought to go to England to 
answer it personally. In cooler moments, 
however, he resolved merely to write his 
" Vision of Judgment," which was a parody 
on Southey's, and appeared in one of the num- 
ber- of the "Liberal," for which Hunt, the 
publisher, was prosecuted by the "Constitu- 
tional Association," and found guilty. 

As some of our readers may be curious to 

know the rate at which Lord llyion \\ as paid 
for his productions, we annex the following 
statement, by Mr. Murray, the bookseller, of 
the sums given by him for the copy-rights of 
most of his lord-hip s works: 

Cliil.lc Harold, I. II 600/. 

, HI 1,575 

— , IV 2,100 

Giaour 

Bride of Abydos 

r 525 

t ira 701) 

; Corinth £-jj 

Parisina 525 

L&mi hi ..)' Taaso 315, 

Manfred 



I). hi Juan, I. II 

, III. IV. V 1,525 

Doge of Venice 1,050 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXVII 



Sardanapalus, Cain, and Foscari, 

Mazeppa ■ 

Prisoner of Chillon 

Sundries 



1,100/. 
525 
525 
450 



Total 10,455/. 

As is the case with many men in Sffliu -nl 
c-i.eumstances, Byron was at times more than 
generous; and again, at other times, what 
might he called mean. lie once borrowed 
501)/. in order to give it to the widow of one 
who had been his frfend; he frequently dined 
on five Bauls, and once gave his hills to a lady 
to be examined, because he thought he was 
cheated, lie gave 1000/. for a yacht, which 
he sold again for 300/., and refused to give the 
sailors their jackets. It ought, however, to be 
observed, that generosity was natural to him, 
and that his avarice, if it can be so termed, 
was a mere whim or caprice of the moment — 
a role he could not long sustain. He once 
borrowed 100/. to give to the brother-in-law 
of Southey, Coleridge, the poet, when the 
latter was in distress. In his quarrel with the 
laureate, he was provoked to allude to this 
circumstance, which certainly he ought not 
to have done. 

Byron was a great admirer of the Waverley 
novels, and never travelled without them. 
" They are," said he to Captain Medwin one 
day, " a library in themselves, — a perfect lite- 
rary treasure. I could read them once a-ycar 
with new pleasure." During that morning, 
he had been reading one of Sir Walter's nov- 
els, and delivered, according to Medwin, the 
following criticism: "How difficult it is to 
say any thing new ! Who was that voluptuary 
of antiquity, who offered a reward for a new 
pleasure? Perhaps all nature and art could 
not supply a new idea." 

The anxious and paternal tenderness Lord 
Byron felt for his daughter, is expressed with 
unequalled beauty and pathos in the first 
stanza of the third canto of Childe Harold. 
" What do you think of Ada?" said he to Med- 
win, looking earnestly at his daughter's minia- 
ture, that hung by the side of his writing-ta- 
ble. " They tell me she is like me — but she 
has her mother's eyes. It is very odd that my 
mother was an only child ; — I am an only child: 
my wife is an only child; and Ada is an only 
child. It is a singular coincidence; that is 
the least that can he said of it. I can't help 
thinking it was destined to be so ; and perhaps 
it is best. I was once anxious for a son ; but, 
after our separation, was glad to have had a 
daughter; for it would have distressed me too 
much to have taken him away from Lady By- 
ron, and I could not have trusted her with a 
son's education. I have no idea of hoys being 
brought up by mothers. I suffered too much 
from that myself: and then, wandering about 
the world as I do, I could not take proper care 
of a child; otherwise I should not have lefl 
Allegra, poor little thing! at Ravenna. She 
has been a great resource to me, (hough I am 
not so fond of her as of Ada : and \( t I mean 
to make their fortunes equal — there will be 
enough for them both. I have desired in my 
will that Allegra shall not marry an English- 



man. The Irish and Scotch make better hus- 
bands than we do. You will think it was an 
odd fancy: but I was not in the best of hu- 
mours with my countrymen at that moment 
— you know the reason. I am told that Ada 
is a little termagant ; I hope not. I shall write 
to my sister to know if this is the case: per- 
haps I am wrong in letting Lady Byron have 
entirely her own way in her education. I hear 
that my name is not mentioned in her pres- 
ence ; that a green curtain is always kept 
over my portrait, as over something forbidden; 
and that she is not to know that she has a 
father till she comes of age. Of course she 
will he taught to hate me; she will be brought 
up to it. Lady Uyron is conscious of all this, 
and is afraid that I shall some day carry off 
her daughter by stealth or force. I might 
claim her of the Chancellor, without hai ins 
recourse to either one or the other; but I had 
rather be unhappy myself than make her 
mother so; probably. I shall never s C c her 
again." Here he opened his writing-desk 
and showed Captain Medwin some hair, which 
he told him was his child's. 

Several years ago, Lord Byron presented 
Ids friend," Mr. Thomas Moore, with his 
M Memoirs," written by himself, with an un- 
derstanding that they were not to be publish- 
ed until after his death. Mr. Moore, with the 
consent, and at the desire of Lord Byron, sold 
the manuscript to Mr. Murray, the booksi ll< f, 
for the sum of two thousand guineas. The 
following statement by Mr. Moore, will how- 
ever show its fate: ''Without entering into 
the respective claims of Mr. Murray and my- 
self to the property in these memoirs, (a 
question which now that they arc destroyed 
can be but of little moment to any one), it is 
sufficient to sav, that, believing the manuscript 
still to be mine, 1 placed it at the disposal of 
Lord Byron's sister, Mrs. Leigh, with the sole 
reservation of a protest against its total de 
struction ; at least, without previous perusal 
and consultation among the parties. The ma- 
jority of the persons present disagreed with 
this opinion, and it was the only point upon 
which there did exist any difference between 
us. The manuscript was accordingly torn 
and burnt before our eyes, and I immediately 
paid to Mr. Murray, in the presence of the 
gentlemen assembled, two thousand guineas, 
with interest, etc., being the amount of what 
I owed him upon the security of my bond, 
and for which I now stand indebted to my 
publishers, Messrs. Longman and Co. 

l i Since then, the family of Lord Byron have, 
in a manner highly honourable to themsi i\ 1 s, 
proposed an arrangement, by which the SUfn 
thus paid to Mr. Murray might lie reimburs- 
ed me; but from feejmgs and considerations^ 
wlmli ii is unnecessary hereto explain,! have 
respectfully, hut peremptorily, declined their 
offer. 

One evening, after a dinner-party at the. 
Lanfranchi palace, his lordship wrote the fol- 
lowing drinking--. 

" Fill the goblet again, for I never before 

Fell the glow thai now gladdens my heart to its r.oie • 



1 



xxvni 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



Lei ut drink— who would not? since, llirouyli life's 

varied round, 
In tfafl goWel alone no deception is found. 

" 1 have tried, in its turn, aO that life can supply ; 
I have bask'd in the beams of ;i darii rolling eve ; 
I have loved — who has not/ hut what tongue wiU 

declare 
That pleasure existed while passion was there ? 

"In the days of our youth, when the heart's in its 

And dreams that affection ran never take wing, 
I had ti i, a N— who has not / but what tongue will 

avow 
That friends, rosy wine, are so faithful as thou ? 

"The breast of a mistress some boy may estrange, 
Friendship shifts with the sun-heam, thou never canst 

change ; 
Thou grow'st old— who docs not ? but on earth w hat 

tears, 
V. virtues, like thine, but increase with our years. 

"Yet if blest to the utmost that love can bestow, 
Should a rival bow down to our idol below, 

] — who's not 1 thou ha-t no such alloy, 
For the more that enjoy thee, the more they enjoy. 

"When the season of youth and its jollity's past, 
For refuge we tly to the goblet at lust, 
Tie ii we find — who does not ? in the flow of the soul, 
That truth, as of yore, is confined to the howl. 

" When the box of Pandora was opened on earth, 
Ami Memory's triumph commenced over Mirth, 
Hope was left — was she not? but the goblet we kiss, 
And care not for Hope, who are certain of bliss. 

" Long life to the grape ! and when summer is flown, 
The age of our nectar shall gladden my own. 
We must die — who does not t may our sins be forgiven! 
And Hebe shall never be idle in heaven." 

Before we close the details of what may be 
termed Lord Hymn's poetical life — before we 
enter on the painfully interesting particulars 
connected with the last and noblest part he 
pei formed in bis brilliant but brief career — 
we beg leave to introduce the following sum- 
mary of his character : 

Tliere seems to have been something of a 
magical antidote in Lord Byron's genius to 
the strange propensities to evil arising both 
from his natural passions and temper, and the 
accidental unpropitious circumstances of his 
life. In no man were good and evil mingled 
in such strange intimacy, and in such strange 
proportions. His passions were extraordina- 
rily violent and fierce; and his temper, un- 
easy, bitter, and capricious. His pride was 
deep and gloomy, and his ambition ardent and 
Uncontrollable. All these were exactly such 
as the fortuitous position of his infancy, boy- 
hood, and first manhood, tended to aggravate 
by discouragements, crosses, and mortifica- 
tions. I le was directly and immediately sprufag 
from a stock of old nobility, of a historic 
name, of venerahle antiquity. All his alli- 
ances, including his father, had moved in high 
society. But this (jay father died, improi idenl 
or reckless of the future, and left him to.waste 
his childhood m poverty and dereliction, in 
.he remote town of Aberdeen, among the few 
liaternal relations who yet would not utterly 
abandon his mother's shipwrecked fortunes. 



At the age of six years he became presump- 
tive heir to the family peerage, and at the age 
of ten the peerage devolved on him. lie then 
nt to the public school of Harrow ; but 
neither hi^ person, his acquired habits, his 
scholarship, nor his temper, fitted him fortius 
strange arena. A peer, not immediately is- 
suing from the fashionable circles, and not as 
rich as foolish boys suppose a peer ought to 
be, must have a wonderful tact of society, and 
a managing, bending, intriguing temper, to 
play bja part with eclat, or with comfort, or 
even without degradation. All the treatment 
which Lord Byron now received, confirmed 
the bitterness of a disposition and feelings 
naturally sour, and already augmented by 
chilling solitude, or an uncongenial sphere of 
society. 

To a mind endowed with intense sensibility 
and unextinguishahle ambition, these circum- 
stances operated in cherishing melancholy, 
and even misanthropy. They bred an intract- 
ability to the light humours, the heartless 
cheerfulness, and all the artillery of unthink- 
ing emptiness by which the energies of the 
bosom are damped and broken. There were 
implanted within him the seeds of profound 
reflection and emotion, which grew in him to 
such strength, that the tamencss, the petty 
passions, and frivolous desires of mankind in 
their ordinary intercourses of pleasure and 
dissipation, could never long retain him in 
their chains without weariness and disgust, 
even when they courted, dandled, Battered- 
and admired him. lie was unskilled in their 
pitiful accomplishments, and disdained the 
trifling aims of their vanity, and the test- of 
excellence by which they were actuated, and 
by which they judged, lie never, therefore. 
enjoyed their blandishments, and, ere long, 
broke like a giant from their bonds. 

There can be no doubt, that disappoint- 
ments, working on a sombre temper, and the 
consequent melancholy and sensitiveness, aid- 
in g, and aided by, the spells of the muse, were 
Lord Hymn's preservatives; at least, that they 
produced redeeming splendours, and moments 
ot" pure and untainted intellect, and exalting 
ebullitions of grand or tender sentiment, ox 
noble passion, which, by tits at hast, if not 
always, adorned his compositions, and will for 
r\rr electrify and elevate his readers. 

1 1. nl Lord Byron succeeded in the ordinary 
way to his peerage, accompanied by the usual 
circumstances of prosperity and ease, — had 
nothing occurred capable of stimulating tc 
strong personal exertions, the mighty seeds 
within him had probably been worse than 
neutral— they bad worked to unqualified mis- 
chief! In many cases, this is not the effect of 
prosperity; but Lord Byron's qualities were 
of a very peculiar cast, as well as intense and 
unrivalled in degree. 

^ hen. in the spring of 1816, Lord Byron 
quitted England, to return to it no more, he 
had a dark, perilous, and appalling prospect 
before him. The chances against the t\\)f fu- 
ture use of his miraculous and fearful gifts of 
genius, poisoned and frenzied as the] Were by 
blighted hopes, and all the evil incidents which 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXIX 



had befallen Mm, were too numerous to be 
calculated without overwhelming dismay ! 
Few persons, of a sensibility a little above the 
common, would have escaped the pit of black 
and unmitigated despondence ! But Lord By- 
ron's elasticity of mind recovered itself, and 
soon rose to far higher conceptions and per- 
formances thaii before. He passed the sum- 
mer upon the hanks of the lake of Geneva! 
With what enthusiasm he enjoyed, and with 
vrhal contemplations he dwelt among its scene- 
ry, his own poetry soon exhibited to the world! 
lie has been censured for his peculiarities, 
his unsocial life, ana his disregard of the habits, 
the deeorums, and the civilities of the world, 
and op the rank to which he belonged. He 
might have pleaded, that the world rejected 
him, and he the world; but the charge is idle 
in itself, admitting it to have originated with 
his own will. A man has a right to live in 
solitude, if he chooses it; and, above all, he 
who "ives such fruits of his solitude ! 

In the autumn of 1822, Lord Byron quitted 
Pisa, and went to Genoa, where lie remained 
throughout the winter. A letter written by 
his lordship, while at Genoa, is singularly 
honourable to him, and is the more entitled to 
notice, as it tends to diminish the credibility 
of an assertion made since his death, that he 
could bear no rival in fame, but instantly be- 
came animated with a bitter jealousy and ha- 
tred of any person who attracted the public 
attention from himself. If there be a living 
being towards whom, according to that state- 
ment. Lord Byron would have experienced 
such a sentiment, it must be the presumed 
author of " Waverlev." And yet, in a letter 
to Monsieur Beyle, dated May 29, 1823, the 
following are the just and liberal expressions 
used by Lord Byron, in adverting to a pam- 
phlet which had been recently published by 
Monsieur Beyle : 

" There is one part of your observations in 
the pamphlet whicli I shall venture to remark 
upon : — it regards Walter Scott. You say that 
his character is little worthy of enthusiasm,' 
at the same time that you mention his produc- 
tions in the manner they deserve. I have 
known Walter Scott long and well, and in 
occasional situations which call forth the real 
character, and I can assure you that his char- 
acter is worthy of admiration ; — that, of all 
men, he is the most open, the most honour- 
able, the most amiable. With his politics I 
hare nothing to do : they differ from mine, 
which renders it difficult for me to speak of 
them. But he is perfectly sincere in them, and 
sincerity may be humble, but she cannot be 
servile. I pray you, therefore, to correct or 
soften that passage. You may, perhaps, at- 
tribute this officiousness of mine to a false 
affectation of candour, as I happen to be a 
writer also. Attribute it to what motive you 
please, but believe the truth. I say that Wal- 
ter Scott is as nearly a thorough good man as 
man can be, because I know it by experience 
to be the case." 

The motives which ultimately induced Lord 
Byron to leave Italy, and join the Greeks, 
struggling for emancipation, are sufficiently 
c 2 



obvious. It was in Greece that his high po- 
etical faculties had been first fully developed. 
Greece, a land of the most venerable and il- 
lustrious history of peculiarly grand and 
beautiful scenery, inhabited by various races 
of the most wild and picturesque manners, 
was to him the land of excitement, — never- 
cloying, never-wearying, never-changing ex- 
citement. It was necessarily the chosen and 
favourite spot of a man of powerful and orig- 
inal intellect, of quick and sensible feelings, 
of a restless and untameable spirit, of various 
information, and who, above all, was satiated 
with common enjoyments, mid disgusted with 
what appeared to him to be the formality, hy- 
pocrisy, and sameness of daily life. Dwelling 
upon that country, as it is clear from all Lord 
Hyron's writings he did, with the fondest so- 
licitude, and being, as he Mas well known to 
be, an ardent, though, perhaps, not a very sys- 
tematic lover of freedom, he could be no un- 
concerned spectator of its recent revolution : 
and as soon as it seemed to him that his pres- 
ence might be useful, he prepared to visit 
once more the shores of Greece. It is not 
improbable, also, that he had become ambi- 
tious of a name as distinguished for deeds as 
it was already by his writings. A glorious and 
novel career apparently presented itself, and 
he determined to try the event. 

Lerd Byron embarked at Leghorn, and ar- 
rived in Cephalonia in the early part of Au- 
gust, 1823, attended by a suite of six or seven 
friends, in an English vessel, (the Hercules 
Captain Scott), which he had chartered for 
the express purpose of taking him to Greece. 
His lordship had never seen any of the vol- 
canic mountains, and for this purpose the ves 
sel deviated from its regular course, in order 
to pass the island of Stromboli, and lay off that 
place a whole night, in the hopes of witness- 
ing the usual phenomena, but, for the first time 
within the memory of man, the volcano emit- 
ted no fire. The disappointed poet was obliged 
to proceed, in no good humour with the fabled 
forge of Vulcan. 

Greece, though with a fair prospect of ulti- 
mate triumph, was at that time in an unsettled 
state. The third campaign had commenced, 
with several instances of distinguished suc- 
cess — her arms were every where victorious, 
but her councils were distracted. Western 
Greecewas in aciitical situation, and although 
the heroic Marco Botzaris had not fallen in 
vain, yet the glorious enterprise in which he 
perished, only checked, and did not prevent 
the advance of the Turks towards Anatolica 
and Missolonghi. This gallant chiefs worthy 
of the best days of Greece, hailed with trans 
port Lord Byron's arrival in that Country, and 
liis last act, before proceeding to the attack. 
in which he fell, was to write a warm invita- 
tion for his lordship to come to Missolonghi. 
In his letter, which he addressed to a friend .it 
Missolonghi, Botzaris alludes to almost the 
first proceeding of Lord Byron in Greece, 
which was the arming and provisioning of 
forty Suliotes, whom he sent to join in the de- 
fence of Missolonghi. After the battle. Lord 
Byron transmitted banduges and mcd : cinca 



XXX 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



of which lie had brOBgbt a lame store from 
li:ih .ami pecuniary Buocour to those who bad 
been wounded. He had already made a very 
generous offer to the government He Bays, 
in a letter, " I offered to advance a thousand 
dollars a month, for the succour of Misso- 
longhi, anl the Suliptea under Botzaris (since 
hilled); bul the government have answered 

me through of this island, that they wish 

to confer with me previously, which is, in feet, 
saying they wish " 1C t( > spend my moDej in 
some, other direction. I will take care that it 
i- for the public cause, otherwise I will not 
advance a para. The opposition say they 
want to cajole me, and the party in power Bay 

the others u i>h to Beduce me : so. between the 
twp, I bave a difficult part to play: however. 
I will have Dothing to do with the factions, 
unless to reconcile them, if possible." 

Lord Byron established bimself for some 
time at the small village of Metaxata, in 
Cephalonia, and despatched two friends, Mr. 

'.my ami Mr. Hamilton Browne, with 
a letter to the Greek government, in order to 
collect intelligence as to the real state of 
things. I lis lordship's generosity was limps! 
daily exercised in his new Neighbourhood. He 
I I'm many Italian families in distress, 
and even indulged the people of the country 
in paying for the religious ceremonies which 

le 1 essential to their success. 

In the meanwhile, Lord Byron's friends 

lea to Tripolitza, and found Coloco- 

troni (the enemy of Mavrocordato, who had 

lied to flee from the presidency) 

■ I power: his palace was filled with 
arm id men, like the castle of some ancient 
feudal chief, and a good idea of his character 
may be formed from the language he held. lie 
declared thai be had told Mavrocordato, that 
unless he desisted from his intrigues, he would 

Sut him on an ass and whip him out of the 
iorea, and that he had only been withheld 
from doing so by the representation of his 
friends, who had said that it would injure the 
cause. 

They next proceeded to Salamis, where the 
congress was Bitting, and Mr. Trelawney 
agreed to accompany Odysseus, a brave moun- 
tain chief, into Negropont. At this time the 
Greeks /were oreparing for many active en- 
terprises. Marco Botzaris' brother, with his 
Suliotes and Mavrocordato. were to take 
charge of IVfissolongbi, which, at that time, 

t October., I .';-'•'•)• was in a very critical state, 
>ein<j blockaded both by land and sea. " There 
have been," Bays Mr. Trelawney, "thirty bat- 
tles fought and won by the late Marco Bot- 
zaris, and his gallant tribe of Suliotes, who 
are si, nt up in Missolonghi. If it fall, Athens 
will be in danger, and thousands of throats cut. 
A few thousand dollars would provide ships 
to relieve it ; a portion of this sum is raised 
and I would coin my heart to save this key of 
Greece!" A report like this was sufficient to 
show the point where succour was mosl need 
"I, an I Lord Byron's determination to relieve 
Missolonghi, was still more decidedly con- 
firmed bv a letter, which he received from 
Mavrocordato. 



Mavrocordato was at this time endeavour 
ing to collect a fleet for the relief of Misso- 
longhi, and Lord Byron generously offered to 

. i 1 1 \ a nee four hum I red thousand pia-t res (about 
I 2,000/.] to pay for fitting it out. In a letter in 
which he announced llns his noble intention, 
he alluded to the dissensions in Greece, and 
stated, that if these continued, all hope of a 
loan in England, or of assistance, or even good 
H isbea from abroad, w Ould lie at an end. 

M 1 must frankly confess," he says in his 
letter, " that unless union and order are con- 
firmed, all hopes of a loan will be in vain, and 
all the assistance which the Greeks could ex- 
pect from abroad, an assistance which might 
be neither trilling nor worthless, will be sus- 
pended or destroyed : and, what is worse, the 
•Treat powers of Europe, of whom no one was 
an enemy to Greece, but seemed inclined to 
fevOUr her in consenting to the establishment 
of an independent power, will be persuaded 
that the Greeks are unable to govern them- 
selves, and will, perhaps, Ihemselves under- 
take to arrange your disorders in such a way 
as to blast the brightest hopes you indulge, 
and that are indulged by your friends. 

" And allow me to add once for all, I desire 
the well-being of Greece, and nothing else; 
I will do all I can to secure it; but I cannot 
consent — I never will consent to the English 
public, or English individuals being deceived 
as to the real state of Greek affairs. The 
rest, gentlemen, depends on yon; you have 
foughl gloriously ; act honourably towards 
your fellow-citizens, and towards the world, 
and then it will no more be said, as lias been 
repealed for two thousand years, with the Bo- 
man historian, that Philopa-mcn was the last 
of the Grecians. Let not calumny itself (and 
it is difficult to guard against it in so difficult 
a Btruggle] compare the Turkish Pacha with 
the patriot Greek in peace, after you have 
exterminated him in war." 

The dissensions among the Greek chiefs 
evidently gave great pain to Lord Byron, 
whose sensibility was keenly affected by the 
slightest circumstance which he considered 
likely to retard the deliverance of Greece. 
" I 'or my part." he observes, in another of his 
letters, "I will stick by the cause, while a 
plank remains which can be honourably clung 
to; if I qui! it, it will be by the Greeks' con- 
duct, and not the Holy Allies, or the holier 
Mussulmans." In a letter to his banker at 
( 'ephalonia,he says : " I hope things here will 
go well, some time or other; I will stick by 
the cause as long as a cause exists." 

His playful humour sometimes broke out 
amidst the deep anxiety he felt for the suc- 
cess of the Greeks. He ridiculed, with great 
pleasantry, some of the supplies which had 
been sent out from England by the Greek 
committee. In one of his letters, also, after 
alluding to his having advanced 4,000/., and. 
expecting to he called on for 4,000/. more, he 
gays : " I low can I refuse, if they (the Greeks) 
will fight, and especially if I should happen 
to be in their company r I therefore request 
and require thai you should apprise my trusty 
land trustworthy trustee and banker, anil 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXXI 



crown and sheet-anchor, Douglas Kinnaird 
the honourable, that he prepare all moneys of 
mine, including the purchase-money of Roch- 
dale manor, and mine income for the year A. 
D. 1824, to answer and anticipate any orders 
or drafts of mine, for the good cause, in good 
and lawful money of Great Britain, etc. etc. 
etc. Mav you live a thousand years ! which 
is nine hundred and ninety-nine longer than 
the Spanish Cortes constitution." 

All being ready, two Ionian vessels were 
ordered, and, embarking his horses and ef- 
fects. Lord Byron sailed from Argostoli on the 
29th of December. At Zante, his lordship 
took a considerable quantity of specie on 
board, aul proceeded towards Missolonghi. 
Two accidents occurred in this short passage. 
Count Gamba, who had accompanied his lord- 
ship from Leghorn, had been charged with 
the vessel in which the horses and part of the 
money wevc embarked. When off Chiarcnza, 
a point which lies between Zante and the 
place of their destination, they were surprised 
at daylight on finding themselves under the 
bows of a Turkish frigate. Owing, however, 
to the activity displayed on board Lord By- 
ron's vessel, and her superior sailing, she es- 
caped, while the second was fired at, brought 
to, and carried into Patras. Count Gamba 
and his companions, being taken before Yusuff 
Pacha, fully expected to share the fate of 
some unfortunate men whom that sanguinary 
chief had sacrificed the preceding year at 
Previsa, and their fears would most prob- 
ably have been realized, had it not been for 
the presence of mind displayed by the count, 
who, assuming an air of hauteur and indiffer- 
ence, accused the captain of the frigate of a 
scandalous breach of neutrality, in firing at 
and detaining a vessel under Entrlisji colours, 
and concluded by informing Yusuff, that he 
might expect the vengeance of the British 
government, in thus interrupting a nobleman 
who was merely on his travels, and bound to 
Calamos. The Turkish chief, on recognising 
in the master of the vessel a person who had 
saved his life in the Black Sea fifteen years 
before, not only consented to the vessel's re- 
lease, but treated the whole of the passengers 
with the utmost attention, and even urged 
them to take a day's shooting in the neighbour- 
hood. 

Owing to contrary winds, Lord Byron's ves- 
sel was obliged to take shelter at the Scropes, 
a cluster of rocks within a few miles of Mis- 
solonghi. While detained here, he was in 
considerable danger of being captured by 
the Turks. 

Lord Byron was received at Missolonghi 
with enthusiastic demonstrations of joy. No 
mark of honour or welcome which the Greeks 
could devise was omitted. The ships anchored 
olf the fortress, fired a salute as he passed. 
Prince Mavrocordato, and all the authorities, 
with the troops and the population, met him 
on his landing, and accompanied him to the 
house which had been prepared for him, amidst 
the shouts of the multitude, and the discharge 
of cannon. 
One of the first objects to which he turned 



his attention, was to mitigate the ferocity with 
which the war had been carried on. The very- 
day of his lordship's arrival was signalized by 
his rescuing a Turk, who had fallen into the 
hands of some Greek sailors. The individual 
thus saved, having been clothed by his orders, 
was kept in the house until an opportunity 
occurred of sending him to Patras. Nor had 
his lordship been long at Missolonghi, before 
an opportunity presented itself for showing 
his sense of Yusuff Pacha's moderation in re- 
leasing Count Gamba. Hearing that there 
were four Turkish prisoners in the town, he 
requested that they might be placed in his 
hands. This being immediately granted, he 
sent them to Patras, with a letter addressed 
to the Turkish chief, expressing his hope that 
the prisoners thenceforward taken on both 
sides, would be treated with humanity. This 
act was followed by another equally praise- 
worthy, which proved how anxious Lord By- 
ron felt to 'give a new turn to the system of 
warfare hitherto pursued. A Greek cruiser 
having captured a Turkish boat, in which 
there was a number of passengers, chiefly 
women and children, they were also placed 
in the hands of Lord Byron, at his particular 
request; upon which a vessel was immediately 
hired, and the whole of them, to the number 
of twenty-four, were sent to Previsa, provided 
with every requisite for their comfort dining 
the passage. The Turkish governor of Pre- 
visa thanked his lordship, and assured him, 
that he would take care equal attention should 
be in future shown to the Greeks who might 
become prisoners. 

Another grand objectwith Lord Byron, and 
one which he never ceased to forward with 
the most anxious solicitude, was to reconcile 
the quarrels of the native chiefs, to make them 
friendly and confiding towards one another, 
and submissive to the orders of the govern- 
ment. He had neither time nor opportunity 
to carry this point to any great extent: much 
good was, however, done. 

Lord Byron landed at Missolonghi animated 
with military ardour. After paying the fleet, 
which, indeed, had only come out under the 
expectation of receiving its arrears from the 
loan which he promised to make to the pro- 
visional government, he set about forming a 
brigade of Suliotes. Five hundred of these, 
the bravest and most resolute of the soldiers 
of Greece, were taken into his pay on the 1st 
of January, 1824. An expedition against Le- 
panto was proposed, of which the command 
was. given to Lord Byron. This expedition, 
however, had to experience delay and disap- 
pointment. The Suliotes, concoivingthat they 
liad found a patron whose wealth was inex 
haustible, and whose generosity was bound 
less, determined to make the most of the on 
casion, and proceeded to the most extravagant 
demands on their leader for arrears, and un- 
der other pretences. These mountaineers 
untameablc in the field, and unmanageable in 
a town, were, at this moment, peculiarly dis- 
posed to be obstinate, riotous, and mercenary 
They had been chiefly instrumental in pre 
sening Missolonghi, when besieged the pre 



KXM1 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



rioua autumn by the Turks; had been driven 
fi >m their abode*; and this whole of their 
families mere, al this lime, m the town, des- 
titute of either borne or sufficient supplies. 
Of turbulent and reckless character, the) 
kepi the place in awe ; and Mavrocordato 
having, unlike the other captains, no boI- 

diers of his own, was glad to find a body of 

valiant mercenaries* especially if paid for out 
of the funds of another; and, consequently, 
was not disposed to treat tlicm with harshness. 
Within a fortnight after Lord Byron's arrival, 
a burgher refusing to quarter some Suliotes, 
who rudely demanded entrance into bis house, 
wa- hilled, and a riot ensued, in which some 
In es were lost. Lord Bj ron!s impatient spirit 
could ill brook the delay of a. favourite scheme, 
but he saw, with the utmost chagrin, thai the 
state of his troops »as such as- to render any 
attempt to lead them out at that time imprac- 
• 
The project of proceeding against Lepanto 

being thus suspended, at a moment when Lord 

Byron's enthusiasm was at its height, and when 
lie had fully calculated on striking a blow 
which cquIc not fail to be of the ufmo-sl ser- 
\ ice to the o reek cause, the unlooked-for d is? 
appointment preyed on Ids spirits, and pro- 
duce 1 a degree of irritability, which, if it was 
not the sole cause, contributed greatly to a 
severe fit of epilepsy, with which he w 
tacked on the 1.3th of February. His lordship 
was sitting in the apartment of Colonel Stan- 
hope, talking in a jocular manner with Mr. 
Parry, the engineer, when it was observed, 
from occasional and rapid changes in his coun- 
tenance, that he was suffering under some 
Btrong emotion. On a sudden lie complained 
of a weakness in one of his legs, and rose, but 
finding himself unable to walk, he cried out 
for assistance, He then fell into a state of 
nervous and convulsive agitation, and was 
placed on a bed. For some minutes his coun- 
tenance was much distorted. He however 
quickly recovered his senses, his speech re- 
turned, and he BOOH appeared perfectly Well, 

although enfeebled and exhausted by the vio- 
lence of the simple. During the fit, lie be- 
haved with his usual extraordinary firmness, 
and his efforts in contending with, and at- 
tempting to master, the disease, are described 
as gigantic. In the course of the month, the 
attack was repeated four limes; the violence 
of the disorder, at length, j ieldod to the reme- 
dies which his physicians advised, such as 
bleeding, cold bathing, perfect relaxation of 
mind, etc.. and he gradually recovered. An 
accident, however, happened a few days after 
his first illness, which'Was ill calculated to aid 

the efforts of his medical advisers. A Suliote. 
accompanied by another man, and the late 
Marco Botzaris' little hoy, walked into the 
Seraglio, a place which, before Lord Byron's 
arm al. had been used as a sort of fortress and 

barrack for the Suliotes. and out of which they 
l with great difficulty for the re- 
ception of the committee-stores, and for the 
occupation of the engineers, who required it 

for a laboratory. The sentinel on guard or- 
dered (he Suliote to retire, which being a spe- 



cies of motion to which Suliotes are not ac 
customed, the man carelessly advanced; upon 
which the serjeant of the guard (a German) 

demanded hi- bn-ine-s. and recei\ ing no sat- 
isfactory answerj pushed him back. These 
wild warriors, who will dream for years of a 
blow if revenge is out of their power, are not 
-low to resent e\ en a push. The Suliote struck 
again, the serjeant and he closed and strug- 
gled, when the Suliote <]ve\v a pistol from his 
belt : the serjeant wrenched it out of his hand, 
and blew the powder out of the pan. At this 

i nl, Captain Sass, a Swede, seeing the 

fray, came up, and ordered the man to be ta- 
ken to the guard-room. The Suliote was then 
I to depart, and would have done SO it 

rjeanl would have permitted him. L*n- 
fortunatelj . ( 'aptain Sass did not confine him- 
self to merely giving the order for his arrest; 
for when the" Suliote struggled to get away, 
Captain Sass drew his sword, and struck him 
with the flat part of it ; whereupon the en- 
raged Greek Pew upon him. with a pistol in 
one hand and the sabre in the other, and at 
the same moment nearly cut off the Captain's 
right arm, and shot him through the head. 
mi Sass, who was remarkable for bis 
mild and con raucous character, expired in a 
W-w minutes. The Suliote also was a man of 
distinguished bravery. This was a serious af- 
fair, and great apprehensions were entertained 
that it would not end here. The Suliotes re- 
fusi 1 l" surrender the man to justice, alleging 
that he had been struck, -which, in Suliote 
law, justifies all the consequences which may 
follow. 

In a letter written a few days after Lord 
Byron's first attack, to a friend in Zante, he 
-peaks of himself as rapidly recovering. " 1 
am a good deal better," he observes, " though 
of course weakly. The leeches took too much 
blood from my temples the day after, and there 
was some difficulty in stopping it; but I have 
been up daily, and out in boats or on horse- 
hack. To-day I have taken a warm bath, 
and live as temperately as well can be, with- 
out an Y liquid but water, and without any ani- 
mal food." After adverting to some other 
subjects, the letter thus concludes : '• Matters 
are here a little embroiled with the Suliotes, 
foreigners, etc. ; but 1 still hope better things, 
and will -land by the cause as long as my 
health and circumstances will permit me to 
he supposed useful," 

Notwithstanding Lord LSyron's improvement 
in health. h:s friends felt, from the first, that 
he ought to try a change of air. Missolonghi 
is a flat, marshy, and pestilential place, and. 
except tbr purposes of utility, never would 
have bei n selected for his residence. A gen- 
I leman of /.ante w rote to him early in March, 
to induce him to return to that island for a 
time. To his letter the following answer was 
received : — 

" 1 am exfremely obliged by your offer of 
your country-house, as for all other kindness, 
in case my health should require my removal; 
but I cannot quit Greece while ihere is a 
chance of tny being of (even supposed) utility 
There is a stake worth millions such as I am 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXXlll 



aud while I can stand at all, I must stand by 
the cause. While I say this, I am aware of 
the difficulties, and dissensions, and defects of 
the Greeks themselves : but allowance must 
be made for them by all reasonable people." 
It may he well imagined, after so severe a 
fit of illness, and that in a great measure 
brought on by the conduct of the troops he 
had taken into his pay, and treated with the 
utmost generosity, that Lord Byron was in no 
humour to pursue his scheme against Le- 

Eanto, even supposing that his state of health 
ad been such as to bear the fatigue of a cam- 
paign in Greece. The Suliotes, however, 
showed some signs of repentance, and offered 
to place themselves at his lordship's disposal. 
But still they had an objection to the nature 
of the service : " they would not fight against 
stone walls !" It is not surprising that the ex- 
pedition to Lepanto was no longer thought of. 

In conformity with our plan, we here add a 
selection of anecdotes, etc. connected with 
Lord Byron's residence at Missolonghi. They 
are principally taken from Captain Parry's 
" Last Days of Lord Byron ;" a work which 
seems to us, from its plain and unvarnished 
6tyle, to bear the stamp and impress of truth. 

In speaking of the Greek Committee one 
day, his lordship said — " I conceive that I 
have been already grossly ill-treated by the 
committee. In Italy, Mr. Blaquiere, their 
agent, informed me that every requisite sup- 
ply would be forwarded with all despatch. I 
was disposed to come to Greece, but 1 has- 
tened my departure in consequence of earnest 
solicitations. No time was to be lost, I was 
told, and Mr. Blaquiere, instead of waiting 
on me at his return from Greece, left a paltry 
note, which gave me no information what- 
ever. If I ever meet with him, I shall not fail 
to mention my surprise at his conduct; but it 
has been all of a-piece. I wish the acting 
committee had had some of the trouble which 
has fallen on me since my arrival here ; they 
would have been more prompt in their pro- 
ceedings, and would have known better what 
the country stood in need of. They would not 
have delayed the supplies a day, nor have sent 
out German officers, poor fellows, to starve at 
Missolonghi, but for my assistance. I am a 
plain man, and cannot comprehend the use 
of printing-presses to a people who do not 
read. Here the committee have sent supplies 
of maps, I suppose, that I may teach the young 
mountaineers geography. Here are bugle- 
horns, without buglemen, and it is a chance 
if we can find any body in Greece to blow 
them. Books are sent to a people who want 
guns : they ask for a sword, and the commit- 
tee give them the lever of a printing-press. 
Heavens ! one would think the committee 
meant to inculcate patience and submission, 
and to condemn resistance. Some materials 
for constructing fortifications they have sent, 
but they have chosen their people so ill, that 
the work is deserted, and not one para have 
they sent to procure other labourers. Their 
secretary, Mr. Bowring, was disposed, I be- 
lieve, to claim the privilege of an acquaint- 
ance with me. He wrote me a lone: letter 



about the classic land of freedom, the birth- 
place of the arts, the cradle of genius, the 
babitation of the gods, the heaven of poets, 
and a great many such fine things. I Mas 
obliged to answer him, and I scrawled some 
nonsense in reply to his nonsense ; but I fancy 
I shall get no more such epistles. When I 
came to the conclusion of the poetry part of 
my letter, I wrote, ' so much for blarney, now 
for business.' I have not since heard in the 
same strain from Mr. Bowring." ^ 

" My future intentions," continued he, " as 
to Greece, may be explained in a lew words: 
I will remain here till she is secure against 
the Turks, or till she has fallen under their 
power. All my income shall be spent in her 
service; but, unless driven by some great ne- 
cessity, I will not touch a farthing of the sum 
intended for my sister's children. Whatever 
I can accomplish with my income, and my 
personal exertions, shall be cheerfully done. 
When Greece is secure against external ene- 
mies, I will leave the Greeks to settle their 
government as they like. One service more, 
and an eminent service it will be, I think I 
may perform for them. You, Parry, shall 
have a schooner built for me, or I will buy a 
vessel; the Greeks shall invest me with the 
character of their ambassador or agent ; I will 
go to the United States, and procure that free 
and enlightened government to set the exam- 
ple of recognising the federation of Greece 
as an independent state. This done, England 
must follow the example, and then the fate of 
Greece will be permanently fixed, and she 
will enter into all her lights, as a member of 
the great commonwealth of Christian Eu- 
rope." 

" This," observes Captain Parry, in his plain 
and manly manner, " was Lord Byron's hope 
and this was to be his last project in favour of 
Greece. Into it no motive of personal ambi- 
tion entered, more than that just and proper 
one, the basis of all virtue, and the distin- 
Sguished characteristic of an honourable mind 
— the hope of gaining the approbation of good 
^nen. As an author, he had already attained 
the pinnacle of popularity and of fame ; but 
this did not satisfy his noble ambition. He 
hastened to Greece, with a devotion to liberty, 
and a zeal in favour of the oppressed, as pure 
as ever shone in the bosom of a knight in the 
purest days of chivalry, to gain the reputation 
of an unsullied warrior, and of a disinterested 
statesman. He was by her unpaid, but the 
blessings of all Greece, and the high honours 
his own countrymen bestow on his memory 
bearing him in their hearts, prove that he was 
not her unrewarded champion." 

Lord Byron's address was the most affable 
and courteous perhaps ever seen ; his man- 
ners, when in a good humour, and desirous of 
being well with his guest, were winning, fas- 
cinating in the extreme, and though bland. 
still spirited, and with an air of frankness and 
generosity — qualities in which he was cer- 
tainly not deficient. He was open to a fault 
— a characteristic probably the result of his 
fearlessness, and independence of the world; 
but so open was he, that his friends were 



XXXI V 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



obliged to be upon their guard with him. He 
was tin- worst person in the world to confide 
a secret to ; and if any charge against any 
body was mentioned to him, it was probably 
the first communication he made to the per- 
son in question. He hated scandal and tit- 
tle-tattle loved the manly straight-forward 
course: he would harbour no doubts, and 
never live with another with suspicions in his 
bosom— out came the accusation, and he called 
upon the individual to clear, or be ashamed 
of, himself. He detested a lie — nothing en- 
! him so much: he was by temperament 
ami education excessively irritable, and a lie 
completely unchained him — his indignation 
knew no bounds. He had considerable tact 
in detecting untruth; he would smell it out 
almost instinctively; he avoided the timid 
driveller, and generally chose his companions 
among the lovers and practisers of sincerity 
and candour. A man tells a falsehood and 
conceals the truth, because he is afraid that 
the declaration of th^ thing as it is will hurt 
him. Lord Byron was above all fear of this 
sort : he flinched from telling no one what he 
thought to his face; from his infancy he had 
been afraid of no one. Falsehood is not the 
vice of the powerful : the Greek slave lies, 
the Turkish tyrant is remarkable for his ad- 
herence to truth. The anecdote that follows, 
told hy Parry, is highly characteristic : — 

•■ When the Turkish fleet was lying off Cape 
Papa, blockading Missolonghi, I was one day 
ordered by Lord Byron to accompany him to 
the mouth of the harbour to inspect the forti- 
fic ations, in order to make a report on the state 
they were in. He and I were in his own punt, 
a little boat which he had, rowed by a boy; 
and in a large boat, accompanying us, were 
Prince Mavrocordato and his attendants. As 
I was viewing, on one hand, the Turkish fleet 
attentively, and reflecting on its powers, and 
our means of defence; and looking, on the 
other, at Prince Mavrocordato and his attend- 
ant-, perfectly unconcerned, smoking their 
pipes, and gossiping as if Greece were libe- 
rated and at peace, and Missolonghi in a state 
of complete security, I could not help giving 
vent to a feeling of contempt and indignation. 
'What is the matter,' said his lordship, ap- 
pearing to be very serious, ' what makes you 
so angry -Parry ?' 'I am not angry,' I replied, 
' my lord, but somewhat indignant. The 
Turks, if they were not the most stupid 
wretches breathing, might take the fort of 
Vasaladi, by means of two pinnaces, any night 
they pleased ; they have only to approach it 
with muffled oars; they will not be heard, I 
will answer for their not being seen ; and they 
may storm it in a few minutes. With eight 
guU-boats, properly armed with 24-pounders, 
they might hatter both Missolonghi and v\na- 
tolica to the ground. And there sits the old 
gentlewoman, Prince Mavrocordato and his 
troop, 10 whom I applied an epithet I will not 
here repeat, as if they were all perfectly safe. 
They know their powers of defence are in- 
adequate, and they have no means of improv- 
ing them. If 1 were in their place, I should 
he in a fever ai the thought of my own inca- 



pacity and ignorance, and I should burn with 
impatience to attempt the destruction of those 
stupid Turkish rascals. The Greeks s.nd 
Turks are opponents worthy, by their imbe- 
cility, of each other.' I had scarcely explain- 
ed myself fully, when his lordship ordered our 
hoat to be placed alongside the other, and ac- 
tually related our whole conversation to the 
prince. In doing it, however, he took on him- 
self the task of pacifying both the prince and 
me, and though I was at first very angry, and 
the prince, 1 believe, very much annoyed, he 
succeeded. Mavrocordato afterwards showed 
no dissatisfaction with me, and I prized Lord 
Byron's regard too much, to remain long dis- 
pleased with a proceeding which was only an 
unpleasant manner of reproving us both." 

" On one occasion (which we before slightly 
alluded to), he had saved twenty-four Turkish 
women and children from slavery, and all its 
accompanying horrors. I was summoned to 
attend him, and receive his orders, that every 
thing should be done which might contribute 
to their comfort. He was seated on a cushion 
at the upper end of the room, the women and 
children Were standing before him, with their 
eyes fixed steadily on him, and on his right 
hand was his interpreter, who was extract ing 
from the women a narrative of their suffer- 
ings. One of them, apparently about thirty 
years of age, possessing great vivacity, and 
whose manners and dress, though she was then 
dirty and disfigured, indicated that she was 
superior in rank and condition to her com- 
panions, was spokeswoman for the whole. I 
admired the good order the others preserved, 
never interfering with the explanation, or in- 
terrupting the single speaker. I also admired 
the rapid manner in which the interpreter ex- 
plained every thing they said, so as to make 
it almost appear that there was but one 
speaker. — After a short time, it was evident 
that what Lord Byron was hearing, affected 
his feelings — his countenance changed, his 
colour went and came, and I thought he was 
ready to weep. But he had, on all occasions, 
a readv and peculiar knack in turning con- 
versation from any disagreeable or unpleasant 
subject ; and he had recourse to this expedi- 
ent. He rose up suddenly, and turning round 
on his heel, as was his wont, he said something 
quickly to his interpreter, who immediately 
repeated it to the women. All eyes were in- 
stantly fixed on me, and one of the party, a 
young and beautiful woman, spoke very 
warmly. Lord Byron seemed satisfied, and 
said they might retire. The women all slip- 
lied off their shoes in an instant, and going up 
to his lordship, each in succession, accompa- 
nied by their children, kissed his hand fer- 
vently, invoked, in the Turkish manner, a 
blessing both on his head and heart, and then 
quitted the room. This was too much for Lord 
Byron, and he turned his face away to con- 
ceal his emotion." 

" One of Lord Byron's household had sev- 
eral times involved himself and his master in 
perplexity and trouble, by his unrestrained 
attachment to women. In Greece this had 
been very annoying, and induced Lord Byron 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXXV 



to think of a means of curing it. A young 
Suliote of the guard was accordingly dressed 
up like a woman, and instructed to place him- 
self in the way of the amorous swain. The 
bait took, and after some communication, had 
rather by signs than by words, for the pair did 
not understand each other's language, the 
sham lady was carefully conducted by the gal- 
lant to one of Lord Byron's apartments. Here 
the couple were surprised by an enraged Su- 
liote. a husband provided for the occasion, 
accompanied by half a dozen of his comrades, 
whose presence and threats terrified the poor 
lacquey almost out of his senses. The noise 
of course brought Lord Byron to the spot, to 
laugh at the tricked serving-man, and rescue 
turn from the effects of his terror." 

" A few days after the earthquake, which 
took place on the 21st of February, as we 
were all sitting at table in the evening, we 
were suddenly alarmed by a noise and a 
shaking of the house, somewhat similar to 
that which we had experienced when the 
earthquake occurred. Of course all started 
from their places, and there was the same kind 
of confusion as on the former evening, at 
which Byron, who was present, laughed im 
moderately ; we were re-assured by this, and 
soon learnt that the whole was a method he 
had adopted to sport with our fears." 

" The regiment, or rather the brigade, we 
formed, can be described only as Byron him- 
self describes it. There was a Greek tailor, 
who had been in the British service in the 
Ionian Islands, where he had married an Ital- 
ian woman. This lady, knowing something 
of the military service, petitioned Lord Byron 
to appoint her husband master-tailor of the 
brigade. The suggestion was useful, and this 
part of her petition was immediately granted. 
At the same time, however, she solicited that 
she might be permitted to raise a corps of 
women, to be placed under her orders, to ac- 
company the regiment. She stipulated for 
free quarters and rations for them, but reject- 
ed all claim for pay. They were to be free 
of all incumbrances, and were to wash, sew, 
cook, and otherwise provide for the men. The 
proposition pleased Lord Byron, and, stating 
the matter to me, he said he hoped I should 
have no objection. I had been accustomed 
to see women accompany the English army, 
and I knew that, though sometimes an incum- 
brance, they were, on the whole, more bene- 
ficial than otherwise. In Greece, there were 
many circumstances which would make their 
services extremely valuable, and I gave my 
consent to the measure. The tailor's wife did 
accordingly recruit a considerable number of 
unincumbered women, of almost all nations, 
bin principally Greeks, Italians, Maltese, and 
Negresses. ' I was afraid,' said Lord Byron, 
'"lira I mentioned this matter to you, you 
would be crusty, and oppose it — it is the very 
thing. Let me see, my corps outdoes Fal- 
staff's : there are English, Germans, French, 
Maltese, Ragusians, Italians, Neapolitans, 
Transylvanians, Russians, Suliotes, Moreotcs, 
and Western Greeks in front, and, to bring up 
the rea<\ the tailor's wife and her troop. Glo- 



rious Apollo ! no general had ever before such 
an army.' " 

" Lord Byron had a black groom with him 
in Greece, an American by birth, to whom he 
was very partial. He always insisted on this 
man's calling him Massa, whenever he spoke 
to him. On one occasion, the groom met with 
two women of his own complexion, who had 
been slaves to the Turks and liberated, but 
had been left almost to starve when the Greeks 
had risen on their tyrants. Being of the same 
colour was a bond of sympathy between them 
and the groom, and he applied to me to give 
both these women quarters in the Seraglio. I 
granted the application, and mentioned it to 
Lord Byron, who laughed at the gallantry of 
his groom, and ordered that he should be 
brought before him at ten o'clock the next 
day, to answer for his presumption in making 
such an application. At ten o'clock, accord- 
ingly, he attended his master with great trem- 
bling and fear, but stuttered so when he at- 
tempted to speak, that he could not make 
himself understood ; Lord Byron endeavour- 
ing, almost in vain, to preserve his gravity, 
reproved him severely for his presumption. 
Blacky stuttered a thousand excuses, and was 
ready to do any thing to appease his massa's 
anger. His great yellow eyes wide open, he 
trembling from head to foot, his wandering 
and stuttering excuses, his visible dread — all 
tended to provoke laughter; and Lord By- 
ron, fearing his own dignity would be hove 
overboard, told him to hold his tongue, and 
listen to his sentence. I was commanded to 
enter it in his memorandum-book, and then 
he pronounced, in a solemn tone of voice, 
while Blacky stood aghast, expecting some 
severe punishment, the" following doom : ' My 
determination is, that the children born of 
these black women, of which you may be the 
father, shall be my property, and I will main- 
tain them. What say you?' 'Go — Go — God 
bless you, massa, may you live great while,' 
stuttered out the groom, and sallied forth to 
tell the good news to the two distressed wo- 
men." 

The luxury of Lord Byron's living at this 
time, may be seen from the following order, 
which he gave his superintendent of the house- 
hold, for the daily expenses of his own table. 
It amounts to no more than one piastre. 

PARAS. 

Bread, a pound and a half 15 

Wine 7 

Fish \'o 

Olives 3 

40 

This was his dinner; his breakfast consisted 
of a single dish of tea, without milk or sugar. 

The circumstances that attended the death 
of this illustrious and noble-minded man, are 
described in the following plain and simple 
manner, by his faithful valet and constant fol 
lower, Mr. Fletcher: — 

" My master," says Mr. Fletcher, " con 
tinued his usual custom of riding daily, whei 
the weather would permit, until the 9th oi 
April. But on that ill-fated day he got very 



X\WI 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



wi'i : anil on l»i- return liome, li is lordabip 
changed the whole of his dross; but lie bad 
been too long in bis « el clothes, and the cold, 
of which he bad complained more or Lee 
since we lefl Cephalonia, made this attack be 
more severelj felt. Though rather feverish 

ig the night, his lordship slept pretty well, 
lnii complained in the morning of a pain in 
his bones, and a head-ache i 1 1 1 i -^ did not, how - 
ever, prevent him from taking a ride in the 
afternoon, which, I grieve to say. was hi 
On bis return, my master said that the Baddle 
was oot perfectly dry. from being so wei the 
day before, and observed that, be thougbl it 
had made bim worse. His Lordship was again 
! by the same slow fever, ami I was sorry 
to perceive, on the next morning, thai bis i!l- 

ippeared to be increasing. I Ee w as \ ery 
low, and complained of not baying bad any 
deep during' the night. His lordship's appe- 
tite was also quite gone. I prepared a little 
arrow-root, of which be look three or four 
ilk, saying it was very good, but he 
could take do more. It was not till the third 
day, the l-'th. that I began to he alarmed for 
my master. In all his former colds! be always 
slept well, and was never aiHeted by I hi-, slow 

I therefore went to Dr. Bruno and 
Mr. Millihgen. the two medical attendants', 
and inquired minutely into every circumstance 
connected with my master's present illness; 

both replied that there was no danger, and I 

mighl make myself perfectly easy on the sub- 
ject, tor all would be well in a t\-w days. This 
was on the 13th. Ob the follow iqg day, I round 
my master in such a slate, thai I could not 
feel happy without supplicating that he would 
send to Zante for Dr. Thomas. After ex- 
pressing my fears lest his lordship should gel 
worse, he desired me to consult the doctors, 
which I did, and was told there was no occa- 
sion for calling in any person, as they hoped 
all would he well inafewdays. I lore I should 
remark, that his lordship repeatedly said, in 
mrse of the day, he was sure the doctors 
did not understand his disease; to which 1 an- 
swered, 'Then, my lord, have other advice 
hy all means.' 'They tell me,' said his lord- 
ship, 'that it is only a common cold, which, 
you know, I have had a thousand times.' ' I am 
sure, my lord,' said I, 'that you never had 
one of so seriiius a nature.' ' 1 think I never 
had,' was his lordship's answer. I repeated 
my Supplications that Dr. Thomas should be 
sent for, on the 15th, and was again assured 
that my master would he heller in two or three 
days. After these confident assurances, I did 
not renew my entreaties until it was too late. 

With respect to the medicines that were given 
to my master, I could not persuade myself 

that those of a strong purgative nature were 

the besl adapted for his complaint, concluding 

that, as he bad DOthing on his stomach, the 

effect would be to create pain: indeed. 
this must have been the case with a person in 
perfect health. The whole nourishment taken 
by my master, for the hist eight days, consist- 
ed of a small quantity of broth, at two or three 
different limes, and two spoonfuls of arrow- 
root on the Iftth, the day before his death. 



The first time I heard of there being any in- 
tention of bleeding his lordship, was on the 
LSth, when it was proposed by Dr. Bruno, hut 
objected to at first by my master, who asked 
Mr. Millingcn if there was any great reason 
for taking blood? The latter replied that it 
might he of service, but added, it might be 
deferred till the next day; and* accordingly, 
my master was hied in the ri.<_dit arm on the 
ei ening of the 10th, and a pound of bipod was 
taken. I observed, at the time, that it had a 
most inflamed appearance. Dr. IJnirio now 
began to say, that he had frequently urged my 
master to be bled, but that he always refused. 
V 1 • > 1 1 lt dispute now arose about the time that 
had been lost, and the necessity of sending 
for medical aid to Zante; upon which I was 
informed, for the first time, that it would be 
of no use, as my master would he letter, or 
no more, before the arrival of Dr. Thomas. 
His lordship continued to pet worse, hut Dr. 
Bruno said, he thought letting hlood again 
would save his life; and I lost no time in tell- 
ing my master how necessary it was to com- 
ply with the doctor's wishes. To Ihis he re- 
plied, hy saving, he feared they knew nothing 
about his disorder: and then, stretching out 
his arm, said, ' Here, take my arm, and do 
whatever you like.' His lordship continued 
to get weaker, and on the I7tb he was bled 
twice in the morning, and at two o'clock in 
the afternoon ; the bleeding at both time- was 
followed by fainting fits, and he would have 
fallen down more than once, had I not caught 
him in my arms. In order to prevent Mich an 
accident, I took care not to permit his lord- 
ship to stir without supporting him. On this 
day my master said to me twice, ' I cannot 
sleep, and you well know I have not been 
able to sleep for more than a week : I know,' 
added his lordship, ' that a man can only be 
a certain lime without sleep, and then he must 
go mad, without any one beiiiir able to save 
him; and I would ten times sooner shoot my- 
self than be mad, for I am not afraid of dying 
— I am more fit to die than people think !' 

" I do not, however, believe that his lord- 
ship had any apprehension of his fate till the 
day after the 18th, when he said. ' 1 fear you 
and Titawill be ill by sitting continually night 
and day.' I answered, • We shall never leave 
your lordship till you are better.' As my mas- 
ter had a slight fit of delirium on the 1 6th, I took 
care to remove the pistol and stiletto, which 
had hitherto been kept at his bedside in the 
night. On the Kith, his lordship addressed mc 
frequently, and seemed to be very much dis- 
satisfied with his medical treatment. I then 
said, ' Do allow me to send for Dr. Thomas?' 
to which he answered, ' Do so, hut he quick; 
I am sorry I did not let you do so before, as 1 
am sure they have mistaken my dii 
Write yourself, for I know they would not 
like to see other doctors here.' 1 did not lose 
a moment in obeying my master's orders ; and 
on informing Dr. Bruno and Mr. Millingeti 
of it, they said it was very light, as they now 
began to be afraid themselves. On returning 
to my master's room, his first words were 
' have you seat?' — ' I have ; my lord.' was my 



LTFE OF LORD BYRON 



XXXMI 



answer; upon which he said, 'you have done 
right, for 1 sliuula like lo know what is the 
matter with me.' Although his lordship did 
not appear to think his dissolution was so near, 
I could perceive he was getting weaker every 
hour, and he even began to have occasional 
fits of delirium. He afterwards said, ' I now 
begin to think I am seriously ill, and in case 
I should be taken off suddenly, I wish to give 
you several directions, which I hope you will 
he particular in seeing executed.' I answered 
I would, in case such an event came to pass, 
but expressed a hope that he would live many 
years to execute them much better himself 
than 1 could. To this my master replied, ' No, 
it is now nearly over;' and then added, 'I 
must tell you all, without losing a moment !' I 
then said, ' Shall I go, my lord, and fetch pen. 
ink, and paper?' — 'Oh, my God! no; you will 
lose too much time, and I have it not to spare, 
for my time is now short,' said his lordship. 
and immediately after, ' Now, pay attention !' 
H>s lordship commenced by saying, ' You will 
be provided for.' I begged him, however, to 
proceed with things of more consequence. He 
then continued, ' Oh, my poor dear child ! my 
dear Ada ! my God ! could I but have seen her ! 
Give her my blessing — and my dear sister 
Augusta, and her children ; and you will go 
to Lady Byron, and say — tell her every thing, 
— you are friends with her.' His lordship 
seemed to be greatly affected at this moment. 
Here my master's voice failed him, so that I 
could only catch a word at intervals ; but he 
kept muttering something very seriously for 
some time, and would often raise his voice, 
and said, ' Fletcher, now if you do not exe- 
cute every order which I have given you, I 
will torment you hereafter, if possible.' Here 
I told his lordship, in a state of the greatest 
perplexity, that I had not understood a word 
of what he said; to which he replied, 'Oh, 
my God ! then all is lost, for it is now too late ! 
Can it be possible you have not understood 
me?' — ' No, my lord,' said I, ' but I pray you 
to try and inform me once more.' ' How can 
I ?' rejoined my master. ' it is now too late, 
and all is over!' I said, 'Not our will, but 
God's be done !' — and he answered, ' Yes, not 
mine be done ! — but I will try.' His lordship 
did indeed make several efforts to speak, but 
could only speak two or three words at a time, 
— such as ' My wife ! my child ! my sister! — 
you know all — you must say all —you know 
my wishes'— the rest was quite unintelligible. 
A consultation was now held (about noon), 
when it was determined to administer some 
Peruvian bark and wine. My master had 
now been nine days without any sustenance 
whatever, except what I have already men- 
tioned. With the exception of a few words. 
which can only interest those to whom they 
were addressed, and which, if required, I shall 
communicate to themselves, it was impossible 
to understand any thing his lordship said after 
taking the bark. He expressed a wish lo 
sleep. I at one time asked whether 1 should 
call Mr. Parry, to which he replied, ' Y< is, 
you may call him.' Mr. Parry desired him 
to compose himself. He shed tears, and ap- 



parently sunk into a slumber. Mr. Parry 
went away, expecting to find him refreshed 
on his return, — hut it was the commencement 
of the lethargy preceding his death. The last 
words I heard my master utter, were at six 
o'clock on the evening of the l!!l!i, when he 
said, ' I iraisl sleep now;' upon which he laid 
down, never to rise again ! — for he did not 
move hand or f ->Dt during the following twen- 
ty-four hours. His lordship appeared, how- 
ever, to be in a state of suffocation at intervals, 
and had a frequent rattling in the throat; on 
these occasions, I called Tita to assist me in 
raising his head, and I thought he seemed to 
get quite stiff. The rattling and choking in 
the throat took place every half-hour, and we 
continued to raise his head whenever the fit 
came on, till six o'clock in the evening of the 
1 9th, when I saw my master open his eyes and 
then shut them, but without showing any symp- 
tom of pain, or moving hand or foot. 'Oh! 
my God !' I exclaimed, ' I fear his lordship is 
gone!' the doctors then felt his pulse, and said, 
' You are right — he is gone !' " 

It would be vain to attempt a description 
of the universal sorrow that ensued at Misso- 
longhi. Not only Mavrocordato and his im- 
mediate circle, but the whole city and all its 
inhabitants were, as it seemed, stunned by this 
blow; it had been so sudden, so unexpected. 
His illness, indeed, had been known, and for 
the last three days none of his friends could 
walk in the streets, without anxious inquiries 
from every one, of " How is my lord?" 

On the day of this melancholy event, Prince 
Mavrocordato issued a proclamation expres- 
sive of the deep and unfeigned grief felt by all 
classes, and ordering every public demonstra- 
tion of respect and sorrow to be paid to the 
memory of the illustrious deceased, by firing 
minute-guns, closing all the public offices and 
shops, suspending the usual Easter festivities, 
and by a general mourning, and funeral pray- 
ers in all the churches. It was resolved that 
the body should be embalmed, and after the 
suitable funeral honours had been performed, 
should be embarked for Zante, — thence to be 
conveyed to England. Accordingly the med- 
ical men opened the body and embalmed it, and 
having enclosed the heart, and brain, and in- 
testines in separate vessels, they placed it in 
a chest lined with tin, as there were no means 
of procuring a leaden coffin capable of hold- 
ing the spirits necessary for its preservation 
on" the voyage. Dr. Bruno drew up an ac- 
count of the examination of the body, by 
which it appeared his lordship's death had 
been caused by an inflammatory fever. Dr. 
Meyer, a Swiss physician, who was present, 
and had accidentally seen Madame de Stael 
after her death, stated, that the formation oi 
the brain in both these illustrious persons was 
extremely similar, but that Lord Byron had 
a much greater quantity. 

On rhe22d of April, 1824, in the midst of 
his own brigade, oi the troops of the govern 
ment, and of the whole population, on the 
shoulders of the officers of his corps, relieved 
occasionally by other Greeks, the most pre- 
cious portion of his honoured remains wer* 



WW 111 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



carried to the church, where lie the bodies of 
Marco Botzaria and of Genera] Normann. 
There they were laid down: the coffin was a 
rude, ill-constructed chest of wood ; a black 
mantle served for a pall, and over it were 
placed a helmet, a sword, and a crown of lau- 
rel. But no funeral pomp could have left the 
impression, nor spoken the feelings, of this 
simple ceremony. The wretchedness and deso- 
l.iii »f the place itself; the wild and half- 
civilized warriors present; their deep-felt, un- 
affected grief ; the fond recollections ; the dis- 
appointed hopes; the anxieties and sad pre- 
sentiments which might be read on every 
countenance— all contributed to form a scene 
more moving, more truly affecting, than per- 
haps was ever before witnessed round the grave 
of a great man. 

W hen the funeral service was over, the bier 
was left in the middle of the church, where it 
remained until the evening of the next day. 
and was guarded by a detachment of his own 
brigade. The church was incessantly crowd- 
ed by those who came to honour and to regret 
the benefactor of Greece. In the everting of 
the 23d, the bier was privately carried back 
bv his officers to his own house. The coffin 
was not closed till the 29th of the month. 

Immediately after his death, his countenance 
had an air of calmness, mingled with a se 
verity, that seemed gradually to soften, and 
the whole expression was truly sublime. 

On May 2d, the remains of Lord Byron 
were embarked, under a salute from the guns 
of the fortress. " How different, " exclaims 
Count Gamba, "from that which had wel- 
comed the arrival of Byron only four months 
ago !" After a passage of three days, the. ves- 
sel reached Zante, and the precious deposit 
was placed in the quarantine house. Here 
some additional precautions were taken to en- 
sure its safe arrival in England, by providing 
another case for the body. On May the 10th, 
Colonel Stanhope arrived at Zante, from the 
Morea, and, as he was on his way back to 
England, he took charge of Lord Byron's re- 
mains, and embarked with them on board the 
Florida. On the 25th of May she sailed from 
Zante, on the 29th of June entered the Downs, 
and from thence proceeded to Stangate creek, 
to perform quarantine, where she arrived on 
Thursday, July 1st. 

John Cam Hobhousc, Esq. and John Han- 
son, Esq. Lord Byron's executors, after hav- 
mir proved Ids will, claimed the body from the 
Florida, and under their directions it was re- 
moved to the house of Sir Edward Knatch- 
bull, No. 20, Great George-street, West- 
minster. 

It was announced, from time to time, that 
the body of Lord Byron was to be exhibited 
in state, and the progress of the embellish- 
ments of the poet's bier was recorded in the 
pages of a hundred publications. They were 
at length completed, and to separate the curi- 
osity of the poor from the admiration of the 
rich, the latter were indulged with tickets of 
admission, anil a day was set apart fur them 
to go and wonder over the decked room and 
the emblazoned bier. Beers and peeresses, 



priests, poets, and politicians, came in gilded 
Chariots, and in hired hacks, to gaze upon the 
splendour of the funeral preparations, am! to 
Bee in bow rich and how vain a shroud the 
body of the immortal bard had been hid. 
Those idle trappings, in which rank seems to 
mark its altitude above the vulgar, belonged 
to the state of the peer, rather than to the state 
of the poet : genius required no such attrac- 
tions, and all this magnificence served only to 
distract our regard from the man, whose in- 
spired tongue was now silenced for ever. 
Who cared for Lord Byron, the peer and the 
privy-counsellor, with his coronet, and his 
long descent from princes on one bide, and 
from heroes on both 3 and who did not care 

for George Gordon Byron, the poet, who has 

charmed us, and will charm our descendants, 
with his deep and impassioned verse? The 
homage was rendered to genius, not surely to 
rank— for lord can be stamped on any clay, 
hut inspiration can only be impressed on the 
finest metal. 

A few s, loct friends and admirers followed 
Lord Byron to the grave — his coronet was 
borne before him, and there were many indi- 
cations of his rank; but, save the assembled 
multitude, no indications of his genius. In 
conformity with a singular practice of the 
great, a long train of their empty carriages 
followed the mourning-coaches — mocking the 
dead with idle state, and impeding with barren 
pageantry the honester sympathy of the crowd. 
Where were the owners of those machines of 
sloth and luxury — where were the men of 
rank, among whose dark pedigrees Lord By- 
ron threw the light of his genius, and lent the 
brows of nobility a halo to which they were 
strangers? Where were the great whigsS 
where were the illustrious tones? could a 
mere difference in matters of human belief 
keep those fastidious persons away ? But, above 
all, where were the friends with whom wed- 
lock had united him ? On his desolate corpse 
no wife looked, no child shed a tear. We have 
no wish to set ourselves up as judges in do- 
mestic infelicities, and we are willing to be- 
lieve they were separated in such a w ay as to 
render conciliation hopeless; but who could 
stand and look on his pale manly face, and his 
dark locks, which early sorrows were making 
thin and gray, without feeling that, gifted as 
he was, with a soul above t lie ma rk of other 
men, his domestic misfortunes palled for pur 
pity, as surely as his genius called for our ad- 
miration ? 

As the cavalcade proceeded through the 
streets of London, a fine-looking honest tar 
was observed to walk near the hearse uncov- 
ered, throughout the morning, and on being 
asked by a stranger whether he formed part 
of the funeral cortege, he replied, he Came 
there to pay his respects to the deceased, w lib 
whom he bad served in the Levant, wheu he 
made the tour of the Grecian Islands. This 
poor fellow Was kindly offered a place I -. 

of the sen ants w ho were behind the cat 
but be said he was strong, and had rather walk 
near the hearse. 
It was not till Friday, July 16th, that the 



LIFE OF LORD BYRON. 



XXXIX 



interment took place. Lord Byron was buried 
in the family vault, at the village of Huck- 
nall, eight miles beyond Nottingham, and 
within two miles of the venerable abbey of 
Newstead. He was accompanied to the grave 
by crowds of persons eager to show this last 
testimony of respect to his memory. In one 
of his earlier poems, he had expressed a wish 
that his dust might mingle witli his mother's, 
and, in compliance with this wish, his coffin 
was placed in the vault next to hers. It was 
twenty minutes past four o'clock, on Friday, 
July IGtli, I!i24, when the ceremony was con- 
cluded, when the tomb closed for ever on By- 
ron, and when his friends were relieved from 
every care concerning him, save that of doing 
justice to his memory, and of cherishing his 
fame. 

The following inscription was placed on 
the coffin : — 

" George Gordon Noel Byron, 

Lord Byron, 

of Rochdale, 

Born in London, 1 

Jan. 22, 17S8, 

died at Missolonghi, 

in Western Greece, 

April 19th, 1824." 

1 Mr. Dallas says Dover which is undoubtedly correct 



An urn accompanied the coffin, and on it 
was inscribed : 

" Within this urn are deposited the heart, 

brain, etc. 

of the deceased Lord Byron." 

An elegant Grecian tablet of white marble, 
has been placed in the chancel of the Hucknall 
church. We subjoin a copy of the inscrip- 
tion. 

The words are in Roman capitals, and di- 
vided into lines, as under: 

IN THE VAULT BENEATH, 

WHERE MANY OF HIS ANCESTORS AND HIS MOTHER 

ARE BURIED, 

LIE THE REMAINS OF 

GEORGE GORDON NOEL BYRON, 

LORD BYRON, OF ROCHDALE, 

IN THE COUNTY OF LANCASTER; 

THE AUTHOR OF "CHILDE HAROLD's PILGRIMAGE." 

HE WAS BORN IN LONDON, ON THE 

22D OF JANUARY, 1788. 

HE DIED AT MISSOLONGHI, IN WESTERN GREECE, 

ON THE 19TH OF APRIL, 1824, 

ENGAGED IN THE GLORIOUS ATTEMPT TO RESTORE 

THAT COUNTRY TO HER ANCIENT FREEDOM 

AND RENOWN. 



HIS SISTER, THE HONOURABLE 

AUGUSTA MARIA LEIGH, 

PLACED THIS TABLET TO HIS MEMOES'. 



THE 



COMPLETE WORKS 



«XI3 



fftoutw of JfoUueasu 



Mijr' dp jit paX aXvct, p'lTS ti viiicei. 

Homer. Iliad. 10. 

He whistled as he went for want of thought. 
Dryden. 



lO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE FREDERICK, EARL OF CARLISLE 

KNIGHT OF THE GARTER, etc., 

THESE POEMS ARE INSCRIBED, 

ET HIS OBLIGED WARD, AND AFFECTIONATE KINSMAN, 

THE AUTHOR. 



ON LEAVING NEWSTEAD ABBEY. 



Why dost thou build the hall 1 Son of the winged days ! 
Thou lookest from thy tower to-day ; yet a few years, and the 
blast of the desert conies ; it howls in thy empty court. 

OSSIAN. 



Through thy battlements, Newstead, the hollow winds 
whistle ; 
Thou, the hall of my fathers, art gone to decay; 
In thy once smiling garden, the hemlock and thistle 
Have choked up the rose which late bloom'd in the 
way. 

Of the mail-cover'd barons who, proudly, to battle 
Led their vassals from Europe to Palestine's plain, 

The escutcheon and shield, which with every blast rattle, 
Are the only sad vestiges now that remain. 

No more doth old Robert, with harp-stringing numbers, 
Raise a flame in the breast, for the war-laurel'd wreath; 

Near Askalon's Towers John of Honstan 1 slumbers, 
Unnerved is the hand of his minstrel by death. 

Paul and Hubert too sleep, in the valley of Crcssy ; 

For the safety of Edward and England they fell ; 
My fathers ! the tears of your country redress ye ; 

How you fought ! how you died ! still her annals can 
tell. 

On Marston, 2 with Rupert J 'gainst traitors contending, 
Four brothers enrich'd with their blood the bleak field ; 



5 Horistan Castle, in Deroyshire, an ancient Beat of the 
Byron family. 

2 The battle of Marston moor, where the adherents of 
Charles I. were defeated. 

3 Son of the Elector Palatine, and related to Charles I. He 
•fterwards commanded the fleet in the reign of Charles II 

D 2 6 



For the rights of a monarch, their cou.itry defending. 
Till death their attachment to royalty seal'd. 

Shades of heroes, farewell ! your descendant departing 
From the seat of his ancestors bids you adieu ! 

Abroad or at home, your remembrance imparting 
New courage, he 'U think upon glory and you. 

Though a tear dim his eye at this sad separation, 
'T is nature, not fear, that excites his regret ; 

Far distant he goes, with the same emulation, 
The fame of his fathers he ne'er can forget. 

That fame, and that memory, still will he cherish, 
He vows that he ne'er will disgrace your renown , 

Like you will he live, or like you will he perish ; 
When decay'd, may he mingle his dust with your own. 

1803. 



EPITAPH ON A FRIEND. 



Aoriip vptv jitv eXap-rrci CVt £wo<<rci' tuiue. 
La f.ktius. 



Oh, Friend ! for ever ioved, for ever dear ! 
What fruitless tears have bathed thy honour'd bier! 
What sighs re-echoM to thy patting breath, 
While thou wast struggling in the pangs ot'ilcutfi • 
Could tears retard tin: tyrant in his course ; 
Could sighs avert his dart's relentless force , 
Could youth ami virtue claim a short delay, 
Or beauty charm the spectre from his prev : 
Thou still had'st livrd, to bless mv selling Sight, 
Thy comrade's honour, and thy friend's delight. 



BYRON S WORKS. 



If, yet, ihy gentle spirit hover nigh 
The spot, where now thy mouldering ashes lie, 
Here wilt thou tread, recorded on my heart, 
A grief too deep to trust the sculptor's art. 
No marble marks thy couch of lowly sleep, 
Hut living statues there are seen to weep ; 
Affliction's semblance bends not o'er thy tomb, 
Allliction's self deplores thy youthful doom. 
What though thy sire lament his failing line, 
A father's sorrows cannot equal mine ! 
Though none, like thee, his dying hour will cheer, 
Yet, other offspring sooth his anguish here : 
But who with me shall hold thy former place? 
Thine image what new friendship can efface ? 
Ah, none ! a father's tears will cease to flow, 
Time will assuage an infant brother's woe ; 
To all, save one, is consolation known, 
While solitary Friendship sighs alone. 

1803. 



A FRAGMENT. 
When to their airy hall my fathers' voice 
Shall call my spirit, joyful in their choice ; 
When, poised upon the gale, my form shall ride, 
Or, dark in mist, descend the mountain's side ; 
Oh ! may my shade behold no sculptured ums, 
To mark the spot where earth to earth returns : 
No lengthen'd scroll, no praise-encumber'd stone ; 
My epitaph shall be my name alone : 
If that with honour fail to crown my clay, 
Ob ! may no other fame my deeds repay ; 
Thai, only that, shall single out the spot, 
Uy that remember'd, or with that forgot. 

1303. 



THE TEAR. 



O lacrymarum fons, tenero sacros 
Ducentium ortus ex anirno ; qualer 
Felix ! in imo qui acatentem 
Pectore te, pin Nymplia, sensiL 



GRAY. 



Whew Friendship or Love 

Our sympathies move ; 
When Truth in a glance should appear ; 

The lips may beguile, 

With a dimple or smile, 
But the test of affection 's a Tear. 

Too oft is a smile 

But the hypocrite's wile, 
To mask detestation or fear; 

Give me the soft sigh, 

Whilst the soul-telling eye 
Is dimm'd, for a time, with a Tear. 

Mild charity's glow, 

To us mortals below, 
Shows the soul from barbarity clear ; 

Compassion will melt, 

Where this virtue is felt, 
And its dew is diffused in a Tear. 

The mm doom'd to sail, 
With the blast of the gale, 
ITirough billows Atlantic to steer; 



As he bends o'er the wave, 
Which may soon be his grave, 
The green sparkles bright with a Tear. 

The soldier braves death, 

For a fanciful wreath, 
In Glory's romantic career ; 

But he raises the foe, 

When in battle laid low, 
And bathes every wound with a Tear. 

If, with high-hounding pride, 

He return to his bride, 
Renouncing the gore-crimson'd spear; 

All his toils are repaid, :'■' 

When, embracing the maid, 
From her eyelid he kisses the Tear. 

Sweet scene of my youth, 

Seat of Friendship and Truth, 
Where love chased each fast-fleeting year; 

Loth to leave thee, I mourn'd, 

For a last look I tum'd, 
But thy spire was scarce seen through a Teal. 

Though my vows I can pour, 

To my Mary no more, 
My Mary, to Lo7e once so dear ; 

In the shade of her bower, 

I remember the hour, 
She rewarded those vows with a Tear, 

By another possest, 

May she ever live blest, 
Her name still my heart must revere ; 

With a sigh I resign, 

What I once thought was mine, 
And forgive her decei' with a Tear. 

Ye friends ' ! ,.,y heart, 

Ere from yuii I depart, 
This hope to my breast is most near ; 

If again we shall meet, 

In this rural retreat, 
May we meet, as we part, with a Tear. 

When my soul wings her flight, 

To the regions of night, 
And my corse shall recline on its bier; 

As ye pass by the tomb, 

Where my ashes consume, 
Oh ! moisten their dust with a Tear. 

May no marble bestow 

The splendour of woe, 
Which the children of vanity rear ; 

No fiction of fame 

Shall blazon my name, 
All I ask, all I wish, is a Tear. 

1806. 



AN OCCASIONAL PROLOGUE, 

Delivered previous to the performenre of " The JVhta 

of Fortune" at a private theatre. 

Since the refinement of this polish'd ace 
Has swept immoral raillery from the stn^p ; 
Since taste has now expunged licentious wit, 
Which stamp'd disgrace on all an author writ ; 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



5 



Since, now, to please with purer scenes we seek, 

Nor dare to call the blush from Beauty's cheek ; 

Oh! let the modest Muse some pity claim, 

And meet indulgence though she rind not fame. 

Still, not for her alone wc wish respect, 

Others appear more conscious of defect ; 

To-night, no Veteran Roscii you behold, 

[n all the arts of scenic action old ; 

No Cooke, no Kemble, can salute you here, 

No Si ddOns draw the sympathetic tear ; 

To-night, you throng to witness the debut 

( )f embryo Actors, to the drama new. 

Here, then, our almost unfledged wings we try; 

Clip not our pinions, ere the birds can fly ; 

Failing in this our first attempt to soar, 

Drooping, alas! we fall to rise no more. 

Not one poor trembler, only, fear betrays, 

Who hopes, yet almost dreads, to meet your praise, 

But all our Dramatis Persona; wait, 

In fond suspense, this crisis of their fate. 

No venal views our progress can retard, 

Your generous plaudits are our sole reward ; 

For these, each Hero all his power displays, 

Each timid Heroine shrinks before your gaze: 

Surely, the last will some protection find, 

None to the softer sex can prove unkind : 

Whdst Youth and Beauty form the female shield, 

The sternest Censor to the fair must yield. 

Yet should our feeble efforts nought avail, 

Should, after all, our best endeavours fail ; 

Still, let some mercy in your bosoms live, 

And, if you can't applaud, at least forgive. 



ON THE DEATH OF MR FOX. 

The following illiberal Impromptu appeared in 
Morning Paper. 

Our Nation's foes lament, on Fox's death, 
But bless the hour when Pitt resign'd his breath ; 
These feelings wide let Sense and Truth undue, 
We give the palm where Justice points it due. 

To which lite Author of these Pieces sent the following 

Reply. 
On ! factious viper! whose envenom'd tooth 
Would mangle still the dead, perverting truth ; 
What, though our "nation's foes" lament the fate, 
With generous feeling, of the good and great ; 
Shall dastard tongues essay to blast the name 
Of hint, whose meed exists in endless fame? 
When Pitt expired, in plenitude of power, 
Though ill success obscured his dying hour, 
Pity her dewy wings before him spread, 
For nobie spirits " war not with the dead." 
His friends, in tears, a last sad requiem gave, 
As all his errors slunibcr'd in the grave ; 
He sunk, an Atlas, bending 'neath the weight 
Of cares o'erwhelming our conflicting state ; 
When, to! a Hercules, in Fox, appear'd, 
Who, f. >r a time, the ruin'd fabric rear'd ; 
He, too, is fall'n, who Britain's loss supplied ; 
With him, our fast-reviving hopes have died: 
Not one great people only raise his urn, 
All Europe's far-extended regions mourn. 
" These feelings wide let Sense and Truth uncluc, 
To give the palm where Justice points it due ;" 



Yet let not canker'd calumny assa.l, 

Or round our statesman wind her gloomy veu. 

Fox ! o'er whose corse a mourning world must weep, 

Whose dear remains in honour'd marble sleep 

For whom, at last, e'en hostile nations groan, 

While friends and foes alike his talents own ; 

Fox shall, in Britain's future annals, shine, 

Nor e'en to Pitt the patriot's palm resign, 

Which Envy, wearing Candour's sacred mask, 

For Pitt, and Pitt alone, has dared to ask. 



STANZAS TO A LADY. 

With the Poems of Camoens. 

This votive pledge of fond esteem, 

Perhaps, dear girl ! for rne thou 'It prize ; 
It sings of Love's enchanting dream, 

A theme we never can despise. 
Who blames it but the envious fool, 

The old and disappointed maid ? 
Or pupil of the prudish school, 

In single sorrow doom'd to fade. 
Then read, dear girl, with feeling read, 

For thou wilt ne'er be one of those ; 
To thee in vain I shall not plead, 

In pity for the Poet's woes. 
He was, in sooth, a genuine bard ; 

His was no faint fictitious flame ; 
Like his, may love be thy reward, 

But not thy hapless fate the same. 



TO M * * *. 



Oh ! did those eyes, instead of fire, 

With bright, but mild atfection shine ; 
Though they might kindle less desire, 

Love, more than mortal, would be thine. 
For thou art form'd so heavenly fair, 

Howe'er those orbs may wildly beam, 
We must admire, but still despair: 

That fatal glance forbids esteem. 
When Nature stamp'd thy beauteous birth, 

So much perfection in thee shone, 
She fear'd that, too divine for earth, 

The skies might claim thee for their own. 
Therefore, to guard her dearest work, 

Lest angels might dispute the prize, 
She bade a secret lightning lurk 

Within those once celestial eyes. 
These might the boldest svlph appal, 

When gleaming with meridian blaze ? 
Thy beauty must enrapture all, 

But who can dare thine ardent gaze? 
'T is said, that Berenice's hair 

In stars adonis the vault of heaven , 
But they would ne'er permit thee there, 

Thou would'st so far outshine the seven. 
For, did those eyes as planets roll, 

Thy sister lights would scarce appear: 
E'en suns, which systems now control, 

Would twinkle dimly through their spher* 

iSOo 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



TO WOMAN. 
Wo \m \ ' ■ lerieQce might have told me, 
That all must lofe thee who behold thee, 
B . experience might have taught, 
Thy firmest promi?3s are nought ; 

charms before me, 
All 1 f'>ri,"'t, but in adore thee. 
Oh! Memory! thou choicest blessing ; 
When join'd with hope, when still possessing; 
Hiit Inn', much cursed by every lover, 
When hope is Red, and passion's over. 
Woman, that fair ami fond deceiver, 
How prompt arc striplings to believe her! 
How throbs the pulse, when lirst we view 

dial rolls in glossy blue, 
Or sparkles hlaek, or mildly throws 
A beam from under hazel brows! 
How quich we credit every oath, 
And hear her plight the willing troth! 
Fondly we hope* will last For aye, 

, to ! she changes in a day. 
This record will tor ever stand, 
" Woman ! thy vows arc traced in sand.'" 



TO M. S. G. 
When I dream that you love me, you'll surely forgive, 

Cui'inl not vmir anger to sleep ; 
For in I i, your affection can live ; 

I rise, and it leaves me to weep. 
Then, Morpheus! envelope my faculties fast, 

Shed o'er me your languor benign; 
Should the dream of to-nighl hut resemble the last; 

What rapture «elcstial is mine ! 
They tell us, that slumber, the sister of death, 

.Mortality's emblem is given; 
To fate how I long to resign my frail breath, 

If this be a foretaste of heaven! 
Ah! frown not, sweet Lady, unbend your soft brow, 

Nor deem me too happy in this ; 
If I sin rti my dream, I atone for it now, 

Thus doom'd but to gaze upon bliss. 
rhoagh in visions, sweet Lady, perhaps, you may smile, 

Oh * think not mv penance deficient ; 
When dreams of your presence my slumbers beguile, 

To awake will be torture sufficient. 



SONG. 
When I roved, a young Highlander, o'er the dark heath, 

And clinib'd thy steep summit, oh ! Morven of Snow, 2 
To gose on the torrent thai thunder'd beneath, 

Or the mist of the tempest that gather'd below,' 



1 The '.asl line is almost a literal translation from the Spanish 
proverb. 

J Morven, a lofty mountain in Aberdeenshire : "Oormal of 
Snow." is an expression frequently to be found in Ossian. 

Ii Tins will not appear extraordinary to those who have heen 
accustomed, tu the mountains it is by no means uncommon on 
- thetop'pf Ben e vis, Beo y boom, etc. to perceive, 
between Lhfl iu nmi) and me valley, clouds pouring down rain, 
and. occasionally, le i-oinpanieil liy li^luiiiin,', whiiu the spec- 
tator literally looks dowa uu tlic storm; perfectly secure hum 
iu ell '••«•* 



t'ntiit ir' I by science, a stranger to fear, 

An I ru te as the rocks where my infancy grew, 
No feeling, save one, to my bosom was dear, 

Need I say, my sweet Mar)', 1 was centred in you? 

Vet, it could not be Love, for I Ku.w noi die name ; 

What passion can dwell in the heart of a child ? 
Hut, still, 1 perceive an emotion lb 

As I felt, when a boy, on the crag-cover' d wild: 
One image, alone, on my bosom impn >t, 

1 Coved my bleak regions, nor panted fur new; 
And few were mv wants, for my wishes were blest, 

And pure were my thoughts, for my soul was with you 

I arose with the dawn ; with my dog as my guide, 

From mountain to mountain I bounded 
I breasted ' the billows of /><'.<- rushing tide, 

And heard at a distance the Highlander's song: 
At eve, on my hcath-cover'd couch of repose, 

No dreams, save of Mary, were spread to my view 
And warm to the skies my devotions arose, 

For the first of my prayers was a blessing on you. 

I led my bleak home, and my visions are gone, 

The mountains are vanish'd, my youth is no more; 
As the last of my race, I must wither alone, 

And delight but in days I have witnessed l>efore. 
Ah ! splendour has rais'd, but embitterd my lot, 

More dear were the scenes which my infancy knew 
Though my hopes may have fail'd, yet they are not forgot, 

Though cold is my heart, still it lingers with von. 

When I see some dark hill point its crest to the sky, 

1 think of the rocks that o'ershadow Colbleen ; 
When I sec the soft blue of a love-speaking eye, 

I think of those eves that endear d the rude scene ; 
When, haply, some light waving locks I tx held, 

That faintly resemble ray Mary's in hue, 
I think on the long flowing ringlets of gold, 

The locks that were sacred to beauty, and you. 

Vet the day may arrive, when the mountains, once mon% 

Shall rise to my sight, in their mantles of snow : 
Rut while these soar above me, unchanged as before, 

Will Marv be there to receive me .' ah, no! 
Adieu! then, ye hills, where my chil Ihood was bred, 

Thou sweet flowing Dee, to thy waters adieu ! 
No home in the forest shall shelter my head ; 

Ah ! Mary, what home could be mine, but with you? 



TO * * *. 

On ! yes, I will own we were dear to each other, 
The friendships of childhood, though fleeting, are 
true ; 

The love which you felt was the love of a brother, 
Nor less the affection I chcrish'd for you. 

But Friendship can vary her gentle dominion, 
The attachment of years in a mbmi nl expires ; 

Like Love too, she moves on a swift-waving pinion, 
But glows not, like Love, with unquenchable tires. 



1 " Breasting the loftf Burge." — Skalu 

2 The Dee it t beautiful river, which rises near Mar Loagu 
ami tails into the sea at New Aberdeen. 

H Collilri n is n mountain near tho verge of the Highlands, 
uot far tium llie ruins of Deo CasUSJ 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



Full oft have we wander'd through Ida togetlu r, 

And blest were the scenes of our youth, I allow ; 
In the spring of our life, how serene is the weather ! 

But winter's rude tempests arc gathering now. 
No more with Affection shall Memory blending 

The wonted delights of our childhood retrace ; 
Winn Pride steels the bosom, the heart is unbending, 

And what would be Justice appears a disgrace. 
However, dear S , for I still must esteem you, 

The few whom I love I can never upbraid, 
The chance, which has lost, may in future redeem you, 

Repentance will cancel the vow you have made. 
I will not complain, and though chill'd is affection, 

With me no corroding resentment shall live ; 
My bosom is calm'd by the simple reflection, 

That both may be wrong, and that both should 
forgive 
You knew that my soul, that my heart, my existence, 

If danger demanded, were wholly your own ; 
You knew me unalter'd, by years or by distance, 

Devoted to love and to 'riendship alone. 
You knew, — but away with the vain retrospection, 

The bond of affection no longer endures ; 
Too late vou may droop o'er the fond recollection, 

And sigh for the friend who was formerly yours. 
For the present, we part, — I will hope not for ever, 

For time and regret will restore you at last ; 
To forget our dissension we both should endeavour ; 

I ask no atonement, but days like the past. 



TO MARY, 

On receiving her picture. 

This faint resemblance of thy charms, 

Though strong as mortal art could give, 
My constant heart of fear disarms, 

Revives my hopes, and bids me live. 
Here, I can trace the locks of gold, 

Which round thy snowy forehead wave ; 
The cheeks, which sprung from Beauty's mould, 

The lips, which made me Beauty's slave. 
Here, I can trace ah no ! that eye, 

Whose azure floats in liquid fire, 
Must all tin' painter's art defy, 

And bid him from the task retire. 
Here I behold its beauteous hue, 

But where's the beam so sweetly straying? 
Which gave a lustre to its blue, 

Like Luna o'er the ocean pla)nng. 
Sweet copy ! far more dear to me, 

Lifeless, unfeeling as thou art, 
Than all the living forms could be, 

Save her who placed thee next my heart. 
She placed it, sad, with needless fear, 

Lest time might shake my wavering soul, 
Unconscious, that her image, there, 

Held every sense in fast control. 
Thro' hours, thro' years, thro' time, 't wii] cheer; 

My hope, in gloomy moments, raise ; 
In life's last conflict 't will appear, 

And meet my Ibna expiring gaze. 



DAM^TAS. 

In law an infant, ' and in years a boy, 
In mind a slave to every vicious joy, 
From every sense of shame and virtue wean'd, 
In lies an adept, in deceit a fiend ; 
Versed in hypocrisy, while yet a child, 
Fickle as wind, of inclinations wild; 
Woman his dupe, his heedless friend a tool, 
Old in the world, tho' scarcely broke from school 
Danv etas ran through all the maze of sin, 
And found the goal, when others just begin ; 
Even still conflicting passions shake his soul, 
And bid him drain the dregs of pleasure's bowl ; 
But, pall'd with vice, he breaks his former chain, 
And, what was once his bliss, appears his bane. 



TO MARION. 

Marion! why that pensive brow ? 

What disgust to life hast thou ? 

Change that discontented air ; 

Frowns become not one so fair. 

'T is not love disturbs thy rest, 

Love's a stranger to thy breast ; 

He in dimpling smiles appears ; 

Or mourns in sweetly timid tears ; 

Or bends the languid eyelid down, 

But shuns the cold forbidding frown. 

Then resume thy former fire, 

Some will love, and all admire ; 

While that icy aspect chills us, 

Nought but cool indifference thrills us. 

Wouldst thou wandering hearts beguile, 

Smile, at least, or seem to smile ; 

Eyes like thine were never meant 

To hide their orbs, in dark restraint; 

Spite of all thou fain wouldst sny 

Still in truant beams they play. 

Thy lips, — but here my modest Muse 

Her impulse chaste must needs refuse ; 

She blushes, curtsies, frowns, — in short, she 

Dreads, lest the subject should transport me ; 

And flying off, in search of reason, 

Brings prudence back in proper season. 

All I shall therefore say (what e'er 

I think is neither here nor there), 

Is that such lips, of looks endearing, 

Were form'd for better things than sneering ; 

Of soothing compliments divested, 

Advice at least disinterested ; 

Such is my artless song to thee, 

From all the flow of flattery free; 

Counsel, like mine, is as a brother's, 

My heart is given to some others ; 

That is to say, unskill'd to cozen, 

It shares itself amongst a dozen. 

Marion! adieu! oh! prithee slight** tot 

This warning, though it may delight not; 

And lest my precepts be displeasing 

To those who think remonstrance teazhig, 

At once I '11 tell thee our opinion, 

Concerning woman's soft dominn n : 



1 In law, every person is an infant who lias not attaium) u» 
age of tweuty-ono. 



BYRON'S WORKS 



Howe'i r we gaze with admiration, 
On eyes of blue, pi lips carnation; 
Howe'er Ihe Bowing locks attract us, 
Howe'er those beauties may distract us; 
Si ill fickle, we are prone to rove, 
'lii. 96 CanilOl fbc our souls to love ; 
It is pol too severe ;i strielure, 
To say they form a pretty picture. 
Hut wmild'st ihou see the secret chain, 
Which lands us in your humble train, 
To hail you cjueens of all creation, 
i low, in a word, 'l is Animation. 



OSCAR OF ALVA.' 

A TALE. 

How sweetly shinei, through azure skies, 
The lamp of heaven on Lora's shore, 

Where Alva's hoary turrets rise, 
And hear the din of arms no more. 

But often lias yon rolling moon 
On Alva's casques of silver play'd, 

And view'd, ;it midnight's silent noon, 
Her chiefs in "learning mail array'd. 

And on the crimson'd rocks beneath, 
U Inch scowl o'er ocean's sullen How, 

Pale in the scattcr'd ranks of death, 
She saw the gasping warrior low. 

While many an eye, which ne'er again 
Could mark the rising orb of day, 

Tiirn'd feebly from the gory plum, 
Beheld in death her fading ray. 

Once, to thoje eyes the lamp of Love, 
They blest her dear propitious light : 

But now, she glimmer'd from above, 
A sad funereal torch of night. 

Faded is Alva's noble race, 

And grey her towers are seen afar ; 
No more her heroes urge the chase, 

Or roll the crimson tide of war. 

But who was last of Alva's clan? 

Why grows the moss on Alva's stone? 
Her towers resound no steps of man, 

They echo to the gale alone. 

And, when that gale is fierce and high, 
A sound is heard in yonder hall, 

It rises hoarsely through the sky, 

And vibrates o'er the mouldering wall. 

Yes, when the eddying tempest sighs, 
It shakes the shield of Oscar brave ; 

But there no more his banners rise, 
No more his plumes of sable wave. 

Pair shone the sun on Oscar's birth, 
When Angus hail'd his eldest born; 

ihe vassals round their chieftain's hearth, 
Crowd to applaud the happy morn. 



I The catastrophe of this tale was suggested by the story of 
■li.Toiiyinii Hud Lorenzo," in llie first volume of "The Ar- 
menian. Br Ghost Seer:" it also hears some resemblar.ee to 
scene in the third act of " Macltcth." 



They feast upon the mountain deer, 
The Pibroch raised its piercing notej 

To gladden more their Highland cheer, 
The strains in martial numbers float. 

And ihey who heard the war-notes wild, 
Hoped that, one day, the Pibroch's strain 

Should play before the Hero's child, 
While he .should lead the Tartan train. 

Another year is quickly past, 

And Angus hails another son, 

His natal day is like the last, 

Nor soon the jocund feast was done. 

Taught by their sire to bend the bow, 

On Alva's dusky hills of wind, 
The boys in childhood chased the roe, 

And left their hounds in speed behind. 

But, ere their years of youth are o'er 
They mingle in the ranks of war ; 

They lightly wield the bright claymore, 
And send the whistling arrow far. 

Dark was the flow of Oscar's hair, 
Wildly it stream'd along the gale ; 

But Allan's locks were bright and fair, 
And pensive seeni'd his cheek, and pale. 

But Oscar own'd a hero's soul, 

liis dark eye shone through beams of truth , 
Allan had early learn'd control, 

And smooth his words had been from youth. 

Both, both were brave ; the Saxon spear 
Was shiver'd ofi beneath their steel ; 

And Oscar's bosom scorn'd to fear, 
But Oscar's bosom knew to feel. 

While Allan's soul belied his form, 
Unworthy with such charms to dwell ; 

Keen as the lightning of the storm, 
On foes his deadly vengeance fell. 

From high Southannon's distant tower 
Arrived a young and noble dame; 

With Kenneth's lands to form her dower 
Glenalvon's blue-eyed daughter came : 

And Oscar claim'd the beauteous bride, 

And Angus on his Oscar smiled ; 
It soothed the father's feudal pride, 

Thus to obtain Glenalvon's child. 
Hark ! to the Pibroch's pleasing note, 

Hark ! to the swelling nuptial song ; 
In joyous strains the voices float, 

And still the choral peal prolong. 
See how the heroes' blood-red plumes, 

Assembled wave in Alva's hall ; 
Each youth Ins varied plaid assumes, 

Attending on their chieftain's call. 
It is not war their aid demands, 

The Pibroch plays the song of peace; 
To Oscar's nuptials throng the bands, 

Nor yet the sounds of pleasure cease. 
But where is Oscar? sure 'tis late: 

Is this a bridegroom's ardent flame? 
While thronging guests and ladies wait 

Nor Oscar nor his brother came. 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



At length young Allan join'd the bride, 
" Why comes not Oscar ?" Angus said ; 

"Is he not here?" The youth replied, 
" With me he roved not o'er the glade. 

" Perchance, forgetful of the day, 
T is his to chase the bounding roe ; 

Or Ocean's waves prolong his slay, 
Yet Oscar's bark is seldom slow." 

" Oh ! no !" the anguish'd sire rejoin'd, 

" Nor chase nor wave my boy delay; 
Would he to Mora seem unkind ? 

Would aught to her impede his way ? 
" Oh ! search, ye chiefs ! oh, search around ! 

Allan, with these through Alva fly, 
Till Oscar, till my son is found, 

Haste, haste, nor dare attempt reply !" 
All is confusion — through the vale 

The name of Oscar hoarsely rings, 
It rises on the murmuring gale, 

Till night expands her dusky wings. 
It breaks the stillness of the night, 

But echoes through her shades in vain ; 
It sounds through morning's misty light, 

But Oscar comes not o'er the plain. 
Three days, three sleepless nights, the chief 

For Oscar scarch'd each mountain cave ; 
Then hope is lost in boundless grief, 

His locks in grey torn ringlets wave. 

" Oscar ! my son ! — Thou God of heaven ! 

Restore the prop of sinking age ; 
Or, if that hope no more is given, 

Yield his assassin to my rage. 
" Yes, on some desert rocky shore 

My Oscar's whiten'd bones must lie ; 
Then, grant, thou God ! I ask no more, 

With him his frantic sire may die. 
" Yet, he may live — away despair ; 

Be calm, my soul ! he yet may live ; 
T' arraign my fate, my voice forbear ; 

God, my impious prayer forgive. 

" What, if he live for me no more, 

1 sink forgotten in the dust, 
The hope of Alva's age is o'er ; 

Alas ! can pangs like these be just ?" 

Thus did the hapless parent mourn, 

Till Time, who soothes severest woe, 
Had bade serenity return, 

And made the tear-drop cease to flow. 
For still some latent hope survived, 

That Oscar might once more appear ; 
His hope now droop'd, and now revived, 

Till Time had told a tedious year. 

Days roll'd along, the orb of light 
\gain had run his destined race : 

No Oscar bless'd his father's sight, 
And sorrow left a fainter trace. 

For youthful Allan still remain'tl, 
And, now, his father's only joy : 

And Mora's heart was quickly gain'd, 
For beauty crown'd the fair-hair'd boy. 



She thought that Oscar low was laid, 
And Allan's face was wondrous fair ; 

If Oscar lived, some other maid 

Had claim'd his faithless bosom's care. 

And Angus said, if one year more 
In fruitless hope was pass'd away, 

His fondest scruple should be o'er, 
And he would name their nuptial day. 

Slow roll'd the moons, but blest at last, 
Arrived the dearly destined morn ; 

The year of anxious trembling past, 
What smiles the lover's cheeks adorn ! 

Hark ! to the Pibroch's pleasing note, 
Hark ! to the swelling nuptial song ; 

In joyous strains the voices float, 
And still the choral peal prolong. 

Again the clan, in festive crowd, 

Throng through the gate of Alva's hail , 

The sounds of mirth re-echo loud, 
And all their former joy recall. 

But who is he, whose darken'd brow 
Glooms in the midst of general mirth? 

Before his eye's far fiercer glow 

The blue flames curdle o'er the hearth. 

Dark is the robe which wraps his form, 
And tall his plume of gory red ; 

His voice is like the rising storm, 
But light and trackless is his tread. 

'T is noon of night, the pledge goes round, 
The bridegroom's health is deeply quaft 5 

With shouts the vaulted roofs resound, 
And all combine to hail the draught. 

Sudden the stranger chief arose, 

And all the clamorous crowd are hush'd , 
And Angus' cheek with wonder glows, 

And Mora's tender bosom blush'd. 

" Old man !" he cried, " this pledge is done 
Thou saw'st 't was duly drunk by me, 

It hail'd the nuptials of thy son ; 

Now will I claim a pledge from thee. 

" While all around is mirth and joy, 
To bless thy Allan's happy lot ; 

Say, had'st thou ne'er another boy ? 
Say why should Oscar be forgot?" 

" Alas !" the hapless sire replied, 
The big tear starting as he spoke ; 

" When Oscar left my hall, or died, 
This aged heart was almost broke. 

" Thrice has the earth revolved her course, 
Since Oscar's form has blest my sight ; 

And Allan is my last resource, 

Since martial Oscar's death or flight." 

" 'T is well," replied the stranger stem, 
And fiercely flash'd his rolling eye ; 

" Thy Oscar's fate I fain would learn ; 
Perhaps the hero did not die. 

" Perchance, if those whom most he loved 
Would call, thy Oscar might return : 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Perchance the chief has only roved, 

For him thy Beltane ' yet may bum. 
" Fill high the bowl, the table round, 

We will not claim the pledge by stealth ; 
With wine let every cup be crown'd, 

Pledge me departed Oscar's health.'' 
" With all my soul," old Angus said, 

And fill'd his goblet to the brim ; 
" Here 's to my boy ! alive or dead, 

I ne'er shall find a son like him." 
" Bravely, old man, this health has sped, 

But why does Allan trembling stand ? 
Come, drink remembrance of the dead, 

And raise thy cup with firmer hand." 
The crimson glow of Allan's face 

Was turn'd at once to ghastly hue ; 
The drops of death each other chase, 

Adown in agonizing dew. 

Thrice did he raise the goblet high, 

And thrice his lips refused to taste ; 
For thrice he caught the stranger's eye, 

On his with deadly fury placed. 
" And is it thus a brother hails 

A brother's fond remembrance here? 
If thus affection's strength prevails, 

What might we not expect from fear?" 
Roused by the sneer, he raised the bowl ; 

" Would Oscar now could share our mirth !" 
Internal fear appall'd his soul, 

He said, and dash'd the cup to earth. 
" 'Tis he ! I hear my murderer's voice," 

Loud shrieks a darkly-gleaming Form} 
" A murderer's voice !" the roof replies, 

And deeply swells the bursting storm. 

The tapers wink, the chieftains shrink, 

The stranger 's gone, amidst the crew 
A Form was seen, in tartan green, 
And tall the shade terrific grew. 
His waist was bound with a broad belt round, 

His plume of sable stream'd on high ; 
But his breast was bare, with the red wounds there, 
And fix'd was the glare of his glassy eye. 

And thrice he smiled, with his eye so wild, 

On Angus, bending low the knee ; 
And thrice he frown'd on a Chief on the ground, 

Whom shivering crowds with horror see. 

The bolts loud roll, from pole to pole, 

The thunders through the welkin ring ; 
And the gleaming Form, through the mist of the storm, 

Was borne on high by the whirlwind's wing. 

Cold was the feast, the revel ceased ; 

Who lies upon the stony floor ? 
Oblivion prest old Angus' breast, 

At length his life»pulse throbs once more. 

" Away, away, let the leech essay, 
To pour the light on Allan's eyes !" 

His sand is done, — his race is run, 
Oh! never more shall Allan rise! 



1 Beltane-Tree.— A Highland festival, on the 1st of May, 
beta near firca lighted for the occasion. 



But Oscar's breast is cold as clay, 

His locks are lifted by the gale, 
And Allan's barbed arrow lay, 

With him in dark Glentanar's vale. 
And whence the dreadful stranger came, 

Or who, no mortal wight can tell ; 
But no one doubts the Form of Flame, 

For Alva's sons knew Oscar well. 
Ambition nerved young Allan's hand, 

Exulting demons wing'd his dart, 
While Envy waved her burning brand, 

And pour'd her venom round his heart. 
Swift is the shaft from Allan's bow : 

Whose streaming life-blood stains his side? 
Dark Oscar's sable crest is low, 

The dart has drunk his vital tide. 
And Mora's eye could Allan move, 

She bade his wounded pride rebel : 
Alus ! that eyes, which beam'd with love, 

Should urge the soul to deeds of Hell. 
Lo ! see'st thou not a lonely tomb, 

Which rises o'er a warrior dead ! 
It glimmers through the twilight gloom; 

Oh ! that is Allan's nuptial bed. 

Far, distant far, the noble grave, 

Which held his clan's great ashes, stood ; 
And o'er his corse no banners wave, 

For they were stain'd with kindred blood. 
What minstrel grey, what hoary bard, 

Shall Allan's deeds on harp-strings raise ? 
The song is glory's chief reward, 

But who can strike a murderer's praise? 
Unstrung, untouch'd, the harp must stasid, 

No minstrel dare the theme awake ; 
Guilt would benumb his palsied hand, 

His harp in shuddering chords would bic A 
No lyre of fame, no hallow'd verse, 

Shall sound his glories high in air, 
A dying father's bitter curse, 

A brother's death-groan echoes there. 

TO THE DUKE OF D. 



In looking over my papers, to select a few additional J «em» 
for this second edition, I found the following lines, which 1 
had totally forgotten, composed in the Summer of 1 H05. a 

short time previous to my departure from II . They 

were addressed to a younn school-fellow of high rank, who 
hail been my frequent companion in some ramhles through 
the neighbouring country ; however he never saw the lines, 
and most probably never will. As, on a re-perusal, I found 
them not worse (ban some other pieces in the collection, I 
have now published them, for the first time, after a slight 
revision. 

D — r — t ! whose early steps with mine have stray'd, 
Exploring every path of Ida's glade, 
Win mi, still, affection taught me to defend, 
And made me less a tyrant than a friend ; 
Though the harsh custom of our youthful band 
Bade thee obey, and gave me to command ; ' 



1 At every public school, the junior boys arc completely 
subservient to the upper forms, till they attain a seat in the 
higher classes. From this state of probation, very properly, 
no rank is exempt | but after a certain period, they command, 
in turn, those who succeed. 



Thee, on whose head a few short years will shower 

The gift of riches, and the pride of power; 

Even naw a name illustrious is ihine own, 

Renown'd in rank, not far beneath the throne. 

Yet, D — r — t, let not this seduce thy soul, 

To shun fair science, or evade control ; 

Though passive tutors, 1 fearful to dispraise 

The titled child, whose future breath may raise, 

\ iew ducal errors with indulgent eyes, 

And wink at faults they tremble to chastise. 

VVhen youthful parasites, who bend the knee 

To wealth, their golden idol, — not to thee ! 

And, even in simple boyhood's opening dawn, 

Some slaves are found to flatter and to fawn : 

When these declare, " that pomp alone should wait 

On one by birth predestined to be great ; 

That books were only meant for drudging fools ; 

That gallant spirits scorn the common rules;" 

Believe them not, — they point the path to shame, 

And seek to blast the honours of thy name : 

Turn to the few, in Ida's early throng, 

Whose souls disdain not to condemn the wrong ; 

Or if, amidst the comrades of thy youth, 

None dare to raise the sterner voice of truth, 

Ask thine own heart ! 't will bid thee, boy, forbear, 

For well I know that virtue lingers there. 

Yes ! I have mark'd thee many a passing dav, 

But now new scenes invite me far away; 

Yes ! I have maik'd, within that generous mind, 

A soul, if well matured, to bless mankind: 

Ah ! though myself by nature haughty, wild, 

Whom Indiscretion hail'd her favourite child, 

Though every error stamps me for her own, 

And dooms my fall, I fain would fall alone; 

Though my proud heart no precept now can tame, 

I love the virtues which I cannot claim. 

'T is not enough, with other Sons of power, 

To gleam the lambent meteor of an hour, 

To swell some peerage page in feeble pride, 

With long-drawn names, that grace no page beside ; 

Then share with titled crowds the common lot, 

In life just gazed at, in the grave forgot ; 

While nought divides thee from the vulgar dead, 

Except the dull cold stone that hides thy head, 

The mouldering 'scutcheon, or the herald's roll, 

That well cmblazon'd, but neglected scroll, 

Whei e Lords, unhonour'd, in the tomb may find 

One spot to leave a worthless name behind ; — 

There ^Ieep, unnoticed as the gloomv vaults 

Thai veil their dust, their follies, and their faults ; 

A tare, with old armorial lists o'erspread, 

In records destined never to be read. 

Fain would I view thee, with prophetic C}'es, 

Exalted more among the good and wise ; 

A glorious and a long career pursue, 

As first in rank, the first in talent too ; 

Spurn every vice, each little meanness shun, 

Not Fortune's minion, but her noblest son. 



Turn to the annals of a former day, — 

Bright are the deeds thine earlier Sires display; 

One, though a Courtier, lived a man of worth, 

And call'd, proud boast! the British Drama forth. 1 

Another view! not less renown'd tor Wit, 

Alike for courts, and camps, or senates fit ; 

Bold in the field, and favour'd by the Nine, 

In every splendid part ordain'd to shine ; 

Far, far distingnish'd from the glittering throng, 

The pride of princes, and the boast of song.- 

Snch were thy Fathers ; thus preserve their name, 

Not heir to titles only, but to Fame. 

The hour draws nigh, a few brief days will close, 

To me, this little scene of joys and woes ; 

Each knell of Time now warns me to resign 

Shades, where Hope, Peace, and Friendship, all wer«" 

mine ; 
Hope, that could vary like the rainbow's hue, 
And gild their pinions, as the moments fiVv, : 
Peace, that reflection never frown'd awa v, 
By dreams of ill, to cloud some future da v ; 

Friendship, whose truth let childhood only tell 

Alas ! they love not long, who love so well. 
To these adieu ! nor let me linger o'er 
Scenes hail'd, as exiles hail their native shore, 
Receding slowly through the dark blue dec p, 
Beheld by eyes that mourn, yet cannot weep! 

D — r — t ! farewell ! I will not ask one part 

Of sad remembrance in so young a heart : 

The coming morrow from thy youthful mind 

Will sweep my name, nor leave a trace behind. 

And yet, perhaps, in some maturer year, 

Since chance has thrown us in the self-same sphere. 

Since the same senate, nay, the same debate, 

May one day claim our suffrage for the state, 

We hence may meet, and pass each other by 

With faint regard, or cold and distant eye. 

For me, in future, neither friend nor foe, 

A stranger to thyself, thy weal or woe ; 

With thee no more again I hope to trace 

The recollection of our early race ; 

No more, as once, in social hours, rejoice, 

Or hear, unless in crowds, thy well-known voice. 

Still, if the wishes of a heart untaught 

To veil those feelings, which, perchance, it ought 

If these, — but let me cease the lengthen'd strain. 

Oh ! if these wishes are not breathed in vain, 

The Guardian Seraph, who directs thy fate, 

Will leave thee glorious, as he found thee greai. 



1 Allow me tn disclaim any personal allusions, even the 
most distant ; I merely mention, generally, what is too often 
the weakness of preceptors. 

E 7 



1 "Thomas S — k — lie, Lord B — k — st, created Karl ni 
D by James the First, was one of the earliest and hrii; lit- 
est ornaments to the poetry of his country, and the first who 
produced a regular drama." — Anderson's British I'ucit. 

2 Churles S — k — lie, Earl of D . esteemed rhe mom 

accomplished man of his day, was alike distinguished in the 
voluptuous court of Charles II. and the gloomy one of Wil- 
liam III. He bel ved with greal gallantry in the sea-fight 
with the Dutch, in 1665, on the day preview to which he 
composed his celebrated song. His charactei has been drawn 
in the highest colours by Dryden, Pope, Prior, und Co&grev*. 
Vide Anderson's British Poets. 






10 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



gransUtums antt imitations. 



ADRIANS ADDRESS TO HIS SOUL, WHEN 
DYING. 

A mm c l a ! vagula, blandula, 
Hospes, comesque, corporis, 
Quss nunc abibis in loca / 

I I idllla, ri;'i.l;i, nuclula, 
Nuc, ut soles, dabis jocos. 



TRANSLATION. 

An! gentle, fleeting, wavering Sprite, 
Friend and associate of this clay! 

To what unknown region borne, 
Wilt thou now wing thy distant flight? 
No more, with wonted humour gay, 

But pallid, cheerless, and forlorn. 



TRANSLATION FROM CATULLUS. 



"ad lesbiam." 



Eqi'al to Jove that youth must be, 

Greater than Jove he seems to me, 

Who, free from Jealousy's alarms, 

Securely views thy matchless charms ; 

That check, which ever dimpling glows, 

That mouth from whence such music flows, 

To him, alike, are always known, 

Reserved for him, and him alone. 

Ah ! Lesbia! though 't is death to me, 

I cannot choose but look on thee ; 

But, at the sight, my senses fly ; 

I needs must gaze, but gazing die ; 

Whilst trembling with a thousand fears, 

Parch'd to the throat, my tongue adheres, 

My pulse beats quick, my breath heaves short, 

My limbs deny their slight support ; 

Cold dews my pallid face o'erspread, 

With deadly languor droops my head, 

My ears with tingling echoes ring, 

And life itself is on the wing ; 

My eyes refuse the cheering light, 

Their orbs are veil'd in starless night : 

Such pangs my nature sinks beneath, 

And feels a temporary death. 



TRANSLATION 
UF THE EPITAPH OX VIRGIL AND TIBULLUS. 

BY DOMITIUS MARSUS. 

He who, sublime, in Epic numbers roll'd, 
And lie who struck the softer lyre of love, 

By Death's unequal hand ' alike control'd, 
Fit comrades in Elysian regions move. 



1 The hind of Death is saiil to !>e unjust, or unequal, as 
Virti) wns considerably older than Tibullus, at his decease. 



TRANSLATION FROM CATULU « 



" LUCTUS DE MORTE PASSEK<«.' 



Ye Cupids, droop each little head, 
Nor let your wings with joy be spread ; 
My Lcsbia's favourite bird is dead, 

Whom dearer than her eyes she loved ; 
For he was gentle, and so true, 
Obedient to her call he flew, 
No fear, no wild alarm lie knew, 

But lightly o'er her bosom moved ; 
And softly fluttering here and there, 
He never sought to cleave the air; 
But chirrup'd oft, and, free from care, 

Tuned to In r ear his grateful strain. 
Now having pass'd the gloomy bourn, 
From whence he never can return, 
His death, and Lcsbia's grief, I mourn, 

Who sighs, alas ! but sighs in vain. 
Oh ! curst be thou, devouring grave ! 
Whose jaws eternal victims crave, 
From whom no earthly power can save, 

For thou hast ta'cn the bird awav: 
From thee, my Lcsbia's eyes o'erllow, 
Her swollen cheeks with weeping glow, 
Thou art the cause of all her woe, 

Receptacle of life's decay. 



IMITATED FROM CATULLUS. 



TO ELLEN. 



Oh ! might I kiss those eyes of f;re, 
A million scarce would quench desire ; 
Still would I steep my lips in bliss, 
And dwell an age on every kiss ; 
Nor then my soul should sated be, 
Still would I kiss and cling to thee : 
Nought should my kiss from thine dissever, 
Still would we kiss, and kiss for ever ; 
E'en though the number did exceed 
The yellow harvest's countless seed ; 
To part would be a vain endeavour, 
Could I desist ? — ah ! never — never. 



TRANSLATION FROM ANACREON 



TO HIS LYRE. 



I wish to tune my quivering lyre, 
To deeds of fame, and notes of fire ; 
To echo from its rising swell, 
How heroes fought, and nations fell ; 
Whan Alreus' sons advanced to war, 
Or Tynan Cadmus roved afar ; 
Bat, still, to martial strains unknown. 
My lyre recurs to love alone. 
Fired with the hope of future fame, 
I seek some nobler hero's name ; 
The dying chords are strung anew, 
To war, to war my harp is due ; 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



11 



With glowing strings, the epic strain 
To Jove's great son I raise again ; 
Alcides and his glorious deeds, 
Beneath whose arm the Hydra bleeds ; 
All, all in vain, my wayward lyre 
Wakes silver notes of soft desire. 
Adieu ! ye chiefs renown'd in arms ! 
Adieu ! the clang of war's alarms. 
To other deeds my soul is strung, 
And sweeter notes shall now be sung ; 
My harp shall all its powers reveal, 
To tell the tale my heart must feel ; 
Love, love alone, my lyre shall claim, 
In so^gs of bliss, and sighs of flame. 



ODE m. 

'T was now the hour, when Night had driven 

Her car half round yon sable heaven ; 

Bootes, only, seem'd to roll 

His Arctic charge around the Pole ; 

While mortals, lost in gentle sleep, 

Forgot to smile, or cease to weep ; 

At this lone hour, the Paphian boy, 

Descending from the realms of joy, 

"iuick to my gate directs his course, 

\nd knocks with all his little force : 

My visions fled, alarm'd I rose ; 

-' What stranger breaks my blest repose ?" 

■' Alas !" replies the wily child, 

'n faltering accents, sweetly mild, 

" A hapless infant here I roam, 

Far from my dear maternal home ; 

Oh ! shield me from the wintry blast, 

The mighty storm is pouring fast ; 

No prowling robber lingers here, 

A wandering baby who can fear ?" 

I heard his seeming artless tale, 

I heard his sighs upon the gale ; 

My breast was never pity's foe, 

But felt for all the baby's woe ; 

I drew the bar, and by the light, 

Young Love, the infant, met my sight ; 

His bow across his shoulders flung, 

And thence his fatal quiver hung, 

(Ah ! little did I think the dart 

Would rankle soon within my heart ;) 

With care I tend my weary guest, 

His little fingers chill my breast ; 

His glossy curls, his azure wing, 

Which droop with nightly showers, I wring. 

His shivering limbs the embers warm, 

And now, reviving from the storm, 

Scarce had he felt his wonted glow, 

Than swift he seized his slender bow : 

" I fain would know, my gentle host," 

He cried, " if this its strength has lost ; 

I fear, relax'd with midnight dews, 

The strings their former aid refuse :" 

With poison tipt, his arrow flies, 

Deep in my tortured heart it lies : 

Then loud the joyous urchin laugh'd, 

" My bow can still impel the shaft ; 

'T i3 firmly fix'd, thy sighs reveal it ; 

Say, courteous host, canst thou not feel it 7" 



FRAGMENTS OF SCHOOL EXERCISES. 

FROM THE PROMETHEUS OF £SCH¥LUS. 

Great Jove! to whose Almighty throne 

Both gods and mortals homage pay, 
Ne'er may my soul thy power discvn, 

Thy dread behests ne'er disobey. 
Oft shall the sacred victim fall 
In sea-girt Ocean's mossy hall ; 
My voice shall raise no impious strain 
'Gainst him who rules the sky and azure main. 

How different now thy joyless fate, 

Since first Hesione thy bride, 
When placed aloft in godlike state, 

The blushing beauty by thy side, 
Thou sat'st, while reverend Ocean smiled, 
And mirthful strains the hours beguiled ; 
The Nymphs and Tritons danced around, 
Nor yet thy doom was fix'd, nor Jove relentless frown'd. 
Harrow, Dec. 1, 1804. 



THE EPISODE OF NISUS AND EURYALUS. 

A PARAPHRASE FROM THE .ENEID, LIB. 9. 

Nisus, the guardian of the portal, stood, 

Eager to gild his arms with hostile blood ; 

Well skill'd in fight, the quivering lance to wield, 

Or pour his arrows through th' embattled field t 

From Ida torn, he left his sylvan cave, 

And sought a foreign home, a distant grave 

To watch the movements of the Daunian host, 

With him, Euryalus sustains the post ; 

No lovelier mien adorn'd the ranks of Troy, 

And beardless bloom yet graced the gallant boy ; 

Though few the seasons of his youthful life, 

As yet a novice in the martial strife, 

'Twas his, with beauty, valour's gift to share, 

A soul heroic, as his form was fair ; 

These bum with one pure flame of generous love, 

In peace, in war, united still they move ; 

Friendship and glory form their joint reward, 

And now combined, they hold the nightly guard. 

" What god," exclaim'd the first, " instils this fire ? 
Or, in itself a god, what great desire ? 
My labouring soul, with anxious thought opprest, 
Abhors this station of inglorious rest ; 
The love of fame with this can ill accord, — 
Be 't mine to seek for glory with my sword. 
See'st thou yon camp, with torches twinkling dim, 
Where drunken slumbers wrap each lazy limb ? 
Where confidence and ease the watch disdain, 
And drowsy Silence holds her sable reign ? 
Then hear my thought : — In deep and sullen gnef, 
Our troops and leaders mourn their absent chief; 
Now could the gifts and promised prize be thine 
(The deed, the danger, and the fame be mine); 
Were this decreed — beneath yon rising mound, 
Metliinks, an easy path perchance were fom.d, 
Which past, I speed my way to Pallas' walls, 
And lead ^Eneas from Evander's halls." 
With equal ardour fired, and warlike joy, 
His glowing friend address'd the Dardan boy 
" These deeds, my Nisus, shalt thou dare alone f 
Must all the fame, the peril, be tliine own ? 



12 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Am I by thee despised, and Sefi afar, 
A - OBe unfit lo share tlic toils of war 7 
Nol thus his son the great Ophcltcs taught, 
is my sire in Argive combats fought ; 
Not thus, when Ilion fell by heavenly hate, 
I traek'd vKneas tnrough the walks of fate ; 
l know'st my deeds, my breast devoid of fear, 

An. I hostile life-drops dim my gory spear; 

a soul with hope immortal burns, 
And life, ignoble life, for Glory spurns ; 
Fame, Gum is cheaply carn'd by fleeting breath, 
The price of honour is the sleep of death." 
Then Nisus — "Calm thy bosom's fond alarms, 
Thy heart beats fiercely to the din of arms ; 
More dear thy worth and valour than my own, 
I swear by him who fills Olympus' throne! 
Sj may 1 triumph, as I speak the truth, 
And clasp again the comrade of my youth, 
lint should I fall, and he who dares advance 
Through hostile legions must abide by chance ; 

luitulian arm, with adverse blow, 
Should lay the friend who ever loved thee low ; 
Live thou, such beauties I would fain preserve, 
Thy budding years a lengthen'd term deserve ; 
When bumbled in the dust, let some one be, 
Whose gentle eyes will shed one tear for me ; 
Whose in inly arm may snatch me back by force, 
Or wealth redeem from foes my captive corse: 
Or, if my destiny these last deny, 
If in the spoiler's power my ashes lie, 
Thy pious care may raise a simple tomb, 
To mark thy love, and signalize my doom. 
Why should thy doating wretched mother weep 
! 1 T milv boy, reclined in endless sleep ? 
Who, for thy sake, the tempest's fury dared, 
Who, for thy sake, war's deadly peril shared ; 
Who braved what woman never braved before, 
And left her native for the Latian shore." 
" In vain you damp the ardour of my soul," 
Replied Euryalus, " it scorns control ; 
Hence, let us haste." — Their brother guards arose, 
Roused by their call, nor court again repose ; 
The pair, buoy'd up on Hope's exulting wing, 
Their stations leave, and speed to seek the king. 
Now, o'er the earth a solemn stillness ran, 
And lull'd alike the cares of brute and man ; 
Save where the Dardan leaders nightly hold 
Alternate converse, and their plans unfold ; 
On one great point the council arc agreed, 
An instant message to their prince decreed ; 
Each lean'd upon the lance he well could wield, 
And poised, with easy arm, his ancient shield ; 
When Nisus and his friend their leave request 
To offer something to their high behest. 
With anxious tremors, yet unawed by fear, 
The faithful pair before the throne appear ; 
lulus greets them ; at his kind command, 

. r first addrcss'd the hoary band. 
" With patience," thus Hyrtacides began, 
" Attend, nor judge from youth our humble plan; 
\\ lure yonder beacons, half-expiring, beam, 
Our slumbering foes of future conquest dream, 
Nor hoed that we a secret path have traced, 
Between the ocean and the portal placed: 
Beneath the covert of the blackening smoke, 
Whose shade securely our design will cloak. 



If you, ye chiefs, and Fortune will allow, 
We 'II bend our course to yonder mountain's brow •, 
Where Pallas' walls, at distance, meet the sight, 
Seen o'er the glade, when not obscured by night ; 
Then shall .rEneas in his pride return, 
While hostile matrons raise their offspring's um, 
And Latian spoils, and purpled heaps of dead, 
Shall mark the havoc of our hero's tread ; 
Such is our purpose, 1 1 < • t unknown the way, 
Where yonder torrent's devious waters stray . 
Oft have we seen, when hunting by the stream, 
The distant spires above the valleys gleam." 

Mature in years, for sober wisdom famed, 
Moved by the speech; Alethes here exclaim'd: 
" Ye parent gods ! who rule the fate of Troy, 
Still dwells the Dardan spirit in the boy; 
When minds like these in striplings thus ye laise, 
Yours is the godlike act, be yours the praise; 
In gallant youth my fainting hopes revive, 
And Ilion's wonted glories still survive." 
Then, in his warm embrace, the boys he press'd, 
And, quivering, strain'd them to his aged breast ; 
With tears the burning cheek of each bedew'd, 
And, sobbing, thus his first discourse renew'd : — 
"What gift, my countrymen*, what martial prize 
Can wc bestow, which you may not despise? 
Our deities the first, best boon have given, 
Internal virtues are the gift of Heaven. 
What poor rewards can bless your deeds on earth, 
Doubtless, await such young exalted worth ; 
./Eneas and Ascanius shall combine 
To yield applause far, far surpassing mine." 
lulus then : " By all the powers above ! 
By those Penates* who my country love ; 
By hoary Vesta's sacred fane, I swear, 
My hopes are all in you, ye generous pair ! 
Restore my father to my grateful sight, 
And all my sorrows yield to one delight. 
Nisus ! two silver goblets are thine own, 
Saved from Arisba's stately domes o'erthrown ; 
My sire secured them on that fatal day, 
Nor left such bowls an Argive robber's prey. 
Two massy tripods also shall be thine, 
Two talents polish'd from the glittering mine ; 
An ancient cup which Tyrian Dido gave, 
While yet our vessels press'd the Punic wave : 
But, when the hostile chiefs at length bow down, 
When great ..Eneas wears Hesperia's crown, 
The casque, the buckler, and the fiery steed, 
Which Turnus guides with more than mortal speed, 
Are thine ; no envious lot shall then be cast, 
I pledge my word, irrevocably pass'd; 
Nay more, twelve slaves and twice six captive dames, 
To soothe thy softer hours with amorous Bailies, 
And all the realms which now the Latians s^xy, 
The labours of to-iiijjht shall well repay. 
But thou, my generous youth, whose tender years 
Are near my own, whose worth my heart reveres, 
Hence forth affection, sweetly thus begun, 
Shall join our bosoms and our souls in one ; 
Without thy aid no glory shall be mine, 
Without lliy dear advice, no great design ; 
Alike, through life esteem'd, thou godlike boy, 
In war my bulwark, and in peace my joy." 



Household Gods 



HOURS OP IDLENESS. 



13 



To him Euryatus • K No aay snail shame 
The rising giories which from this I claim. 
Fortune may favour or the skies may frown, 
.But valour, spite of fate, obtains renown. 
Yet, ere from hence our eager steps depart, 
One boon I beg, the nearest to my heart : 
My mother sprung from Priam's royal line, 
Like thine ennobled, hardly less divine ; 
Nor Troy nor King Acestes' realms restrain 
Her feebled age from dangers of the main j 
Alone she came, all selfish fears above, 
A bright example of maternal love. 
Unknown, the secret enterprise I brave, 
Lest grief should bend my parent to the grave : 
From this alone no fond adieus I seek, 
No fainting mother's lips have press'd my cheek J 
By gloomy Night, and thy right hand, I vow 
Her parting tears would shake my purpose now : 
Do thou, my prince, her failing age sustain, 
In thee her much-loved child may live again ; 
Her dying hours with pious conduct bless, 
Assist her wants, relieve her fond distress : 
So dear a hope must all my soul inflame, 
To rise in glory, or to fall in fame." 
Struck with a filial care, so deeply felt, 
[n tears, at once, the Trojan warriors melt ; 
Faster than all, lulus' eyes o'erflow ; 
Such love was his, and such had been his woe. 
" All thou hast ask'd, receive," the prince replied, 
"Nor this alone, but many a gift beside ; 
To cheer thy mother's years shall be my aim, 
Creusa's ' style but wanting to the dame ; 
Fortune an adverse wayward course may run, 
But bless'd thy mother in so dear a son. 
Now, by my life, my Sire's most sacred oath, 
To thee I pledge my full, my firmest troth, 
All the rewards which once to thee were vow'd, 
If thou shouldst fall, on her shall be bestow'd." 
Thus spoke the weeping prince, then forth to view 
A gleaming falchion from the sheath he drew ; 
Lycaon's utmost skill had graced the steel, 
For friends to envy and for foes to feel. 
A tawny hide, the Moorish lion's spoil, 
Slain midst the forest, in the hunter's toil, 
Mnestheus, to guard the elder youth, bestows, 
And old Alethes' casque defends his brows ; 
Arm'd, thence they go, while all the assembled train, 
To aid their cause, implore the gods in vain ; 
More than a boy, in wisdom and in grace, 
lulus holds amidst the chiefs his place ; 
His prayers he sends, but whit can prayers avail, 
Lost in the murmurs of the sighing gale? 

The trench is past, and, favour'd by the ni^ht, 
Through sleeping foes they wheel their wary flight. 
When shall the sleep of many a foe be o'er? 
Alas ! some slumber who shall wake no more ! 
Chariots, and bridles, mix'd with arms, are seen, 
And flowing flasks, and scatter'd troops between ; 
Bacchus and Mars to rule the camp combine, 
A mingled chaos this of war and wine. 
" Now," criea the firstj " for deeds of blood prepare, 
With me the conquest and the labour share ; 
Here lies our path; lest any hand arise, 
Watch thou, while many a dreaming chieftain dies; 



I The molhur of lulus, lost on the night when Troy waa taken. 

e2 



I'll carve our passage through the heedless foe, 

And clear thy road, with many a deadly blow." 

His whispering accents then the youth represt, 

And pierced proud Rhamnes through his panting breast; 

Stretch'd at his ease, th' incautious king reposed, 

Debauch, and not fatigue, his eyes had closed ; 

To Turnus dear, a prophet and a prince, 

His omens more than augur's skill evince ; 

But he, who thus foretold the fate of all, 

Could not avert his own untimely fall. 

Next Remus' armour-bearer, hapless, fill, 

And three unhappy slaves the carnage swell : 

The charioteer along his courser's sides 

Expires, the steel his severed neck divides ; 

And, last, his lord is number'd with the dead, 

Bounding convulsive, flies the gasping head ; 

From the swollen veins the blackening torrents pour, 

Stain'd is the couch and earth with clotting gore. 

Young Lamyrus and Lamus next expire, 

And gay Serranus, fill'd with youthful fire ; 

Half the long night in childish games was past, 

Lull'd by the potent grape, he slept at last ; 

Ah ! happier far, had he the morn survcy'd, 

And, till Aurora's dawn, his skill display'd. 

In slaughter'd folds, the keepers lost in sleep, 
His hungry fangs a lion thus may steep ; 
Mid the sad flock, at dead of night, he prowls, 
With murder glutted, and in carnage rolls ; 
Insatiate still, through teeming herds he roams, 
In seas of gore the lordly tyrant foams. 

Nor less the other's deadly vengeance came, 
But falls on feeble crowds without a name ; 
His wound unconscious Fadus scarce can feel. 
Yet wakeful Rhaesus sees the threatening stee 
His coward breast behind a jar he hides, 
And, vainly, in the weak defence confides ; 
Full in his heart, the falchion search'd his veins, 
The reeking weapon bears alternate stains ; 
Through wine and blood, commingling as they flow, 
The feeble spirit seeks the shades below. 
Now, where Messapns dwelt they bend their wav, 
Whose fires emit a faint and trembling ray; 
There, unconfined behold each grazing steed, 
Umvatch'd, unheeded, on the herbage feed; 
Brave Nisus here arrests his comrade's arm, 
Too flush'd with carnage, and with conquest warm: 
" Hence let us haste, the dangerous path is past, 
Full foes enough, to-night, have breathed their last; 
Soon will the day those eastern clouds adorn. 
Now let us speed, nor tempt the rising morn." 

What silver arms, with various arts emboss'd, 
What bowls and mantles, in confusion toss'd, 
They leave regardless! yet, one glittering prize 
Attracts the younger hero's wandering eyes; 
The gilded harness Rhamnes' coursers fell, 
The gems which stud the monarch's golden belt: 
This from the pallid corse w;is quickly torn, 
Once by a line of former Chieftains worn. 
Th' exulting boy the studded girdle wears, 
Messapns' helm his head, in triumph, bears, 
Then from the tents their cautious steps they bend. 
To seek the vale, where safer paths extend. 

Just at this hour, a band of Latian horse 
To Tun. us' camp pursue their destined course; 



14 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



While the slow foot their tardy march delay, 

The knights, impatient, spur along the way: 

Three hundred mail-clad men, by Volscens led, 

To Tumus, with tin ir master's promise sped : 

Now, they approach the trench, and view the walls, 

When, on the left, a light reflection falls ; 

The plundered helmet, through the waning night, 

Sheds forth a silver radiance, glancing bright ; 

Volscens, with question loud, the pair alarms — 

" Stand, stragglers ! stand! why early thus in arms ? 

From whence? to whom?" He meets with no reply; 

Trusting the covert of the night, they fly ; 

The thicket's depth, with hurried pace, they tread, 

While round the wood the hostile squadron spread. 

With brakes entangled, scarce a path between, 
Dreary and dark appears the sylvan scene ; 
Euryalus his heavy spoils impede, 
The boughs and winding turns his steps mislead ; 
But Nisus scours along the forest's maze, 
To where Latinus' steeds, in safety graze, 
Then backward o'er the plain his eyes extend, 
On every side they seek his absent friend. 
" O God ! my boy," he cries, " of me bereft, 
In what impending perils art thou 'eft!" 
Listening he runs — above the waving trees, 
Tumultuous voices swell the passing breeze; 
The war-cry rises, thundering hoofs around 
Wake the dark echoes of the trembling ground; 
Again he turns — of footsteps hears the noise, 
The sound elates — the sight his hope destroys ; 
The hapless boy a ruffian train surround, 
While lengthening shades his weary way confound ; 
Him, with loud shouts, the furious knights pursue, 
Struggling in vain, a captive to the crew. 
What can his friend 'gainst thronging numbers dare? 
Ah! must he rush, his comrade's fate to share ! 
What force, what aid, what stratagem essay, 
Back to redeem the Latian spoiler's prey ! 
His life a votive ransom nobly give, 
Or die with him for whom he wish''* to live ! 
Poising with strength his lifted lance on high, 
On Luna's orb he cast his phrenzied eye : 
"Goddess serene, transcending every star! 
Queen of the sky ! whose beams arc seen afar ; 
By night, Heaven owns thy sway, by day, the grove, 
When, as chaste Dian, here thou dcign'st. to rove ; 
If e'er myself or sire have sought to grace 
Thine altars with the produce of the chase ; 
Speed, speed my dart to pierce yon vaunting crowd, 
To free my friend, and scatter far the proud." 
Tims having said, the hissing dart he flung ; 
Through parted shades the hurtling weapon sung ; 
The thirsty point in Sulmo's entrails lay, 
Transfix'd his heart, and stretch'd him on the clay : 
Jle gobs, he dies, — the troop, in wild amaze, 
Unconscious whence the death, with horror gaze; 
While pale they stare, through Tagus' temples riven, 
A second shaft with equal force is driven ; 
Fierce Volscens rolls around his lowering eyes, 
Vcil'd by the night, secure the Trojan lies. 
Burning with wrath, he view'd his soldiers fall; 
«' Thou youth accurst ! thy life shall pay for all." 
QuieK from the sheath his flaming glaive he drew, 
And raging, on the boy defenceless flew. 



Nisus no more the blackening shade conceals. 

Forth, forth he starts, and all liis love reveals ; 

Aghast, confused, his fears to madness rise, 

And pour these accents, shrieking as he flies : 

" Me, me, — your vengeance hurl on me alone, 

Here sheathe the steel, my blood is all your own ; 

Ye starry Spheres ! thou conscious Heaven attest! 

He could not — durst not — lo! the guile coldest ! 

All, all was mine — his early fate suspend, 

He only loved too well his hapless friend ; 

Spare, spare, ye chiefs ! from him your rage remove 

His fault was friendship, all his crime was love." 

He pray'd in vain, the dark assassin's sword 

Pierced the fair side, the snowy bosom gored ; 

Lowly to earth inclines his plume-clad crest, 

And sanguine torrents mantle o'er his bicast : 

As some young rose, whose blossom scents the air, 

Languid in death, expires beneath the share ; 

Or crimson poppy, sinking with the shower, 

Declining gently, falls a fading flower ; 

Thus, sweetly drooping, bends his lovely head, 

And lingering Beauty hovers round the dead. 

But fiery Nisus stems the battle's tide, 
Revenge his leader, and Despair his guide ; 
Volscens he seeks, amidst the gathering host, 
Volscens must soon appease his comrade's gnost ; 
Steel, flashing, pours on steel, foe crowds on foe, 
Rage nerves his arm, Fate gleams in every blow ; 
In vain, beneath unnumber'd wounds he bleeds, 
Nor wounds, nor death, distracted Nisus heeds ; 
In viewless circles whecl'd his falchion flies, 
Nor quits the Hero's grasp till Volscens dies ; 
Deep in his throat its end the weapon found, 
The tyrant's soul fled groaning through the wound. 
Thus Nisus all his fund affection p'ro\ ed, 
Dying, revenged the fate of him he loved ; 
Then on his bosom, sought his wonted place, 
And death was heavenly in his friend's embrace. 

Celestial pair ! if aught my verse can claim, 
Wafted on Time's broad pinion, yours is fame ! 
Ages on ages shall your fate admire ; 
No future day shall see your names expire; 
While stands the Capitol, immortal dome! 
And vanquish'd millions hail their Empress, Rome 

TRANSLATION FROM THE MEDEA OF 
EURIPIDES. 

When fierce conflicting passions urge 

The breast where love is wont to glow, 
What mind can stem the Stormy sur<*c, 

Which rolls the tide of human woe? 
The hope of praise, the dread of uhame, 

Can rouse the tortured breast no more ; 
The wild desire, the guilty flame, 

Absorbs each wish it felt before. 

But, if affection gently thrills 

The soul, by purer dreams possest, 

The pleasing balm of mortal ills, 

In love can soothe the aching breast; 

If thus, thou comesl in gentle guise, 
Fair Venus ! from thy native heaven, 

What heart, unfeeling, would despise 
The sweetest boon the gods have given * 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



1 



But, never from thy golden bow 

May I beneath the shaft expire, 
Whose creeping venom, sure and slow, 

Awakes an all-consuming fire ; 
Ye racking doubts ! ye jealous fears ! 

Willi others wage eternal war; 
Repentance ! source of future tears, 

From me be ever distant far. 

May no distracting thoughts destroy 

The holy calm of sacred love ! 
May all the hours be wing'd with joy, 

Which hover faithful hearts above! 
Fair Venus ! on thy myrtle shrine, 

May I with some fond lover sigh! 
Whose heart may mingle pure with mine, 

With me to live, with me to die. 

My native soil ! beloved before, 

Now dearer, as my peaceful home, 
Ne'er may I quit thy rocky shore, 

A hapless, banish'd wretch to roam ; 
This very day, this very hour, 

May I resign this fleeting breath, 
Nor quit my silent, humble bower — 

A doom, to me, far worse than death. 

Ha*e I not heard the exile's sigh, 

And seen the exile's silent tear? 
Tlirough distant climes condemn'd to fly, 

A pensive, weary wanderer here : 
Ah ! hapless dame ! ' no sire bewails, 

No friend thy wretched fate deplores, 
No kindred voice with rapture hails 

Thy steps, within a stranger's doors. 

Perish the fiend ! whose iron hea't, 

To fair affection's truth unknown, 
Bids her he fondly loved depart, 

Unpitied, helpless, and alone ; 
Who ne'er unlocks, with silver itey, * 

The milder treasures of his soul ; 
May such a friend be far from me, 

And Ocean's storms between us roll ! 



FUGITIVE PIECES. 



THOUGHTS SUGGESTED BY A COLLEGE 

EXAMINATION. 3 
High in the midst, surrounded by his peers, 
Magnus his ample front sublime uprears ; 
Placed on his chair of state, he seems a god, 
While Sophs and Freshmen tremble at his nod ; 



1 Medea, who accompanied Jason to Corinth, was deserted 
by him for the daughter of Creon, kin;; of that city. The Chorus 
from which this is taken, here, address Medea; though a con- 
siderable liberty is taken with the original, by expanding the 
idea, as aim i" BOOM Other parts of the translation. 

2 The original is " KnOapiiv avuilavri KXcica (ppcvSv :" 
literally " Disclosing the hright key of the mind." 

3 Xo reflection is here intended against the person mentioned 
under the name of Magnus. He is merely represented as per- 
forming nn unavoidable function of his office: indeed BQi h an 
nttenipt could only recoil open myself; as that gentleman is 
now ::< much distinguished by his eloquence, anil the dignified 
propriety with which he fills his situation, as he was, in his 
younger days, for wit and conviviality 



As all around sit wrapt in speechless gloom, 
His voice, in thunder, shakes the sounding dome, 
Denouncing dire reproach to luckless fowls, 
Unskill'd to plod in mathematic rules. 

Happy the youth ! in Euclid's a.\ioms tried, 
Though little versed in any art beside ; 
Who, scarcely skill'd an English line to pen, 
Scans Attic metres with a critic's ken. 
What ! though he knows not how his fathets bled, 
When civil discord piled the fields with dead ; 
When Edward bade his conquering bands advance, 
Or Henry trampled on the crest of France ; 
Though, marv'ling at the name of Magna Charta, 
Yet well he recollects the laws of Sparta ; 
Can tell what edicts sage Lycurgus mad , 
While Blackstone's on the shelf neglected l;:ij ; 
Of Grecian dramas vaunts the deathless fan e, 
Of Avon's bard remembering scarce the name. 

Such is the youth, whose scientific pate, 
(Mass-honours, medals, fellow snips, awe.il j 
Or even, perhaps, the declamation prize, 
!f to such glorious height he lifts his eyes. 
But, lo ! no common orator can hope 
The envied silver cup within his scope : 
Not that our Heads much eloquence require, 
Th' Athenian's glowing style, or Tully's fire. 
A manner clear or warm is useless, since 
We do not try, by speaking, to convince : 
Be other orators of pleasing proud, 
We speak to please ourselves, not move the crowd ; 
Our gravity prefers the muttering tone, 
A proper mixture of the squeak and groan ; 
No borrow'd grace of action must be seen, 
The slightest motion would displease the Dean ; 
Whilst every staring Graduate would prate 
Against what he could never imitate. 

The man, who hopes t' obtain the promised CLp, 
Must in one posture stand, and ne'er look up ; 
Nor stop, but rattle over every word, 
No matter what, so it can not be heard — 
Thus let him hurry on, nor think to rest ! 
Who speaks the fastest 's sure to speak the best • 
Who utters most within the shortest space, 
May safely hope to win the wordy race. 

The setts of science these, \\ ho, thus repaid, 
Linger in ease in Granta's sluggish shade ; 
Where, on Cam's sedgy banks, supine they lie, 
Unknown, unhonour'd live, — unwept for, die ; 
Dull as the pictures which, adorn their halls, 
They think all learning fix'd within their walls; 
In manners rude, in foolish forms precise, 
All modern arts affecting to despise ; 
Yet prizing Bentlev's, Brunck's, ' or Porso.i &' 

note, 
More than the verse on which the critic wrote, 
Vain as their honours, heavy as their ale, 
Sad as their wit, and ledums as their tale, 
To friendship dead, though not untaoghi to feel, 
When Self and Church demand a bigot zeal. 
With eager haste they court the lord of power, 
Whether 't is Pitt or P — ttv rules the hour - 3 



1 Celebrated critics. 

'.' The present Creek professor fit Trinitv College, Cam 
bridge; a man whose powers of mind and writings may pn- 
haps justify their preference. 

3 Since this was written, Lord II. I' v has <*' hisplac* 



iG 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



To him, with suppliant smilesj they bend the head, 
While distant mitres to their iyca ;ir.= spread ; 
I ulJ a storm o'erwhehri him with disgrace, 

They M lis lo seek the next who tiU'd his place. 
Such arc the men who learning'! treasures guard, 
Such is their practice, such is their reward; 
This much, at least, we may presume to say — 
The premium can't exceed the prio> they pay 



LS06. 



TO THE EARL OF * + *. 

" tu semper amoris 
Sis manor, et cari comifis nc abscedol imago." 

VALERIUS I'LACCUS. 



Friend of my youth ! when young we roved, 
Like striplings mutually beloved, 

With Friendship's purest glow ; 
The bliss which wmg'd those rosy hours 
Was such as pleasure seldom showers 

On mortals here below. 

The recollection seems, alone, 
Dearer than all the joys I 've known, 

When distant far from you ; 
Though pain, 't is still a pleasing pain, 
To trace those days and hours again, 

And sigh again, adieu ! 

My pensive memory lingers o'er 
Those scenes to be enjoy'd no more, 

Those scenes regretted ever ; 
The measure of our youth is full, 
Life's evening dream is dark and dull, 

And we may meet — ah ! never ! 

As when one parent spring supplies 

Two streams, which from one fountain rise, 

Together join' d in vain ; 
How soon, diverging from their source, 
Each murmuring seeks anothei course, 

Till mingled in the main. 

Pur vital streams of weal or WOO, 
Though near, alas ! distinctly How, 

Nor mingle as before ; 
Now swift or slow, now black or clear, 
Till death's unfathom'd gulf appear, 

And both shall <pnt the shore. 

Our souls, my Friend ! whjch once supplied 
One wish, nor breathed a thought beside, 

Now flow in different channels ; 
Disdaining humbler rural spoils, 
'Tis yours to mix in polish'd courts, 

And shine in Fashion's annals. 

'T is mine to waste on Love my time, 
Or vent my reveries in rhyme, 

Without the aid of Reason; 
For Sense and Reason (critics know it) 
Have quitted every amorous poet, 

Nor left a thought to seize on. 



ana eubsemicntly (1 bad almost said consequently) thehoneur 
*f representing the University ; a fact so glaring requires no 
comment 



Ponr Little! sweet, melodious bard. 
01 late esteem'd it monstrous hard, 

That he, who sang before all ; 
He, who the love of Love expanded, 

By din- reviewers should be branded, 
As void of wit and moral. ' 

And vet, while Beauty's praise is thine, 
Harmonious favourite of the Nine ! 

Repine not at thy lot ; 
Thy soothing lays may still be read, 
When 1'crscculion's ami is dead, 

And critics are forgot. 

Still, I must yield those worthies merit, 
Who chasten, with unsparing spirit, 

Bad rhymes, and those who write them; 
And though myself may be the next 
By critic sarcasm to be vext, 

I really will not fight them ; a 

Perhaps they would do quite as well, 
To break the rudely-sounding shell 

Of such a young beginner ; 
He who offends at pert nineteen, 
Ere thirty, may become, I ween, 

A very harden'd sinner. 

Now - 



I must return to you, 



And sure apologies are due ; 

Accept then my concession ; 

In truth, dear , in fancy's flight, 

I soar along from left to right ; 

My muse admires digression. 

I think I said 't would be your fate 
To add one star to royal state ; 

May regal smiles attend you; 
And should a noble Monarch reign, 
You will not seek his smiles in vain, 

If worth can recommend you. 

Tet, since in danger courts abound, 
Where specious rivals glitter round, 

From snares may saints preserve you; 
And grant your love or friendship .ae'er 
From any claim a kindred care, 

But those who best deserve you. 

Not for a moment may you stray 
From Truth's secure unerring way ; 

May no delights decoy ; 
O'er roses may your footsteps move, 
Your smiles he ever smiles of love, 

Your tears be tears of joy. 

Oh! if you wish that happiness 

Your coming days and years may bless, 

And virtues crown your brow ; 
Be still, as you were wont to be, 
Spotless as you 've been known to me, 

Be, still, as you are now. 



1 These Stanzas were written soon after the r.ppea'.once of 
a severe critique in a Northern review, on a new publication 
of the British Anacroon. 

2 A Ban! (horresco referens) defied his reviewer to morts. 
combat. It this exempts become* prevalent, our peftodbal 
censors must he dipped in die rivor Styx, for what else can 
secure them from (be numerous host of their enraged assail- 
ants ? 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



1 



And though some trifling share of praise, 
To cheer my last declining days, 

To me were doubly dear ; 
Whilst blessing your beloved name, 
I 'd waive at once a PoeCs fame, 

To prove a Prophet Jure. 



GRANTA, A MEDLEY. 



Aoyveai; ^oy^aiiri fia^ou Kai -navra Kparijaais. 

Oh ! could Le Sage's 1 demon's gift 

Be realized at my desire, 
This night my trembling form he'd lift, 

To place it on St. Mary's spire. 
Then would, unroof 'd, old Granta's halls 

Pedantic inmates full display ; 
Fellows who dream on lawn, or stalls, 

The price of venal votes to pay. 
Then would I view each rival wight, 

P — tty and P — lm — st — n survey; 
Who canvass there with all their might, 

Against the next elective da} - . 
Lo ! candidates and voters lie, 

All lull'd in sleep, a goodly number! 
A race renow n'd for piety, 

Whose conscience won't disturb their slumber. 
Lord H , indeed, may not demur, 

Fellows are sage, reflecting men ! 
They know preferment ca occur 

But very seldom, — now and then. 
They know the Chancellor has got 

Some pretty livings in disposal ; 
Each hopes that one may be his lot, 

And, therefore, smiles on his proposal. 
Now, from the soporific scene 

I'll turn mine eye, as night grows later, 
To view, unheeded and unseen, 

The studious sons of Alma Mater. 

There, in apartments small and damp, 
The candidate for college prizes 

Sits poring by the midnight lamp, 

Goes late to bed, yet early rises. 

He, surely, well deserves to gain them, 
With all the honours of his college, 

Who, striving hardly to obtain them, 

Thus seeks unprofitable knowledge ; 

Wbo sacrifices hours of rest, 

To scan, precisely, metres Attic, 

Or agitates his anxious breast 

In solving problems mathematic ; 

Who reads false quantities in Sele, 2 
Or puzzles o'er the deep triangle, 

Deprived of many a wholesome meal, 

In barbarous Latin 3 doom'd to wrangle; 

1 The Dinble BoitetU of Le Sa^r, where AsmodeUB, the 
demon, placet Don Cleofas on an elevated situation and un- 
roofs the houses for Ins inspection. 

2 Sir's publication on Gjeek metres displays considerable 
talent and ingenuity, but, ns might he expected in so difficult 
a work, is nnt remarkable for aceurae) 

:i The Latin of the schools is of the canine species, and not 
»ery intelligible. 



Renouncing every pleasing page 

From authors of historic use ; 
Preferring to the letter'd sage 

The square of the hypothenu.se. 1 
Still, harmless are these occupations, 

That hurl none bat the hapless student, 
Compared with other recreations, 

Which bring together the imprudent ; 
Whose daring revels shock the sight, 

When vice and infamy combine, 
When drunkenness r.nd dice 

And every sense is steep'd in nine. 
Not so the methodistic crew, 

Who plans of reformation lay : 
In humble attitude they sue, 

And for the sins of others pray. 
Forgetting that their pride of spirit, 

Their exultation in their tiial, 
Detracts most largely from the mi lit 

Of all their boasted self-denial. 
'Tis morn, — from these I turn my sight: 

What scene is this which meets the eye? 
A numerous crowd, array'd in while, 2 

Across the green in numbers lly. 
Loud rings, in air, the chapel bell ; 

'T is hush'd : What sounds are these I hear J 
The organ's soft celestial swell 

Rolls deeply on the listening car. 
To this is join'd the sacred song, 

The royal minstrel's hallow M strain ; 
Though he who hears the music long 

Will never wish to hear again. 
Our choir would scarcely be excused, 

Even as a band of raw beginners; 
All mercy, now, must be refused, 

To such a set of croaking sinners. 
If David, when his toils were ended, 

Had heard these blockheads sing before him, 
To us his psalms had ne'er descended, 

In furious mood he would have torn 'em. 
The luckless Israelites, when taken, 

By some inhuman tyrant's order, 
Were ask'd to sing, by joy forsaken, 

On Babylonian river's border. 

Oh ! had they sung in notes like these, 

Inspired by stratagem or fear, 
They might have set their hearts at ease— 

The devil a soul had stay'd to hear. 

But, if I scribble longer now, 

The deuce a soul will stay to read , 

My pen is blunt, my ink is low, 

'T is almost time to stop indeed. 

Therefore, farewell, old Grama's spires, 

No more, like Cleofas, I fly ; 
No more thy theme my Muse inspires 

The reader's tired, and so am I. 

iao6 



1 The discovery of Pythagoras, that the square ol In* 
hypotbenuse is equal to the squares of the other two sides <>» 
a right-angled triangle. 

2 On a S:m!t day, the students wear surplices in chaoe' 



13 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LACHIN Y GAIR. 



Lnehiny Gair, or, as it Is pronounced in the I'rs.-, Tn-'i n>i 

towers |ir Ily pre-eminent in the Northern High 

lands, in- ir Invcrruufil. One of our modem tourists inpn- 
aa the highest mountain, perhaps, in Great Britain; 
be this as it may, it is certainly one of the moat mblime 
am! picturesque utmni^ -^i uui " Caledonian Alps " It- ap 
ce i» of .'i dusky hue, bul the summit is the * it ol 
eternal Bnows: near Laohin r Gail 1 sunn Bonn 

p iri of my life, 'in-- recjollection of which Ins given 
butli tci the following Stanzas. 



Awa v, yc gay landscapes, ye gardens of roses! 

In you let ilie minions of luxury rove ; 
Restore me the rocks where the snow-flake reposes, 

Though still they arc sacred to freedom and love: 
Yet, Caledonia, beloved are thy mountains, 

Round then - white summits though elements war, 
Though cataracts foam, 'stead of smooth-flowing foun- 
tains, 

I sigh for the valley of dark Loch na Garr. 
Ah ! there my young footsteps in infancy wander'd, 

My cap was the bonnet, my cloak "as tie' plaid j 1 
On chieftains long perish'd my memory ponder'. I, 

As daily I strode through the pine-eo\ er'd glade ; 
I sought not my home till the day's dying glory 

Gave place to the rays of the bright polar star; 
For Fancy was cheer'd by traditional story 

Disclosed by the nalives of dark Loch na Garr. 
" Shades of the dead ! have I not heard your voices 

Rise on the night-rolling breath of the gale ?" 
Surely the soul of the hero rejoices, 

And rides on the wind o'er his own Highland vale: 
Round Loch na Garr, while the stormy mist gathers, 

Winter presides in his cold icy car; 
Clouds there encircle the forms of my fathers — 

They dwell in the tempests of dark Loch na Garr: 
" Ill-starr'd, 2 though brave, did no visions foreboding 

Tell you that Fate had forsaken your cause?" 
Ah ! were you destined to die at Cullodcu, • 

Victory crown'd not your fall with applause ; 
Still were you happy, in death's early slumber 

You rest with your clan, in the caves of Bracmar,' 
The Pibroch 4 resounds to the piper's loud number 

Your deeds on the echoes of dark Loch na Gurr. 
Years have roll'd on, Loch na Garr, since I left you ; 

Years must elapse ere I tread you again; 
Nature of verdure and flowers has bereft you, 

Yet, still, are you dearer than Albion's plain: 
England! thy beauties are tame and domestic 

To one who has roved on the mountains afar ; 
Oh! for the crags that are wild and majestic, 

Tne steep-frowning glories of dark Loch na Garr! 

1 This word is erroneously pronounced, plod', the proper 

pronunciation (according lo the SeotcbJ is shown by the 
O'tlne-'raphy. 

2 I allude here to my maternal ancestors, "the Go 
many of whom Fought for the unfortunate Prince Charles, 
better known by the name of the Pretender. This biflnoh was 
nearly allied by blood, tig well to the Stewarts. 

George, 'he second Knr] of Huntley, married the Princess 
Annabella Stewart, daughter of James the First of Scotland ; 

bj her he .eft I'onr sons: the third, Sir William Gotdo'n, 1 
have the honoui to claim as one of my progenitors. 

3 Whether any perished in the battle of I 'uUoden I am not 
terrain; but as many i«ll in the insurrection, I have used the 
■ame of the principal actu>n, " pari pro loto." 

4 A traet of '.he Highlands so called ; there is also a Castle 
•if Riaornar. 

1 The Bagpipe. 



TO ROMANCE. 
Parent of golden dreams, Romance! 

Auspicious queen of childish jo\s ! 
Who lead'st along, in airy dance, 

Thy votive train of girls and boys; 
At length, in spells no longer bound, 

J break the fetters of my youth ; 
No more I tread thy mystic tound, 

But leave thy realms for those of Trutlu 

And yet, 'tis hard to quit the dreams 

Which haunt the unsuspicious soul, 
Where every nvtnph a goddess seems, 

Whose eyes through rays immortal roll; 
While Fancy holds her boundless reign, 

And all assume a varied hue, 
Winn virgins seem no longer vain, 

And even woman's smiles are true. 
And must we own thc-e but a name, 

And from thy hall of clouds descend ; 
Nor lind a sylph in every dame, 

A Pylades ' in every friend ? 
But leave, at once, thy realms of air, " 

To mingling bands of fairy elves: 
Confess that woman's false as fair, 

And friends have feelings for — themselves. 

With shame, I own I 've felt thy sway, 

Repentant, now thy reign is o'er ; 
No more thy precepts I obey, 

No more on fancied pinions soar : 
Fond fool ! to iove a sparkling eye, 

And think that eye to Truth was dear, 
To trust a passing wanton's sigh, 

And melt beneath a wanton's tear. 

Romance! disgusted with deceit, 
Far from thy motley court I By, 

Where Affectation holds her seat, 
And sickly Sensibility ; 

Whose silly tears can never flow 
For any pangs excepting thine ; 

Who turns aside from real woe. 

To steep in dew thy gaudy shrine : 

Now join with silde Sympathy, 

With cypress crown'd, array'd in w:eds, 
Wlio heaM s with thee uer simple sigh, 

VVb.es ~""' bleeds ; 

And call thy sylvan fi 

To mourn a swain for ever gone, 

Wii ice c mid glow with equal I 

But bends not now before thy ihrone. 

Y>- genial nymphs, whose ready tears, 

On all occasions, swiftly flqw : 
\ 

With fancied flames and phrenzy »low; 
Hay, \\;ll you mourn my absent bs 

Apostate from your gentle train I 
An infant Bard, at lea 

From you a sympathetic straiu 



1 It i? h.ir.ltv nesMatji lo •>!•.!. thit frlsda was trie companion "J 

Achilla! and htrocles, Nina sod Baryalos, Damon sod Pyl 

ty as r arfcabl ' .rruuinU 

which, in all pmbab lily, i ; food ttu imagination o( lb 

poel, trie page ot a hulor.an, or niodtin novelist. 






HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



Adieu ! fond race, a long adieu ! 

The hour of fate is hovering nigh; 
Even now the gulf appears in view, 

Where unlamente'd you must lie : 
Oblivion's blackening lake is seen 

Convulsed by gales you cannot weather, 
Where you, and eke your gentle queen, 

Alas ! must perish altogether. 



ELEGY ON NEWSTEAD ABBEY.' 



It is the voice of years that are gone! they roll before' me 
with all their deeds. OSS1AN. 

Newstead ! fast falling, once resplendent dome ! 

Religion's shrine ! repentant Henry's 2 pride! 
Of warriors, monks, and dames the cloister'd tomb, 

Whose pensive shades around thy ruins glide : 

Hail to thy pile ! more honour'd in thy fall, 
Than modern mansions in their pillar'd state ; 

Proudly majestic frowns thy vaulted hall, 
Scowling defiance on the blast of fate. 

No mail-clad serfs, 3 obedient to their lord, 
In grim array, the crimson cross 4 demand: 

Or gay assemble round the festive board, 
Their chief's retainers, an immortal band. 

Else might inspiring Fancy's magic eye 

Retrace their progress, through the lapse of time ; 

Marking each ardent youth, ordain'd to die, 
A votive pilgrim, in Judea's clime. 

But not from thee, dark pile! departs the Chief, 

His feudal realm in other regions lay ; 
In thee, the wounded conscience courts relief, 

Retiring from the garish blaze of day. 

Yes, in thy gloomy cells and shades profound, 
The monk abjured a world he ne'er could view ; 

Or blood-stain'd Guilt repenting solace found, 
Or innocence from stern Oppression flew. 

A monarch bade thee from that wild arise, 

Where Sherwood's outlaws once were wont to prowl; 

And Superstition's crimes, of various dyes, 
Sought shelter in the priest's protecting cowl. 

Where now the grass exhales a murky dew, 

The humid pall of life-e.xtinguish'd clay, 
In sainted fame the sacred fathers grew, 

Nor raised their pious voices, but to pray. 
Whore now the bats their wavering wings extend, 

Soon as the gloaming b spreads her waning shade, 
The choir did oft their mingling vespers blend, 

Or matin orisons to Mary 6 paid. 



Years roll on years — to ages, ages yield — 

Abbots to abbots in a line succeed, 
Religion's charter their protecting shield, 
Till royal sacrilege their doom decreed. 
One holy Henrv rear'd the Gothic walls, 

And bade the pious inmates rest in peace ; 
Another Henky ' the kind gift recalls, 

And bids devotion's hallow'd echoes cease. 
Vain is each threat, or supplicating prayer, 

He drives them exiles from their blest abode, 
To roam a dreary world, in deep despair, 

No friend, no home, no refuge but their God. 
Hark ! how the hall, resounding to the strain, 
Shakes with the martial music's novel din ! 
The heralds of a warrior's haughty n ign, 

High-crested banners, wave thy walls within. 
Of changing sentinels the distant hum, 

The mirth offcasts, the clang of burnish'd arms, 
The braying trumpet, and the hoarser drum, 

Unite in concert with increased alarms. 
An abbey once, a regal fortress 2 now, 
Encircled by insulting rebel powers ; 
War's dread machines o'erhang thy threatening brow 

And dart destruction in sulphureous showers. 
Ah ! vain defence ! the hostile traitor's siege, 

Though oft repulsed, by guile o'ercomes the brave; 
His thronging foes oppress the faithful liege, 

Rebellion's reeking standards o'er him wave. 
Not unavenged, the raging baron yields, 

The blood of traitors smears the purple plain ; 
Unconquer'd still his falchion there he wields, 

And days of glory yet for him remain. 
Still, in that hour the warrior wish'd to strew 
Self-gather'd laurels on a self-sought grave ; 
But Charles' protecting genius hither flew, 

The monarch's friend, the monarch's hope, to save. 
Trembling she snatch'd him 3 from the unequal strife, 

In other fields the torrent to repel, 
For nobler combats here reserved his life, 

To lead the band where godlike Falkland 4 fell. 
From thee, poor pile ! to lawless plunder given, 

While dying groans their painful requiem sound, 
Far different incense now ascends to heaven — 

Such victims wallow on the gory ground. 
There, many a pale and ruthless robber's corse, 

Noisome and ghast, defiles thy sacred sod ; 
O'er mingling man, and horse commix'd with horse, 

Corruption's heap, the savage spoilers trod. 
Graves, long with rank and sighing weeds o'erspread, 

Ransack'd, resign perforce their mortal mould ; 
From ruffian fangs escape not e'en the dead, 
Raked from repose, in search of buried gold. 



1 As one poem on this subject is printed in the beginning, 
the author had originally no intention of inserting the follow- 
ing : it is now added at the particular request of some friends. 

2 Henry II. founded Newstead soon after the murder of 
Thoinas-a-Bncket. 

3 This word is used by Walter Scott, in his poem, "The 
Wild Huntsman," as synonymous with Vassal. 

4 The Red Cross was the badge of the Crus 

5 \s "Gloaming," the Scottish word* for Twilight, is far 
more poetical, and has been recommended l»y many eminent 
literary men, particularly Dr. Moore, in his Letters to liurns. 
I have ventured to use it on account of its harmony. 

C The Priory was dedicated to the Virgin 



1 At the dissolution of the Monasteries Henry VIII. be- 
stowed Newstead Abbey on Sir John Byron. 

2 Newstead sustained a ( shietable siege in the war be- 
tween Charles I. and his Parliament. 

I! Lord Byron and Ins brother Sir William held high com 
munds in the royal urm> ; the former was Ccnerai in Chi. t in 
Ireland, Lieutenant of die Tower, sad Governor to James 
Duke of York, afterwards the unhappy .lames II. The latter 
hud a principal share in many actions. Vide Clarendon, 
Home, etc. 

4 Lucius Cary, Lord Viscount Falkland, the most accom 
plished man ..tins age, was killed at the battle of Newborn 
charging in the ranks of Lord Byron's regiment of cava.r» 



2C 



BYRON'S WORKS 



Rush'd is the harp, unstrung the warlike lyre, 

The minstrel's palsied hand reclines In death ; 
No more he strikes the quivering chords with lire, 

Or sings the glories of the martial wreath. 
At length, the sated murderers, gorged with prey, 

Re'.ire — the clamour of the fight is o'er ; 
Silence again resumes her awful swav, 

And sable Horror guards the massy door. 
Here Desolation holds her dreary court ; 

What satellites declare her dismal reign! 
Shrieking their dirge, ill-omen'd birds resort 

To flit their vigils in the hoary fane. 

Soon a new morn's restoring beams dispel 

The clouds of anarchy from Britain's skies ; 
The fierce usurper seeks his native hull, 

And Nature triumphs as the tyrant dies. 
With storms she welcomes his expiring groans, 

Whirlwinds responsive greet his labouring breath ; 
Earth shudders as her cave receives his bones, 

Loathing ' the offering of so dark a death. 
The legal Ruler 2 now resumes the helm, 

He guides through gentle seas the prow of state : 
Hope cheers with wonted smiles the peaceful realm, 

And heals the bleeding wounds of wearied Hate. 

The gioomy tenants, Newstead, of thy cells, 

Howling resign their violated nest ; 
Again the master on his tenure dwells, 

Enjoy'd, from absence, with enraptured zest. 

Vassals within thy hospitable pale, 

Loudly carousing, bless their lord's return ; 
Culture again adorns the gladdening vale, 

And matrons, once lamenting, cease to mourn. 
A thousand songs on tuneful echo float, 

Unwonted foliage mantles o'er the trees ; 
And, hark ! the horns proclaim a mellow note, 

The hunter's cry hangs lengthening on the breeze. 
Beneath their coursers' hoofs the valleys shake : 

What fears, what anxious hopes attend the chase ! 
The dying stag seeks refuge in the lake, 

Exulting shouts announce the finish'd race. 
All! happy days! too happy to endure ! 

Such simple sports our plain forefathers knew : 
No splendid vices glitter'd to allure — 

Their joys were many, as their cares were few. 
From these descending, sons to sires succeed, 

Time steals along, and Death uprcars his dart ; 
Another chief impels the foaming steed, 

Another crowd pursue the panting hart. 
Newstead ! what saddening change of scene is thine ! 

Thy yawning arch betokens slow decay ; 
The last and youngest of a noble line 

Now holds thy mouldering turrets in his sway. 
Deserted now, ho scans thy gray-worn towers — 

Thy vaults, where dead of feudal ages sleep — 



1 This is a historical fact. A violent tempest occurred im- 
mediately iiitaequeni to the death, <>r interment, of Cromwell, 
which occasioned many disputes between his partisans and 
the vavaliere ; both interpreted the circumstance imo divine 
mterpoeitieOi hut whether as approbation <>r conderonstion, 
«r leave -o the casuists of that age to decide. I have rr.nde 
•mil [i*c i/f theioccurrence as suited the subject of my poem. 

V Charles 11. 



Thv cloisters, pervious to the wintry showers — ■ 

These, these he views, and views ihem but to weep 
Yet are his tears no emblem of regret, 

Cheriah'd affection only bids them How; 
Pride, Hope, and Love forbid him to forget, 

But warm his bosom with impassion'd glow. 
Yet, he prefers thee to the gilded domes, 

Or gewgaw grottos of the vainly greal ; 
Yet lingers 'mid thy damp and mossy tombs, 

Nor breathes a murmur 'gainst the will of fate 
Haply thy sun emerging yet may shine, 

Thee to irradiate with meridian ray; 
Hours splendid as the past may still be thine. 

And bless thy future as thy former day. 



TO E. N. L. ESQ. 



Nil ego contulerim jucundosanus amien. 

HOR. E 

Dear L , in this sequester'd scene, 

While all around in slumber he, 
The joyous days which ours have been 

Come rolling fresh on Fancy's eye : 
Thus, if amidst the gathering storm, 
While clouds the darken'd noon deform, 
Yon heaven assumes a varied glow, 
I hail the sky's celestial bow, 
Which spreads the sign of future peace, 
And bids the war of tempests cease. 
Ah ! though the present brings but pain, 
I think those days may come again ; 
Or if, in melancholy mood, 
Some lurking envious fear intrude, 
To check my bosom's fondest thought, 

And interrupt the golden dream ; 
I crush the fiend with malice fraught, 

And still indulge my wonted theme ; 
Although we ne'er again can trace, 

In Granta's vale, the pedant's lore, 
Nor, through the groves of Ida, chase 

Our raptured visions as before ; 
Though Youth has flown on rosy piuioK, 
And Manhood claims his stern dominion, 
Age will not every hope destroy, 
But yield some hours of sober joy. 
Yes, I will hope that Time's broad wing 
Will shed around some dews of spring ; 
But, if his scythe must sweep the flowers 
Which bloom among the fairy bowers, 
Where smiling Youth delights to dwell, 
And hearts with early rapture swell ; 
If frowning Age, with cold control, 
Confines the current of the soul, 
Congeals the tear of Pity's eve, 
Or checks the sympathetic sigh, 
Or hears unmoved Misfortune's groan, 
And bids me feel for self alone ; 
Oh ! may my bosom never learn, 

To sooth its wonted heedless flow, 
Still, still, despise the censor stern, 

But ne'er forget another's woe. 
Yes, as you knew me in the days 
O'er which Remembrance yet delays, 



HOURS OF IDLENESS 



c 2\ 



Still may I rove untutor'd, wild, 
And even in age at heart a child. 
Though now on airy visions borne, 

To you my soul is still the same, 
Oft has it been my fate to mourn, 

And all my former joys are tame. 
But, hence ! ye hours of sable hue, 

Your frowns are gone, my sorrow 's o'er ; 
By every bliss my childhood knew, 

I '11 think upon your shade no more. 
Thus, when the whirlwind's rage is past, 

And caves their sullen roar enclose, 
We heed no more the wintry blast, 

When lull'd by zephyr to repose. 
Full often has my infant Muse 

Attuned to love her languid lyre ; 
But now, without a theme to choose, 

The strains in stolen sighs expire; 
My youthful nymphs, alas ! are flown ; 

E is a wife, and C a mother, 

And Carolina sighs alone, 

And Mary 's given to another ; 
And Cora's eye, which roll'd on me, 

Can now no more my love recall ; 
In truth, dear L , 't was time to flee, 

For Cora's eye will shine on all. 
And though the sun, with genial rays, 
His beams alike to all displays, 
And every lady's eye 's a sun, 
These last should be confined to one. 
The soul's meridian don't become her 
Whose sun displays a general sximmer. 
Thus faint is every former flame, 
And Passion's self is now a name : 
As, when the ebbing flames are low, 

The aid which once improved their light, 
And bade them burn with fiercer glow, 

Now quenches all their sparks in night ; 
Thus has it been with passion's fires, 
As many a boy and girl remembers, 
While all the force of love expires, 
Extinguish'd with the dying embers. 

But now, dear L , 't is midnight's noon, 

And clouds obscure the watery moon, 
Whose beauties I shall not rehearse, 
Described in every stripling's verse ; 
For why should I the path go o'er, 
Yi hich every bard has trod before ? 
Yet, ere yon silver lamp of night 

Has thrice perform'd her st-ated round, 
Has thrice retraced her path of light, 

And chased away the gloom profound, 
I trust that we, my gentle friend, 
Shall see her rolling orbit wend 
Above the dear-loved peaceful seat 
Which once contain'd our youth's retreat; 
And then, with those our childhood knew, 
We '11 mingle with the festive crew ; 
While many a tale of former day 
Shall wing the laughing hours away; 
And all the flow of soul shall pour 
The sacred intellectual shower, 
Nor cease, till Luna's waning horn 
Scarce glimmers through the mist of Morn. 



TO . 

Oh ! had my fate been join'd with thine, 
As once this pledge appear'd a token, 

These follies had not then been mine, 
For then my peace had not been broken. 

To thee these early faults I owe, 

To thee, the wise and old reproving ; 
They know my sins, but do not know 

'T was thine to break the bonds of loving. 
For once my soul, like thine, was pure, 

And all its rising fires could smother ; 
But now thy vows no more endure, 

Bestow'd by thee upon another. 
Perhaps his peace I could destroy, 

And spoil the blisses that await him ; 
Yet, let my rival smile in joy, 

For thy dear sake I cannot hate him. 
Ah ! since thy angel form is gone, 

My heart no more can rest with any ; 
But what it sought in thee alone, 

Attempts, alas ! to find in many. 
Then fare thee well, deceitful maid, 

'T were vain and fruitless to regret thee ; 
Nor hope nor memory yield their aid, 

But pride may teach me to forget thee. 
Yet all this giddy waste of years, 

This tiresome round of palling pleasures. 
These varied loves, these matron's fears, 

These thoughtless strains to passion's measures 
If thou wert mine, had all been hush'd ; 

This cheek, now pale from early riot, 
With Passion's hectic ne'er had flush'd, 

But bloom'd in calm domestic quiet. 
Yes, once the rural scene was sweet, 

For Nature seem'd to smile before thee ; 
And once my breast abhorr'd deceit, 

For then it beat but to adore thee. 
But now I seek for other joys ; 

To think would drive my soul to madness ■ 
In thoughtless throngs and empty noise, 

I conquer half my bosom's sadness. 
Yet, even in these a thought will steal, 

In spite of every vain endeavour; 
And fiends might pity what I feel, 
To know that thou art lost for ever. 

STANZAS. 

I would I were a careless child, 

Still dwelling in my highland cave, 
Or roaming through the dusky wild, 

Or bounding o'er the dark-blue wave. 
The cumbrous pomp of Saxon ' pride 

Accords not with the frce-lrcrn soul, 
Which loves the mountain's craggy side, 

And seeks the rocks where billows roll. 
Fortune ! take back these cultured lands, 

Take back this name of splendid sound! 
I hate the touch of servile hands — 

I hate the slaves that cringe around : 



1 SesBenah, or Suxon, a Gaelic word signifying eitlioi '* 
land or English. 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Place mc along the rocks I love, 

Winch sound to ocean's wildest roar; 
I ask but this — again to rove 

Through scenes my youth bath known before. 
Few are my years, and yet I feel 

The world was ne'er design'd for me ; 
Ah ! why do dark'ning shades conceal 

The hour when man must cease to be ? 
Once I beheld a splendid dream, 

A visionary scene of bliss ; 
Truth ! wherefore did thy hated beam 

Awake me to a wor d like this? 
I loved — but those 1 loved are gone ; 

Had friends — my ear.y friends are fled ; 
How cheerless feels the heart alone 

When all its former hopes are dead ! 
Though gay companions o'er the bowl 

Dispel awhile the sense of ill, 
Though Pleasure stirs the maddening soul, 

The heart — the heart is lonely still. 

How dull to hear the voice of those 

Whom Rank or Chance, whom Wealth or Power, 
Have made, though neither friends nor foes, 

Associates of the festive hour. 
Give mc again a faithful few, 

In years and feelings stili the same, 
And I will fly the midnight crew, 

Where boist'rous Joy is but a name. 

And Woman! lovely Woman, thou, 

My hope, my comforter, my all ! 
How cold must be my bosom now, 

When e'en thy smiles begin to pall ! 
Without 1 a sigh would I resign 

This busy scene of splendid woe, 
To make that calm contentment mine 

Which Virtue knows, or seems to know. 
Fain would I fly the haunts of men— 

I seek to shun, not hate mankind ; 
My breast requires the sullen glen, 

Whose gloom may suit a darken'd mind. 
Oh ! that to me the wings were given 

Which bear the turtle to her nest! 
Then would I cleave the vault of Heaven, 

To flee away and be at rest. ' 



LINES 

WRITTEN BENEATH AN ELM IN THE CHURCHYARD 

OF HARROW ON THE HILL. 

SEPT. 2, 1807. 

Spot of my youth ! whose hoary branches sigh, 
Swept by the breeze that fans thy cloudless sky ; 
Where now alone I muse, who oft have trod, 
With those I loved, thy soft and verdant sod ; 
With those who, scatter'd far, perchance deplore, 
Like me, the happy scenes they knew before : 
Oh ! as I trace again thy winding hill, 
Mine eyes admire, my heart adores thee still, 
I'hou drooping Elm ! beneath whose boughs I lay, 
And frequent mused the twilight hours away ; 
Where, as they once were wont, my limbs recline, 
Hut ah ' without the thoughts which then were mine : 

I Psalm Iv. v. 6. — " And I said, Oh ! that I hail wings like 
a dove, Chen would I fly away and bo at rest." This verse 
aUo constitutes a part of the most beautiful anthem in our 
eneiiane 



How do thy branches, moaning to the blast, 
Invite the bosom to recall the past ; 
And seem to whisper, as they gently swell, 
"Take, while thou can'st, a lingering last farewell "' 
When Fate shall chill at length this fever'd breast, 
And calm its cares and passions into rest, 
Oft have I thought 't would soothe my dying hour. 
If aught may soothe when life resigns her power, 
To know some humbler grave, some narrow cell, 
Would hide my bosom where it loved to dwell : 
With this fond dream methinks 't were sweet to die— 
And here it linger'd, here my heart might lie; 
Here might I sleep, where all my hopes arose, 
Scene of my youth, and couch of my repose : 
For ever stretch'd beneath this mantling shade, 
l'rest by the turf where once my childhood play'd, 
Wrapt by the soil that veils the spot I loved, 
Mix'd with the earth o'er which my footsteps moved ; 
lilest by the tongues that charm'd my youthful ear, 
Mourn'd by the few my soul acknowledged here, 
Deplored by those in early days allied, 
And unreniember'd by the world beside. 



THE DEATH OF CALMAR AND ORLA. 

An imitation of Macpher son's Ossian. 1 
Dear are the days of youth! Age dwells on their re- 
membrance through the mist of time. In the twilight 
he recalls the sunny hours of morn. He lifts his spear 
with trembling hand. " Not thus feebly did I luise the 
steel before my fathers !" Past is the race of heroes ! 
but their fame rises on the harp ; their souls ride on 
the wings of the wind ! they hear the sound through 
the sighs of the storm, and rejoice in their hall ot 
clouds ! Such is Calmar. The gray stone marks his 
narrow house. He looks down from eddying tempests, 
he rolls his form in the whirlwind ; and hovers on the 
blast of the mountain. 

In Morven dwelt the chief; a beam of war to Fingal. 
His steps in the field were marked in blood ; Lochlin's 
sons had fled before his angry spear : but mild was the 
eye of Calmar ; soft was the flow of his yellow locks — 
they stream's like the meteor of the night. No maid 
was the sigh of his soul ; his thoughts were given to 
friendship, to dark-haired Orla, destroyer of heroes ! 
Equal were their swords in battle ; but fierce was the 
pride of Orla, gentle alone to Calmar. Together they 
dwelt in the cave of Oithona. 

From Lochlin, Swaran bounded o'er the blue waves. 
Erin's sons fell beneath his might. Fingal roused his 
chiefs to combat. Their ships cover the ocean ! Their 
hosts throng on the green hills. They come to the aid 
of Erin. 

Night rose in clouds. Darkness veils the armies ; 
but the blazing oaks gleam through the valley. The 
sons of Lochlin slept: their dreams were of blood. They 
lift the spear in thought, and Fingal flies. Not so the 
host of Morven. To watch was the post of Orla. Cal- 
mar stood by his side. Their spears were in their hands. 
Fingal called his chiefs. They stood around. The king 
was in the midst. Gray were liis locks, but strong was 
the arm of the king. Age withered not his powers 



1 It may be necessary to observe, that the story, though 
considerably varied in the catastrophe, i» taken from "A'isus 
nml 1'iiryahis," of which episode a translation has been ul 
ready given. 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



23 



" SonsofMorven," said the hero, " to-morrow we meet 
the foe; but where is Cuthullin, the shield of Erin? 
He rests in the halls of Tura ; he knows not of our 
coming. Who will speed through Lochlin to the hero, 
and caU the chief to arms ? The path is by the swords 
of foes, but many are my heroes. They are thunderbolts 
of war. Speak, ye chiefs ! who will arise ?" 

" Son of Trenmor ! mine be the deed," said dark- 
haired Orla, " and mine alone. What is death to me ? 
I love the sleep of the mighty, but little is the danger. 
The sons of Lochlin dream. I will seek car-borne 
Cuthullin. If I fall, raise the song of bards, and lay 
me by the stream of Lubar." — "And shalt thou fall 
alone ?" said fair-haired Calmar. " Wilt thou leave thy 
friend afar, Chief of Oithona? not feeble is my arm in 
fight. Could I see thee die, and not lift the spear? No, 
Orla ! ours has been the chase of the roebuck, and the 
feast of shells ; ours be the path of danger : ours has 
been the cave of Oithona ; ours be the narrow dwelling 
on the banks of Lubar." — " Calmar !" said the chief of 
Oithona, "why should thy yellow locks be darkened 
in the dust of Erin? Let me fall alone. My father 
dwells in his hall of air : he will rejoice in his boy : but 
the blue-eyed Mora spreads the feast for her son in 
Morven. She listens to the steps of the hunter on the 
heath, and thinks it is the tread of Calmar. Let him 
not say, 'Calmar is fallen by the steel of Lochlin ; he 
died with gloomy Orla, the chief of the dark brow.' 
Why should tears dim the azure eye of Mora? Why 
6hould her voice curse Orla, the destroyer of Calmar? 
Live, Calmar ! live to raise my stone of moss ; live to 
revenge me in the blood of Lochlin ! Join the song of 
bards above my grave. Sweet will be the song of death 
to Oria, from the voice of Calmar. My ghost shall smile 
on the notes of praise." — "Orla!" said the son of 
Mora, " could I raise the song of death to my friend ? 
Could I give his fame to the winds? No; my heart 
would speak in sighs ; faint and broken are the sounds 
of sorrow. Orla ! our souls shall hear the song together. 
One cloud shall be ours on high ; the bards will mingle 
the names of Orla and Calmar." 

They quit the circle of the chiefs. Their steps are 
to the host of Lochlin. The dying blaze of oak dim 
twinkles through the night. The northern star points 
the path to Tura. Swaran, the king, rests on his 
lonely hill. Here the troops are mixed : they frown in 
sleep, their shields beneath their heads. Their swords 
gleam, at distance, in heaps. The fires are faint ; their 
embers fail in smoke. All is hushed ; but the gale 
sighs on the rocks above. Lightly wheel the heroes 
through the slumbering band. Half the journey is 
past, when Mathon, resting on his shield, meets the 
eye of Orla. It rolls in flame, and glistens through the 
shade : his spear is raised on high. "Why dost thou 
bend thy brow, Chief of Oithona?" said fair-haired 
Calmar. "We are in the midst of foes. Is this a time 
for delay ?" — " It is a time for vengeance," said Orla, 
of the gloomy brow. " Mathon of Lochlin sleeps : seest 
thou his spear? Its point is dim with the gore of my 
father. The blood of Mathon shall reck on mine ; but 
shall I slay him sleeping, son of Mora? No! he shall 
feel his wound ; my fame shall not soar on the blood 
of slumber. Rise, Mathon ! rise ! the son of Connal calls; 
thy life is his : rise to combat." Mathon starts from 
sleep, but did he rise alone ? No : the gathering chiefs 
bound on the plain. "Fly, Calmar, fly!" said dark- 



haired Orla : " Mathon is mine ; I shall die in joy ; bu» 
Lochlin crowds around ; fly through the shade of night." 
Orla turns ; the helm of Mathon is cleft ; his shield 
falls from his arm : he shudders in his blood. He rolls 
by the side of the blazing oak. Strumon sees him fall. 
His wrath rises ; his weapon glitters on the head of 
Orla ; but a spear pierced his eye. His brain gushes 
through the wound, and foams on the spear of Calmar. 
As roll the waves of Ocean on two mighty barks of the 
north, so pour the men of Lochlin on the chiefs. As, 
breaking the surge in foam, proudly steer the barks of 
the north, so rise the chiefs of Morven on the scattered 
crests of Lochlin. The din of arms came to the earol 
Fingal. He strikes his shield : his sons throng around ; 
the people pour along the heath. Ryno bounds in joy. 
Ossian stalks in his arms. Oscar shakes the spear. The 
eagle wing of Fillan floats on the wind. Dreadful is 
the clang of death ! many are the widows of Lochlin. 
Morven prevails in his strength. 

Morn glimmers on the hills : no living foe is seen $ 
but the sleepers are many : grim they lie on Erin. The 
breeze of ocean lifts their locks : yet they do not awake. 
The hawks scream above their prey. 

Whose yellow locks wave o'er the breast of a chief? 
bright as the gold of the stranger, they mingle with the 
dark hair of his friend. 'Tis Calmar — he lies on the 
bosom of Orla. Theirs is one stream of blood. Fierce 
is the look of the gloomy Orla. He breathes not ; but 
his eye is still a flame: it glares in death unclosed. 
His hand is grasped in Calmar's ; but Calmar lives : he 
lives, though low. "Rise," said ihe king, "rise, son ot 
Mora, 'tis mine to heal the wounds of heroes. Calmar 
may yet bound on the hills of Morven." 

"Never more shall Calmar chase the deer of Morven 
with Orla;" said the hero, "what were the chase to 
me, alone? Who would share the spoils of battle with 
Calmar? Orla is at rest! Rough was thy soul, Orla! 
yet soft to me as the dew of morn. It glared on others in 
lightning ; to me a silver beam of night. Bear my swoid 
to blue-eyed Mora : let it hang in my empty hall. It is 
not pure from blood : but it could not save Orla. Lay 
me with my friend : raise the song when I am dark." 

They are laid by the stream of Lubar. Four gray 
stones mark the dwelling of Orla and Calmar. 

When Swaran was bound, our sails rose on the blue 
waves. The winds gave our barks to Morven. The 
Bards raised the song. 

"What form rises on the roar of clouds! whose dark 
ghost gleams on the red streams of tempests? his voice 
rolls on the thunder. 'T is Orla ; the brown chief of 
Oithona. He was unmatched in war. Peace to thy soul, 
Orla! thy fame will not perish. Nor thine, Calmar! lovely 
wast thou, son of blue-eyed Mora ; but not harmless 
was thy sword. It hangs in thy cave. The ghosts of 
Lochlin shriek around its steel. Hear thy praise, Calmar! 
it dwells on the voice of the mighty. Thy name shakes 
on the echoes of Morven. Then raise thy fair locks, son 
of Mora ; spread them on the arch of the rainbow, and 
smile through the tears of the storm." ' 



1 1 feU I.ning 'slate edition has completely overthrown every 
hope that Mncpherson's Ossian might prove the Translation of 
a series of Poems, complete in themselves; but, while the im 
posture is discovered, the merit of the work remains undisputed, 
though not without faults, particularly, in some parts, turgid and 
bombastic diction. — The present humble imitation will be par- 
doned l>> the admirers of the original, as an attempt, nowever 
inferior, which evinces an attacliment/o their favourite author 



24 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CRITIQUE 

EXTRACTED FROM THE EDINBURGH REVIEW, NO. 22, FOR JANUARY 1808. 



Hours of Idleness ; a Series of Poems, original and 
trantlatfd. By George Goui>on, Loud Uvrom, 
a Minor. 8vo. pp. 200.— Newark, 1807. 

The poesy of this young Lord belongs to the class 
which neither gods nor men art Bald to permit. Indeed, 
we I" not recollect to have seen a quantity of verse 
with so few deviations in either direction from that 
exact Standard. His effusions are spread over a dead 
flat, and can no more get above or below the level, than 
if they were so much stagnant water. As an extenuation 
of this olfence, the noble author is peculiarly forward 
in pleading minority. We have it in the title-page, 
and on the very back of the volume ; it follows his 
name like a favourite part of his style. Much stress is 
laid upon it in the preface, and the poems are connected 
with this general statement of his case, by particular 
dates, substantiating the age at which each waswritti n. 
Now, the law upon the point of minority we hold to lie 
perfectly clear. It is a plea available only to the de- 
fendant ; no plaintiff can ofTer it as a supplementary 
ground of action. Thus, if any suit could be brought 
against Lord Byron, for the purpose of compelling him 
to put into court a certain quantity of poetry, and if 
judgment were given against him, it is highly probable 
that an exception ild be taken were he to deliver 
for poetry the rente s of this volume. To this he 
might plead minority ; but, as he now makes voluntary 
tender of the article, he hath no right to sue, on that 
ground, for the price in good current praise, should 
the goods be unmarketable. Tliis is our view of the 
law on the point, and, we dare to say, so will it be ruled. 
Perhaps however, in reality, all that he tells us about 
his youth is rather with a .iew to increase our wonder, 
than to soften our censun . He possibly means to say, 
" See how a minor can write ! This poem was actually 
composed by a young man of eighteen, and this by one 
of only sixteen!" — But, alas ! we all remember the poetry 
of Cowley at ten, and Pope at twelve ; and so far from 
hearing, with any degree of surprise, that very poor 
verses were written by a youth from his leaving school 
to his leaving college, inelusive, we really believe this 
to be the most common of all occurrences ; that it hap- 
pens in the life of nine men in ten who are educated in 
England ; and that the tenth man writes better verse 
than Lord Byron. 

His other plea of privilege our author rather brings 
forward in order to waive it. He certainly, however, 
does allude frequently to his family and ancestors — 
sometimes in poetry, sometimes in notes ; and while 
giving up his claim un the score of rank, he takes care 
to remember us of Df Johnson's Baying, that when a 
nobleman appears as an author, his merit should be 
handsomely acknowledged. In truth, it is this consid- 
eration only, that induces us to give Lord Byron's poems 
a place in our review, beside our desire to counsel him, 
that he do forthwith abandon poetry, and turn his talents, 
winch are considerable, and liis opportunities, which are 
jre;', lo better account. 



With this view, we must beg leave seriously to assure 
him, that the mere rhyming of the final syllable, even 
when accompanied by the presence of a certain numbei 
effect; nay, although (which does not always happen) 
those feet should scan regularly, and have been all 
counted accurately upon the fingers, — it is not the 
whole art of poetrv. We would entreat him to believe, 
that a certain portion of liveliness, somewhat of fancy, 
is necessary to constitute a poem, and that a poem in 
the present day, to be read, must contain at least one 
thought, either in a little degree different from the ideas 
of former writers, or differently expressed. We put it 
to his candour, whether there is any thing so deserving 
iii' iiinie of poetry in verses like the following, written 
in 1806 ; and whether, if a youth of eighteen could say 
aw thing so uninteresting to his ancestors, a youth of 
nineteen should publish it: 

" Shades of heroes, farewell ! your descendant, departing 
From the seat of his ancestors, bids you adieu I 

Abroad or at home, your remembrance imparting 
New courage, he 'U think upon glory and you. 

" Though a tear dim his eye at this sad separation, 
'T is nature, not fear, thai excites his regie! : 

Far distant he goes, with the same emulation ; 
The fame of his fathers he ne'er can forget. 

" That fame, and that memory, still will he cherish, 
lie vows that he ne'er will disgrace your renown ; 

Like you will he live, or like you will he perish ; 
When decay'd, may he mingle his dust with your own.' 

Now we positively do assert, that there is nothing bet 
ter than these stanzas in the whole compass of the nobli 
minor's volume. 

Lord Byron should also have a care of attempting 
what the greatest poets have done before him, for 
comparisons (as he must have had. occasion to see at 
his writing-master's,) are odious. — Graj'sOde on Eton 
College should really have kept oat the ten hobbling 
stanzas " On a distant view of the village and school of 
Harrow." 

" Where fancy yet joya to retrace tiSe resemblance 
Of comrades, in friendship and mischief allied ; 

Jlow welcome to me your ne'er-fading remembrance, 
Which rests in the bosom, though hope is denied." 

In like manner, the exquisite lines of Mr Rogers " On 
a 2'ear," might have warned the nolle author off* those 
premises, and spared us a whole dozen such stanzas as 
the following : 

" Mild Charity's plow, 

To us mortals below 
Shows the sou! from hiirbnnor c.\.ii 

Compassion will melt, 

Where this virtue is felt, 
And its dew is diffused in a Tear. 

" The man doom'd to sail 
With the biast of the rale, 

Through billows Atlantic to steer. 
As he bends o'er the wave. 
Which may soon be his grave. 

The green sparkles bright vith a ear 



CRITIQUE ON HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



And so of instances in which former poets hail failed. 
Thus, we do not think Lord Byron was made for trans- 
lating, during his non-age, Adrian's Address to his 
Soul, when Pope succeeded so indifferently in the at- 
tempt. If our readers, however, are of another opinion, 
♦hey may look at it. 

" Ah ! gentle, fleeting, wavering sprite, 
Friend and associate of this clay ! 

To what unknown region home. 
Wilt thou now wing thy distant Bigb'tl 
JS'o more wiih wotted hofnouf eay. 

But pallid, cheerless, and forlorn." 

However, be this as it may, we fear his translations 
and imitations are great favourites with Lord Byron. 
We have them of all kinds, from Anacrcon to Ossian ; 
and, viewing them as school exercises, they may pass. 
Only, why print them after they have had their day 
and served their turn? And why call the thing in.p. 79, ' 
a translation, where two words (Oc\io AcyEU') of the 
original are expanded into four lines, and the other 
thing in p. 81, 2 where ficaovvKTiai; nod' wpais, is ren- 
dered hy means of six hobbling verses ? As to his Os- 
sianic poesy, we are not very good judges, being, in 
truth, so moderately skilled in that species of compo- 
sition, that we should, in all probability, be criticising 
some bit of the genuine Macpherson itself, were we to 
express our opinion of Lord Byron's rhapsodies. If, 
then, the following beginning of a " Song of Bards" is 
ay his Lordship, we venture to object to it, as far as we 
can comprehend it. " What form rises on the roar of 
clouds, whose dark ghost gleams on the red stream of 
tempests ? His voice rolls on the thunder ; 't is Orla, the 
brown chief of Oithona. He was," etc. After detaining 
this " brown chieP' some time, the bards conclude by 
giving him their advice to " raise his fair locks ;" then 
to "spread them on the arch of the rainbow ;" and "to 
smile through the tears of the storm." Of this kind of 
thing there are no less than nine panes ; and we can so 
far venture an opinion in their favour, that they look 
very like Macpherson ; and we are positive they are 
pretty nearly as stupid and tiresome. 

It is a sort of privilege of poets to be egotists ; but 
they should " use it as not abusing it ;" and particu 
.arly one who piques himself (though indeed at the 
ripe age of nineteen) of being " an infant bard," — 
("The artless Helicon I boast is youth;") — should either 
not know, or should seem not to know, so much about 
his own ancestry. Besides a poem above cited, on the 
family seat of the Byrons, we have anouV r of eleven 
pages, on the selfsame subject, introduced with an 
apology, "he certainly had no intention of inserting 
it," but really "the particular request of some friends, 
ttc., etc. It concludes with five stanzas on himself, " the 



1 Set page 1C 
F 2 



last and youngest of a noble line." There is a good 
deal also about his maternal ancestors, in a poem on 
Lachin y Gair, a mountain where he spent part of his 
youth, and might have learnt that pibroch is not a 
bagpipe, any more than duet means a fiddle. 

As the author has dedicated so large a part of his 
volume to immortalize his employments at school and 
college, we cannot possibly dismiss it without present- 
ing the reader with a specimen of these ingenious effu- 
sions. In an ode with a Greek motto, called Granta, 
we have the following magnificent stanzas : 

" There, in apartments small and damp, 
The candidate far college prices 

Sits poring by the midnight lamp. 
Goes la'.e to bed, yet early rises. 

" Wbo read* t'dse quantities in Sele 

Or puzzlos e'er the deep triangle, 
Deprived of many a wholesome meal, 

In barbarous Latin doom'd to wrangle: 

"Rcnpuncin? every pleasing page. 
Prom anthers el' historic use, 
Preferring to toe 1 

The square of the hypothennse. 

"Still harmless are these occupations. 
That hurt none hut the hapless student, 

Compared with other recreations. 

Which bring together lire imprudent." 

We are sorry to hear so bad an account of the col- 
lege psalmody as is contained in the following Attic 
stanzas : 

" Our choir would scarcely he. excused 

Even as a band of raw beginners ; 
All mercy now must be refused 

To such a set of croakie. tinners. 

" If David, when his toils wj.i ended, 

Had heard these blot khs 's sing before him. 

To us his psalms had ne'er descended : 

In furious mood he would have tore 'em '.' 

But whatever judgment may be passed on the poems 
of this noble minor, it seems we must take them as wo 
find them, and be content; for they are the last \\e 
shall ever have from him. He is, at best, he says, but 
an intruder into the groves of Parnassus ; he never lived 
in a garret, like thorough-bre^d poets ; and " though he 
once roved a careless mountaineer in the Highlands of 
Scotland," he has not of late enjoyed this advantage. 
Moreover, he expects no profit from his publication; 
and, whether it succeeds or not, " it is highly improba- 
ble, from his situation and pursuits hereafter," that he 
should again condescend to become an author. There- 
fore, let us take what we get, and be thankful. What 
right have we poor devils to be nice ? We are well otf 
to have got so much from a man of this Lord's station, 
who does not live in a garret, but, " has the swav " of 
Newstead Abbey. Again, we say, let us he thankful; 
and, with honest Sancho, bid God bless the giver, not 
look the gift horse in the mouth. 



I 26 ) 



A SATIRE. 



I bad rather t»e a kitten, and cry mew ! 

Than (me of those same metre ballad-moneers. 

BHAKSPEARB. 

Such shameless Bards we have ; and yet, 't is true. 
There arc U8 mad, abandon'd Critics too. 

POPE 



PREFACE." 



All my friends, learned anil unlearned, have urged 
me not to publish this Satire with my name. If I wen; to 
be '•turned from the oareer of my humour by quibbled 
quick, and paper bullets of the brain," I should have 
complied with then - counsel. But I am not to be ter- 
rified by abuse, or bullied by reviewers, with or with- 
out arms. I can safely say that I have attacked none 
personilly who did not commence on the offensive. 
An author's works are public property: he who pur- 
chases may judge, and publish his opinion if he pleases'; 
and the authors I have endeavoured to commemorate 
may do by me as I have done by them : I dare say they 
will succeed better in condemning mv scribblinga than 
in mending their own. But my object is not to prove 
that I can write well, but, if possible, to make others 
write better. 

As the Poem has met with far more success than 1 
expected, I have endeavoured in this edition to make 
some additions and alterations, to render it more worthy 
of public perusal. 

In the first edition of this Satire, published anony- 
mously, fourteen lines on the subject of Bowles's Pope 
were written and inserted at the request of an inge- 
nious friend of mine, who has now in the press a vol- 
ume of poetry. In the pres-ent edition they are erased, 
and some of my own substituted in their stead ; my 
only reason for this being that which I conceive would 
operate with any other person in the same manner — a 
determination not to publish with my name any pro- 
duction which was not entirely and exclusively my own 
composition. 

With regard to the real talents of many of the poet- 
ical persons whose performances are mentioned or 
alluded to in the following pages, it is presumed by the 
author that there can be little difference of opinion in 
ine public at large ; though, like other sectaries, each 
has his separate tabernacle of proselytes, by whom his 
abilities are overrated, his faults overlooked, and his 
metrical canons received without scruple and without 
consideration. But the unquestionable possession of 
considerable genius by several of the writers here 
i ensured, renders their mental prostitution more to be 
regretted. Imbecility may be pitied, or, at worst, 
laughed at and forgotten ; perverted powers demand 
the most decided reprehension. No one can wish more 



than the author, that some known and able writer liar 
undertaken th< ir exposure; but Mr. Gifford has de- 
voted himself to Massingcr, and, in the absence of the 
regular physician, a country practitioner may, in cases 
of absolute in cessity, be allowed to prescribe his nos- 
trum, to prevent the extension of so deplorable an 
epidemic, provided there be no quackery in his treat- 
ment of the malady. A caustic is heir; offered, as it is 
I" be feared nothing short of actual cautery can re- 
cover tli '• numerous patients afflicted with the present 

prevalent and distressing rabies for rhyming As to 

the Edinburgh Reviewers, it would indeed require a 
Hercules to crush the Hydra; but if the author succeeds 
in merely " bruising one of the heads of the serpent," 
though his own hand should suffer in the encountei, 
he will be amply satisfied. 



ENGLISH BARDS, 

etc. etc. 



1 This Preface was written for the second edition of this 
Voem, and printed with it. 



Still must I hear? — shall hoarse Fitzgerald 1 ba\V 
Ili< creaking Couplets in a tavern hall, 
And 1 not siiiL T , lest, haply, Scotch Reviews 
Should dub me scribbler, and denounce my Muse? 
Prepare for rhyme — I'll publish, right or wrong: 
Fools are my theme, let Satire be my song. 

Oh ! Nature's noblest gift — my gray goose-quill ! 
Slave of my thoughts, obedient to my will, 
Torn from thy parent bird to form a pen, 
That rmghty instrument of little men! 
JFho penl fbtedoom'd to aid the mental throes 
Of brains that labour, big with verse or prose, 
Though nymphs forsake, and critics may deride, 
The lover's solace, and the author's pride : 
What wits, what poets dost thou daily raise! 
How frequent is thy use, how small thy praise ! 
Condemn'd at length to be forgotten quite; 
With all the pages which 't was thine to write. 
But thou, at hast, mine own especial pen! 
Once laid aside, but now assumed again, 



1 IMITATION. 
" Semper epo auditor tamum? nunqunmne reponam. 
Vexatus tolies rauci Theeoide Codn?" — Juvenal, ^ai. 1 
Mr. Fitzgerald, facetiously termed by Qobbctl the 
Her Poet," inflicts his annual tribute of verse on ilie "Lit- 
erary Fund ." not content with writing, he spouts in person, 
fcftei the company have imbibed a reasonable quantity ol bud 
port, to enable them to sustain the operation. 



ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



27 



Our task complete, like Harriet's ' shall be free ; 
Though spurn'd by others, yet beloved by me : 
Then let us soar to-day ; no common theme, 
No eastern vision, no distemper'd dream 
Inspires — our path, though full of thorns, is plain ; 
Smooth be the verse, and easy be the strain. 

When vice triumphant holds her sovereign sway, 
And men, through life her willing slaves, obey ; 
When Folly, frequent harbinger of crime, 
Unfolds her motley store to suit the time ; 
When knaves and fools combined o'er all prevail, 
When Justice halts, and Right begins to (ail, 
E'en then the boldest start from public sneers, 
Afraid of shame, unknown to other fears, 
More darkly sin, by Satire kept in awe, 
And shrink from ridicule, though not from law. 

Such is the force of Wit ! but not belong 
To me the arrows of satiric song ; 
The royal vices of our age demand 
A keener weapon, and a mightier hand. 
Still there are tollies e'en for me to chase, 
And yield at least amusement in the race : 
Laugh when I laugh, I seek no other fame — 
The cry is up, and Scribblers are my game ; 
Speed, Pegasus ! — ye strains of great and small, 
Ode, Epic, Elegy, have at you all ! 
I too can scrawl, and once upon a time 
I pour'd along the town a flood of rhyme — 
A school-boy freak, unworthy praise or blame : 
I printed — older children do the same. 
'T is pleasant, sure, to see one's name in print ; 
A book's a book, although there's nothing in't. 
Not that a title's sounding charm can save 
Or scrawl or scribbler from an equal grave : 
This Lambe must own, since his patrician name 
Fail'd to preserve the spurious farce from shame. 2 
No matter, George continues still to write, 3 
Though now the name is veil'd from public sight. 
Moved by the great example, I pursue 
The selfsame road, but make my own review: 
Not seek great Jeffrey's — yet, like him, will be 
Self-constituted judge of poesy. 

A man must serve his time to every trade, 
Save censure — critics all are ready made. 
Take hackney'd jokes from Miller, got by rote, 
With just enough of learning to misquote ; 
A mind well skill'd to find or forge a fault ; 
A turn for punning, call it Attic salt ; 
To Jeffrey go, be silent and discreet, 
His pay is just ten sterling pounds per sheet: 
Fear not to he, 't will seem a lucky hit ; 
Shrink not from blasphemy, 't will pass for wit ; 
Care not for feeling — pass your proper jest, 
And stand a critic, hated yet caress'd. 

And shall we own such judgment? no — as soon 
Seek roses in December, ice in June ; 
Hope constancy in wind, or com in chafFj 
Believe a woman, or an epitaph ; 



Or any other thing that '8 false, before 

You trust in critics who themselves are sore ; 

Or yield one single thought to be misled 

By Jeffrey's heart, or Lambe's Boeotian head. ' 

To these young tyrants, 2 by themselves misplaced, 
Combined usurpers on the throne of Taste ; 
To these, when authors bend in humble awe, 
And hail their voice as truth, their word as law ; 
While these are censors, 't would be sin to spare ; 
While such are critics, why should I forbear V 
But yet, so near all modern worthies run, 
'T is doubtful whom to seek, or whom to shun ; 
Nor know we when to spare, or where to strike, 
Our bards and censors are so much alike. 

3 Then should you ask me, why I venture o'er 
The path which Pope and Gifford trod before; 
If not yet sicken'd, you can still proceed : 
Go on ; my rhyme will tell you as you read. 

Time was, ere yet in these degenerate days 
Ignoble themes obtain'd mistaken praise, 
When Sense and Wit with poesy allied, 
No fabled Graces, flourish'd side by side, 
From the same fount their inspiration drew, 
And, rear'd by Taste, blooni'd fairer as they grew. 
Then, in this happy isle, a Pope's pure strain 
Sought the rapt soul to charm, nor sought in vain ; 
A polish'd nation's praise aspired to claim, 
And raised the people's, as the poet's fame. 
Like him great Drvden pour'd the tide of song, 
In stream less smooth, indeed, yet doubly strong. 
Then Congreve's scenes could cheer, orOrwAV* 

melt — 
For Nature then an English audience felt. 
But why these names, or greater still, retrace, 
When all to feebler bards resign their place ? 
Yet to such times our lingering looks are cast, 
When taste and reason with those times are past. 
Now look around, and turn each trifling page, 
Survey the precious works that please the age ; 
This truth at least let Satire's self allow, 
No dearth of bards can be complain'd of now : 
The loaded press beneath her labour groans, 
And printers' devils shake their weary bones ; 
While Southey's epics cram the creaking shelves, 
And Little's lyrics shine in hot-press'd twelves. 

Thus saith the preacher, 4 " nought beneath the sun 
Is new ;" yet still from change to change we run : 
What varied wonders tempt us as they pass ! 
The cow-pox, tractors, galvanism, and gas, 
In turns appear, to make the vulgar stare, 
Till the swoln bubble bursts — and all is air ! 
Nor less new schools of poetry arise, 
Where dull pretenders grapple for the prize: 
O'er Taste awhile these pseudo-bards prevail ; 
Each country book-club bows the knee to Baal, 



1 Cid ffamct Bencngcli promises repose to his pen in the last 
chapter of Don Quixote. Oh ! ihat our voluminous gentry 
would follow the example of Cid Humct lienengclil 

2 This ingenious youth is mentioned more particularly, with 
his production, in another place. 

3 In the Edinburgh Review. 



1 Messrs. Jeffrey and I.ambe are the Alpha and Omega. Ui8 
first and last, of th? Edinburgh Review : the others are meu 
tioned hereafter. 

2 "stulta est dementia, cum tot uliinuo 

occurrasperiuirsn panci cchirUL'." — Juvenal. Sat. 1- 

3 IMITATION. 
"Cur tamen hoc potior libeal decumre campo 
Per qucm maenoB equea Aurunc* ll>.ut alumnus', 
Si vacal, et placidi rationem adiiiittilis, edam." — 

Juvenal. Sat 1 
4 Ecclcsiastcs, Chap. 1. 



28 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And, hurling lawful genius from the throne, 
Er< eta a ahrme and idol of its own ; 

leaden calf- — but whom it matters not, 
From soaring SoUTHfcl down to groveling Stott. ' 

Behold ! in various throngs the scribbling crew, 
For notice eagir, paas in long review : 
E;i'-!i spun Ins jaded Pegasus apace, 
And rhyme and blank maintain an equal race ; 
Sonnets on sonnets crowd, and ode on ode; 
And tales of terror jostle on the road ; 
Immeasurable measures move along; 
For simpering Folly loves a varied song, 
To strange mysterious Dulness still the friend, 
Admires the strain she cannot comprehend. 
Thus Lays of Minstrels 2 — may they be the last ! 
On half-strung harps whine mournful to the blast. 
While mountain spirits prate to river sprites, 
That dames may listen to their sound at nights ; 
And goblin brats, of Gilpin Horner's 3 brood, 
young border-nobles through the wood. 
And skip at every step, Lord knows how high, 

(iteh foolish babes, the Lord knows why; 
While high-born ladies in their magic cell, 
Forbidding knights to read who cannot spell, 
Despatch a courier to a wizard's grave, 
And fight with honest men to shield a knave. 

Next view in state, proud prancing on his roan, 
The golden-crested haughty Marmion, 
Now forging scrolls, how foremost in the fight, 
Not quite a felon, yet but half a knight, 



i-Stptt, Letter known in the " Morning Post" by the name 
of Hi jr.. This personage is at present the most profound ex- 
plorer of the bathos. I remember, lo the reigning family of 

Portugal, a special ode of Master -Shitt's, beginning thus • 

(Stott loquitur quoad Hibernfa.) 
'Trincely offspring of liraganza, 
Erin greets thee with a stanza," etc. etc. 

Also a sonnet to Rats, well worthy of the subject, and a most 
thundering ode commencing as follows: 

" Oh ! for a lay ! loud as the surge 
That lashes Lapland's sounding shore." 
Lord have mercy on us: the "Lay of the Last Minstrel" 
was nothing to this. 

- See the " Lay of the Last Minstrel," passim. Never was 
any plan so Incongruous and absurd as the groundwork of 
this production. The entrance of Thunder end Lightning pro- 
./ to Hayes' tragedy, unfortunately tsjces away the 
merit of originality from the dialogue between Messieurs the 
Sp'riis of Frond and Fell, in the lirst canto. Then we have 
the amiable William of Deloraine, "a stark moss-truoper," 
videlicit, a happy compound of poacher, sheep stealer, and 
highwayman. The propriety of his magical lady's injunction 
ii. il in read can only he equalled by his candid acknowledg 

mint of Ins independence of the trammels of spelling, al- 
though, to use" hi* own elegant phrase, " 't was his neck-verse 
at Hairibee," i. e. the gallows. 

3 The Biography of Gilpin Horner, and the marvellous pe- 
destrian page, who travelled twice as fast is his Master's horse, 
without the aid of seven-leagued boots, are chrfs-d'truvre in 
the improvement of taste. For incident wo have the invisible, 
hul by no means spilling, box on the ear hestowed on the 

page, and the entrance of a Knight and Charger into the 

CBStle, under the very natural disguise of a wain id' hay. Mar- 

iHN'ii. the hero of the lattei romance, is exactly what William 

nl Deloraine would have heen. hail he been able to read or 

writo. The Poem was manufactured for Messrs, Constable, 
Murray, and Miller, worshipful Booksellers, in consideration 

ol the reaeipl ofa sum of mopey . and, truly, considering the 
inspiration, it is a very creditable production. If Mr. Scott will 
v, iti for hire, let linn dp his hist for his paymasters, but not 
disgrace his genius, which is undoubtedly great, by a repeti- 
tion of black letter imitations 



The gibbet or the field prepared to grace — 

A nnghr] mixture of the great and base. 

And think'sl ilmu, Snui ! by vain conceit perchance. 

On public taste to foist thy stale romance, 

Though Mikiiav with lus Milleu may combine 

'I'm yield thy muse just half-a-crown per line? 

No ! when the sons of song descend to trade, 

Their bays are sear, their lorrncr laurels fade, 

Let such forego the poet's sacred name, 

' k their brains lor lucre, not for fame: 
, tiny sink to merited contempt, 
And scom remunerate the mean attempt! 
Such be their meed, such still the just reward 
Of prostituted muse and hireling bard ! 
For this we spurn Apollo's venal son, 
And bid a long "good night to Marmion." 1 

These are the themes that claim our plaudits now ; 
These are the bards to whom the muse must bow: 
While Milton, Diivde.n, Pope, alike forgot, 
Resign their hallow'd bays to W t alter Scott. 

The time has been when yet the muse was young, 
When HOMES swept the lyre, and JIaro sung, 
An epic scarce ten centuries could claim, 
While awe-struck nations liail'd the magic name: 
The work "I each immortal bard appears 
The single wonder of a thousand years. 2 
Empires have iiionlder'd from the face of earth, 
Tongues have expired with those who gave them birth, 
Without the glory such a strain can give, 
As even in ruin bids the language live. 
Not so with us, though minor bards, content, 
On one great work a life of labour spi a; : 
W ith eagle pinions soaring to the skies, 
Heboid the ballad-monger, Southev, rise! 
To him let Camoens, Milto.n', Tasso, yield, 
W r hose annual strains, like armies, take the field, 
First in the ranks see Joan of Arc advance, 
The scourge of England, and the boast of France ' 
Though burnt by wicked Bedford for a witch, 
Behold her statue placed in glory's niche ; 
Her fetters burst, and just released from prison, 
A virgin Phoenix from her ashes risen. 
Next see tremendous Thalaba come on, 3 
Arabia's monstrous, wild, and wondrous son ; 
Domdaniel's dread destroyer, who o'erthrew 
More mad magicians than the world e'er knew 
Immortal hero ! all thy foes o'ercome, 
For ever reign — the rival of Tom Thumb ! 
Since startled metre fled before thy face, 
Well wert thou doom'd the last of all thy race! 
Well might triumphant Genii bear thee hence, 
Illustrious conqueror of common sense! 



1 "Good night to Marmion" — the pathetic and also pia- 
phetic exclamation of Henri/ Blount, Esquire, on the death 
of honest Marmion. 

2 As the Odyssey is so closely connected with the story of 
the flind, they may almost In: classed as one grand historical 
poem. In aOoding to Miltori and TaSSO, we consider the 
"Paradise Lost," anil "Gierusalemme LiberMa," as their 
standard efforts, since init her the "Jerusalem CohqueredV of 

the Italian, the "Paradise Regained" of the English Hard, 

obtained a proportionate celebrity to their former poems. 
Query: Which of Mr. Souther's will survive? 

3 Thalaba, Mr Southev' s second poem, is written in open 
defiance of precedent ami poetry. Mr. S. wished to produce 
something novel, and succeeded to a miracle. Joan of Arc 
was marvellous enough, hut Thalaba was one of lho-c poems 
* Which (in the words of I'orson) will he reud when Homer 
and Virgil are forgotten, but — nut till then." 



ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



29 



Now, last and greatest, Madoc spreads his sails, 

Cacique in Mexico, and Prince in Wales; 

Tells us strange tales, as other travellers do, 

More old than Mandcville's, and not so true. 

Oh ! Southf.v, Southey! ' cease thy varied song! 

A Bard may chaunt too often and too long : 

As thou art strong in verse, in mercy spare ! 

A fourth, alas ! were more than we could bear. 

But if, in spite of all the world can say, 

Thou still wilt verseward plod thy weary way; 

If still in Berkley ballads, most uncivil, 

Thou wilt devote old women to the devil, 2 

The babe unborn thy dread intent may rue ; 

" God help thee," Southev, and thy readers tao. 3 

Next comes the dull disciple of thy school, 
That mild apostate from poetic rule, 
The simple Wordsworth, framer of a lay 
As soft as evening in his favourite May ; 
Who warns his friend " to shake off* toil and trouble ; 
And quit his books, for fear of growing double ;" 4 
Who, both by precept and example, shows 
That prose is verse, and verse is merely prose, 
Convincing all, by demonstration plain, 
Poetic souls delight in prose insane ; 
And Christmas stories, tortured into rhyme, 
Contain the essence of the true sublime : 
Thus when he tells the tale of Betty Foy, 
The idiot mother of " an idiot Boy ;" 
A moon-struck silly lad who lost his way, 
And, like his bard, confounded night with day; i 
So close on each pathetic part he dwells, 
And each adventure so sublimely tells, 
That all who view the "idiot in his glory," 
Conceive the Bard the hero of the story. 

Shall gentle Coleridge pass unnoticed here, 
To turbid ode and tumid stanza dear ? 
Though themes of innocence amuse him best, 
Yet still obscurity 's a welcome guest. 
If Inspiration should her aid refuse 
To him who takes a Pixy for a Muse, 6 



1 Wo be:; Mr. Southey'A pardon: "Madoc disdains tho de- 
graded title of epic." See his preface. Why is epic degraded 1 
and by whom ? Certainly the late Romauntsof Masters Cottle, 
Laoreat Pue, OgitO]/, Hoyle; and gentle Mistress Cowley, 
have not exalted the Epic Muse: but as Mr. Suut/icy's poem 
"disdains the appellation," allow us to ask — has he substituted 
any thinn better in its stead ? or must he be content to rival Sir 
Iiicharii lilackmore, in the quantity as well as quality of bis 
verse. 

2 See The Old Woman of Bcrk?ay, a Ballad by Mr. Sbutluv, 
wherein an aged gentlewoman is carried away by Beelzebub, 
on a " Dish-trotting horse." 

3 The last line. " God help thpo," is an rvidi nt plagiarism 
from the Anti jacobin to Mr. Smifirri, on his Dactylics: 
"God help live, silly one." — Poetry of the Anti -jacobin, p. i'i. 

4 Lyrical Ballads, page 4. — "The tables turned." Stanza 1. 

"I'ii, up, my friend, and clear your looks — 

Why all this toil and trouble 1 
Up, up, my friend, and quit your books, 

< )r surely you 'II grow double." 

5 Mr. W., in his preface, labours hard to prove that prose 
and verse are much the same, and certainly his precepts and 
practice are strictly conformable: 

" And thus to Betty's questions ho 
Made answer, like a traveller bold, 
The cock did crow to -who, to-who. 
And the sun did shine BO cold," etc., etc. 

Lyrical Ballads, pane 129. 

6 Coleridge's Poems, paie 11. Songs, of the Pixies, i.e. 
Devonshire Fairies. P:il-" 4-', we nave, " Lines to a young 
Lady," and page 52, " Lines to a Young Ass." 



Yet, none in lofty numbers can surpass 
The bard who soars to elegize an ass. 
How well the subject suits his noble rabid ! 
"A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind !" 

Oh! wonder-working Lewis ! Monk, or Bard, 
Who fain wouldst make Parnassus a church-yard ! 
Lo ! wreaths of yew, not laurel, bind thv brow, 
Thy Muse a sprite, Apollo's sexton thou ! 
Whether on ancient tombs thou tak'st thy stand, 
By gibbering spectres haiPd, thy kindred band, 
Ortraccst chaste description on thy page, 
To please the females of our modest age, 
All hail, M. P. ! ' from whose infernal brain 
Thin-sheeted phantoms glide, a grisly train ; 
At whose command, "grim women" throng in crowds, 
And kings of fire, of water, and of clouds, 
With "small gray men," — " wild yagers," and what not, 
To crown with honour thee and Walter Scott : 
Again, all hail ! If tales like thine may please, 
St. Luke alone can vanquish the disease ; 
E'en Satan's self with thee might dread to dwell, 
And in thy skull discern a deeper hell. 

Who in soft guise, surrounded by a choir 
Of virgins melting, not to Vesta's tire, 
With sparkling eyes, and cheek by passion flush'd, 
Strikes his wild lyre, whilst listening dames are hush'd? 
'T is Little ! young Catullus of his day, 
As sweet, but as immoral in his lay ! 
Grieved to condemn, the Muse must still be just, 
Nor spare melodious advocates of lust. 
Pure is the flame which o'er the altar burns ; 
From grosser incense with disgust she turns : 
Yet, kind to youth, this expiation o'er, 
She bids thee " mend thy line and sin no more." 

For thee, translator of the tinsel song, 
To whom such glittering ornaments belong, 
Hibernian Stranoford ! with thine eyes of blue, 2 
And boasted locks of red, or auburn hue, 
Whose plaintive strain each love-sick Miss admires, 
And o'er harmonicus fustian half expires, 
Learn, if thou canst, to yield thine author's sense, 
Nor vend thy sonnets on a false pretence. 
Think'st thou to gain thy verse a higher place 
By dressing Camoens in a suit of law 
Mend, Strangford ! mend thy morals and thy taste 
Be warm, but pure ; be amorous, but be chaste : 
Cease to deceive; thv pilfer'd harp restore, 
Nor teach the Lusian Bard to copy Moore. 

In many marble-cover'd volumes view 
Haylev, in vain attempting something new: 
Whether he spin his comedies in rhyme, 
Or scrawl, as Wnon and BaKCL w walk, 'gcinst time, 
His style in vouth or age is still the si'i.i-. 
For ever feeble and for ever tame. 
Triumphant first see "Temper's Triumphs" shine * 
At least, I'm sure, they triumph'd over mine. 



1 "For everyone knows little Mall's an M. 1'." — Seen 

1'n. 'in to Mr. henna, in The Statesman, supposed to be ivnt 
ten by Mr. Jrl.iiU. 

2 The reader, who mnv wish for an explanation of* tins, may 
refer to " StrangfoTcTs Camoens," pajre 107, note lo | 

or to the last page of (he Edinburgh Review of Strait 
Camoens. It is also to" be remarked, thai tbe things given lo 
the public as Poems of Camoens, are no more to be Ibuiiu <n 
the original Portuguese than in the Song of Solomon 



30 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Of "Music's Triumphs" all who read may swear 
That luckless Music never triumph'd there. ' 

Moravians, rise ! hestow some meet reward 
On dull Devotion — lo ! the Sahbath Bard, 
Sepulchral Graiiame, pours his notes sublime 
In mangled prose, nor e'en aspires to rhyme, 
Breaks into blank the Gospel of St. Luke, 
And boldly pilfers from the Pentateuch ; 
And, undisturb'd by conscientious qualms, 
Perverts the Prophets, and purloins the Psalms. 2 

Hail, Sympathy ! thy soft idea brings 
A thousand visions of a thousand things, 
And shows, dissolve 1 in thine own melting tears, 
The maudlin prince of mournful sonneteers. 
And art thou not thpir prince, harmonious Bowles ? 
Thou first great oracle of tender souls ? 
Whether in sighing '.vinds thou seek'st relief, 
Or consolation in a yellow leaf; 
Whether thy must most lamentably tells 
What merry sounds proceed from Oxford bells,' 
Or, still in bells delighting, finds a friend, 
In every chime that jingled from Ostend ? 
Ah! how much juster were thy Muse's hap, 
If to thy bells thou wouldst but add a cap ! 
Delightful Bowles ! still blessing and still blest, 
All love thy strain, but children like it best. 
Th thine, with gentle Little's moral song, 
To soothe the mania of the amorous throng ! 
With thee our nursery damsels shed their tears, 
Ere Miss as yet completes her infant years : 
But in her teens thy whining powers are vain : 
She quits poor Bowles for Little's purer strain. 
Now to soft themes thou scornest to confine 
The lofty numbers of a harp like thine : 
" Awake a louder and a loftier strain," 4 
Such as none heard before, or will again ; 
Where all discoveries jumbled from the Rood, 
Since first the leaky ark reposed in mud, 
By more or less, are sung in every book, 
From Captain Noah down to Captain Cook. 
N a this alone, but pausing on the road, 
The bard sighs forth a gentle episode ; b 
And gravely tells — attend each beauteous Miss ! — 
When first Madeira trembled to a kiss. 
Bowles ! in thy memory let this precept dwell, 
Stick to thy Sonnets, man! at least they sell. 



1 //jj//e>/'«two most notorious verse productions, are "Tri- 
umphs of Temper." Bind " Triumph* of Music." He has also 
written much comedy in rhyme, Epistles, etc. etc As lie is 
rathei an elesrant wiitor of notes and biography, let u- 

incnd Pupr's Advice to Wycherln/ to Mr. H.'s consideration , 
viz. "to convert his poetry into prose," which may be easily 
done by taking awny the fin:il syllable of each couplet. 

2 Mr. (rruhitmc has poured forth two volumes of cant, under 

of "Sabbath Walks," and !» Biblical Pictures." 
:? See Bowles's Sonnets, etc. — "Sonnet to Oxford," and 
' Stanzas on bearing the Bells of Ostend." 
4 " Awake a louder," etc. et". is the first line in Bowles's 
Spirit or Discovery i" a very spirited and pretty Dwarf Epic. 
Among other exquisite lines we have the following: — 

" A kiss 

St.. I on the list'ning silence, never set 
Here heard; they tr. mbled evense if the power," etc. etc. 
, the woods of Madeira trembled to a kiss, very much 
■■■ II they might be, at such a phenomenon. 
• r > The episod ,i to is the story of " Robert a 

Machin.'! and " Anna d'Arfet," a pair of constant lovers, 
vt, o performed the kiss above mentioned, that startled the 
■mods ut Madeira 



But if some new-born whim, or larger bribe, 

Prompt thy crude brain, and claim thee for a scribe; 

If chance some bard, though once by dunces fiar'd, 

Now, prone in dust, can only be rci 

If Pope, whose fame and genius from the first 

Have foil'd the best of critics, needs the worst, 

Do thou essay ; each fault, each failing scan 

The first of potts was, alas ! but man ! 

Rake from each ancient dunghill every pearl, 

Consult Lord Fanny, and confide in Clkll ; ' 

Let all the scandals of a former age 

Pesch on thy pen and flutter o'er thy page ; 

Affect a candour which thou canst not feel, 

Clothe envy in the garb of honest zeal ; 

Write as if St. John's soul could still inspire, 

And do from hate what Mallet 2 did for hire. 

Oh ! hadst thou lived in that congenial time, 

To rave with Dennis, and with Ralph to rhyme, 1 

Throng'd with the rest around his living head, 

Not raised thy hoof against the lion dead, 

A meet reward had crown'd thy glorious gains, 

And link'd thee to the Dunciad for thy pains. * 

Another Epic ! who inflicts again 
More books of blank upon the sons of men ? 
Boeotian Cottle, rich Bristowa's boast, 
Imports old stories from the Cambrian coast, 
And sends his goods to market — all alive ! 
Lines forty thousand, Cantos twenty-five ! 
Fresh fish from Helicon ! who '11 buy ? who '11 buy 7 
The precious bargain's cheap — in faith not I. 
Too much in turtle Bristol's sons delight, 
Too much o'er bowls of 'rack prolong the night: 
If commerce fills the purse, she clogs the brain, 
And Amos Cottle strikes the Lyre in vain. 
In him an author's luckless lot behold ! 
Condemn'd to make the books which once he sold. 
(Mi! Amos Cottle! — Phoebus! what a name 
To fill the speaking-trump of future fame ! — 
Oh! Amos Cottle! for a moment think 
What meagre profits spread from pen and ink! 
Winn thus devoted to poetic dreams, 
Who will peruse thy prostituted reams? 
Oh ! pen perverted ! paper misapplied ! 
Had Cottle ' still adorn'd the counter's side, 
Bent o'er the desk, or, born to useful toils, 
Been taught to make the paper which he soils, 
Plough'd, delved, or plied the oar with lusty lunb, 
He had not sung of Wales, nor I of him. 

As Sisyphus against the infernal steep 
Roll6 the huge rock, whose motions ne'er may sleep, 



1 Curll is one of the heroes of the Duneiad. and was a book- 
seller. Lord Fanny is the poetical name of Lord IL.rcty 
author of " Lines to the imitator of Horace." 

2 Lord Bolingbrok'i hind Mallei to trS'duce Pnpe nfler his 
decease, hccaiise the poet had retained some copies of a work 
by Lord Bolingbroke [the Patriot King), which that splendid, 
but malignant genius, had i-dered to be destroyed. 

:i Dennis the critic, and Ralph the rhymester, 

. ye wolves! while Ralph to Cynthia howls. 
Making night hideous — answer hhn, ye owls !' — D\ 

4 See Bowles's hue edition of Popr.'s works, for Which he 
received 3047. i tlina Mr. B. has experii ac •>' hon mn 

it is to profit by the reputation of another, than to elevalo his 
own. 

5 Mr. Gittir,. linos or Joseph, I don't know which, hut ona 
orboth.it I. uuks tney did not write, and now 
writers of books that do not sell, have published a pair ol 
Spies. "Altred" (poor Alfred! Pi/ehas been at him too 1 
and tho Kali of " Cambria." 






ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



31 



Ss up thy hill, ambrosial Richmond! heaves 

Dull Maurice ' all his granite weight of leaves: 

Smooth, solid monuments of mental pain! 

The petrifactions of a plodding brain, 

That ere ih. y reach the top fall lumbering back again. 

With broken lyre and cheek serenely pale, 

Lo ! sad Ai.c.eis wanders down the vale! 

Though fair they rose, and might have bloom'd at last, 

Kis hopes hue perish'd by the northern blast: 

Nipp'd in the bud by Caledonian gales, 

His blossoms wither as the blast prevails ! 

O'er his lost works let classic Sheffield weep; 

May no rude hand disturb their early sleep ! 2 

Yet say ! why should the Bard at once resign 
His claim to favour from the sacred Nine? 
For ever startled !iy the mingled howl 
OT northern wolves, that still in darkness prowl: 
A coytard brat) 1, which mangle as they prey, 
By hellish instinct, all that cross their way; 
Aged or young, the living or the dead,- 
No mercy find — these harpies must be fed. 
Why do the injured unresisting yield 
The calm possession of their native field? 
Why tamely thus before their fangs retreat, 
Nor hunt the bloodhounds back to Arthur's Seat? 3 

Health to immortal Jeffrey ! once, in name, 
England could boast a judge almost the same: 
In soul so like, so merciful, yet just, 
Some think that Satan has resigned his trust, 
And given the Spirit to the world again, 
To sentence letters as he sentenced men ; 
With hand less mighty, but with heart as black, 
With voice as willing to decree the rack ; 
Bred in the courts betimes, though all that law 
As yet hath taught him is to find a flaw. 
Since well instructed in the patriot school 
To rail at party, though a party tool, 
Who knows, if chance his patrons should restore 
Back to the sway they forfeited before, 
His scribbling toils some recompense may meet, 
And raise this Daniel to the Judgment Seat. 
Let Jeffries' shade indulge the pious hope, 
And greeting thus, present him with a rope: 
" Heir to my virtues ! man of equal mind ! 
Skill'd to condemn as to traduce mankind. 
This cord receive — for thee reserved w ith care, 
To yield in judgment, and at length to wear." 

Health to great Jeffrey ! Heaven preserve his life, 
To flourish on the fertile shores of Fife, 
And guard it sacred in his future wars, 
Since authors sometimes seek the field of Mars! 
Can none remember that eventful day, 
That ever glorious, almost fatal fray, 



1 Mr. JKavrice hath manufactured the component pirts of a 

is quarto, jopoo the beauties of " Richmond Hill,'' ami 
the liki — it also takes in a charming view of Turnhato 
I lammersmkh, Brentford, Old and New, and the parts 
adj l ■ ■ • ■ 1 1 1 . 

2 Poor Montgomery! though praised by every Knslish Re- 
view, li i I by 'lie Edinburgh. Alter all, 
the Bard of Sheffield is a man of considerable (renins: his 
"Wanderer of Switzerland" is worth a thousand "Lyrical 
Ballads," and a' teasl fifty "degraded I 

3 Arthur's Seat, Uie hill which overhangs Edinburgh. 



When Little's leadless pistol met his eye, 
And Bow-street myrmidons stood laughing by .' ' 

Oh day disastrous! on her firm-set rock, 

Dunedin's castle felt a secret shock ; 

Dark roll'd the sympathetic waves of Forth, 

Low groan'd the startled whirlwinds of the north ; 

Tweed milled hail" his wa\c to form a tear, 

The other half pursued its calm career; 5 

Arthur's st< ep summit nodded to iis base, 

The surly Tolbooth scarcely kept her place ; 

The Tolbooth li It — fir marble sometimes can, 

On such occasions, feel as much as man — 

The Tolbooth felt defrauded of his charms 

If Jeffrey died, except within her arms : a 

Xay, last, not least, on that portentous mom, 

The sixteenth storey, where himself was born, 

His patrimonial garret fell to ground, 

And pale Fdina shudder'd at ihe sound: 

Strewed were ihe streets around with milk-while reams 

Floiv'd all the Cr.nongate with inky streams ; 

This of his candour seemM the sable i\c\\\ 

That of his valour show'd the bloodless hue, 

And all with justice deem'd the two combined 

The rttingled emblems of his mighty mind. 

But Caledonia's Goddess hovci'd o'er 

The field, and saved him from the wrath of Moobe, 

From cilher pistol snatch'd the vengeful lead, 

And straight restored it to her favourite's head : 

That head, with greater than magnetic power, 

Caught it, as Danae the golden shower : 

And, thoitghthe thickening dross will scarce refine, 

Augments its ore, and is itself a mine. 

" My son," she cried, " ne'er thirst lor gore again, 

Resign the pistol, and resume the pen ; 

O'er politics and poesv preside, 

Boast of thy country, and Britannia's guide ! 

For, long as Albion's heedless sons submit, 

Or Scottish taste decides on English wil, 

So long shall last thine unmolested reign, 

Nor any dare to take thy name in vain. 

Behold a chosen band shall aid thy plan, 

And own thee chieftain of the critic clan. 

First in ihe ranks illustrious shall be seen 

The travell'd Thane! Athenian Aberdeen. 4 

Herceet shall wieldTnoK's hammer, 5 and soi..ctimes, 

In gratitude, thou 'It praise his rugged rhymes. 



1 In 1801!, Messrs. .Jeffrey and JInnrt met at Chalk Farm. 
The duel was prevented by the interference ofthe magistracy; 
and, on examination, the halls of Ihe pistols, like the emirate 
of the combatants, were /bund lo have evaporated. Tliisincr- 
di nt nave occasion to much wa&pety in the daily prints. 

2 The Tweed here behavi 3 with proper decorum ; il would 
have been highly reprehensible in the English half ofthe river 
to hive shown ihe smallest symptom fff apprehension, 

3 This display of sympathy mi the i>;ti of the Tolbooth fthe 
principal prison in Edinburgh), which truly seems to have been 
most ail' sled on this occasion, is much m he comn 

uas iii be apprehended, thai ti: 
cuted in the front, might have rendered the i 
Urns. She is said to he ofthe softer Bex, because her A 
.d' feeling mi this >'■ y was truly i< minine, though, like most 
ae rmpuloss, perhaps a little si Iflsh. 

•1 Hi- lordship ha- I n much ibroa I, is i member of the 

Ail in Suet. n. and reviewer of 6*Ws Topography of Troy. 

5 Mi. //■ rhi rt is a translator of Icelandic and other poetry. 

if Tier's 
Hummer " the translation is a pleasant daunt in die vulgu 
tongue, aud ended thus : — 

" Instead of money and rimrs, (wot, 

The hs ir's hi uisea » ere her lot ; 

Thus Udin's son his hammer got ' 



BYRON'S WORKS 



. ' loo thj bitfi t page shall seek, 
And classic Hallam, 9 much renown'd for Greek. 

.1 1 influence tend, 
And paltry Pilla»s j Bhall traduce his friend: 
While gdj Thalia's luckless votary, Lsmi-.i, 1 
As he himself was damn'd, sliull trv to daftgL 
i name, unbounded be thy sway ! 

Thy Ho-jCland's banquets shall each toil repay; 
While grateful Britain yields the praise she owes 
To EIoll ind's hirelings, and i" Learning's foi s. 
5fet mark one caution, era thy next Review 
.liroii and of blue, 
li si blundering BnouGHAM i destroy the sale, 
Turn bei fto bannocks, cauliflowers to kail. 
Thus having said, the kHted goddi 
Her son, and vauish'd in a Scolti li mist,* 
Illustrious Holland! hard would be his lot, 
His hirelings mention'd, and himself Jbrgol ! 
Holland, with Henry Petty at Ins h.-n-k, 
The whipper-in and huntsman of the pai 
Blest be the banquets spread at Holland I 
V\ here Scotchmen feed, and critics may carouse ! 
Long, long beneath that hospitable roof, 
Shall Grub-street dme, wink- duns are kept aloof. 
See honest II w.i.a.m lay aside his fork, 
Resume his pen, review Ins lordships work, 
And, grateful to the founder of tin 
Declare his landlord can translate, at least!' 
Dunedin! view thy children with delight, 
They write for food, and feed because they write: 
And lest, when heated with th' unusual grape, 
Some glowing thoughts should to the press escape, 



1 The lev. Sidney Smith, the reputed author of Peter 
Plymley'e Letters, and sundry criticisms. 

2 Mr. nullum reviewed Payne Knight's Taste, and waaex- 
ceedingly Bevete on Bome Greek verses therein: it was aol die 
covered that the lines were Pindar's, nil the press rendered it 
impossible to cancel the critique, which still stands aa everlast- 
ing monument of HaHam'i ingenuity. 

The sniil I lull a in is incensed, I ause he |a falsely bi 

seeing that he never dineth at Holland House. If this be true. 
I ;i:n sorrj — nol foi havirfg said so, hut on his ac :ount, as I 

ind Ins lordship's feasts are preferable to his posi 

thins, If he did not review Lord Holland's perfbrmai 
giail. because it most have been painful to read, and irksome 
to piaise it. If Mr. II, ilium will tell me who did review it, the 
real name shall find a place in the text, pro\ ii 

n ime be of two orthodox musical syllables, and will 

cen it.j tliu verse ; till then, Jlallam must stand tor want ol 

a better. 

'■I I'illiing is a tutor at Eton. 

4 The Hen <;. hatnbt reviewed " BerssforcVs Hi 

and is reaver author of a farce enacted with much np- 

PJhusc at the Priory, Stanmore, and lamned with great expe 
riitinn at the hue Theatre Oovenl-Garden. It was entitled 
" Whistle for it." 

5 Mr. Brougham, in No. XXV. of the Edinburgh Review, 
throughout the article concerning Don Pedro de Cavallos, 
has displayed more politics than policy; many of the worthy 
; irgh being bo incensed at the infamous 
principles it evinces, as to have withdraws their subscriptions. 
It seems thai Mr, Brougham is npl a Pict, as 1 supposed, but 

■ ' his name is pronounced Broom, from Trent 
to Tay. So ho it. 

li I Ought to apologise to the worthy Deities for introducinc 
a new Goddess m itb sn in petticoats to their notice . but atai ! 
what was to be done 1 I couftLnot say Caledonia's Genius, u 
being weD known there is no Genius to bi Ibuod from Clack- 
munn in to < ' lithnesst yet, wit hunt supernatural agency, hew 

was Ji ill' i in be savi a ! The " n'at al !<• Ipii -." etc., are 

iimi unpoetical, and the "Brownies" and "<;u!e Neierh- 
l.oin*" (Spirits of n loh.i1 disposition), refused » extricate 
loin. A Goddess thcrefi called for the purpose, and 

(treat ought to ha thi gratitude of Jeffrey, Beeuig il is 

rnnimuhicul u ever held, nr is likely to bold, «nli any 

Hum.' heavenly, 

7 Lord II. h ■ I linens of Lope de Vena 

Inserted ii hit I fe ol tli Author' hoih are bepraised hy his 
tltmtsrtstt ii «vvbt. 



e with red the female reader's cheek, 
m of each critique; 

her purity of soul, 

ror. and refines the whole. 1 
Now tfl the drama turn : Oh motley sigfal ! 
What precious scenes the wondering eye- invite ! 
Puns, and a prince within a barrel penjt, 8 
And Dibdix S nonsense, yield complete content. 
though now, thank Heaven ! the Roscio mania's o'er, 
And full-grown actors are endured once more; 
Yet what avail their vain attempts to pleas*, 
While British critics sutler scenes like these? 
While Re> mm. iis vents his "dammes," " poohs," and 

"zounds," 3 
And common-place, and common sense confounds? 
While Kenny's World, just Bufier'd to proceed, 
Proclaim i the audience very kind indeed .' 
And Beaumont's pilfer'd Caratach affords 
A tragedy; complete in all but words ? * 
Who hut must mourn while these are all the rage, 
The degradation of pur vaunted stage ? 
Hcavi n! is all sense of shame and talent gone? 
Have we no living hard of merit? — none ! 
Awake, George Colman, Cumberland, awake! 
Ring the alarum-bell, let folly quake! 
Oh Sheridan ! if aught can move thy pen, 
Let comedy resume her throne again, 
Abjure the mummery of German schools, 
Leave new Pi/.arros to translating fools; 
Give, as thy last memorial to the age, 
One classic Drama, and reform the stage. 
( rods ! o'er those hoards shall Folly rear her head 
\\ In re (■'■ VRRJGS trod, and Kemble lives to tread? 
On those shall Farce display Buffoonery's mask, 
And Hooke conceal his heroes in a cask? 
Shall sapient managers new scenes produce 
From C merry, Skeffington, and Mother Goose? 
While Shakspeare, Otway, Massinqeb, foryot, 
On stalls must moulder, or in closets rot? 
Lo! with what pomp the daily prints proclaim 
The rival candidates tor Attic fame! 
In grim array though Lewis' spectres rise, 
Still Shi ffinoton and Goose divide the prize. 
And sure great Skeffincton must claim our praise, 
For skirtless coats and skeletons of plavs 
Renown'd alike ; whose genius ne'er confines 
Her flight to garnish Greenwood's gay designs; ' 
Nor sleeps with " Sleeping Beauties," but anon 
In five facetious acts comes thundering on, 6 
While poor John Bull, bewilder'd with the scene, 
Stares, wondering what the devil it can mean ; 



l i li it, t is, In r ladyship is Buspected of having displayed 

her matchless wit in the Edinburgh Review: however that 
may be, we know from good authority that the manuscripts 
are submitted to her perusal — no doubt for correction. 

■2 Iii the melo-drame ofTekeli, that heroic prince is clapt 
into B barrel on the stagi — a new asylum for distressed heroi 3. 

:; Ml the* are favourite expressions of. Mr. R. and prom- 
inent in Ins ( 'omedies, In ing and dofunct, 

4 Mr. T. Sheridan, the new Manager of Drury-laneTI 

;edy ofBgnduca of the dialogue, and exhib- 
ited the scenes as (he Bpectai lea of Caract&cus. Was this 
worthy of his sire, or of himself ? 

, r > Mr. i ,ii, iiir-uJ is, we believe, Scene-Palater to Dmry- 
I.iinr TI i .in . us such Mr. S is much indebted to him. 

(I Mi. S.i- the illustrious author of the " Sleeping Beauty i" 
t i iicl some Comi lies, particularly "Maids and Bachelors* 
Uaccalaurei baculo magis quam luuro digni. 



ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



33 



B'it as gome hands applaud, a venal few ! 
Rather than sleep, why John applauds it too. 

Such are we now, ah ! wherefore should we turn 
To what our fathers were, unless to mourn ? 
Degenerate Britons ! are ye dead to shame, 
Or, kin 1 to dulness, do ye fear t<> hlame? 
Well may the nobles of our present race 
Watch each distortion of a Naldi's face ; 
Well niav they smile on Italy's buffoons, 
And worship Catalani's pantaloons, ' 
Since their own drama yields no fairer trace 
Of wit than puns, of humour than grimace. 

Then It ;. Ausowia, skill'd in every art, 
To soften manners, but corrupt the heart, 
Pour her exotic follies o'er the Jowl), 
To sanction vice and hunt decorum down : 
Let wedded strumpets languish o'er Deshayes, 
And bless the promise which his form displays ; 
While Gayton bounds before the enraptured looks 
Of hoary marquisses and stripling dukes : 
Let high-born lechers eye the lively Pre le 
Twirl her light limbs that spurn the needless veil : 
Let Angioljni bare her breast of snow, 
Wave the white arm and point the pliant toe : 
Collini trill her love-inspiring song, 
Strain her fair neck and charm the listening throng! 
Raise not your scythe, suppressors of our vice! 
Reforming saints, too delicately nice ! 
By whose decrees, our sinful souls to save, 
No Sunday tankards foam, no barbers shave, 
And beer undrawn and beards iinmown display 
Your holy reverence for the sabbath-day. 

Or hail at once the patron and the pile 
Of vice and folly, Greville and Argyle ! ? 
Where yon proud palace, Fashion's hallow' d fane, 
Spreads wide her portals for the motley Irani, 
Behold the new Petronius 3 of the day, 
The arbiter of pleasure and of play ! 
There the hired eunuch, the Hesperian choir, 
The melting lute, the soft lascivious lyre, 
The song fiom Italy, t] ie step from France, 
The midnight orgy, and the mazy dance, 
The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine, 
For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and lords combine: 
Bach to his humour, — Comus all allows ; 
Champaign, dice, music, or your neighbour's spouse. 



1 AVi/i and Ctttalani require little notice, for the visage of 
!i one, and the salary of the other, will enable us long to re- 
collect these amusing vagabonds; besides, we are Kt ill black 
anil liluo from the squeeze on tho first night of the lady's ap- 
pearance in trowsera. 

■J T.i prevent any blunder, such as mistaking a street for a 
man, 1 beg leave to state, that it is the Institution, and not the 
i that i :niie, which is here Blinded to. 

villi trhom I am Bltghtly acquainted, lost in the 

.Arm :■• Rooms several thousand pounds at backgammon. It is 

but justice to the manager in this instance to gay, that some 

of disapprobation was manifested. Hut why are the 

Implements of gaming allowed in a place devoted to the society 

of both sexes 1 A plea-ant thins fir the wives and daughters 
of those who are blest or cursed with such connexions! to hear 
the billiard-tables rattling in one room, and the dice in an- 
other ! Tins is the case I myself Can testify, as a late unworthy 
of an institution whir!, materially affects the meals 

ther orders, while the lower nmy not even move to the 

sound of a tabor and fiddle, without a chance of indictment for 

riotous behai iour. 

3 Petroniua, " arbiter elegantiarutn" to Nero, " and a very 

pictly fellow in his day," as Mr. Covgrcrc's old Bachelor suith 

G J" 



Talk not to us, ye starving sons of trade I 

Of piteous ruin, which ourselves have made: 

In Plenty's sunshine Fortune's minions bask, 

Nor think of Poverty, except "en masque)" 

When for the night some lately titled ass 

Appears the beggar which his grandsire was. 

The curtain dropp'd, the gay burletta o'er, 

The audience take their turn upon the floor; 

Now round the room the circling dow'gers sweep, 

Now in loose waltz the thin-clad daughters leap: 

The first in lengthened line m 

The last display the free, unfetter' d limb : 

Those for Hibernia's lusty sons repair 

With art the charms winch Nature eould not spare; 

These after husbands wine their eager flight, 

Nor leave much mystery for the nuptial night. 

Oh! blest retreats of infamy and ease! 
Where, all forgotten, but the power to please, 
Each maid may give a loose to genial thought, 
Each swain may teach new systems, or be taughl : 
There the blithe youngster, just return'd from Spain, 
Cuts the light pack, or calls the rattling main ; 
The jovial caster's set, and seven's the nick, 
Or — done! — a thousand on the coming trick ! 
If mad with loss, existence 'gins to tire, 
And all your hope or wish is to expire, 
Here 's Powell's pistol ready for your life, 
And, kinder still, a Paget for your wife. 
Fit consummation of an earthly race 
Begun in folly, ended in disgrace, 
While none but menials o'er the bed of death, 
Wash thy red wounds, or watck thy wavering breath • 
Traduced by liars, and forgot by all, 
The mangled victim of a drunken brawl, 
To live like Clodius, 1 and like Falkland 2 fall. 
Truth ! rouse some genuine bard and guide his hand, 
To drive this pestilence from out the land. 
Even I — least thinking of a thoughtless throng, 
Just skill'd to know the risrht and choose the wrong, 
Freed at that age when Reason's shield is lost, 
To fight my course through Passion's countless host, 
Whom every path of pleasure's flowery way 
Has lured in turn, and all have led astray — 
E'en I must raise my voice, e'en I must feel 
Such scenes, such men. destroy the public weal ; 
Altho' some kind, censorious friend will say, 
" What art thou better, meddling fool, than they ."' 
And every brother rake will smile to see 
That miracle, a moralist, in me. 
No matter — when some bard, in virtue strong, 
Gifford perchance, shall raise the chastening song, 
Then sleep my pen for ever ! and my voice 
Be only heard to hail him and rejoice : 
Rejoice, and yield my feeble praise ; thnngh I 
May feel the lash that virtue must a| 



1 Mittato nomine de to 
I abota narralur. 
2 I knew the 1 ' md well. On Sunday nighl ( 

belaid him presiding at his own table, in all the hom 
6f hospitality ; on Wednesday morning at throe o*cloek K I saw, 
stretchod before me, all that remained of courage, feeling, and 
a host of passions, He was a gallant and successful i 

ivi re i be faults of a sailot — as Buch, Britons will for- 
,y n ,. them. He died likfc a brave man in b bettei cause, for had 

m falli ii ill eke ma r on the deck of the frigate to which he 

was just appointed, bis last n lents Would have been held 

up by hs countijmcn as an example to succecdinn heroes 



34 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



As for the smaller fry, who swarm in shoals, 
From silly Hah/. ' op to simple Bowles, 
Why should we call them from their dark abode, 
In broad St. Giles's or in Tottenham road? 
Or (since some men of fashion nobly dure 
To scrawl in verse) from Bond-street, or the Square? 
If things of ton their harmless lays indite, 
Most wisely doom'd to shun the public sight, 
What harm ? in spite of every critic elf, 
Sir T. may read his stanzas to himself; 
Miles Andrews still his strength in couplets try, 
And live in prologues, though his dramas die. 
Lords too are bards : such tilings at times befall, 
And 't is some praise in peers to write at all. 
Yet, did or taste or reason sway the times, 
Ah ! who would take their titles with their rhymes? 
Rosco-m.yion ! Sheffield! with your spirits tied, 
No future laurels deck a noble head ; \ 
No muse will cheer, with renovating smile\ 
The paralytic puling of Carlisle: 
The puny school-boy and his early lay 
Men pardon, if his follies pass away ; 
But who forgives the senior's ceaseless verse, 
Whose hairs grow hoary as his rhymes grow worse? 
What heterogeneous honours deck the peer! 
Lord, rhymester, petit-maitre, pamphleteer! 2 
So dull in youth, so drivelling in his age, \'» 

His scenes alone had datnn'd our sinking stagey 
But managers for once cried "hold, enough !" 
Nor drugg'd their audience with the tragic stuff. 
Yet at their judgment let his lordship laugh, 
And case his volumes in congenial calf: 
Yco ! dotf that covering where morocco shines, 
And hang a. calf-skin 3 on those recreant lines. 

With you, ye Druids ! rich in native lead, 
Who daily scribble for your daily bread, 
With you I war not : Gifford's heavy hand 
Has crush'd, without remorse, your numerous band. 
On "all the talents" vent your venal spleen, 
Want your defence, let pity be your screen- 
Let monodies on Fox regalo your crew, 
And Melville's Mantle* prove a blanket too! 
One common Lethe waits each hapless bard, 
And peace be with you ! 't is your best reward. 
Such damning fame as Dunciads only give, 
Could bid your lines beyond a mon.ing live; 
But now at once your fleeting labours close, 
With names of greater note in blest repose. 
Far be't from me unkindly to upbraid 
The lovely Rosa's prose in masquerade, 



1 What would be the sentiments of the Persian All 
Mafii. could he rise ftom bis splendid sepulchre at £ 
where he reposes wfch Fprdotui and .■wi.o.thei iriental Uonur 
and Catullus, and behold bis name assumed !>y ore si,, it of 
Dromore, the mo.-t impudent and execrable of litcrury poach- 
ers for the iluily prints J 

2 The Earl of Carlisle has lately published nn oighteen-ponny 
pamphlet on the state of the stage, and offers Ins plan tin 

,i new theatre.: it is to be hoped his lordship will be 
permiiteil to bring forward any thing lor the stage, except his 
own tniL 

3 ' PnlT that lion's hide, 
And hang a calfjsBJn on those recreant limbs." 

Shake. King John: 
L>oiti C. s works, most resplendent); hound, form a conspicu- 
ous ornament to nil book shelves: 

"The rest is all but leather and prunella." 
4 MeloilW* Mantle, a parody on " Elijah's Mantle," a poem. 



Whose strains, the faithful echoes of her mind, 
Leave wandering comprehension far behind, 1 
Though Cktmca's bards no more our journals rill, 
Some stragglers skirmish round their columns still. 
Last of the howling host which once was Bell's, 
Matilda snivels yet, and Hafiz yells; 
And Merry's metaphors appear anew, 
Chain'd to the signature of O. P. Q. 2 

When some brisk youth, the tenant of a stall, 
Employs a pen less pointed than his awl, 
Leaves his snug shop, forsakes his store of shoes, 
St. Crispin quits, and cobbles for the Muse, 
Heavens ! how the vulgar stare ! how crowds applaud ! 
How ladies read, and literati laud! 
If chance some wicked wag should pass his jest, 

r denature, don't the world know b si 
Genius must guide when wits admire the rl 
And Capel Lofft 3 declares 'tis quite sublime. 
Hear, then, ye happy sons of needless trade! 
Swains! quit the plough, resign the useless spade': 
Lo! Burks and Bloommeld, 4 n..y, a greater far, 
Gifford was born beneath an adverse star, 
Forsook the labours of a senile state, 
Stemm'd the rude storm, and triumph'd over Fate. 
Then why no more? if Phoebus smiled on you, 
Bloomfield ! why not on brother Nathan too? 
Him too the Mania, not the Muse, has seized, 
Not inspiration, but a mind diseased : 
And now no boor can seek his last abode, 
No common be inclosed, without an ode. 
Oil! since increased refinement deigns to smile 
On Britain's sons, and bless our genial isle, 
Let Poesy go forth, pervade the whole. 
Alike the rustic and mechanic soul : 
Ye tuneful cobblers! still your notes prolong, 
Compose at once a slipper and a song ; 
So shall the fair your handiwork peruse ; 
Your sonnets sure shall please — pcrnaps your shoes 
May Moorland b weavers boast Pindaric skill, 
And tailors' lays be longer than their bill ! 
While punctual beaux reward the grateful notes, 
And pay for poems— when they pay for coats. 

To the famed throng now paid the tribute due, 
Neglected Genius ! let me turn to you. 
Come forth, Oh C ami'UEll ! ,; give thy talents scoye, 
Who dares aspire if thou must cease to hope? 
And thou, melodious Rogers! rise at last, 
Recall the pleasing memory of the past; 

1 This lovely little Jessica, the daughter of the noted Jew 
K .seems to he n follower ol the Delhi Cruses 

and bas published two volumes of verj n ib iihlities 

in rhyme, us limes go ; besides sundry novels in the style of die 
tirst edition of tbe Monk. 

2 These, ure the signatures of various worthies who figure 
in the poetical departments of t he newspapers. 

IS Capel Lofft, Esq.', the Miecerras of dHoemakers, nod 
Preface-writer general to distress'd vereemon . a kn.>l of nr.uia 
scooucbeu! to those who wish to he delivered of rhyme, but 
do not know how to In in:: it forth. 

•I 9e • Nathaniel Bloomfield' soda, elegy, or whatever he or 
any one else chpcses to call it, on the inclosure of " Honuig- 
ton Green." 

5 Vide "Recollections of a Weaver in the Moorlands of 
Staffordshire." 

ti It would be superfluous to recall to the mid. 1 oftb 
the author of "The Pleasures of Memory," and "TI 
■yes of Hop*i" the most beautiful didactic no 
guage, if we except Pope's Essay on Man: but 
poetasters have started up, that even the names of Campbell 
and Rogers me become Btrange 






ENGLISH CARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



Arise ! let blest remembrance still inspire, 

And strike to wonted tones thy hallow'd lyre ! 

Restore Apollo to his vacant throne, 

Assert thy country's honour and thine own. 

What ! must deserted Poesy still weep 

Where her last hopes with pious Cowper sleep 7 

Unless, perchance, from his cole bier she turns, 

To deck the turf that wraps her n.!nstrel, Burns ! 

No ! though contempt hath mark'd the spurious brood, 

The race who rhvme from folly, or for food ; 

Yet still some genuine sons, 'tis her's to boast, 

Who, least affecting, still effect the most; 

Feel as they write, and write but as they feel — 

Bear witness, Gifford, Sothkev, Macneil. 1 

" Why slumbers Gi fford ?" once was ask'd in vain: - 
Why slumbers Gifford? let us ask again: 
Are there no follies for his pen to purge ? 
Are there no fools whose backs demand the scourge ? 
Are there no sins for Satire's Bard to greet? 
Stalks not gigantic Vice in every street? 
Shall peers or princes tread Pollution's path, 
And 'scape alike the law's and Rinse's wrath ? 
Nor blaze with guilty glare through future time, 
Eternal beacons of consummate crime ? 
Arouse thee, Gifford ! be thy promise claim' d, 
Make bad men better, or at least ashamed. 

Unhappy White ! 3 while life was in its spring, 
And thy young muse just waved her joyous wing, 
The spoiler came, and all thy promise fair 
Has sought the grave, to sleep for ever there. 
Oh! what a noble heart was here undone, 
When Science' self destroy'd her favourite son ! 
Yes ! she too much indulged thy fond pursuit, 
She sow'd the seeds, but death has reap'd the fruit. 
'T was thine own genius gave the final blow, 
And help'd to plant the wound that laid thee low : 
So the struck eagle, stretch'd upon the plain, 
No more through rolling cbuds to soar again, 
View'd his own feather on the fatal dart, 
And wing'd the shaft that quiver'd in his heart : 
Keen were his pangs, but keener far to feel 
He nursed the pinion which impell'd the steel, 
Wliile the same plumage that had warm'd his nest 
Drank the last life-drop of his bleeding breast. 

There be who say in these enlighten'd days 
That splendid lies are all the poet's praise ; 
That strain'd invention, ever on the wing, 
Alone impels the modern bard to sing : 
T is true that all who rhyme, nay, all who write, 
Shrink* from that fatal word to genius — trite ; 



1 Gifford, author of the Baviad and Maiviatl, the first satires 
of the day, and translator of .Juvenal. 

Sotheby, translator of WidamA's Oberon and Virgil's 
. anil author of Saul, an epic poem. 

Macneil, whose poems are deservedly popular : particularly 
" Scotland's Scaitb, or the Wats of War," of which ten 
thousanil copies were sold in one month. 

2 Mr. (I iffurd promised public); that ihe Baviad and Ma.'viad 
should not be DM last original works: let him remember, 
" mox in reluctstntee dracones." 

:i lltnru Kirke H'/iite died at Cambridge, in October 1H06, 
in consequence of too much exertion in the pursuit of studies, 
that would have matured a mind which disease and poverty 
could not impair, and whirl] Death itsfelf destroyed rutin r lh.ui 
subdued. His poems abound in such beauties as must impress 
the reader with the liveliest regret that so short a period was 
■Dotted to talents which would have dignified even die sacred 
functions he was lestined to assume. 



Yet truth sometimes will lend her noblest fires, 
And decorate the verse herself inspires: 
This fact in virtue's name let Ckabbe attest — 
Though Nature's sternest painter, yet the best. 

And here let Siiee ' and genius find a place 
Whose pen and pencil yield an equal grace; 
To guide whose hand the sister arts combine, 
And trace the poet's or the painter's line ; 
Whose magic touch can bid the canvas glow, 
Or pour the easy rhyme's harmonious flow, 
While honours doubly merited attend 
The poet's rival, but the painter's friend. 

Blest is the man who dares approach the bower 
Where dwelt the Muses at their natal hour ; 
Whose steps have press'd, whose eye has marked alar 
The clime that nursed the sons of Bong and war, 
The scenes which glory still must hov< r o'er, 
Her place of birth, her own Achaian shore : 
But doubly blest is he whose heart expands 
With hallow'd feelings for those classic lands; 
Who rends the veil of ages long gone by, 
And views the remnants with a poet's eye! 
Wright ! 2 't was thy happy lot at once to view 
Those shores of glory, and to sing them too : 
And sure no common muse inspired thy pen 
To hail die land of gods and godlike men. 

And you, associate Bards ! 3 who snatch'd to light 
Those gems too long withheld from modern sight ; 
Whose mingling taste combined to cull the wreath 
Where Attic flowers Aonian odours breathe, 
And all their renovated fragrance flung, 
To grace the beauties of your native tongue, 
Now let those minds that nobly could transfuse 
The glorious spirit of the Grecian muse, 
Though soft the echo, scorn a borrow'd tone. 
Resign Achaia's lyre, and strike your own. 

Let these, or such as these, with just applause, 
Restore the Muse's violated laws : 
But not in flimsy Darwin's pompous chime, 
That mighty master ol unmeaning rhyme ; 
Whose gilded cymbals, more adorn'd than clear, 
The eye delighted, but fatigued the ear, 
In show the simple lyre could once surpass, 
But now worn down, appear in native brass ; 
While all his train of hovering sylphs around, 
Evaporate in similies and sound: 
Him let them shun, with him let tinsel die ■ 
False glare attracts, but more offends the eye. * 

Yet let them not to vulgar Wordsworth stoop, 
The meanest object of the lowly group, 
Whose verse, of all but childish prattle void, 
Seems blessed harmony to Lajibf. and Llovd : '' 
Let them — but hold, my muse, nor dare to teach 
A strain far, far beyond thy humble reach : 



1 Mr. Slice, author of " Rhymes on Art," arid " Elements 
of Art." 

2 Mr. H'riflrf, late Consul-General for the Seven Islands, ie 
author of a very beautify! poem jusl published : it is entitles 
"HoriE Ionicrp," and is descriptive of the Isles and the adja- 
ceril (roast of Greece. 

3 The translators of the Anthology have since published 
separate poems, which evince genius that only requires uppor 
tunity to attain eminence. 

4 The neglect of the " Botanic Garden' ' is some proof of 
returning taste . ihe scenery is its solo recommendation. 

:"i Mnssrs. l.amle and Lloyd, the most .gnoble followers o 
Soulhey and Co. 



36 



BYRON'S WORK'S. 



The native genius with their feeling given 

Will point the path, and peal their notes to heaven. 

And thou, too, Scott ! ' resign to minstrels rude 
The wilder slogan of a Border fend : 
Let others spin their meagre lines for hire — 
Enough for genius if itself inspire ! 
Let Southey sing, although his teeming muse, 
Prolific every string, be too profuse ; 
Let simple Wordsworth chime his childish verse, 
And brother Coleridge lull the babe at nurse; 
Let spectre-mongering Lewis aim at most 
To rouse the galleries, or to raise a ghost ; 
Let Moore be lewd; let Stkangjord steal from 

Moore, 
And swear that Camoens sang such notes of yore: 
Let Hayley hobble on, Montgomery rave, 
And godly Grahame chaunt the Stupid stave; 
Let sonnettcering Bowles his strains refine, 
And whine and whimper to the fourteenth line ; 
Let Stott, Carlisle, 2 Matilda, and the rest 
Of Grub-street, and of Grosvenor-Place the best, 
Scrawl on, till death release us from the strain, 
Or common sense assert her rights again ; 
But thou, with powers that mock the aid of praise, 
Should'st leave to humbler bards ignoble lays : 
Thy country's voice, the voice of all the Nine, 
Demand a hallow'd harp — that harp is thine. 
Say! will not Caledonia's annals yield 
The glorious record of some nobler field, 
Than the vile foray of a plundering clan, 
Whose proudest deeds disgrace the name of man ? 
Or Marmion's acts of darkness, fitter food 
For outlaw'd Sherwood's tales of Robin Hood ? 
Scotland ! still proudly claim thy native bard, 
And be thy praise his first, his best reward ! 
Vet not with thee alone his name should live, 
But own the vast renown a world can give ; 
Be known, perchance, when Albion is no more, 
And tell the tale of what she was before ; 
To future times her faded fame tecall, 
And save her glory, though his country fall. 

1 By the hyp, T hope tint in Mr. Scott's next nnem his hero 
or heroine will be less addicted to "gramarye,' ami more u> 
grammar, than the Lady of the Lay, ami her bravo, William 
of Dulorair.e. 

2 It may be asked why I have censored the Earl of Carlisle, 

my guardian ami relative, to whom I dedicated a vol e "I 

puerile poems a lew years njro. The guardianship was nomi- 
nal at least as far as 1 have been able to discover; tli" rela- 
tionship I cannot belp, and am verysorr,y tor it: hut as h,s 
lordship seemed to forget it on a very essential occasion to me, 
1 shall not burthen oiy memory with the recollection. I do not 
think that pergonal difference sanction the unmet condemns 

,„ fa brother scribbler; but Isee no reasonVhjr they Should 

act as a preventive, when the author, noble or ignoble, has 
for a series of ve.ars beguiled a ' discerning public as the 
advertisements have it) with divers reams of most orthodox, 
imoeual nonsense. Besides. I do not Step aside to 1 1 

the Earl no— Ins works Come fairly in review with those Ol 
other patrician literati. If before 1 caeaped from my teens,. I 
said any thing in favour of b> lordship's paper hooks, it was in 
the way of dutiful dedication, end more from the advice ol 
others than my own judgment, and I seize the first opportunity 
ofpronouncingmysincererecantation. I havehearaM 
persons conceive me to be under obligations to Lord ( arlttu: 
U-, ighall be most particularly happy to learn what they 
■ire and when conferred, that they may be .duly appreciated 
and publicly acknowledged. What I have humbly advanced 
us an opinion on Ins printed things, I am prepared to .support, 
if ,„■!-. Bgary, by quotations from elegies, eulogies, odes, epis- 
udos, and certain facetious and damty tragedies, beanng his 
name and mark : 

" What can ennoble knave--, or fun's, or cowards! 

Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards!" 
Po «ay= 1'one Amen 



Vet what avails the sanguine poet's hope 
To conquer ages, and with time to cope? 
New eras spread their wings, new nations rise, 
And other victors ' till the applauding skies: 
A few brief generations Seel along, 
Whose sons forget the poet and his song: 
F.Yn now what i ic e-l- >ved minstrels scarce may claim 
The tran-ii-nt mention of a dubious name ! 
When Fame's loud trump hath blown its noblest blast, 
Though long the sound, the echo sleeps at last, 
And glory, Like the phftenis midst her lires, 
Exhales her odours, blazes, arid expires. 

Shall hoary Granta call her sable sons, 
Expert in science, more expert at puns .' 
Shall these approach the muse? ah, no! she flies, 
And even spurns the great Seatonian prize, 
Though printers condescend the press to soil 
Willi rhyme by Hoare, and epic blank by Hgyi.e : 
Not him whose page, if still upheld by whist, 
Requires no sacred theme to bid us hst.- 
Ye, who in Granta's honours would surpass, 
Must mount her Pegasus, a full-grown ass — 
A foal well worthy of her ancient dam, 
Whose Helicon is duller than her Cam. 
There Clarkic, still striving piteously "to pleaac," 
Forgetting doggrel leads not to degrees, 
A would-be satirist, a hired buffoon, 
A monthly scribbler of some low lampoon, 
Condemn'd to drudge the meanest of the mean, 
And furnish falsehoods for a magazine, 
Devotes to scandal his congenial mind — 
I Innself a living libel on mankind. 3 
Oh, dark asylum of a Vandal race ! * 
At once the boast of learning, and disgrace ; 
So sunk in dulness and so lost in shame, 
That Smvthe and Hodgson i scarce redeem thy fame' 
But where fair Isis rolls her purer wave, 
The partial muse delighted ioves to lave ; 
On her green banks a greener wreath is wove, 
To crown the bards that haunt her classic grove, 
Where RICHARDS wakes a genuine poet's fires, 
And modem Britons justly praise their sires. 6 

For mc, who thus unask'd have dared to tell 
My country what her sons should know too well, 
Zeal for her honour bade me here engage 
The host of idiots that infest her age. 



1 "Tollore humo, victorque viruin volitare per ora."- 
Virgil. 

2 The "Games of Hoyle," well known Co the votaries ol 
whist, chess, etc., are not to he superseded by the vagaries ol 

fug i deal m sake, whose poem comprised, as expressly 

stated in th Ivertisement, all the " flaguea of Egypt. ! 

\\ This person, who has lately betrayed the most rapid symp- 
toms of confirmed authorship, is writer of a p n denominated 

the " Vrl oi Pleasing," as ' lucus s non lucendo," containing 
licle plea 9 poetry. He also acts as monthly 

stipendiary and collector of calumnies fi.r the Satirist. It this 
unfortunate young man would exchange the magazines for the 
mathematics, and endeavour to take a decent degree in ins 
. it might eventually prove n fe than 

his present salary. 

.1 " Into Cambridgeshire the Emperor Probus transp 

I of Vandals."— Gibbon's Decline and Fall, 
page S3, vol. 2. There is no reason to doubt the truth ol this 
assertion— the breed is still in high perfection. 

3 This gentleman's m requires no praise: the man who 

Ltion displays unquestionable genius, may well be 
to excel in original composition, ol which it is to Pa 
hoped wo shall soon see a splendid specimen. 

ft The "Aboriginal Britons." an excellent poem by Rich 
arils. 



ENGLISH BARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS. 



3? 



Vo just applause her honour'd name shall lose, 
As first ia freedom, dearest to the muse. 
Oh, would thy hards hut emulate thy fame, 
And rise more worthy, Albion, of thy name! 
What Athens was in science, Rome in power, 
What Tyre appear'd in her meridian hour, 
'Tis thine at once, fair Albion, to have been, 
Earth's chief dictatress, Ocean's mighty queen: 
But Rome docay'd, and Athens strew'd the plain, 
And Tyre's proud piers lie shatter'd in the main : 
Like these thy strength may sink in ruin hurl'd, 
And Britain fall, the bulwark of the world. 
But let me cease, and dread Cassandra's fate, 
With warning ever scoff'd at, 'till too late; 
To themes U-ss lofty still my lay confine, 
And urge thy bards to gain a name like thine. 

Then, hapless Britain! be thy rulers blest, 
The senate's oracles, the people's jest! 
Still hear thy motley orators dispense 
The Bowers of rhetoric, though not of sense, 
Win' - Canning's colleagues hate him for his wit, 
And old dame Portland ' fills the place of Pitt. 

Yet once again adieu ! ere this the sail 
That wafts me hence is shivering in the gale : 
And Afric's coast and Calpe's 2 adverse height, 
And fMamboul's 3 minarets must greet my sight: 
Thence shall I stray through beauty's 4 native clime, 
Where KatP is clad in rocks, and crown'd with snows 

sublime. 
But should 1 back return, no letter'd rage 
Shall drag my commonplace book on the stage : 
Let vain Yalentia 6 rival luckless Carr, 
And equal him whose work he sought to mar; 
f,et Aberdeen and Elgin' still pursue 
The shade of fame through regions of virtu ; 
Waste useless thousands on their Phidian freaks, 
Misshapen monuments and maim'd antiques ; 
And make their grand saloons a general mart 
For all the mutilated blocks of art : 
Of Dardan tours let dilettanti tell, 
I leave topography to classic Gell ; 8 
And, quite content, no more shall interpose 
To stun mankind with poesy or prose. 

Thus far I 've held my undisturb'd career, 
Prepared for rancour, steel'd 'gainst selfish fear : 
Tins thing of rhyme I ne'er disdam'd to own — 
Though not ohtrusive, yet not quite unknown : 



1 A friend of mine being asked why his Grace of P. was 
likened to an olil woman 1 replied, "lie supposed it was be- 
cause lie was past bearing." 

i i ' ]:»• is Hie ancient name of Gibraltar. 

,t StambonI is the Turkish word tor Constantinople. 

4 Georgia, remarkable fur die beauty of its inhabitants. 

5 Mount i Caucasus. 

ti Lord yalentia (whose tremendous travels are forthcom- 
ing, with ilue decorations, graphical*, topographical, and typo- 
graphical) deposed, on Sir John Carr's unlucky suit, that 
Dubois' satire prevented his purchase of the "Stranger in 
Ireland." — Oh tie, my Lord 1 has yuur lordship no more feel- 
ing for a fellow-tourist ? but " two of a trade," they say, etc. 

7 T.nril Elgin would fain persuade us '.hat nil the figures, 
with and without noses, in his stone-shop, are the work of 
riii<lia> : " ( !redat JndBus." 

8 Mr. OeWs Topography of Troy and Ithaca cannot fail 
to ensure the approbation of every man possessed of classical 
taste, as well for the information Mr. G. conveys to the mind 
of the reader, as for tlio aHity and research the respective 
works display 



My voice was heard again, though not so loud ; 
My page, though nameless, never disavow'd, 
And now at once I tear the veil away : 
Cheer on the pack! the quarry stands at bay, 
I'nseared by all the din of Mel bourn E-house, 
15y Lawbe's resentment, or by Holland's spcuse» 
By Jeffrey's harmless pistol, Hall All's rage, 
Edi.na's brawny sons and brimstone page. 
Our men in buckram shall have blows enough, 
And feel they too are " penetrable stutl :" 
And though I hope not hence UBSCathi d to gO / 
Who conquers me shall find a stubborn foe. 
The time hath been, when no harsh sound would fafi 
From lips that now may seem imbued with gall, 
Nor fools nor follies tempt me to despise 
The meanest thing that crawl'd beneath my e\ i s : 
But now, so callous grown, so changed since youth, 
I've learn'd to think and sternly speak the truth ; 
Learn'd to deride the critic's starch decree, 
And break him on the wheel he meant (or me ; 
To spurn the rod a scribbler bids me kiss, 
Nor care if courts and crowds applaud or hiss ; 
Nay, more, though all my rival rhymesters frown, 
I too can hunt a poetaster down ; 
And, arm'd in proof, the gauntlet cast at once 
To Scotch marauder, and to Southern dunce. 
Thus much I 've dared to do ; how far my lay 
Hath wrong'd these righteous times, let others sayi 
This let the world, which knows not how to snare, 
Yet rarely blames unjustly, now declare. 



POSTSCRIPT. 1 



I have been informed, since the present edition went 
to the press, that my trusty and well-beloved cousins, 
the Edinburgh Reviewers, are preparing a most vehe- 
ment critique on my poor, gentle, unresisting muse, 
whom they have already so bedeviled with their ungodly 
ribaldry : 

" Tantaone aniinis cmlestibus ira? '." 
I suppose I must say of Jeffrey as Sir Andrew 
Aguecheek saith, " an I had known he was so cun- 
ning offence, I had seen him damned ere I had fought 
him." What a pity it is that I shall be beyond the Bos- 
phorus before the next number has passed the Tweed. 
But yet I hope to light my pipe witli it in Persia. 

My northern friends have accused me, with justice, of 
personality towards their great literary Anthropophagus, 
Jeffrey : but what else was to be done with him and 
his dirty pack, who feed " by lying and slandering, and 
slake their thirst by "evil-speaking?" I have adduced 
facts already well known, and of Jeffrey's mind I have 
stated my free opinion ; nor has he thence sust 
any injury : what scavenger was ever soiled by being 
pelted with mud? It may be said that I quit England 
because I have censured there "persons of honour and 
wit about town;" but I am coming back again, and 
their vengeance will keep hot till my return. Those 
who know me can testify that my motives for leaving 
England are very different from fears, literary or pei- 
sonal ; those who do not, may one day be convinced. 



1 Published to the Second Edition. 



38 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Since the publication of this thing, my name has not 
been concealed ; I have been mostly in London, ready 
to answer for my transgressions, and in daily expecta- 
tion of sundry cartels ; but, alas 1 " The age of chiv- 
alry is over;" or, in the vulgar tongue, there is no 
spirit now-a-days. 

There is a youth yclept Hewson Clarke (subaudi, 
Esq.), a si/.er of Emanuel College, and I believe a den- 
izen of Berwick-upon-Tweed, whom I have introduced 
in these pages to much better company than he has been 
accustomed to meet : he is, notwithstanding, a very sad 
dog, and, for no reason that I can discover, except a 
personal quarrel with a bear, kept by me at Cambridge 
to sit for a fellowship, and whom the jealousy of his 
Trinity contemporaries prevented from success, has been 
abusing me, and, what is worse, the defenceless innocent 
above mentioned, in the Satirist, for one year and some 
months. I am utterly unconscious of having given him 
any provocation ; indeed I ain guiltless of having heard 
his name, till it was coupled with the Satirist. He has, 
therefore, no reason to complain, and I dare say that, 
like Sir Fretful Plagiary, he is rather pleased than other- 
wise. I have now mentioned all who have done me the 
honour to notice me and mine, that is, my bear and my 
book, except the editor of the Satirist, who, it seems, 
is a gentleman. God wot ! I wish he could impart a lit- 
tle of his gentility to his subordinate scribblers. I hear 
that Mr. Jerningham is about to take up the cudgels 
for his Ma;cenas, Lord Carlisle : I hope not ; he was one 
of the few who, in the very short intercourse I had 



with him, treated me with kindness when a boy, and 
whatever he may say or do, " pour on, I will endure." 
I have nothing further to add, save a general note o/ 
thanksgiving to readers, purchasers, and publisher; and, 
in the words of Scott, I wish 

" To a. and curb a fair good sight. 
And rosy drea&U and oliitnburs light." 



The fallowing Linesucre writtenby Mr. Fitzgerald, 
in a Copy of English Bards and Scotch He 
viewers : — 

I find Lord Byron scorns my muse — 

Our fates are ill agreed ! 
His verse is safe — I can't abuse 
Those lines I never read. 

W. F. F. 



His Lordship accidentally met Willi the Copy, and sub- 
joined the following pungent Reply : — 

What 's writ on me, cried Fitz, I never read ; — 
What 's wrote by thee, dear Fitz, none will indeed. 
The case stands simply thus, then, honest Fiti. — 
Thou and thine enemies are fairly quits, 
Or rather would be, if, for time to iome, 
They luckily were deaf, or thou wert dumb — 
But, to their ]iens, while scribblers add their tongue*,* 
The waiter only can escape their lungs. 



1 Mr. Filzg/raltl is in the habit of reciting his own poetry 
— See note to English Bards, p. 2C. 



A ROM AUNT. 



L'univers est une espece de livre, dont on n'a lu que la premiere page, quand on n'a vu que eons pays 
J'en ai feuillete un assez grand nombre, que j'ai trouvees egalement mauvaises. Cet examen ne m'a 
point ete infructueux. Je haissais ma patrie. Toutes les impertinences des peuples divers, parmi 
lesquels j'ai veeu, m'ont reconniliii avec elle. Quand je n'aurais tire d'autre benelice de mes voy- 
ages que celui la, je n'en regretterais ni les frais ni les fatigues. LE COSMOPOLITE. 



PREFACE. 



The following poem was written, for the most part, 
amidst the scenes which it attempts to describe. It 
was benun in Albania ; and the parts relative to Spain 
and Portugal were composed from the author's obser- 
vations in those countries. Thus much it may be ne- 
cessary to <-tnte for the correctness of the descriptions. 
The scenes attempted to be sketched are in Spain, 
Portugal, Epirus, Acarnania, and Greece. There 
for the present the poem stops: its reception will 
determine whether the author may venture to conduct 
his readers to the capital of the East, through Ionia and 
Phrygia : these two cantos are merely experimental. 

A fictitious character is introduced for the sake of 
giving some connexion to the piece ; which, however, 
makes no pretension to regularity. It has been sug- 
gested to nie by friends, on whose opinions I set a hign 
■faluc, that in this fictitious character, "Childc Harold," 
I may incur the suspicion of having intended some real 
personage: this I beg leave, once for all, to disclaim — 



Harold is the child of imagination, for the purposi 1 
have stated. In some very trivial particulars, and thtje 
merely local, there might be grounds for such a notii -i : 
but in the main points, I should hope, none whatever. 

It is almost superfluous to mention that the appela- 
tion "Childe," as "Childe Waters," "Childe Chil- 
ders," etc., is used as more consonant with the old struc- 
ture of versification which I have adopted. The " Good 
Night," in the beginning of the first canto, was sug- 
gested by " Lord Maxwell's Good Night," in the Bor- 
der Minstrelsy, edited by Mr. Scott. 

With the different poems which have been published 
on Spanish subjects, there may he found some slight 
coincidence in the first part, which treats of the Penin- 
sula, but it can only be casual ; as, with the exception 
of a few concluding stanzas, the whole of this poem 
was written in the Levant. 

The stanza of Spenser, according to one of our most 
successful poets, admits of every variety. Dr. Beanie 
makes the following observation : " Not long ago I 
began a poem in the style and stanza of Spenser, in 
which! propose to give full scope to my inclina'ion. 



PREFACE TO CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



aiid be either droll or pathetic, descriptive or senti- 
mental, tender or satirical, as the humour strnces me ; 
for, if I mistake not, the measure which I have adopted, 
admits equally of all these kinds of composition." 1 — 
Strengthened in my opinion by such authority, and by 
the example of some in the highest order of Italian 
poets, I shall make no apology for attempts at similar 
variations in the following composition ; satisfied that, 
if they are unsuccessful, their failure mast be in the 
execution, rather than in the design sanctioned by the 
practice of Ariosto, Thomson, and Beattie. 

ADDITION TO THE PREFACE. 

I have now waited till almost all our periodical jour- 
nals have distributed their usual portion of criticism. 
To the justice of the generality of their criticisms I 
have nothing to object ; it would ill become me to 
quarrel with their very slight degree of censure, when 
perhaps, if they had been less kind, they had been more 
candid. Returning, therefore, to all and each my best 
thanks for their liberality, on one point alone shall I 
venture an observation. Amongst the many objections 
justly urged to the very indifferent character of the 
"vagrant Childe" (whom, notwithstanding many hints 
to the contrary, I still maintain to be a fictitious per- 
sonage), it has been stated that, besides the anachron- 
ism, he is very unknighib/, as the times of the knights 
were times of love, honour, and so forth. Now, it so 
happens, that the good old times, when "l'amour du 
bon vieux temps, l'amour antique" flourished, were the 
most profligate of all possible centuries. Those who 
have any doubts on this subject, may consult St. Palaye, 
passim, and more particularly vol. ii. page 69. The 
rows of chivalry were no better kept than any other 
vows whatsoever, and the songs of the Troubadours 
were not more decent, and certainly were much less 
refined, than those of Ovid. — The "Cours d'amour 
parlemeuts d'amour ou de courtoisie ct de gentilesso," 
hal much more of love than of courtesy or gentleness. — 
See Roland m the same subject with St. Palaye. — 
Whatever other objection may be urged to that most 
un imiable personage, Childe Harold, he was so far 
perfectly knightly in his attributes — " No waiter, but a 
knight templar." 2 — By the bye, I fear that Sir Tristram 
and Sir Lancelot were no better than they should be, 
although very poetical personages and true knights 
"sans peur," though not "sans reproche." — If the 
story of the institution of the "Garter" be not a fable, 
the knights of that order have for several centuries borne 
the badge of a Countess of Salisbury, of indifferent 
memory. So much for chivalry. Burke need not have 
regretted that its days are over, though Marie Antoinette 
was quite as chaste as most of those in whose honours 
lances were shivered, and knights unhorsed. 

Before the days of Bayard, and down to those of Sir 
Joseph Banks (the most chaste and celebrated of an- 
cient and modern times), few exceptions will be found 
to this statement, and I fear a little investigation will 
teach us not to regret those monstrous mummeries of 
the middle ages. 

I now leave "Childe Harold" to live h'.s day, such 
as he is , it had been more agreeable, and certainly 
more easy, to have drawn an amiable character. It had 
been easy to varnish over his faults, to make him do 

1 Beatlie'a Letter*. 2 The Rovers. — rfnti-jacobm. 



more and express less, but he never was intended as an 
example, further than to show- that early perversion of 
mind and morals leads to satiety of past pleasures and 
disappointment in new ones, and that even the beauties 
of nature, and the stimulus of travel (except ambition, 
the most powerful of all excitements), are lost on a soul 
so constituted, or rather misdirected. Had I proceeded 
with the poem, this character would have d( ep< ned as 
he drew to the close ; for the outline which I or.ce 
meant to fill up for him, was, with some i \< < ptii ns, 
the sketch of a modern Timon, perhaps a poetical 
Zeluco. 



TO IANTHE. 

Not in those climes where I have late been straying 
Tho' beauty long hath there been matchless d( i m'd , 
Not in those visions to the heart displaying 
Forms which it sighs but to have only dream'd, 
Hath aught like thee, in truth or fancy seenr'd : 
Nor, having seen thee, shall I vainly seek 
To paint those charms which varied as they beam'd — 
To such as see thee not my words were weak ; 
To those who gaze on thee what language could they 
speak ? 

Ah ! may'st thou ever be what now thou art, 
Nor unbeseem the promise of thy spring, 
As fair in form, as warm yet pure in heart, 
Love's image upon earth without his wing, 
And guileless beyond hope's imagining ! 
And surely she who now so Ibndly rears 
Thy youth, in thee, thus hourly brightening, 
Beholds the rainbow of her future years, 
Before whose heavenly I ixs all sorrow disappears. 

Young Peri of the West! — 'tis well for me 
My years already doubly number thine ; 
My loveless eye unmoved may gaze on thee, 
And safely view thy ripening beauties shine ; 
Happy, I ne'er shall see them in decline, 
Happier, that while all younger hearts shall bleed, 
Mine shall escape the doom thine eyes assign 
To those whose admiration shall succeed, 
But inix'd with pangs to love's even loveliest hours de- 
creed. 

Oh ! let that eye, which, wild as the gazelle's, 
Now brightly bold or beautifully shy, 
Wins as it wanders, dazzles where it dwells, 
Glance o'er this page, nor to my verse deny 
That smile for which my breast might vainly sigh, 
Could I to thee be ever more than friend : 
This much, dear maid, accord; nor question why 
To one so young, my strain I would commend, 
But bid me with my wreath one matchless lily blend. 

Such is thy name with this my verse entwined ; 
And long as kinder eyes a look shall cast 
On Harold's page, Ianthe's here enshrined 
Shall thus be first beheld, forgotten last: 
My days once number'd, should this homage past 
Attract thy fairy fingers near the lyre 
Of him who hail'd thee, loveliest as thou wast, 
Such is the most my .nemory may desire ; 
Though more than hope can cla'm, could fhendslU" 
less require ? 



•10 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S 
PILGRIMAGE. 



A ROMATJNT. 



CANTO I. 

I. 

On, thou! in Hellas decm'd of heavenly birth, 
Muse ! fprm'd or fabled at the minstrel's will ! 
Since shamed full oft by later lyres on earth, 
Mine dares not call thee from thy sacred hill : 
Yet there I 've wander'd by thy vaunted rill ; 
Yes! sigh'd o'er Del|>hi's long-deserted shrine, 1 
Where, save thai feeble fountain; all is still; 
Nor mote my shell awake the weary Nine, 
I o grace so plain a tale — this lowly lay of mine. 

II. 

Whnorne in Albion's isle there dwelt a youth, 
Who ne in virtue's ways did take delight; 
But spent his days in riot most uncouth, 
And vex'd with mirth the drowsy ear of night. 
Ah, me! in sooth he was a shameless wight, 
bore given to revel and ungodly glee ; 
Few earthly things found favour in his sight 
Save concubines and carnal companie, 
And Haunting wassailers of high and low degree. 

III. 
Childe Harold was he liight : — but whence his name 
And lineage Long, it suits me not to say; 
Suffice it, that perchance they were of fame, 
And had been glorious in another day : 
But one sad losel soils a name for aye, 
However mighty in the olden time ; 
Nor all that heralds rake from coffin'd clay, 
Nor florid prose, nor honied lies of rhyme, 
Can blazon evil deeds, cr consecrate a crime. 

IV. 

Cnilile Harold bask'd him in the noontide sun, 
Disporting there like any other fly ; 
Nor deero'd before his little day was done, 
One blast might chill him into misery. 
But long ere scarce a third of his pass'd by, 
Worse than adversity the Childe befell ; 
He felt the fulness of satiety : 
Then loathed he in his nat:ve land to dwell, 
vYbich seem'd to him more lone than eremite's sad cell. 



For he through sin's long labyrinth had run, 
Nor male atonement when he did amiss, 
Had sigh'd to many, though he loved but one, 
And that loved one, alas ! could ne'er be his. 
Ah, happv she ! to 'scape from him whose kiss 
Had been pollution unto aught so chaste; 
Who soon h id left her eharms for vulgar bliss, 
And Bpoil'd her goodly lands to gild his waste, 
^Sor calui domestic oeHoo \*'J tw doign'd to taste. 



VI. 
And now Childe Harold was sore sick at heart, 
And from Ins fellow bacchanals would flee; 
'Tis said, at times the sullen tear would start, 
But pride COngeal'd the drop within lus ee : 
Apart he stalk'd in joyless reverie, 
And from his native land resolv'd to go, 
And visit scorching climes beyond the sea ; 
Willi pleasure drugg'd he almost long'd for woe. 

And e'en for change of scene would seek the shades 
below. 

VII. 
The Childe departed from his father's hall : 
It was a vast and venerable pile : 
So old, it seemed only not to fall, 
Yet strength was pillar'd in each rnassy aisle. 
Monastic dome ! condemn'd to uses vile! 
Where Superstition once had made her 
Now Paphian girls were known to sing and smile, 
And monks might deem their time was come agen, 

If ancient talcs say true, nor wrong those holy men. 

VIII. 

Yet oft-times in his maddest mirthful mood, 
Strange pangs would flash along Childe Harold's brow, 
As if the memory of some deadly feud 
Or disappointed passion lurk'd below: 
But this none knew, nor haply cared to know; 
For his was not that open, artless soul, 
That feels relief by bidding sorrow flow, 
Nor sought he friend to counsel or condole, 
Whate'er his grief mote be, which he could not control, 

IX. 

And none did love him — though to hall and bower 
He gather'd revellers from far and near, 
He knew them flatterers of the festal hour ; 
The heartless parasites of present cheer. 
Yea, none did love him — not his lemans dear — 
But pomp and power alone are woman's care, 
And where these are light Eros finds a fere ; 
Maidens, like moths, are ever caught by glare, 
And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might despair. 

X. 

Childe Harold had a mother — not forgot, 
Though parting from that mother he did shun ; 
A sister whom he loved, but saw her not 
Before his weary pilgrimage begun: 
If friends he had, he bade adieu to none. 
Yet deem not thence his bn ast a breast of steel ; 
Ye who have known what 't is to dote upon 
A few dear objects, will in sadness feel 
Such partings break the heart they fondly hope to heal. 

XI. 

His house, his home, his heritage, his lands, 
The laughing dames in whom he did delight, 
Whose large blue eyes, fair locks, and snowy bands, 
Mighl shake the saintship of an anchorite, 
And long had fed lus youthful app 
His goblets brimm'd with every costly wine, 
And all that mote to luxury invite, 
Without a sigh he left, to cross the brine, 
And traverse Paynim shorn, ul pass rtrth's cen 
Iiq\> 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE 41 


XII. 


5. 


The sails were fill'd, and fair the light winds blew, 


' My father blcss'd me fervently, 


As glad to waft him from his native home ; 


Yet did not much complain ; 


And fast the white rocks faded from his view, 


But sorely will my mother sigh 


And soon were lost in circumambient foam : 


Till I come back again.' — 


And then, it may be, of his wish to roam 


" Enough, enough, my little lad ! 


Repented he, but in his bosom slept 


Such tears become thine eye ; 


The silent thought, nor from his lips did come 


If I thy guileless bosom had, 


One word of wail, whilst others sate and wept, 


Mine own would not be dry. 


And to the reckless gales unmanly moaning kept. 




XIII. 


6. 


But when the sun was sinking in the sea, 


" Come hither, hither, my staunch yeoman. 


He seized his harp, which he at times could string, 


Why dost thou look so pale? 


And strike, albeit with untaught melody, 


Or dost thou dread a French foeman? 


When deem'd he no strange ear was listening : 


Or shiver at the gale ?" — 


And now his fingers o'er it he did fling, 


' Deem'st thou I tremble for my life? 


And tuned his farewell in the dim twilight. 


Sir Childe, I'm not so weak ; 


While flew the vessel on her snowy wing, 


But thinking on an absent wife 


And fleeting shores receded from his sight, 


Will blanch a faithful cheek. 


Thus to the elements he pour'd his last " Good Night." 




1. 

" Adiec, adieu ! my native shore 
Fades o'er the waters blue ; 


7. 

' My spouse and boys dwell near thy hall, 


Along the bordering lake, 


The night-winds sigh, the breakers roar, 


And when they on their father call, 


And shrieks the wild sea-mew. 


What answer shall she make?' — 


Yon sun that sets upon the sea 


" Enough, enough, my yeoman good, 


We follow in his High' ; 


Thy grief let none gainsay ; 


Farewell awhile to him and thee, 


But I, who am of lighter mood, 


My native land — Good Night ! 


Will laugh to flee away. 


2. 
A few short hours and he will rise 


8. 
" For who would trust the seeming sighs 


To give the morrow birth ; 


Of wife or paramour ? 


And I shall hail the main and skies, 


Fresh feres will dry the bright blue eyes 


But not my mother earth. 


We late saw streaming o'er. 


Deserted is my own good hall, 


For pleasures past I do not grieve, 


Its hearth is desolate ; 


Nor perils gathering near ; 


Wild weeds are gathering on the wall ; 


My greatest grief is that I leave 


My dog howls at the gate. 


No thing that claims a tear. 


3. 

" Come hither, hither, mv little page ! 


9. 

" And now I 'm in the world alone, 


Why dost thou weep and wail ? 


Upon the wide, wide sea : 


Or dost thou dread the billows' rage, 


But why should I for others groan, 


Or tremble at the gale ? 


When none will sigh for me ? 


But dash the tear-drop from thine eye ; 


Perchance my dog will whine in vain, 


Our ship is swift and strong : 


Till fed by stranger hands ; 


Our fleetest falcon scarce can fly 


But long ere I come back again, 


More merrily along." 


He 'd tear me where he stands. 


4. 

• Let winds be shrill, let waves roll high, 


10. 

" With thee, my bark, I'll su iftly go 


I fear not wave nor wind ; 


Athwart the foaming brine ; 


Yet marvel not, Sir Childe, that I 


Nor care what land Ihou bear'st me to, 


Am sorrow fill in mind ; 


So not again to mine. 


For I have from my father gone, 


Welcome, welcome, ye dark-blue waves ' 


A mother whom I love, 


And when you fail my sight, 


And have no friend, save these alone, 


Welcome, ye deserts, and ye caves ! 


But tliee — and one above. 
11 


My native land — Good Night !" 


I 





12 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XIV r . 

On, on the vessel flies, the land is gone, 
And uinds are rude in Biscay's sleepless bay. 
Four days are sped, but with the fifth, anon, 
New shores deseried make every bosom gay; 
And Cintra's mountain greets them on their way, 
And Tagus dashing onward to the deep, 
IFis fabled golden tribute bent to pay ; 
And soon on board the Lusian pilots leap, 
Anl steer 'twixt fertile shores where yet few rustics reap. 

XV. 

Oh! Christ! it is a goodly sight to see 
What Heaven hath done for this delicious land ! 
What fruits of fragrance blush on every tree! 
What goodly prospects o'er the hills expand ! 
But man would mar them with an impious hand: 
And when the Almighty lifts his fiercest scourge 
'Gainst those who most transgress his high command, 
With treble vengeance will his hot shafts urge 
Gaul's locust host, and earth from fellest foemen purge. 

XVI. 

What beauties doth Lisboa first unfold? 
Her image floating on that noble tide, 
Which poets vain'y pave with sands of gold, 
But now whereon a thousand keels did ride 
Of mighty strength, since Albion was allied, 
And to the Lusians did her aid afford : 
A nation swoln with ignorance and pride, 
Who lick yet loathe the hand lhat waves the sword 
To save them from the wrath of Gaul's unsparing lord. 

XVII. 

But whoso entereth within this town, 
That, sheening far, celestial seem3 to be, 
Disconsolate will wander up and down, 
'Mid many things unsightly to strange ee; 
For hut and palace show like filthily: 
The dingy denizens arc reared in dirt ; 
Ne personage of high or mean degree 
Doth care for cleanness of surtout or shirt, 
Though shent with Egypt's plague, unkempt, unwash'd, 
unhurt. 

XVIII. 

Poor, paltry slaves ! yet born 'midst noblest scenes — 
Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men? 
Lo ! Cintra's glorious Eden intervenes 
In variegated maze of mount and glen. 
Ah, me ! what hand can pencil guide, or pen, 
To follow half on which the eye dilates, 
Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken 
Than those whereof such things the bard relates, 
Who to the awe-struck world unlock'd Elysium's gates ? 

XIX. 

The horrid crags, by toppling convent crown'd, 
The cork-trees hoar that clothe the shaggy steep, 
The moOntain-moss by scorching skies imbrown'd, 
The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep, 
The tender azure of the unruffled deep, 
The orange tints that gild the greenest bough, 
The torrents thai from cliff* to valley leap, 
The vine on high, the willow branch below, 
llix'd in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow. 



XX. 

Then slowly climb the many-winding wa) - , 
And frequent turn to linger as you go, 
From loftier rocks new loveliness survey, 
And rest ye at " our Lady's house of woe ;" 2 
Where frugal monks their little relics show, 
And sundry legends to the stranger tell : 
Here impious men have punished been, and lo! 
Deep in yon cave Honorius long did dwell, 
In hope to merit heaven by mailing earth a hell. 

XXI. 

And here and there, as up the crags you spring, 
Mark many rudo-carved crosses near the path : 
Vet deem not these devotion's offering — 
These are memorials frail of murderous wrath: 
For wheresoe'er the shrieking victim hath 
Pour'd forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife, 
Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath ; 
And grove and glen with thousand such are rife 
Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life ' 

XXII. 

On sloping mounds, or in the vale beneath, 
Are domes where whilome kings did make repair ; 
But now the wild flowers round them only breathe; 
Yet ruin'd splendour still is lingering there. 
And yonder towers the prince's palace fair : 
There thou too, Vathek ! England's wealthiest son, 
Once form'd thy paradise, as not aware 
When wanton wealth her mightiest deeds hath done, 
Meek peace voluptuous lures was ever wont to shun. 

XXIII. 
Here didst thou dwell, here schemes of pleasure plo, 
Beneath yon mountain's ever-beauteous brow : 
But now, as if a thing unblest by men, 
Thy fairy dwelling is as lone as thou ! 
Here giant weeds a passage scarce allow 
To halls deserted, portals gaping wide • 
Fresh lessons to the thinking bosom, how 
Vain are the pleasaunces on earth supplied ; 
Swept into wrecks anon by time's ungentle tide ! 

XXIV. 

Behold the hall where chiefs were late convened ! * 
Oh ! dome displeasing unto British eve ! 
With diadem hight foolscap, lo! a fiend, 
A little fiend that scoffs incessantly, 
There sits in parchment robe array'd, and by 
His side is hung a seal and sable scroll, 
Where blazon'd glare names known to chivalry, 
And sundry signatures adorn the roll, 
Whereat the urchin points and laughs with all his souL 

XXV. 

Convention is the dwarfish demon styled 
That foil'd the knights in Marialva's dome: 
Of brains (if brains they had) he them beguiled, 
And turned a nation's shallow jov to gloom. 
Here folly dash'd to earth the victor's plume, 
And policy rcgain'd what arms had lost : 
For chiefs like ours in vain may laurels bloom ' 
Woe to the conquering, not the conquer' d host, 
Since baffled triumph droops on Lusitania's coast' 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



43 



xxv r. 

And ever since that martial synod met, 
Britannia sickens, C intra ! at thy name ; 
And folks in office at the mention fret, 
And fain would blush, if blush they could, for shame. 
How will posterity the deed proclaim ! 
Will not our own and fellow-nations sneer, 
To view these champions cheated of their fame, 
By foes in fight o'erthrown, yet victors here, 
Where Scorn her finger points through many a coming 
year? 

XXVII. 

So deem'd the Childe, as o'er the mountains he 
Did take his way in solitary guise : 
Sweet was the scene, yet soon he thought to flee, 
More restless than the swallow in the skies : 
Though here awhile he learn'd to moralize, 
For meditation fix'd at times on him ; 
And conscious reason whisper'd to despise 
His early youth, mispent in maddest whim ; 
But as he gazed on truth, his aching eyes grew dim. 

XXVIII. 

To horse ! to horse ! he quits, for ever quits 
A scene of peace, though soothing to his soul : 
Again he rouses from his moping fits, 
But seeks not now the harlot and the bowl. 
Onward he flies, nor fix'd as yet the goal 
Where he shall rest him on his pilgrimage ; 
And o'er him many changing scenes must roll 
Ere toil his thirst for travel can assuage, 
)r he shall calm his breast, or learn experience sage. 

XXIX. 

Yet Mafra shall one moment claim delay, 4 
Where dwelt of yore the Lusian's luckless queen; 
And church and court did mingle their array, 
And mass and revel were alternate seen ; 
Lordlings and freeres — ill-sorted fry I ween ! 
But here the Babylonian whore hath built 
A dome, where flaunts she in such glorious sheen, 
That men forget the blood which she hath spilt, 
And bow the knee to pomp that loves to varnish guilt. 

XXX. 

O'er vales that teem with fruits, romantic hills, 
(Oh, that such hills upheld a freeborn race!) 
Whereon to gaze the eye with joyaunce fills, 
Childe Harold wends through many a pleasant place. 
Though sluggards deem it but a foolish chase, 
And marvel men should quit their easy chair, 
The toilsome way, and long, long league to trace, 
Oil ! there is sweetness in the mountain air, 
And life, that bloated ease can never hope to share. 

XXXI. 

More bleak to view the hills at length recede, 
And, less luxuriant, smoother vales extend : 
Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed ! 
Far as the eye discerns, withouten end, 
Spain's realms appear whereon her shepherds tend 
Flocks, whose rich fleece right well the trader knows — 
Now must the pastor's arm his lambs defend : 
For Spain is compass'd by unyielding foes, 
And all must shield their all, or share subjection's woes 



XXXII. 

Where Lusitania and her sister meet, 
Deem ye what bounds the rival realms divide? 
Or ere the jealous queens of nations greet, 
Doth Tayo interpose his mighty tide? 
Or dark Sierras rise in craggy pride ? 
Or fence of art, like China's vasty wall? — 
Ne barrier wall, ne river deep and wide, 
Ne horrid crags, nor mountains dark and tall, 
Rise like the rocks that part Hispania's land from Gaul : 

XXXIII. 

But these between a silver streamlet glides, 
And scarce a name distinguisheth the brook, 
Though rival kingdoms press its verdant sides. 
Here leans the idle shepherd on his crook, 
And vacant on the rippling waves doth look, 
That peaceful still 'twixt bitterest foemen flow ; 
For proud each peasant as the noblest duke : 
Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know 
'Twixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low.' 

XXXIV. 

But, ere the mingling bounds have far been pass'd, 
Dark Guadiana rolls his power along 
In sullen billows, murmuring and vast, 
So noted ancient roundelays among. 
Whilome upon his banks did legions throng 
Of Moor and knight, in mailed splendour drest : 
Here ceased the swift their race, here sunk the strong; 
The Paynim turban and the Christian crest 
MLx'd on the bleeding stream, by floating hosts oppress'd, 

XXXV. 

Oh ! lovely Spain ! renown'd, romantic land ! 
Where is that standard which Pelagio bore, 
When Cava's traitor-sire first call'd the band 
That dyed thy mountain streams with Gothic gore V 
Where are those bloody banners which of yore 
Waved o'er thy sons, victorious to the gale, 
And drove at last the spoilers to their shore ? 
Red gleam'd the cross, and waned the crescent pale. 
While Afric's echoes thrill'd with Moorish matrons' waii. 

XXXVI. 

Teems not each ditty with the glorious tale? 
Ah ! such, alas ! the hero's amplest fate ! 
When granite moulders and when records fail, 
A peasant's plaint prolongs his dubious date. 
Pride ! bend thine eye from heaven to thine estate, 
See how the mighty shrink into a song ! 
Can volume, pillar, pile, preserve thee great ? 
Or must thou trust tradition's simple tongue, 
When flattery sleeps with thee, and history does Uiee 
wrong ? 

xxxvn. 

Awake ! ye sons of Spain ! awake ! advance ! 
Lo ! Chivalry, your ancient goddess, cries, 
But wields not, as of old, tier thirsty lance, 
Nor shakes her crimson plumage in the skies: 
Now on the smoke of blazing bolts she flies. 
And speaks in thunder through yon engine's roai : 
In every peal she calls — " Awake ! arise !" 
Say, is her voice more feeble than of yore, 
When her war-song was heard on Andalusia's shore t 



44 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XXXVIII. 

HarK ! — heard you not those hoofs of dreadful note? 
Sounds not the clang of conflict on the heath ! 
Saw ye not whom the reeking sabre smote ; 
Nor saved your brethren ere they sank beneath 
Tyrants ami tyrants' slaves? — the fires of death, 
The bale-tires flash on high : — from rock to rock 
Each volley tells that thousands cease to breathe; 
Death rides upon the sulphury Siroc, 
Red Battle stamps Ids foot, and nations feel the shock. 

XXXIX. 

Lo ! where the giant on the mountain stands, 
His blood-red tresses deepening in the sun, 
With death-shot glowing in his fiery hands, 
And eye that scorcheth all it glares upon; 
Restless it rolls, now hVd, and now anon 
Flashing afar, — and at his iron feet 
Destruction cowers to mark what deeds are done ; 
For on this morn three- potest nations meet, 
To sheil before Ids shrine the blood he deems most sweet. 

XL. 

By Heaven ! it is a splendid sight to see 
(For one who hath no friend, no brother there) 
Their rival scarfs of mix'd embroidery, 
Their various ami-; that glitter in the air! 
What gallant war-hounds rouse them from their lair, 
And gnash their fangs, loud yelling for tin prey ! 
All join the chase, but few the triumph share ; 
The grave shall bear the chiefest prize away, 
And havoc scarce for joy can number their array. 

XLI. 

Three hosts combine to offer sacrifice ; 
Three tongues prefer strange orisons on high ; 
Three gaudy standards flout the pale blue skies ; 
The shouts are France, Spain, Albion, Victory ! 
The foe, the victim, and the fond ally 
That fights for all, but ever fights in vain, 
Are met — as if at home they could not die — 
To feed the crow on Talavera's plain, 
And fertilize the field that each pretends to gain. 

XLn. 

There shall they rot — ambition's honour'd fools ! 
Yes, honour decks the turf that wraps their clay! 
Vain sophistry ! in these behold the tools, 
The broken tools, that tyrants cast away 
By myriads, when they dare to pave their way 
With human hearts — to what ? — a dream alone. 
Can despots compass aught that hails their sway? 
Or call with truth one span of earth their own, 
have that wherein at last they crumble bone by bone ? 

XLIII. 

Oh, Albuera ! glorious field of grief! 
As o'er thy plain the pilgrim prick'd his steed, 
Who could f >resee thee, in a space so brief, 
A scene where mingling foes should boast and bleed ! 
Peace to the perish'd ! may the warrior's meed 
And tears of triumph their reward prolong ! 
Till others fall where other chieftains lead, 
Thv name shall circle round the gaping throng, 
and shine in worthless lays, the theme of transient song ! 



XLIV. 

Enough of battle's minions ! let them play 
Their game of lives, and barter breath for fame: 
Fame that will scarce reanimate their clay, 
Though thousands fall to deck souk single name. 
In sooth 't were sad to thwart their noble aim 
Who strike, blest hirelings ! fur their country's good 
And die, that living might have proved her shame; 
Perish'd, perchance, in some domestic feud, 
Or in a narrower sphere wild rapine's path pursued. 

XLV. 

Full swiftly Harold wends his lonely way 
Where proud Sevilla triumphs unsubdued : 
Yet is she free — the spoiler's wish'd-1'or prey! 
Soon, soon shall conquest's fiery foot intrude, 
Blackening her lovely domes with traces rude. 
Inevitable' hour! 'gainst fate to strive 
Where desolation plants her famished brood 
Is vain, or Ilion, Tyre might yet survive, 
And virtue vanquish all, and murder cease to thrive. 

XLVI. 

But all unconscious of the coming doom, 
The feast, the song, the revel here abounds ; 
Strange modes of merriment the hours consume, 
Nor bleed these patriots with their country's wounds. 
Not here war's clarion, but loves rebeck sounds ; 
Here folly still his votaries enthralls ; 
And young-eyed lewdness walks her midnight rounds: 
Girt with the silent crimes of capitals, 
Still to the last kind vice clings to the tott'ring walls. 

XLVII. 

Not so the rustic — with his trembling mate 
He lurks, nor casts his heavy eye afar, 
Lest he should view his vineyard desolate, 
Blasted below the dun hot breath of war. 
No more beneath soft eve's consenting star 
Fandango twirls his jocund castanet : 
Ah, monarchs ! could }'e taste the mirth } - c mar, 
Not in the toils of glory would ye fret ; 
The hoarse dull drum would sleep, and man be hap,*/ yet 

XLvm. 

How carols now the lusty muleteer ? 
Of love, romance, devotion, is his lay, 
As whilome he was wont the leagues to cheer, 
His quick bells wildly jingling on the way 1 
No ! as he speeds, he chaunts : — " Viva el Aey !" * 
And checks his song to execrate Godoy, 
The royal wittol Charles, and curse the day 
When first Spain's queen beheld the black- eyed boy 
And gore-faced treason sprung from her adulterate joy 

XLIX. 

On yon long, level plain, at distance crown'd 
With crags, whereon those Moorish turrets rest, 
Wide-scatter'd hoof-marks dint the wounded ground ; 
And, scathed by fire, the green sward's darl on'd vest 
Tells that the foe was Andalusia's guest : 
Here was the cam]), the watch-flame, and the host, 
Here the bold peasant storm'd the dragon's nest ; 
Still does he mark it with triumphant boast, 
And points to yonder cliffs, which oft were won and lost. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



45 



L. 

And whomsoe'er along the path you meet 

Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue, 

Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet: 9 

Woe to the man that walks in public view 

Without of loyalty this token true: 

Sharp is the knife, and sudden is the stroke ; 

And sorely would the Gallic foeman rue, 

If subtle poniards, wrapt beneath the cloak, 

Could blunt the sabre's edge, or clear the cannon's 
smoke. 

LI. 
At every turn Morena's dusky height 
Sustains aloft the battery's iron load ; 
And, far as mortal eye can compass sight, 
The mountain-howitzer, the broken road, 
The bristling palisade, the fosse o'erflow'd, 
The station'd bands, the never-vacant watch, 
The magazine in rocky durance stow'd, 
The holster'd steed beneath the shed of thatch, 

The ball-piled pyramid, the ever-blazing match, 10 

LII. 

Portend the deeds to come : — but he whose nod 
Has tumbled feebler despots from their sway, 
A moment pauseth ere he lifts the rod ; 
A little moment deigneth to delay : 
Soon will his legions sweep through these their way ; 
The West must own the scourger of the world. 
Ah, Spain ! how sad will be thy reckoning-day, 
When soars Gaul's vulture, with his wings unfurl'd, 
And thou shalt view thy sons in crowds to Hades hurl'd ! 

LIII. 

And must they fall ? the young, the proud, the brave, 
To swell one bloated chiePs unwholesome reign ? 
No step between submission and a grave ? 
The rise of rapine and the fall of Spain? 
And doth the Power that man adores ordain 
Their doom, nor heed the suppliant's appeal? 
Is all that desperate valour acts in vain ? 
And counsel sage, and patriotic zeal, 
The veteran's skill, youth's fire, and manhood's heart of 

steel ? 

LIV. 
Is it for this the Spanish maid, aroused, 
Hangs on the willow her unstrung guitar, 
And, all unsex'd, the anlace hath espoused, 
Sung the loud song, and dared the deed of war ? 
And she, whom once the semblance of a scar 
Appall'd, and owlet's larum chill'd with dread, 
Now views the column-scattering bay'net jar, 
The falchion flash, and o'er the vet warm dead 
Stalks with Minerva's step where Mars might quake 

to tread. 

LV. 
Ye who shall marvel when you hear her talc, 
Oh ! had you known her in her softer hour, 
Mark'd her black eve that mocks her coal-black veil 
Heard her light, lively tones in lady's bower, 
Seen her long locks that foil the painter's power, 
Hit fairy form, with more than female grace, 
Scarce would you deem that Sarago/a's tower 
Beheld her smile in danger's Gorgon face, 
Dun the closed ranks, and lead in glory's fearful chase. 

H 



LVI. 

Her lover sinks — she sheds no ill-timed tear ; 
Her chief is slain — she fills his fatal post; 
Her fellows flee — she checks their base caieer; 
The foe retires — she heads the sallving host: 
Who can appease like her a lover's ghost? 
Who can avenge so well a leader's fall ? 
What maid retrieve when man's flush'd hope is lost? 
Who hang so fiercely on the flying Gaul, 
Foil'd by a woman's hand, before a batter'd wall?" 

LVII. 

Yet are Spain's maids no race of Amazon 1 -, 
But form'd for all the witching arts of love : 
Though thus in arms they emulate her sons, 
And in the horrid phalanx dare to move, 
'T is but the tender fierceness of the dove, 
Pecking the hand that hovers o'er her mate : 
In softness as in firmness far above 
Bemoter females, famed for sickening prate ; 
Her mind is nobler sure, her charms perchance as great. 

LVIII. 

The seal love's dimpling finger hath impress'd 
Denotes how soft that chin which bears his touct. " 
Her lips, whose kisses pout to leave their nest, 
Bid man be valiant ere he merit such : 
Her glance how wildly beautiful ! how much 
Hath Phoebus woo'd in vain to spoil her cheek, 
Which glows yet smoother from his amorous clutch ! 
Who round the north for paler dames would seek ? 

How poor their forms appear ! how languid, wan, and 
weak ! 

LIX. 
Match me, ye climes ! which poets love to laud ; 
Match me, ye harams of the land! where now 
I strike my strain, far distant, to applaud 
Beauties that ev'n a cynic must avow ; 
Match me those houries, whom ve scarce allow 
To taste the gale lest love should ride the wind, 
With Spain's dark-glancing daughters — deign to know 
There your wise prophet's paradise we find, 

His black-eyed maids of heaven, angelically kind. 

LX. 

Oh, thou Parnassus!" whom I now survev, 
Not in the phrensy of ri dreamer's eve, 
Not in the fabled landscape of a lay, 
But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky, 
In the wild pomp of mountain majesty ! 
What marvel if I thus essay to sing ! 
The humblest of thy pilgrims passing by 
Would gladly woo thine echoes with his string, 

Though from thy heights no more one muse wili war 
her wing. 

LXI. 
Oft have I dream'd of thee ! whose glorious nam- 
Who knows not, knows not man's divinest lore : 
And now I view thee, 'tis, alas! with shame 
That I in feeblest accents must adore. 
When I recount thy worshippers of yore 
I tremble, and ran only bend the knee : 
Nor raise my voice, nor rafady dare to soai. 
Put gaze beneath thy cloudy canopy 

In silent joy to think at last I look on dice. ' 



46 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXII. 

Happier in this than mightiest bards have been, 
Whose fate to distant homes confined their lot, 
Shall I unmoved behold the hallow'd scene, 
Which others rave of, though they know it not? 
Though here no more Apollo haunts his grot, 
And thou, the muses' seat, art now their grave, 
Some gentle spirit still pervades the spot, 
Sighs in the gale, keeps silence in the cave, 
And glides with glassy foot o'er yon melodious wave. 

LXIII. 

Of thee hereafter. — Even amidst my strain 
I turn'd aside to pay my homage here ; 
Forgot the land, the sons, the maids of Spain ; 
Her fate, to every freeborn bosom dear, 
And hail'd thee, not perchance without a tear. 
Now to my theme — but from thy holy haunt 
Let me some remnant, some memorial bear; 
Yield me one leaf of Daphne's deathless plant, 
Nor let thy votary's hope be deem'd an idle vaunt. 

LXIV. 

But ne'er didst thou, fair mount ! when Greece was 

young, 
See round thy giant base a brighter choir, 
Nor e'er did Delphi, when her priestess sung 
The Pythian hymn with more than mortal fire, 
Behold a train more fitting to inspire 
The song of love, than Andalusia's maids, 
Nurst in the glowing lap of soft desire : 
Ah ! that to these were given such peaceful shades 
As Greece can still bestow, though glory fly her glades. 

LXV. 

Fair is proud Seville ; let her country boast 
Her strength, her weal'n, her site of ancient days; 1 " 
But Cadiz, rising on the distant coast, 
Calls forth a sweeter, though ignoble praise. 
Ah, vice ! how soft are thy voluptuous ways ! 
While boyish blood is mantling who can 'scape 
The fasrina'.ion of thy magic gaze, 
A cherub-hydra round us dost thou gape, 
And mould to every taste thy dear delusive shape. 

LXVI. 

When Paphos fell by time — accursed time ! 
The queen who conquers all must yield to thee— 
The Pleasures fled, but sought as warm a clime; 
And Venus, constant to her native sea, 
To nought else constant, hither deign'd to flee ; 
And lix'd her shrine within these walls of white : 
Though not to one dome circumscribeth she 
Ilcr worship, but, devoted to her rite, 
A thousand altars rise, for ever blazing bright. 

LXVII. 

From morn till night, from night till startled morn 
Peeps blushing on the revel's laughing crew, 
The song is heard, the rosy garland worn, 
Devices quaint, and frolics ever new, 
Tread on each other's kibes. A long adieu 
He bids to sober joy that here sojourns: 
Nought interrupts the riot, though in lieu 
Of true devotion monkish incense burns, 
&od 'ovc and prayer unite, or rule the hour by turns. 



LXV1II. 

The sabbath comes, a day of blessed rest ; 
What hallows it upon this Christian shore? 
Lo! it is sacred to a solemn feast: 
Hark ! heard you not the forest-monarch's roar ? 
Crashing the lance, he snuffs the spouting gore 
Of man and steed, overthrown beneath his horn ; 
The throng'd arena shakes with shouts for more ; 
Yells the mad crowd o'er entrails freshly torn, 
Nor shrinks the female eye, nor even affects to mourn. 

LXIX. 

The seventh day this ; the jubilee of man. 
London ! right well thou know'st the day of prayer . 
Then thy spruce citizen, wash'd artisan, 
And smug apprentice gulp their weekly air : 
Thy coach of Hackney, whiskey, one-horse chair, 
And humblest gig through sundry suburbs whirl, 
To Hampslead, Brentford, Harrow, make repair ; 
Till the tired jade the wheel forgets to hurl, 
Provoking envious gibe from each pedestrian churl. 

LXX. 

Some o'er thy Thamis row the ribbon'd fair, 

Others along the safer turnpike fly ; 

Some Richmond-hill ascend, some scud to Ware, 

And many to the steep of Highgate hie. 

Ask ye, Boeotian shades! the reason why? 15 

'T is to the worship of the solemn horn, 

Grasp'd in the holy hand of mystery, 

In whose dread name both men and maids are sworn, 
And consecrate the oath with draught and dance till 
morn. 

LXXI. 

All have their fooleries — not alike are thine, 

Fair Cadiz, rising o'er the dark-blue sea! 

Soon as the matin-bell proclaimeth nine, 

Thy saint-adorers count the rosary : 

Much is the Virgin teased to shrive them free 

(Well do I ween the only virgin there) 

From crimes as numerous as her beadsmen be ; 

Then to the crowded circus forth they fare, 
Young, old, high, low, at once the same diversion share 

LXXII. 

The lists are oped, the spacious area clear'd, 
Thousands on thousands piled arc seated round; 
Long ere the first loud trumpet's note is heard, 
Ne vacant space for lated wight is found : 
Here dons, grandees, but chiefly dames abound, 
Skill'd in the ogle of a roguish eye, 
Yet ever well inclined to heal the wound ; 
None through their cold disdain are doom'd to die, 
As moon-struck bards complain, by love's sad archery. 

LXXIII. 

Hush'd is the din of tongues — on gallant steeds, 
With milk-white crest, gold spur, and light-poised 

lance, 
Four cavaliers prepare for venturous deeds, 
And lowly bending to the lists advance ; 
Rich arc their scarfs, their chargers featly prance: 
If in the dangerous name they shine to-day, 
The crowd's loud shout and ladies' lovely glance, 
Best prize of better acts, they bear away, 
And all that kings or chiefs e'er gain their toils repav. 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



■17 



LXXIV. 

In costly sheen and gaudy cloak array'd, 
But all a-foot, the light-limb'd Mat adore 
Stands in the centre, eager to invade 
The lord of lowing herds ; but not before 
The ground, with cautious tread, is traversed o'er, 
Lest aught unseen should lurk to thwart his speed : 
His arm 's a dart, he fights aloof, nor more 
Can man achieve without the friendly steed, 
Alas ! too oft condemn'd for him to bear and bleed. 

LXXV. 

Thrice sounds the clarion ; lo ! the signal falls, 
The dun expands, and expectation mute 
Gapes round the silent circle's peopled walls. 
Bounds with one lashing spring the mighty brute, 
And, wildly staring, spurns, with sounding foot, 
The sand, nor blindly rushes on his foe : 
Here, there, he points his threatening front, to suit 
His first attack, wide waving to and fro 
His angry tail ; red rolls his eye's dilated glow. 

LXXVI. 

Sudden he stops ; his eye is fix'd : away, 
Away, thou heedless boy ! prepare the spear : 
Now is thy time, to perish, or display 
The skill that yet may check his mad career. 
With well-timed croupe the nimble coursers veer; 
On foams the bull, but not unscathed he goes ; 
Streams from his flank the crimson torrent clear ; 
He flies, he wheels, distracted with his throes ; 
Dart folljws dart; lance, lance ; loud bellowings speak 
his woes. 

lxxvii. 

Again he comes ; nor dart nor lance avail, 
Nor the wild plunging of the tortured horse ; 
Though man and man's avenging arms assail, 
Vain are his weapons, vainer is his force. 
One gallant steed is stretch'd a mangled corse ; 
Another, hideous sight! unseam'd appears, 
His gory chest unveils life's panting source, 
Though death-struck still his feeble frame he rears, 
Sta<J<fering, but stemming all, his lord unharui'd he bears. 

Lxxvni. 

Foil'd, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last, 
Full in the centre stands the bull at bay, 
'Mid wounds, and clinging darts, and lances brast, 
And foes disabled in the brutal fray: 
And now the Matadores around him play, 
Shake the red cloak, and poise the ready brand : 
Once more through all he bursts his thundering way — 
Vain rage ! the mantle quits the conynge hand; 
Wraps his fierce eye — 't is past — he sinks upon the sand! 

LXXIX. 

Where his vast neck just mingles with the spine, 
Sheathed in his form the deadly weapon lies. 
He stops — he starts — disdaining to decline ; 
Slowly ho falls, amidst triumphing cries, 

Will t a groan, without a struggle, dies. 

The decorated car appears — on high 
The corse is piled — sweet sight for vulgar eyes — 
Four steeds that spurn the rein, as switt as shy, 
Ihirl the dark bulk along, scarce seen in dashing by. 



LXXX. 

Such the ungentle sport that oft invites 
The Spanish maid, and cheers tfie Spanish swain. 
Nurtured in blood betimes, his heart delights 
In vengeance, gloating on another's pain. 
Whal private lends the troubled village slain! 
Though now one phalanx'd host should meet the foi\ 
Enough, alas ! in humble homes remain, 
To meditate 'gainst friends the secret blow, 
For some slight cause of wrath, whence fife's warm 
stream must flow. 

LXXXI. 

But jealousy has fled ; his bars, his bolts, 
His withered sentinel, duenna sage ! 
And all whereat the generous soul revolts, 
Which the stern dotard deein'd he could engage. 
Have pass'd to darkness with the vanish'd a«e. 
Who late so free as Spanish girls were seen 
(Ere war uprose in his volcanic rage,) 
With braided tresses bounding o'er the green, 
While on the gay dance shone night's lover-loving queen' 

LXXXII. 

Oh ! many a time, and oft, had Harold loved, 
Or dream'd he loved, since rapture is a dream ; 
But now his wayward bosom was unmoved, 
For not yet had he drunk of Lethe's stream ; 
And lately had he learn'd with truth to deem 
Love has no gift so grateful as his wings : 
How fair, how young, how soft soe'er he seem, 
Full from the fount of Joy's delicious springs 
Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings. 1 * 

LXXXIII. 

Yet to the beauteous form he was not blind, 
Though now it moved him as it moves the wise ; 
Not that philosophy on such a mind 
E'er deign'd to bend her chastely-awful eves ; 
But passion raves herself to rest, or flies ; 
And vice, that digs her own voluptuous tomb, 
Had buried long his hopes, no more to rise : 
Pleasure's pall'd victim! life-abhorring gloom 
Wrote on his faded brow curst Cain's unresting doom. 

LXXXIV. 

Still he beheld, nor mingled-with the throng ; 
But view'd them not with misanthropic hate: 
Fain would he now have join'd the dance, the song 
But who mav smi'.e that sinks beneath his fate / 
Nought that he saw his sadness could abate : 
Yet once he struggled 'gainst the demon's sway, 
And as in beauty's bower he pensive sate, 
Pour'd forth his unpremeditated lav, 
To charms as fair as those that soothed his happier aay. 



TO INEZ. 
1. 

Nat, smile not at my sullen brow, 

Alas! I cannot smile again ; 
Yet Heaven avert that ever thou 

Should' st weep, and haply weep in vain. 



4ft 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



2. 
\nd dost thou ask, what secret woe 

I bear, corroding joy and youth? 
And will thou vainly seek to know 

A pang, ey'n thou must fail to soothe? 
3. 
It is not love, it is not hate, 

Nor lu\v ambition's honours lost, 
That bids me loathe my present state, 

And lly from all I prized the most; 
4. 
It is that weariness which springs 

From ali I meet, or hear, or sec : 
To me no pleasure beauty brings ; 

Thine eyes have scarce a charm for me. 
5. 
Il is that settled, ceaseless gloom 

The fabled Hebrew wanderer bore ; 
That will not look beyond the tomb, 

Bui cannot hope for rest before. 
6. 
What exile from himself can flee? 

To zones, though more and more remote, 
Still, still pursues, where'er I be, 

The blight of life — the demon thought. 
7. 
Yet others rapt in pleasure seem, 

And taste of all that I forsake ; 
Oh ! may they still of transport dream, 

And ne'er, at least like me, awake ! 
8. 
Through many a clime 't is mine to go, 

With many a retrospection curst; 
And all my solace is to know", 

Whate'er betides, I 've known the worst. 

9. 

What is that worst ? Nay, do not ask — 

In pity from the search forbear : 
Smile on — nor venture to unmask 

Man's heart, and view the hell that's there. 

LXXXV. 

Adieu, fair Cadiz! yea, a long adieu! 

Who may forget how well thy walls have stood! 

When all were changing thou alone wert true, 

First to be free and last to be subdued : 

And if amidst a scene, a shock so rude, 

Some native blood was Been thy streets to dye; 

A traitor only fell beneath the feud: " 

Here all were noble, save nobility ; 
None hugg'd a conqueror's chain, save fallen chivalry! 
LXXXYI. 

Sucn ne the sons of Spain, and, strange her fats ! 

I hey fight for freedom who were never free ; 

A kinglesa people for a nerveless Btate, 

Her vassals combat when their chi< ftains flee, 

True to the veriest slave of treachery ; 

Fond of a land which gave them nought but life, 

Pride (mints the path that leads to liberty ; 

Back to the struggle, baffled in the strife, 
War war is still the cry, "war even to the knife !" 1B 



LXXXVII. 

Ye, who would more of Spain and Spaniards know 
Go, read whate'er is writ of bloodiest strife : 
Whate'er keen vengeance urged on foreign foe 
Can act, is acting there against man's life: 
From Sashing scimitar to secret knife, 
War mouldeth there each weapon to his need — 
So may he guard the sister and the wife, 
So may he make each curst oppressor bleed, 
So may such foes deserve the most remorseless deed . 

LXXXVIII. 

Flows there a tear of pity for the dead / 
Look o'er the ravage of the reeking plain ; 
Look on the hands with female slaughter red ; 
Then to the dogs resign the unburied slain, 
Then to the vulture let each corse remain ; 
Albeit unworthy of the prey-bird's maw, 
Let their bleach'd bones, and blood's unbleaching stain, 
Long mark the battle-field with hideous awe : 
Thus only may our sons conceive the scenes we saw ! 

LXXXIX. 

Nor yet, alas ! the dreadful work is done, 
Fresh legions pour adown the Pyrenees ; 
It deepens still, the work is scarce begun, 
Nor mortal eye the distant end foresees. 
Fall'n nations gaze on Spain ; if freed, she frees 
More than her fell Pizarros once enchain'd : 
Strange retribution! now Columbia's ease 
Repairs the wrongs that Quito's sons sustain'd, 
While o'er the parent clime prowls murder unrestrain'd. 

XC. 

Not all the blood at Talavera shed, 
Not all the marvels of Barossa's fight, 
Not Albuera, lavish of the dead, 
Have won for Spain her well-asserted right. 
When shall her olive-branch be free from blight 7 
When shall she breathe her from the blushing toil ? 
How many a doubtful day shall sink in night, 
Ere the Frank robber turn him from his spoil, 
And freedom's stranger-tree grow native of the soil ! 

XCI. 

And thou, my friend ! 19 — since unavailing woe 
Bursts from my heart, and mingles with the strain- 
Had the sword laid thee with the mighty low, 
Pride might forbid ev'n friendship to complain : 
But thus unlaurel'd to descend in vain, 
By all forgotten, save the lonely breast, 
And mix unbleeding with the boasted slain, 
While glory crowns so many a meaner crest! 
What hadst thou done to sink so peaceably to rest ? 

XCII. 

Oh ! known the earliest, and esteem'd the most ! 
Dear to a heart where nought was left so dear! 
Though to my hopeless days for ever lost, 
In dreams deny me not to see thee here ! 
And morn in secret shall renew the tear 
Of consciousness awaking to her woes, 
And fancy hover o'er thy bloodless bier, 
Till my frail frame return to whence it rose, 
And mourn'd and mourner lie united ; n repose. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



49 



XCIII. 

Here is one fytte of Harold's pilgrimage : 
Ye who of him may further seek to know, 
Shall find some tidings in a future page, 
If he that rhymeth now may scribble moe. 
Is this too much ? stern critic ! say not so : 
Patience ! and ye shall hear what he beheld 
In other lands, where he was doom'd to go : 
Lands that contain the monuments of Eld, 
Ere Greece and Grecian arts by barbarous hands were 
quell'd. 



CANTO II. 



Come, blue-eyed maid of heaven! — but thou, alas! 
Didst never yet one mortal song inspire — 
Goddess of wisdom ! here thy temple was, 
And is, despite of war and wasting fire, ' 
And years, that bade thy worship to expire : 
But worse titan steel, and flame, and ages slow, 
Is the dread sceptre and dominion dire 
Of men who never felt the sacred glow 
That thoughts of thee and thine on polish'd breasts 
bestow. 2 

II. 

\ncient of days ! august Athena ! where, 
Where are thy men of might ? thy grand in soul ? 
Gone, glimmering thro' the dream of things that were: 
First in the rac3 that led to glory's goal, 
They w-on, and pass'd away — is this the whole ? 
A school-boy's tale, the wonder of an hour? 
The warrior's weapon and the sophist's stole 
Are sought in vain, and o'er each mouldering tower, 
Dim with the mist of years, ^ray flits the shade of power. 

Hi. 

Son of the morning, rise ! approach you here! 
Come — but molest not yon defenceless urn ; 
Look on this spot — a nation's sepulchre ! 
Abode of gods, whose shrines no longer burn. 
Even gods must yield — religions take their turn : 
'T was Jove's — 'tis Mahomet's — and other creeds 
Will rise with other years, till man shall learn 
Vainly his incense soars, his victim bleeds ; 
Poor child of doubt and death, whose hope is built on 
reeds. 

rv. 

Bound to the earth, he lifts his eye to heaven — 
Is 't not enough, unhappy thing ! to know 
Thou art ? Is this a boon so kindly given, 
That being, thou wouldst be again, and go, 
Thou know'st not, reck'st not to what region, so 
On earth no more, but mingled with the skies? 
Slill will thou dream on future joy and woe? 
Regard and weigh yon dust before it flies : 
That little urn saith more than thousand homilies. 
h2 12 



Or burst the vanish'd hero's lofty mound ; 
Far on the solitary shore he sleeps : 3 
He fell, and falling nations mourn'd around: 
But now not one of saddening thousands weeps, 
Nor warlike worshipper his vigil keeps 
Where demi-gods appear'd, as records tell. 
Remove yon skull from out the scatter'd heaps: 
Is that a temple where a god may dwell / 
Why ev'n the worm at last disdains her shatter'd ceH 

VI. 

Look on its broken arch, its ruin't wall, 
Its chambers desolate, and portals foul : 
Yes, this was once ambition's airy hall, 
The dome of thought, the palace of the soul : 
Behold through each lack-lustre, eyeless bole, 
The gay recess of wisdom and of wit, 
And passion's host, that never brook'd control: 
Can all, saint, sage, or sophist ever writ, 
People this lonely tower, this tenement relit '.' 

VII. 

Well didst thou speak, Athena's wisest son! 
" All that we know is, nothing can be known." 
Why should we shrink from what we cannot shun? 
Each has his pang, but feeble sufferers groan 
With brain-born dreams of evil all their own. 
Pursue what chance or fate proclaimeth best ; 
Peace waits us on the shores of Acheron : 
There no forced banquet claims the sated guest, 
But silence spreads the couch of ever-welcome rest. 

VIII. 

Yet if, as holiest men have deem'd, there be 
A land of souls beyond that sable shore, 
To shame the doctrine of the Sadducee 
And sophists, madly vain of dubious lore ; 
How sweet it were in concert to adore 
With those who made our mortal labours light! 
To hear each voice we fear'd to hear no more ! 
Behold each mighty shade reveal' d to sight, 
The Bactrian, Samian sage, and all who taught ihc 
right! 

IX. 

There, thou ! — whose love and life together fled, 
Have left me here to love and live in vain — 
Twined with my heart, and can I deem thee dead, 
When busy memory flashes on my bram ? 
Well — I will dream that we may meet again, 
And woo the vision to my vacant breast: 
If aught of young remembrance then remain, 
Be as it may futurity's behest, 
For me 't were bliss enough to know thy spirit blest ! 



Here let me sit upon this massy stone. 
The marble column's yet unshaken base ; 
Here, son of Saturn ! was thy fav'rite throne:* 
Mightiest of many such ! Hence let me trace 
The latent grandeur of thy dwelling place. 
It may not be : nor ev'n can fancy's eye 
Restore what time hath labour'd to deface. 
Yet these proud pillars claim no passing sigh- 
Unmoved the Moslem sits, the light Greek carols bv. 



50 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XI. 

But who, of all the plunderers of you fane 
On high, where Pallas linger'd, lolh to flee, 
The latest relic of her ancient reign ; 
The last, the worst, dull spoiler, who was he? 
Blush, Caledonia! such thy son could be! 
England ! I joy no child he was of thine : 
Thy freeborn men should spare what once was free ; 
Yet they could violate each saddening shrine, 
And bear these altars o'er the long-reluctant brine.' 

XII. 

But most the modern Pict's ignoble boast, 
To rive what Goth, and TurK, and time hath spared: 6 
Cold as the crags upon his native coast, 
His mind as barren and his heart as hard, 
is ne whose head conceived, whose hand prepared, 
Aught to disp'ace Athena's poor remains: 
Her sons too weak the sacred shrine to guard, 
Yet felt some portion of their mother's pains,' 
And never knew, till then, the weight of despots' chains. 

XIII. 

What ! shall it e'er be said by British tongue, 
Albion was happy in Athena's tears? 
Though in thy name the slaves her bosom wrung, 
Tell not the deed to blushing Europe's ears ; 
The ocean queen, the free Britannia bears 
The last poor plunder from a bleeding land: 
Yes, she, whose gen'rous aid her name endears, 
Tore down tnose remnants with a harpy's hand, 
Which envious Eld forbore, and tyrants left to stand. 

XIV. 

Where was thine aigis, Pallas ! that appall'd 
Stern Alaric and havoc or. their way? 8 
Where Peleus' son? whom hell in vain enthrall'd, 
His shade from Hades upon that dread day, 
Bursting to light in terrible array ! 
What! could not Pluto spare the chief once more, 
To scare a second robber from his prey ? 
Idly he wander'd on the Stygian shore, 
Nor now preserved the walls he loved to shield before. 

XV. 

Cold is the heart, fair Greece ! that looks on thee, 
Nor feels as lovers o'er the dust they loved ; 
Dull is the eve that will not weep to see 
Thy walls defaced, thy mouldering shrines removed 
By British hands, which it had best behoved 
To guard those relics ne'er to be restored. 
Curst be the hour when from their isle they roved, 
And once again thy hapless bosom gored, 

And snatch'd thy shrinking gods to northern climes ab- 
horr'd ! 

XVI. 
But where is Harold ? shall I then forget 
To urge the gloomy wanderer o'er the wave ? 
Liu.le reck'd he of all that men regret ; 
No lovea-one now in feign'd lament could rave; 
No I'riond the parting hand extended gave, 
Etc the cold stranger pass'd to other climes : 
Hard is his heart whom charms may not enslave; 
But Harold fell not as in other times, 

Aioi left ivitnoiu a sigh the laud of war and crimes. 



XVII. 
He that has sail'd upon the dark-blue sea 
Has riew'd at times, I ween, a full fair sight; 
When the fresh breeze is fair as breeze may be, 
The white sail set, the gallant frigate tight ; 
Masts, spires, and strand retiring to the right, 
The glorious main expanding o'er the bow, 
The convoy spread like wild swans iti their flight, 
The dullest sailer wearing bravelv now, 
So gaily curl the waves before each dashing prow. 

XVIII. 

And oh, the little warlike world within ! 
The well-reeved guns, the netted canopy,* 
The hoarse command, the busy humming dm, 
When, at a word, the tops are mann'd on high: 
Hark to the boatswain's call, the cheering crv ! 
While through the seaman's hand the tackle glides l 
Or sehool-boy midshipman, that, standing bv, 
Strains his shrill pipe as good or ill I. (tides, 
And well the docile crew that skilful urchin guides. 

XIX. 

White is the glassy deck, without a stain, 
Where on the watch the staid lieutenant walks: 
Look on that part which sacred doth remain 
For the lone chieftain, who majestic stalks 
Silent and fear'd by all — not oft he talks 
With aught beneath him, if he would preserve 
That strict restraint, which broken, ever balks 
Compiest and fame: but Britons rarelv swerve 

From law, however stern, which tends their strength to 
nerve. 

XX. 
Blow ! swiftly blow, thou keel-compelling gale ! 
Till the broad sun withdraws his lessening ray ; 
Then must the pennant-bearer slacken sail, 
That lagging barks may make their lazy nay. 
Ah! grievance sore, and listless dull delay, 
To waste on sluggish hulks the sweetest breeze! 
What leagues are lost before the dawn of day, 
Thus loitering pensive on the willing si as, 

The flapping sail haui'd down to halt for logs like these! 

XXI. 

The moon is up ; by Heaven, a lovely eve ! 
Long streams of light o'er dancing waves expand ; 
Now lads on shore mav sigh, and maids believe : 
Such be our fate when we return to land ! 
Meantime some rude Arion's restless hand 
Wakes the brisk harmony that sailors love; 
A circle there of merry listeners stand, 
Or to some well-known measure featly move. 
Thoughtless, as if on shore they still v ere free to rove. 

XXII. 

Through Calpe's straits survev the Sleepy shore, 
Europe and Afric on each other gaze! 
Lands of the dark-eyed maid and dusky Moor 
Alike beheld beneath pale. Hecate's bli 

How softly on the Spanish Bhori she plays, 

Disclosing rock, and slope, and f >rcst brown, 
Distinct, though darkening with lur waning phase; 
But Mauritania's giant-shadows frown, 
From mountain-cliff to coast descending sombre down 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



51 



XXIII. 

'Tis night, when meditation bids us feel 
We once have loved, though love is at an end : 
The heart, lone mourner of its baffled zeal, 
Though friendless now, will dream it had a friend. 
Who with the weight of years would wish to bend, 
When youth itself survives young love and joy ? 
Alas ! when mingling souls forget to blend, 
Death hath but little left him to destroy ! 
Ah ! happy years ! once more who would not be a boy ? 

XXIV. 

Thus bending o'er the vessel's laving side, 
To gaze on Dian's wave-reflected sphere ; 
The soul forgets her schemes of hope and pride, 
And flies unconscious o'er each backward year. 
None are so desolate but something dear, 
Dearer than self, possesses or possess'd 
A thought, and claims the homage of a tear; 
A flashing pang : of which the weary breast 
Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest. 

XXV. 

To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell, 
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene, 
Where things that own not man's dominion dwell, 
And mortal foot hath ne'er, or rarely been ; 
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen, 
With the wild flock that never needs a fold ; 
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean ; 
This is not solitude ; 'tis but to hold 

Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores 
unroli'd. 

XXVI. 
But 'midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men, 
To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess, 
And roam along, the world's tired denizen, 
With none who bless us, none whom we can bless ; 
Minions of splendour shrinking from distress ! 
None that, with kindred consciousness endued, 
If we were not, would seem to smile the less 
Of all that flattcr'd, follow'd, sought, and sued ; 

This is to be alone ; this, this is solitude ! 

XXVII. 

More blest the life of godly eremite, 
Such as on lovely Athos may be seen, 
Watching at eve upon the giant height, 
Which looks o'er waves so uuie, skies so serene, 
That he who there at such an hour hath been 
Will wistful linger on that hallow'd spot ; 
Then slowly tear him from the 'witching scene, 
Sigh forth one wish that such had been his lot, 
Then turn to hate a world he had almost forgot. 

XXVIII. 
Pass we the long, unvarying course, the track 
Oft trod, that never leaves a trace behind ; 
Pass we the calm, the gale, the change, the tack, 
And each well-known canrice of wave and wind ; 
Pass we the joys and sorrows sailors find, 
Coop'd in their winged sea-girt citadel ; 
The foul, the fair, the contrary, the kind, 
As breezes rise and fall and billows swell, 
Till on some jocund morn — lo, land ! and all is well. 



XXIX. 

But not in silence pass Calypso's isles, 10 
The sister tenants of the middle deep ; 
There for the weary still a haven smiles, 
Though the fair goddess long hath ceased to weep, 
And o'er her cliffs a fruitless watch to keep 
Fot him who dared prefer a mortal bride: 
Here, too, his boy essay'd the dreadful leap 
Stern Mentor urged from high to yonder tide ; 

While thus of both bereft, the nymph-queen doub 
sigh'd. 

XXX. 
Her reign is past, her gentle glories gone : 
But trust not this ; too easy youth, beware ! 
A mortal sovereign holds her dangerous throne, 
And thou may'st find a new Calypso there. 
Sweet Florence ! could another ever share 
This wayward, loveless heart, it would be thine: 
But check'd by every tie, I may not dare 
To cast a worthless offering at thy shrine, 

Nor ask so dear a breast to feel one pang for mine. 

XXXI. 

Thus Harold deem'd, as on that lady's eve 
He look'd, and met its beam without a thought, 
Save admiration glancing harmless by : 
Love kept aloof, albeit not far remote, 
Who knew his votary often lost and caugh», 
But knew him as his worshipper no more, 
And ne'er again the boy his bosom sought : 
Since now he vainly unged him to adore, 
Well deem'd the little god his ancient sway was o'er. 

XXXII. 

Fair Florence found, in sooth with some ami-re, 
One who, 'twas said, still sigh'd to all he saw, 
Withstand, unmoved, the lustre of her gaze, 
Which others hail'd with real, or mimic awe, 
Their hope, their doom, their punishment, tlieii law; 
All that gay beauty from her bondsmen claims : 
And much she marvell'd that a youth so raw 
Nor felt, nor feign'd at least, the oft-told (lames, 

Which, though sometimes they frown, yet rarely anjof 
dames. 

XXXIII. 
Little knew she that seeming marble-hrart, 
Now mask'd in silence or withheld by pride, 
Was not unskilful in the spoiler's art, 
And spread its snares licentious far and wide ; 
Nor from the base pursuit had turn'd aside, 
As long as aught was worthy to pursue : 
But Harold on such arts no more relied ; 
And had he doated on those eyes so blue, 

Yet never would he join the lovers whining crew. 

xxxrv. 

Not much he kens, I ween, of woman's breast, 
Who thinks that wanton thing is won by sighs ; 
What careth she for hearts when once possess'd? 
Do proper homage to thine idol's eyes ; 
But not too heiiilily, or she will despise 
Thee and thy suit, though told in moving tropes . 
Disguise ev'n tenderness, if thou art wise; 
Brisk confidence still best with women copes ; 
Pique her and soothe in turn, soon passion crowns <n» 
hopes. 



52 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XXXV. 
'Tis an old lesson ; time approves it true, 
And those who know it hest, deplore it most; 
When all is won that all desire to woo, 
The paltry prize is hardly worth the cost: 
Youth wasted, minds degraded, honour lost, 
These are thy fruits, successful passion! these! 
If, kindly cruel, early hope is crost, 
Slill to the last it rankles, a disease, 
Not to be cured when love itself forgets to please. 

XXXVI. 

Away ! nor let me loiter in my song, 
For we have many a mountain-path to tread, 
And many a varied shore to sail along, 
By pensive sadness, not by fiction, led — 
Climes, fair withal as ever mortal head 
Imagined in its little schemes of thought ; 
Or e'er in new Utopias were read, 
To each man what he might be, or he ought ; 
If that corrupted tiling could ever such be taught. 

XXXVII. 
Dear Nature is the kindest mother still, 
Though always changing, in her aspect mild ; 
From her bare bosom let me lake my till, 
Her never-wean'd, though not her favour'd child. 
Oh! she is fairest in her features wild, 
Where nothing polish'd dares pollute her path : 
To me by day or night she ever smiled, 
Though I have mark'd her when none other hath, 

And sought her more and more, and loved her best in 
wrath. 

XXXVIII. 
Land of Albania ! where Iskander rose, 
Theme of the young, and beacon of the wise, 
And he, his name-sake, whose oft-baflled foes 
Shrunk from his deeds of chivalrous emprise: 
Land of Albania!" let me bend mine eyes 
On thee, thou rugged nurse of savage men ! 
flie cross descends, thy minarets arise, 
And the pale crescent sparkles in the glen, 

If lirough many a cypress-grove within each city's ken. 

XXXIX. 

Childe Harold sail'd, and pass'd the barren spot 12 
Where sad Penelope o'erlook'd the wave ; 
And onward view'd the mount, not yet forgot, 
The lover's refuge, and the Lesbian's grave. 
Dark Sappho ! could not verse immortal save 
That breast imbued with such immortal lire 7 
Could she not l'.ve who life eternal gave? 
If life eternal may await the lyre, 
That only heaven to which earth's children may aspire. 

XL. 

'T was on a Grecian autumn's gentle eve 
Childe Harold bail'd Leucadia's cape afar: 
A spot he long'd to see, nor cared to leave : 
Oft did he mark the scenes of vamsh'd war, 
Acnum, Lcpanto, fatal Trafalgar; 13 
Mark them unmoved, for he would not delight 
(Born beneath some remote inglorious star) 
In themes of bloody frav, or gallant fight, 
Bu' loathed lot, oravo's trade, and laugh'd at martial 
wi"ht. 



XLI. 
But when he saw the evening star above 
Leucadia's far-projecting rock of woe, 
And hail'd the hist resort of fruitless love, 14 
He felt, or deem'd he felt, no common glow : 
And as the stately vessel glided slow 
Beneath the shadow of that ancient mount, 
He watch'd the billows' melancholy (low, 
And, sunk albeit in thought as he was wont, 
More placid seeni'd his eye, and smooth his pallid front. 

XLII. 

Morn dawns ; and with it stern Albania's hills, 
Dark Suli's rocks, and Pindus' inland peak, 
Robed half in mist, bedew'd with snowy rills, 
Array'd in many a dun and purple streak, 
Arise ; and, as the clouds along them break, 
Disclose the dwelling of the mountaineer : 
Here roams the wolf, the eagle whets his beak, 
Birds, beasts of prey, and wilder men appear, 
And gathering storms around convulse the closing year. 

XLIII. 

Now Harold felt himself at length alone, 
And bade to Christian tongues a long adieu; 
Now he adventured on a shore unknown, 
Which all admire, but many dread to view ; 
His breast was arm'd 'gains! fa'e, his wants were few; 
Peril lie sought not, but ne'er sh-ank to meet, 
The scene was savage, but the fccic was new; 
This made the ceaseless toil of travel sweet, 
Beat back keen winter's blast, and welcomed summer's 
heat. 

XLIV. 
Here the red cross, for still the cross ; s her*;, 
Though sadly scoff'd at by the circumcised, 
Forgets that pride to pamper'd priesthood dear, 
Churchman and votary alike despised. 
Foul superstition! howsoe'er disguised, 
Idol, saint, virgin, prophet, crescent, cross, 
For whatsoever symbol thou art prized, 
Thou sacerdotal gain, but general lose ! 
Who from true worship's gold can separate thy droj ' 

XLV. 

Ambracia's gulf behold, where once was lost 
A world for woman, lovely, harmless thing ! 
In yonder rippling bay, thrir naval host 
Did many a Roman chief and Asian king' s 
To doubtful conflict, certain slaughter bring: 
Look where the second Caesar's trophies rose ! 1S 
Now, like the hands that rear'd them, withering: 
Imperial anarchs, doubling human woes ! 
God! was thy globe ordain'd for such to win and lose 

XLVI. 

From the dark barriers of that rugged clime, 
Ev'n to the centre of Illyria's vales, 
Childe Harold pass'd o'er many a mount sublime, 
Through lands scarce noticed in historic tales ; 
Yet in famed Attica such lovely dales 
Are rarely seen ; nor can fair Tempo boasi 
A charm they know not ; loved Parnassus fans, 
Though classic ground and consecrated most, 
To match some spots that lurk within this lowering euasc 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRTMAGE. 



51 



XLVIL 

He pass'd bleak Pindus, Aclierusia's lake," 
And left the primal city of the land, 
And onwards did his further journey take 
To greet Albania's chief, 18 whose dread command 
Is lawless law ; for with a bloody hand 
He sways a nation, turbulent and bold : 
Yet here and there some daring mountain-band 
Disdain his power, and from their rocky hold 
Hurl their defiance far, nor yield, unless to gold. 19 

XLVIII. 

Monastic Zitza ! 20 from thy shady brow, 
Thou small, but favour'd spot of holy ground ! 
Where'er we gaze, around, above, below, 
What rainbow tints, what magic charms are found ! 
Rock, river, forest, mountain, all abound, 
And bluest skies that harmonize the whole : 
Beneath, the distant torrent's rushing sound 
Tells where the volumed cataract doth roll 
Between those hanging rocks, that shock yet please the 
soul. 

XLIX. 

Amidst the grove that crowns yon tufted hill, 
Which, were it not for many a mountain nigh 
Rising in lofty ranks, and loftier still, 
Might well itself be deem'd of dignity, 
The convent's white walls glisten fair on high : 
Here dwells the caloyer, 21 nor rude is he, 
Nor niggard of his cheer ; the passer-by 
Is welcome still ; nor heedless will he flee 
From hence, if he delight kind nature's sheen tt> see. 

L. 

Here in the sultriest season let him rest, 
Fresh is the green beneath those aged trees ; 
Here winds of gentlest wing will fan his breast, 
From heaven itscif he may inhale the breeze : 
The plain is far beneath — oh ! let him seize 
Pure pleasure while he can ; the scorching ray 
Here pierccth not, impregnate with disease: 
Then let his length the loitering pilgrim lay, 
And gaze, untired, the morn, the noon, the eve away. 

LI. 

Dusky and huge, enlarging on the sight, 
Nature's volcanic amphitheatre, 22 
Chimera's Alps extend from left to right : 
Beneath, a living valley seems to stir ; 
Flocks play, trees wave, streams flow, the mountain fir 
Nodding above : behold black Acheron ! 23 
Once consecrated to the sepulchre. 
Pluto ! if this be hell I look upon, 
Close shamed Elysium's gates, my shade shall seek for 
none! 

LII. 

Ne rity's towers pollute the lovely view ; 
Unseen is Yanina, though not remote, 
Yeil'd by the screen ot hills ! here men are few, 
Scanty the hamlet, rare the lonely cot; 
But, peering down each precipice, the goat 
Browseth : and, pensive o'er his scatter'd flock, 
The little shepherd in his white capote 24 
Doth lean his boyish form along the rock, 
Or in his rave awaits the tempest's short-lived shock. 



LIU. 

Oh ! where, Dodona ! is thine aged grove, 
Prophetic fount, and oracle divine? 
What valley echoed the response of Jove ? 
What trace remaineth of the Thunderer's shrine? 
All, all forgotten — ami shall man repine 
That his frail bonds to fleeting life are broke ? 
Cease, fool! the fate of gods may well be thine: 
Wouldst thou survive the marble or the oik .' 

When nations, tongues, and worlds must sink beneath 
the stroke ! 

LIV. 
Epirus' bounds recede, and mountains ful ; 
Tired of up-gazing still, the wearied eye 
Reposes gladly on as smooth a vale 
As ever spring yclad in grassy dye : 
Even on a plain no humble beauties lie, 
Where some bold river breaks the long expanse, 
And woods along the banks are waving high, 
Whose shadows in the glassy waters dance, 

Or with the moon-beams sleep in midnight's so emn 
trance. 

LV. 
The sun had sunk behind vast Tomerit, 25 
And Laos wide and fierce came roaring by ; 2 
The shades of wonted niwht were gathering yet, 
When, down the steep banks winding wanly, 
Childe Harold saw, like meteors in the sky, 
The glittering minarets of Tepalen, 
Whose walls o'erlook the stream ; and drawing nigh, 
He heard the busy hum of warrior-men 

Swelling the breeze that sigh'd along the lengthening glen 

LVI. 

He pass'd the sacred haram's silent tower, 
And, underneath the wide o'erarching gate, 
Survey'd the dwelling of this chief of powei, 
Where all around proelaiin'd his high estate. 
Amidst no common pomp the despot sate, 
While busy preparations shook the court, 
Slaves, eunuchs, soldiers, guests, and santons .vai , 
Within, a palace, and without, a fort : 
Here men of every ciime appear to make resort. 

LVII. 

Richly caparison'd, a ready row 
Of armed horse, and many a warlike store 
Circled the wide-extending court below : 
Above, strange groups adorn'd the corridor ; 
And oft-times through the Area's echoing JuOf 
Some high-capp'd Tartar spurr'd his sttcd i**if ' 
The Turk, the Greek, the Albanian, auJ the Idu i, 
Here mingled in their many-hued array, 
While the deep war-drum's sound annt_knced the close 
of day. 

Lvni. 

The wild Albanian kirtled to his kne, 
With shawl-girt head and ornameined gun, 
And goW-embrbider'd garments, fair to see; 
The crimson-scarfed men of fittucedon; 
The Delhi with his cap of tetror on, 
And crooked glaive; the lively, supple Greek, 
And swarthy Nubia's mutilated son ; 
The bearded Turk that rarely deigns to speak. 
Master of all around, too potent to be meek. 



64 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LIX. 

Are mix'd conspicuous : some recline in groups, 
Scanning the motley scene that varies round ; 
There some grave Moslem to devotion stoops, 
And some that smoke, and some that play, are found ; 
Here the Albanian proudly treads the ground ; 
Half whispering there the Greek is heard to prate ; 
Hark ! from the mosque the nightly solemn sound, 
The Muezza's call doth shake the minaret, 
"There is no god but God! — to prayer — lo! God is great! " 

LX. 

Just at this season Ramazani's fast 
Through the long day its penance did maintain: 
But when the lingering twilight hour was past, 
Revel and feast assumed the rule again : 
Now all was bustle, and the menial train 
Prepared and spread the plenteous board within ; 
The vacant gallery now seem'd made in vain, 
But from the chambers came the mingling din, 
As page and slave anon were passing out and in. 

LXI. 

Here woman's voice is never heard : apart, 
And scarce permitted, guarded, veil'd, to move, 
She yields to one her person and her heart, 
Tamed to her cage, nor feels a wish to rove : 
For, not unhappy in her master's love, 
And joyful in a mother's gentlest cares, 
Blest cares ! all other feelings far above ! 
Herself more sweetly rears the babe she bears, 
Who never quits the breast no meaner passion shares. 

LXII. 

In marble-paved pavilion, where a spring 
Of living water from the centre rose, 
Whose bubbling did a genial freshness fling, 
And soft voluptuous couches breathed repose, 
Ali reclined, a man of war and woes ; 
Yet in his lineaments ye cannot trace, 
W hile gentleness her milder radiance throws 
Along that aged venerable face, 
The deeds that lurk beneath, and stain him with disgrace. 

LXIII. 

It is not that yon hoary lengthening beard 
111 suits the passions which belong to youth ; 
Love conquers age — so Haliz hath averr'd, 
So sings the Teian, and he sings in sooth — 
But crimes that scorn the tender voice of Ruth, 
Beseeming all men ill, but most the man 
In years, have mark'd him with a tiger's tooth ; 
Blood follows blood, and, through their mortal span, 
In Moodier acts conclude those who with blood began. 

LXIV. 

'Mid many things most new to ear and eye 
The pilgrim rested here his weary feet, 
And gazed around on Moslem luxury, 
Tin quickly wearied with that spacious scat 
Of wealth and wantonness, the choice retreat 
Of sated grandeur from the city's noise: 
And were it humbler it in sooth were sweet ; 
But peace abhorreth artificial joys, 
Ain pleasure, leagued with pomp, the zest of both 
destroys. 



LXV. 

Fierce are Albania's children, yet they lack 
Not virtues, were those virtues more mature. 
Where is the foe that ever saw their back ? 
W T ho can so well the toil of war endure ? 
Their native fastnesses not more secure 
Than they in doubtful time of troublous need : 
Their wrath how deadly ! but their friendship surf 
When gratitude or valour bids them bleed, 
UnshaKen rushing on where'er their chief may lead. 

LXVI. 

Childe Harold saw them in their chieftain's tower 
Thronging to war in splendour and success ; 
And after view'd them, when, within their power, 
Himself awhile the victim of distress ; 
That saddening hour when bad men hotlier press : 
But these did shelter him beneath their roof, 
When less barbarians would have cheer'd him less, 
And fellow-countrymen have stood aloof — 2 ' 
In aught that tries the heart how few withstand the proof. 

Lxvn. 

It chanced that adverse winds once drove his bark 
Full on the coast of Suli's shaggy shore, 
When all around was desolate and dark ; 
To land was perilous, to sojourn more ; 
Yet for a while the mariners forbore, 
Dubious to trust where treachery might lurk : 
At length they ventured forth, though doubting sore 
That those who loathe alike tire Frank and Turk 
Might once agt-n renew their ancient butcher-work. 

LXVIII. 

Vain fear ! the Suhotes stretch'd the welcome hand, 
Led them o'er rocks and past the dangerous swamp, 
Kinder than polish'd slaves though not so bland, 
And piled the hearth, and wrung their garments damp, 
And fill'd the bowl, and trimm'd the cheerful lamp, 
And spread their fare ; though homely, all they had . 
Such conduct bears philanthropy's rare stamp — 
To rest the weary and to soothe the sad, 
Doth lesson happier men, and shames at least the bad. 

LXIX. 

It came to pass, that when he did address 

Himself to quit at length this mountain-land, 

Combined marauders half-way barr'd egress, 

And wasted far and near with glaive and brand ; 

And therefore did he take a trusty band 

To traverse Acarnania's forest wide, 

In war well season'd, and with labours tann'd, 

Till he did greet white Achelous' tide, 

And from bis further bank iEtolia's worlds espied. 

LXX. 

Where lone Utraikey forms its circling cove, 
And weary waves retire to gleam at rest, 
How brown the foliage of the green hill's grove, 
Nodding at midnight o'er the calm bay's breast, 
As winds come lightly whispering from the west, 
Kissing, not ruffling, the blue deep's serene. — 
Here Harold was received a welcome guest, 
Nor did he pass unmoved the gentle scene, 
For many a joy could he from night's soft presence gleaa. 



lxxi. 

On the smooth shore the night-fires brightly blazed, 
The feast was done, the red wine circling fast, 28 
And he that unawares had there ygazed 
With gaping wonderment had stared aghast ; 
For ere night's midmost, stillest hour was past, 
The native revels of the troop began ; 
Each palikar 29 his sabre from him cast,' 
And bounding hand in hand, man link'd to man, 
Veiling their uncouth dirge, long danced the kirtled clan. 

LXXII. 

Childe Harold at a little distance stood 
And view'd, but not displeased, the revelrie, 
Nor hated harmless mirth, however rude : 
In sooth, it was no vulgar sight to see 
Their barbarous, yet their not indecent, glee, 
And, as the flames along their faces gleam'd, 
Their gestures nimble, dark eyes flashing free, 
The long wild locks that .0 their girdles stream'd, 
While thus in concert they this lay half sung, half 
scream'd : 30 

1. 

3 ' Tambourgi ! Tambourgi ! ' thy 'larum afar 
Gives hope to the valiant, and promise of war; 
All the sons of the mountains arise at the note, 
Chimariot, I'.lyrian, and dark Suliote! 



Oh ! who is more brave than a dark Suliote, 

In his snowy camese and his shaggy capote? 

To the wolf and the vulture he leaves his wild flock, 

And descends to the plain like the stream from the rock. 



Shall the sons of Chimari, who never forgive 
The fault of a friend, bid an enemy live? 
Let those guns so unerring such vengeance forego? 
What mark is so fair as the breast of a foe? 



Macedonia sends forth her invincible race ; 
For a time they abandon the cave and the chase : 
But those scarfs of blood-red shall be redder, before 
The sabre is sheathed and the battle is o'er. 



Then the pirates of Parga that dwell by the waves, 
And teach the pale Franks what it is to be slaves, 
Shall leave on the beach the long galley and oar, 
And track to his covert the captive on shore. 



I ask not the pleasures that riches supplv, 
M) sabre shall win what the feeble must buy ; 
Shall win the young bride with her long-flowing hair, 
And many a maid from her mother shall tear. 



I love the fair face of the maid in her youth, 
Her caresses shall lull me, her music shall soothe ; 
Let her bring from the chamber her many-toned lyre, 
And sing us a song on the fall of her sire. 



8. 
Remember the moment when Previsa fell, 32 
The shrieks of the conquer'd, the conquerors' yell ; 
The roofs that we fired, and the plunder we shared, 
The wealthy we slaughter'd, the lovely we spared. 



I talk not of mercy, I talk not of fear ; 
He neither must know who would serve the vizier : 
Since the days of our prophet the crescent ne'er saw 
A chief ever glorious like Ali Pashaw. 

10. 
Dark Muchtar his son to the Danube is sped, 
Let the yellow-hair'd ' Giaours 2 view his horse-tail' 

with dread ; 
When his Delhis 1 come dashing in blood o'er the banks 
How few shall escape from the Muscovite ranks ! 

11. 

Selictar ! i unsheathe then our chief's scimitar : 
Tambourgi ! thy 'larum gives promise of war. 
Ye mountains, that see us descend to the shore, 
Shall view us as victors, or view us no more ! 

LXXIII. 

Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ! 33 
Immortal, though no more; though fallen, great! 
Who now shall lead thy scatter'd children forth, 
And long-accustom'd bondage uncreate? 
Not such thy sons who whilome did await, 
The hopeless warriors of a willing doom, 
In bleak Thermopylae's sepulchral strait — 
Oh! who that gallant spirit shall resume, 
Leap from Eurotas' banks, and call thee from the tomb. 

LXXIV. 

Spirit of freedom ! when on Phyle's brow 34 
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train, 
Couldst thou forebode the dismal hour which ?iow 
Dims the green beauties of thine Attic plain? 
Not thirty tyrants now enforce the chain, 
But every carle can lord it o'er thy land ; 
Nor rise thy sons, but idly rail in vain, 
Trembling beneath the scourge of Turkish hand, 
From birth till death enslaved; in word, in deed unmann'd. 

LXXV. 

In all, save form alone, how changed ! and who 
That marks the fire still sparkling in each eye, 
Who but would deem their bosoms burn'd anew 
With thy unquenched beam, lost liberty ? 
And many dream withal the hour is nigh 
That gives them back their fathers' heritage : 
For foreign arms and aid they fondly sigh, 
Nor solelv dare encounter hostile rage, 
Or tear their name defiled from slavery's mournful poy^ 



1 Yellow is the epithet given to the Russians 

2 Infidel?. 

:t Horse-tails are the insignia of a paeha. 

4 Horsemen, answering to our forlorn hop* 

5 Sword-beurcr. 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXXVI. 
Hereditary bondsmen! know yc not 
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow? 
By their right arms the conquest must be wrought? 
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye? no! 
True, they may lay your proud despoilers low, 
But not lor you will freedom's altars flame. 
Shades of the Helots ! triumph o'er your foe ! 
Greece ! change thy lords, thy state is still the same ; 
Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thine years of shame. 

LXXVII. 

The city won for Allah from tho Giaour, 
The Giaour from Othman's race again may wrest; 
And the Serai's impenetrable tower 
Receive the fiery Frank, her former guest ; 3i 
Or Wahab's rebel brood, who dared divest 
The prophet's tomb of all its pious spoil, 36 
May wind their path ofhldod along the West; 
But ne'er \\ ill freedom seek this fated soil, 
But slave succeed to slave through years of endless toil. 

LXXVI1I. 

Vet mark their mirth — ere lentrn days begin, 
That peiUOnce which their holy rites prepare 
To shrive from man his weight of mortal sin, 
By daily abstinence ami nightly prayer; 
But ere his sackcloth garb repentance wear, 
Some days of joyauncc are decreed to all, 
To take of pleasauncc each his secret share, 
In motley robe to dance at masking ball, 
And join the mimic train of merry Carnival. 

LXXIX. 

And whose more rife with merriment that thine, 
Oh Stamboul ! once the empress of their reign? 
Though turbans now pollute Sophia's shrine, 
And Greece her very altars eyes in vain : 
(Alas! her woes will still pervade my strain!) 
Gay were her minstrels once, for free her throng, 
All felt the common joy they now must feign, 
Nor oft I 've seen such sight nor heard such song, 
4.S woo'd the eye, and thrill'd the Bosphorus along. 

LXXX. 

Loud was the lightsome tumult of the shore, 
Oft music changed, but never ceased her tone, 
And timely echoed back the measured oar, 
And rippling waters made a pleasant moan: 
The queen of tides on high consenting shone, 
And when a transient breeze swept o'er the wave, 
'T was, as if farting from her heavenly throne, 
A brighter glance her form reflected gave, 
J 'ill sparkling billows seem'd to light the banks they lave. 

LXXXI. 

Glanced many alight caique along tl e foam, 
Danced on the shore the daughters ol the land, 
Nc thought had man or maul of rest or home, 
While many a languid eve and thrilling hand 
Exchanged the look few bosoms may withstand, 
Or gently pre**, return'd the pressure still: 
Oh love ! young love ! bound in thy rosy band, 
Let sage or cynic prattle as be will, 
1 lies'; hours, and only these, redeem life's vears of ill! 



LXXXII. 

But, 'midst the throng in merry masquerade, 
Lurk there no hearts that throb with secret pain, 
Ev'n through the closest searmenl half betray'd ? 
To such the gentle murmurs of the main 
Seem to re-echo all they mourn in vain ; 
To such the gladness ol the gamesome crowd 
Is source of wayward thought arid stern disdain : 
How do they loathe the laughter idly loud, 
And long to change the robe of revel for the shroud ? 

LXXXIII. 

This must he feel, the true-born son of Greece, 
If Greece one true-born patriot still can boast : 
Not such as prate of war, but skulk in peace, 
The bondman's peace, who sighs for all he lost, 
Yet with smooth smile his tyrant can accost, 
And wield the slavish sickle, not the sword : 
Ah! Greece! they love thee least who owe thee most 
Their birth, their blood, and that sublime record 
Of hero sires, who shame thy now degenerate horde! 

Lxxrv. 

When riseth Lacedemon's hardihood, 
When Thebes Epaminondas rears again, 
When Athens' children are with hearts endued, 
When Grecian mothers shall give birth to men, 
Then may'st thou be restored ; but not till then. 
A thousand years scarce serve to form a state ; 
An hour may lay it in the dust ; and \% hen 
Can man its shatter'd splendour renovate, 
Recall its virtues back, and vanquish time and fate? 

LXXXV. 

And yet how lovely in thine age of woe, 
Land of lost gods and godlike men, art thou ! 
Thy vales of ever-green, thy hills of snow 37 
Proclaim thee nature's varied favourite now : 
Thy fanes, thy temples to thy surface bow, 
Commingling slowly with heroic earth, 
Broke by the share of every rustic plough: 
So perish monuments of mortal birth, 
So perish all in turn, save well-recorded worth ; 

LXXXVI. 

Save where some solitary column mourns 
Above its prostrate brethren of the cave ; 38 
Save where Tritonia's airy shrine adorns 
Colonna's clilT, and gleams along the wave ; 
Save o'er some warrior's half-forgotten grave, 
Where the gray stones and unmolested grass 
Ages, but not oblivion, feebly brave, 
While strangers only not regardless pass, 
Lingering like me, perchance, to gaze, and sigh "Alas " 

LXXXVII. 

Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ; 
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields, 
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled, 
And still his honied wealth Ilvmettus yields; 
There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress builds, 
The freeborn wamlerer of thy mountain-air; 
Apollo stil! thy Ions, long summer gilds, 
Still in his beam Mendeli's marbles glare; 
Art, glory, freedom fail, but nature still is fair. 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



67 



LXXXVIII. 

Where'er we tread 'tis haunted, holy ground; 
No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould, 
But one vast realm of wonder spreads around, 
And all the muse's tales seem truly told: 
Till the sense aches with gazing to behold 
The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt upon : 
Each hill and dale, each dcep'ning glen and wold 
Defies the power which crush'd thy temples gone : 
Age shakes Athena's tower, but spares gray Marathon. 

LXXXIX. 

The sun, the soil, but not the slave, the same ; 
Unchanged in all except its foreign lord — 
Preserves alike its bounds and boundless fame 
The battle-field, where Persia's victim horde 
First bow'd beneath the brunt of Hellas' sword, 
As on the morn to distant glory dear, 
When Marathon became a magic word ; 39 
Which utter'd, to the hearer's eye appear 
The camp, the host, the fight, the conqueror's career. 

XC. 

The flying Mede, his shaftless broken bow ; 

The fiery Greek, his red pursuing spear ; 

Mountains above, earth's, ocean's plain below; 

Death in the front, destruction in the rear ! 

Such was the scene — what now remaineth here ? 

What sacred trophy marks the hallow'd ground, 

Recording freedom's smile and Asia's tear? 

The rifled urn, the violated mound, 
The dust thy courser's hoof, rude stranger ! spurns 
around. 

XCI. 

Yet to the remnants of thy splendour past 

Shall pilgrims, pensive, but unwearied, throng ; 

Long shall the voyager, with the Ionian blast, 

Hail the bright clime of batde and of song ; 

Long shall thine annals and immortal tongue 

Fill with thy fame the youth of many a shore ; 

Boast of the aged ! lesson of the young ! 

Which sages venerate and bards adore, 
As Pallas and the muse unveil their awful lore. 

XCII. 

The parted bosom clings to wonted home, 
If aught that's kindred cheer the welcome hearth ; 
He that is lonely hither let him roam, 
And gaze complacent on congenial earth. 
Greece is no lightsome land of social mirth ; 
But he whom sadness sootheth may abide, 
And scarce regret the region of his birth, 
When wandering slow by Delphi's, acred side, 
>r gazing o'er the plains where Greek and Persian died. 

xcin. 

Let such approach this consecrated land, 
And pass in pence r'on^ the magic waste: 
But spare its relics — let no busy hand 
Deface the scenes, already how defaced ! 



Not for such purpose were these altars placed : 
Revere the remnants nations once revered : 
So may our country's name be undisgraced, 
So may'st thou prosper where thy youth was rear'd 
By every honest joy of love and life endear'd ! 

XCIV. 

For thee, who thus in too protracted song 
Hast socthed thine idlcsse with inglorious 'ays, 
Soon shall thy voice be lost amid the throng 
Of louder minstrels in these later days : 
To such resign the strife for fading bays — 
111 may such contest now the spirit move 
Which heeds nor keen reproach nor partial praise ; 
Since cold each kinder heart that might approve, 
And none are left to please when none are left to lo«e 

xcv. 

Thou too art gone, thou loved and lovely one ! 
Whom youth and youth's affection bound to me , 
Who did for me what none beside have done, 
Nor shrank from one albeit unworthy thee. 
What is my being ? thou hast ceased to be ! 
Nor staid to welcome here thy wanderer home, 
Who mourns o'er hours \\ hich we no more sha'l see — 
Would they had never been, or were to _ome ! 
Would he had ne'er rcturn'd to find fresn cause to roam' 

XCVI. 

Oh ! ever loving, lovely, and beloved ! 
How selfish sorrow ponders on the past, 
And clings to thoughts now better far removed ! 
But time shall tear thy shadow from me last. 
All thou couldst have of mine, stem Death ! thou hasl 
The parent, friend, and now the more than friend ■ 
Ne'er yet for one thine arrows flew so fast, 
And grief with grief continuing still to blend, 
Hath snatch'd the little joy that life had yet to lend. 

XCVII. 

Then must I plunge again into the crowd, 
And follow all that peace disdains to seek V 
Where revel calls, and laughter, vainly loud, 
False to the heart, distorts the hollow cheek, 
To leave the flagging spirit doubly weak ; 
Still o'er the features, which perforce they cheer, 
To feign the pleasure or conceal the pique ; 
Smiles form the channel of a future tear, 
Or raise the writhing lip with ill-dissembled sneei. 

XCVIII. 
What is the worst of woes that wait on age ? 
What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow? 
To view each loved one blotted from life's page, 
And be alone on earth, as I am now. 
Before the Chastencr humbly let me bow, 
O'er hearts divided, and o'er hopes dcstroy'i) ■ 
Roll on, vain days ! full reckless may ye flow. 
Since time hath reft whate'er my soul enjoy'a, 
And with the ills of Eld mine earlier years alloy'd 



13 



58 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO III. 



" Afin que crtte application vous forcat de penscr a autre 
(UlOte, il n'y a on verite de romcde qae cellii-la et le leinj>s." 
J.cttredu lioi de Prusse a JJalembert, Sep. 7, 177C. 



I. 

Is thy face like thy mother's, my fair child ! 
Ada ! sole daughter of my house and heart? 
When last I saw thy young blue eyes they smiled, 
And then we parted, — not as now we pait, 
Rut with a hope. — 

Awaking with a start, 
The waters heave around me ; and on hioh 
The winds lift up their voices : I depart, 
Whither I know not ; but the hour's gone by, 
When Albion's lessening shores could grieve or glad 
mine eye. 

n. 

Once more upon the waters ! yet once more ! 
And the waves bound beneath me as a steed 
That knows his rider. Welcome to their roar ! 
Swift be their guidance, wheresoe'er it lead ! 
Though the strain'd mast should quiver as a reed, 
And the rent canvas fluttering strew the gale, 
Sli'.l must I on ; for I am as a weed, 
Flutlg from the rock, on ocean's foam, to sail 
Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's breath 
prevail. 

III. 

In my youth's summer I did sing of one, 
The wandering outlaw of his own dark mind ; 
Again I seize the theme then but begun, 
And bear it with me, as the rushing wind 
Hears the cloud onwards : in that tale I find 
The furrows of long thought, and dried-up tears, 
Which, ebbing, leave a sterile track behind, 
O'er which all heavily the journeying years 
Plod the last sands of life, — where not a flower appears. 



Since my young days of passion — joy, or pain, 
Perchance my heart and harp have lost a string, 
And both may jar : it may be, that in vain 
I would essay as I have sung to sing. 
Yet, though a dreary strain, to this I cling ; 
So that it wean me from the weary dream 
Of selfish grief or gladness — so it fling 
Forgetfulness around me — it shall seem 
To me, though to none else, a not ungrateful theme. 



He, who grown aged in this world of woe, 
■In deeds, not years, piercing the depths of life, 
So that no wonder waits him ; nor below 
Can love, or sorrow, fame, ambition, strife, 
Cut to his heart again with the keen knife 
Of silent, sharp endurance : he can tell 
Why thought seeks refuge io /one caves, yet rife 
With airy images, and shapes which dwell 
btill unimpair'd, though old, in the soul's haunted cell. 



VI. 
'Tis to create, and in creating live 
A being more intense, that vvc endo-v 
Willi form our fancy, gaining as wu giv»: 
The life we ini:i;i', cv'ii as I do now. 
What am I? Nothing; hut not soar" tl.pu. 
Soul of my thought ! with whom I tra vi_/sr. earth, 
Invisible but gazing, as I glow 
Mix'd with thy spirit, blended with thy birth. 
And feeling still with thee in my crush'd feelings' dearU. 

VII. 

Yet must I think less wildly: — I have thought 
Too long and darkly, till my brain became, 
In its own eddy boiling and o'erwrought, 
A whirling gulf of phantasy and flam ! 
And thus, untaught in youth my heart to tame, 
My springs of life were poison'd. 'T is too late ! 
Yet am I changed ; though still enough the same 
In strength to bear what time cannot abate, 

And fe^d on bitter fruits without accusing fate. 
VIII. 
Something too much of this: — but now 't is past, 
And the spell closes with its silent seal. 
Long- absent Harold re-appears at last ; 
He of the breast which fain no more would feel, 
Wrung with the wounds which kill not but ne'er hea'; 
Yet time, who changes all, had alter'd him 
In soul and aspect as in age : years steal 
Fire from the mind as vigour from the limb ; 

And life's enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim. 

IX. 

His had been quafF'd too quickly, and he found 
The dregs were wormwood ; but he fill'd again, 
And from a purer fount, on holier ground, 
And deem'd its spring perpetual ; but in vain ! 
Still round him clung invisibly a chain 
Which gall'd for ever, fettering though unseen, 
And heavy though it clank'd not ; worn with pa**, 
Which pined although it spoke not, and grew keen, 
Entering with every step he took, through man} .. scene. 



Secure in guarded coldness, he had mix'd 
Again in fancied safety with his kind, 
And deem'd his spirit now so firmly iix'd 
And sheathco with an invulnerable mind, 
That, if no joy, no sorrow lurk'd behind ; 
And he, as one, might 'midst the many stand 
Unheeded, searching through the crowd to find 
Fit speculation ! such as in strange land 
He found in wonder-works of God and Nature's hand. 

XI. 

But who can view the ripen'd rose, nor seek 

To wear it ? who can curiously behold 

The smoothness and the sheen of beauty's cheek, 

Nor feel the heart can never all grow old ? 

Who can contemplate fame through clouds unfold 

The star which rises o'er her steep, nor climb? 

Harold, once more within the vortex, roll'd 

On with the giddy circle, chasing time, 

Yet with a nobler aim than in his youth's fond pr:m« 



&HILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



60 



XII. 

But soon he knew himself die most unfit 
Of men to herd with man ; with whom he held 
Little in common ; untaught to submit 
His thoughts to others, though his soul was queU'd 
In youth by his own thoughts ; still uncompell'd 
He would not yield dominion of his mind 
To spirits against whom his own rebell'd ; 
Proud though in desolation ; which could find 
\ life within itself, to breathe without mankind. 

XIII. 

Where rose the mountains, there to him were friends; 
Where roll'd the ocean, thereon was his home ; 
Where a blue sky and glowing clime extends, 
He had the passion and the power to roam ; 
The desert, forest, cavern, breaker's foam, 
Were unto him companionship ; they spake 
A mutual language, clearer than the tome 
Of his land's tongue, which he would oft. forsake 
For nature's pages, glass'd by sunbeams on the lake. 

XIV. 

Like the Chaldean, he could watch the stars, 

Till he had peopled them with beings bright 

As their own beams ; and earth, and earth-born jars, 

And human frailties, were forgotten quite : 

Could he have kept his spirit to that flight 

He had been happy ; but this clay will sink 

Its spark immortal, envying it the light 

To which it mounts, as if to break the link 

rhat keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its 
brink. 

XV. 

But in man's dwellings he became a thing 
Restless and worn, and stern and wearisome, 
Droop'd as a wild-born falcon with dipt wing, 
To whom the boundless air alone were home : 
Then came his fit again, which to o'ercome, 
As eagerly the barr'd-up bird will beat 
His breast and beak against his wiry dome 
Till the blood tinge his plumage, so the heat 

Of his impeded soul would through liis bosom eat. 

XVI. 

Self-exiled Harold wanders forth again, 

With nought of hope left, but with less of gloom ; 

The very knowledge that he lived in vain, 

That all was over on this side the tomb, 

Had made despair a smilingness assume, 

Which, though 't were wild, — as on the plunder'd 

wreck 
When mariners would madly meet their doom 
With draughts intemperate on the sinking deck, — 
Did yet inspire a cheer, which he forbore to check. 

XVII. 

Stop ! — for thy tread is on an empire's dust ! 
An earthquake's spoil is sepulchred below ! 
Is the spot niark'd with no colossal bust ? 
Nor column trophied for triumphal show? 
None ; but the moral's truth tells simpler so, 
As the ground was before, thus let it be ; — 
How that red rain hath made the harvest grow ! 
And is this all the world has gain'd by thee, 
Tliou first and last of fields ! king-making victory 7 



XVIII. 

And Harold stands upon this place of skulls, 
The grave of France, the deadly Waterloo ! 
How in an hour the power which gave annuls 
Its gifts, transferring fame as fleeting too ! 
In " pride of place" ' here last the eagle flew, 
Then tore with bloody talon the rent plain, 
Pierced by the shaft of banded nations through ; 
Ambition's life and labours all were vain ; 
He wears the shatter'd links of the world's broken chain. 

XIX. 

Fit retribution ! Gaul may champ the bit 
And foam in fetters ; — but is earth more free? 
Did nations combat to make One submit ; 
Or league to teach all kings true sovereignty ? 
What! shall reviving thraldom again be 
The patch'd-up idol of enlightened days ? 
Shall we, who struck the Hon down, shall we 
Pay the wolf homage ? proffering lowly gaze 
And servile knees to thrones 1 No ; prove before j e praise! 

XX. 

If not, o'er one fallen despot boast no more ! 
In vain fair cheeks were furrow'd with hot tears 
For Europe's flowers long rooted up before 
The trampler of her vineyards ; in vain years 
Of death, depopulation, bondage, fears, 
Have all men borne, and broken by the accord 
Of roused-up millions : all that most endears 
Glory, is when the myrtle wreathes the sword 
Such as Harmodius 2 drew on Athens' tyrant lord. 

XXI. 

There was a sound of revelry by night, 
And Belgium's capital had gather'd then 
Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright 
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men ; 
A thousand hearts beat happily ; and when 
Music arose with its voluptuous swell, 
Soft eyes look'd love to eyes which spake again, 
And all went merry as a marriage-bell ; 3 
But hush ! hark ! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell 

XXII. 

Did ye not hear it? — No ; 't was but the wind, 
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street ; 
On with the dance ! let joy be unconfined , 
No sleep till morn when youth and pleasure moe., 
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet — 
But, hark! — that heavy sound breaks in once mme 
As if the clouds its echo would repeat ; 
And nearer, clearer, deadlier man before ! 
Arm ! arm ! it is — it is — the cannon's opening roai : 

XXIII. 

Within a window'd niche of that high hall 
Sate Brunswick's fated chieftain ; he did heai 
That sound the first amidst the festival, 
And catfght its tone with death's prophetic ear : 
And when they smiled because he deem'd it near. 
His heart more truly knew that peal too well 
Which stretch'd his father on a bloody bier, 
And roused the vengeance blood alone could queD 
He rush'd into the field, and, 'brcmost hgniing, fell. 



* 



GO 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



xxiv. 

Ah ! then and there was hurrying to and fro, 
And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, 
And cheeks all pale, which but an hour ago 
Blush'd at the praise of their own loveliness; 
And there were sudden partings, such as press 
The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs 
Which ne'er might be repeated ; who could guess 
If ever more should meet those mutual <yes, 
Since upon nights so sweet such awful morn could rise ? 
XXV. 
And there was mounting in hot haste: the steed, 
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car, 
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed, 
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war ; 
And the deep thunder peal on peal afar ; 
And near, the beat of the alarming drum 
Roused up the soldier ere the morning star; 
While throng'd the citizens with terror dumb, 
Or whispering, with white lips—" The foe ! They come! 
they come!" 

XXVI. 
And wild and high the "Cameron's gathering" rose ! 
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albvn's hills 
Have heard, and heard, too, have her Saxon foes: — 
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills, 
Savage and shrill ! But with the breath which fills 
Their mountain-pipe, so fill the mountaineers 
With the fierce native daring which instils 
The stirring memory of a thousand years, 
And Evan's," Donald's 4 fame rings in each clansman's 
ears! 

XXVII. 
And Ardennes ° waves above them her green leaves, 
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as they pass, 
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves, 
Over the unreturning brave, — alas ! 
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 
Which now beneath them, but above shall g"."V 
In its next verdure, when this fiery mass 
Of living valour, rolling on the foe, 
And burning with high hope, shall moulder ccld rnd 
low. 

XXVHI. 
Last noon beheld* them full of lusty life, 
Last eve in beauty's circle proudly gay, 
The midnight brought the signal-sound of stnfe, 
The morn the marshalling in arms, — the day 
Battle's magnificently-stern array ! 
The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when rent, 
The earth is cover'd thick with other clay, 
Which her own clay shall cover, heap'd ai.d pent, 
B ider and horse, — friend, foe, — in one red burial blent ! 
XXIX. 
Their praise is hymn'd by loftier harps than mine ; 
Yet one I would select from (hit proud throng, 
Partly because they blend mo with his line, 
And partly that I did his sire some wrong, 
And partly that bright names will hallow song; 
And his was of the bravest, and when shower'd 
The death-bolts deadliest the thinn'd files along. 
Even where the thickest of war's tempest lower'd, 
l"bov rnach'd no nobler breast than thine, young, gallant 
Howard • 



XXX 

There have been tears and breaking hearts for thee, 
And mine were nothing, had I such to give ; 
But when I stood beneath the (resh green tree, 
Which living waves where thou didst cease to live, 
And saw around me the wide field revive 
With fruits and fertile promise, and the spring 
Come forth her work of gladness to contrive, 
With all her reckless birds upon the wing, 
I turn'd from all she brought to those she could not bring 

XXXI. 

I tum'd to thee, to thousands, of whom each 
And one as all a ghastly gap did make 
In his own kind and kindred, whom to teach 
Forgetfulness were mercy for their sake ; 
The archangel's trump, not glory's, must awake 
Those w hom they thirst for ; though the sound of fame 
May for a moment soothe, it cannot slake 
The fever of vain longing, and the name 
So honour'd but assumes a stronger, bitterer claim. 

XXXII. 

They mourn, but smile at length ; and, smiling, mourni 
The tree w ill wither long before it fall ; 
The hull drives on, though mast and sail be torn ; 
The root-tree sinks, but moulders on the hall 
In massy hoariness ; the ruin'd wall 
Stands when its wind-worn battlements arc gone ; 
The bars survive the captive they enthral, 
The day drags through though storms keep out the "uir 
And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on : 

XXXIII. 

Even as a broken mirror, which the glass 
In every fragment multiplies ; and makes 
A thousand images of one that was, 
The same, and still the more, the more it break* 
And thus the heart will do which not forsakes, 
Living in shatter'd guise, and stilt, and cold, 
And bloodless, with its sleepless sorrow aches, 
Yet withers on till all without is old, 
Showing no visible sign, for such things are untold 

XXXIV. 

There is a very life in our despair, 
Vitality of poison, — a quick root 
Which feeds these deadly branches ; for it were 
As nothing did we die ; but life will suit 
Itself to sorrow's most detested fruit, 
Like to the apples on the Dead Sea's a shore. 
All ashes to the taste ; did man compute 
Existence by enjoyment, and count o'er 
Such hours 'gainst years of fife, — say, would lie i«u» 
three-score ? 

XXXV. 

The Psalmist numbcr'd out the years of man: 
They are enough ; and if thy tale be true. 
Thou, who didst grudge him ev'n that fleeting spar 
More than enough, thou fatal Waterloo ! 
Millions of tongues record thee, and anew 
Their children's lips shall echo them, and say — 
" Hire, where the sword united nations drew, 
Our countryman were warring on that dav !" 
And this is much, and all which will not pass away. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



6\ 



XXXVI. 

There sunk the greatest, nor the worst of men, 
Whose spirit antithetically mixt 
One moment of the mightiest, and again 
On little ohjects with like firmness fixt, 
Extreme in all things! hadst thou been betwixt, 
Thy throne had still been thine, or never been ; 
For daring made thy rise as fall : thou seek'st 
Even now to re-assume the imperial mien, 
And shake again the world, the thundcrer of the scene! 

XXXVH. 

Conqueror and captive of the earth art thou ! 
She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name 
Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than now 
That thou art nothing, save the jest of fame, 
Who woo'd thee once, thy vassal, and became 
The flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou wert 
A god unto thyself ; nor less the same 
To the astounded kingdoms all inert, 
Who deem'd thee for a time whate'er thou didst assert. 

xxxvTir. 

Oh, more or less than man — in high or low, 
Battling with nations, flying from the field ; 
Now making monarchs' necks thy footstool, now 
More than thy meanest soldier taught to yield ; 
An empire thou couldst crush, command, rebuild, 
But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor, 
However deeply in men's spirits skill'd, 
Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of war, 
Nor learn that tempted fate will leave the loftiest star. 

XXXIX. 

Yet well thy soul hath brook'd the turning tide 
With that untaught innate philosophy, 
Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep pride, 
Is gall and wormwood to an enemy. 
When the whole host of hatred stood hard by, 
To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast smiled 
With a sedate and all-enduring eye ; — 
When fortune fled her spoil'd and favourite child, 
He stood unbow'd beneath the ills upon him piled. 

XL. 

Sager than in thy fortunes ; for in them 
Ambition steel'd thee on too far to show 
That just habitual scorn which could contemn 
Men and their thoughts ; 't was wise to feel, not so 
To wear it ever on thy lip and brow, 
And spurn the instruments thou wert to use 
Till they were turn'd unto thine overthrow : 
'T is but a worthless world to win or lose ; 
So hath it proved to thee, and all such lot who choose. 

XLI. 

If, like a tower upon a headlong rock, 
Thou hadst been made to stand or fall alone, 
Such scorn of man had help'd to brave the shock ; 
But men's thoughts were the steps which paved rfiy 

throne, 
Their admiration thy best weapon shone ; 
The part of Philip's son was thine, not then 
(Unless aside thy purple had been thrown) 
Like stern Diogenes to mock at men ; 
H jt sceptred cynics earth were far too wide a den.' 
I 2 



XLII. 

But quiet to quick bosoms is a hell, 
And there hath been thy bano; there is a fire 
And motion of the soul which will not dwell 
In its own narrow being, but aspire 
Beyond the fitting medium of desire ; 
And, but once kindled, quenchless evermore, 
Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire 
Of aught but rest ; a fever at the core, 
Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever bore. 

XLIII. 

This makes the madmen who have made men mad 
By their contagion ; conquerors and kings, 
Founders of sects and systems, to whom add 
Sophists, bards, statesmen, all unquiet things, 
Which stir too strongly the soul's secret springs, 
And are themselves the fools to those they fool ; 
Envied, yet how unenviable ! what stings 
Are their's ! One breast laid open were a school 
Which would unteach mankind the lust to shine or ride. 

XLIV. 

Their breath is agitation, and their life 
A storm whereon they ride, to sink at last, 
And yet so nursed and bigoted to strife, 
That should their days, surviving perils past, 
Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast 
With sorrow and supinencss, and so die ; 
Even as a flame unfed, which runs to waste 
With its own flickering, or a sword laid by 
Which eats into itself, and rusts ingloriously. 

XLV. 

He who ascends to mountain-tops shall find 
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow ; 
He who surpasses or subdues mankind 
Must look down on the hate of those below. 
Though high above the sun of glory glow, 
And far beneath the earth and ocean spread, 
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow 
Contending tempests on his naked head, 
And thus reward the toils which to those summits led. 

XLVI. 

Away with these ! true wisdom's world will be 
Within its own creation, or in thine, 
Maternal nature ! Ibr who teems like thee, 
Thus on the banks of thy majestic Rhine? 
There Harold gazes on a work divine, 
A blending of all beauties ; streams and dells, 
Fruit, fbliage, rrajr, wood, corn-field, mountain, viih> 
And chietlcss castles breathing stem farewells 
From gray but leafy walls, where ruin greenly dwe\s. 

xlvii. 

And there they stand, as stands a lofty mind, 

Worn, but unstooping to the baser crowd, 

All tenantless, save to the crannving wind, 

Or holding dark communion with the cloud. 

There was a day when liny were young and proud, 

Banners on high, and bailies passM below, 

But they who fought are in a bl I;, shroud. 

And those which waved are shredless dust ere Wm 
And the bleak battlements shall bear no future blow. 



«2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XLVIII. 

Beneath these battlements, within those walls, 
Power dwelt amidst her passions; in proud state 
Each robber chief upheld his armed halls, 
Doing his evil will, nor less elate 
Than mightier heroes of a longer date. 
What want these outlaws 10 conquerors should have, 
But history's purchased page to call them great? 
A wider space, an ornamented grave? 

Their hopes were not less warm, their souls were full 
as brave. 

XLIX. 
In their baronial feuds and single fields, 
What deeds of prowess unrecorded died! 
And love, which lent a blazon to their shields, 
With emblems well devised by amorous pride, 
Through all the mail of iron hearts would glide ; 
But still their flame was fierceness, and drew on 
Keen contest and destruction near allied, 
And many a tower for some fair mischief won, 

Saw the discoloux'd Rhine beneath its ruin run. 

L. 

But thou, exulting and abounding river! 
Making thy waves a blessing as they flow 
Through banks whose beauty would endure for ever, 
Could man but leave thy bright creation so, 
Nor its fair promise from the surface mow 
With the sharp scythe of conflict, — then to see 
Thy valley of sweet waters, were to know 
Earth paved like heaven ; and to seem such to me 

Even now what wants thy stream ? — that it should 
Lethe be. 

LI. 
A thousand battles have assail'd thy banks, 
But these and half their fame have pass'd away, 
And slaughter heap'd on high his weltering ranks — 
Their *ery graves are gone, and what are they? 
The tide wash'd down the blood of yesterday, 
And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream 
Glass'd with its dancing light the sunny ray, 
But o'er the blacken'd memory's blighting dream 

Thy waves w ould vainly roll, all sweeping as they seem 

LII. 
Thus Harold inly said, and pass'd along, 
Yet not insensibly to all which here 
Awoke the jocund birds to early song 
In glens which might have made even exile dear ; 
Though on his brow were graven lines austere, 
And tranquil sternness which had ta'en the place 
Of feelings fierier far but less severe, 
Joy was not always absent from his face, 
But o'er it in such scenes would steal with transient 
trace. 

LIII. 
Nor was all love shut from him, though his days 
Of passion had consumed themselves to dust. 
It is in vain that we would coldly gaze 
On such as smile upon us ; the heart must 
Leap kindly back to kindness, though disgust 
Hath wean'd it from all worldlings : thus he felt, 
For there was soft remembrance, and sweet trust 
In one fond breast, to which his own would melt, 
And in its tenderer hour on that his bosom dwelt. 



LIV. 

And he had learn'd to love — I know not why, 
For this in such as him seems strange of mood, — 
The helpless looks of blooming infancy, 
Even in its earliest nurture ; what subdued 
To change like this, a mind so far imbued 
With scorn of man, it little boots to know ; 
But thus it was ; and though in solitude 
Small power the nipp'd affections have to grow, 

In him this glow'd when all beside had ceased to glow, 
LV. 
And there was one soft breast, as hath been said, 
Which unto his was bound by stronger ties 
Than the church links withal ; and, though unwed, 
Thnt love was pure, and, far above disguise, 
Had stood the test of mortal enmities 
Still undivided, and cemented more 
By peril, dreaded most in female eyes ; 
But this was firm, and from a foreign shore 

Well to that heart might his these absent greetings pour 

1. 

The castled crag of Drachenfels " 

Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine, 
Whose breast of waters broadly shells 

Between the banks which bear the vine, 
And hills all rich with blossom'd trees, 

And fields which promise corn and wine, 
And scatter'd cities crowning these, 

Whose far white walls along them shine, 
Have strew'd a scene, which I should see 
With double joy wert thou with me ! 

2 
And peasant girls, with deep-blue eyes, 

And hands which offer early flowers, 
Walk smiling o'er this paradise ; 

Above, the frequent feudal towers 
Through green leaves lift their walls of gray, 

And many a rock which steeply lours 
And noble arch in proud decay, 

Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers ; 
But one thing want these banks of Rhine, — 
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine ! 

3. 
I send the lilies given to me ; 

Though long before thy hand they touch, 
I know that they must wither'd be, 

But yet reject them not as such ; 
For I have cherish'd them as dear, 

Because they yet may meet thine eye, 
And guide thy soul to mine even here, 

When thou heboid's! them drooping nigh, 
And know'st them gather'd by the Rhine, 
And offer'd from my heart to thine ! 

4. 
The river nobly foams and flows, 

The charm of this enchanted ground, 
And all its thousand turns disclose 

Some fresher beauty varying round ; 
The haughtiesl breast its wish might bound 

Through life to dwell delighted here ; 
Nor could on earth a spot be found 

To Nature and to me so dear, 
Could thy dear eyes in following mine 
Still sweeten more these banks of Rbuie ! 



LVI. 

By Coblentz, on a rise of gentle ground, 
There is a small and simple pyramid, 
Crowning the summit of the verdant mound; 
Beneath its base are heroes' ashes hid, 
Our enemy's, — but let not that forbid 
Honour to Marceau ! o'er whose early tomb 
Tears, big tears, gush'd from the rough soldier's lid, 
Lamenting and vet envying such a doom, 
Falling for France, whose rights he battled to resume. 

LVII. 

Brief, brave, and glorious was his young career, — 
His mourners were two hosts, his friends and foes ; 
And filly may the stranger lingering here 
Pray for his gallant spirit's bright repose ; 
For he was Freedom's champion, one of those, 
The few in number, who had not o'erstept 
The charter to chastise which she bestows 
On such as wield her weapons: he had kept 
The whiteness of his soul, and thus men o'er him wept. 12 

LVIII. 

Here Ehrenbreitstein, " with her shatter'd wall, 
Black with the miner's blast, upon her height 
Yet shows of what she was, when shell and ball 
Rebounding idly on her strength did light ; 
A tower of victory! from whence the Might 
Of baffled foes was watch'd along the plain: 
Bu1 peace destroy'd what war could never blight, 
And laid those proud roofs bare to summer's rain — 
On which the iron shower for years had pour'd in vain. 

LIX. 

Adieu to thee, fair Rhine ! How long delighted 
The stranger fain would linger on his way ! 
Thine is a scene alike where souls united 
Or lonely contemplation thus might stray ; 
And could the ceaseless vultures cease to prey 
On self-condemning bosoms, it were here, 
Where nature, nor too sombre nor too gay, 
Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere, 
Is to the mellow earth as autumn to the year. 

LX. 

Adieu to thee again! a vain adieu ! 
There can be no farewell to scene like thine ; 
The mind is colour'd by thy every hue ; 
And if reluctantly the eyes resign 
Their cherish'd gaze upon thee, lovely Rhine ! 
'T is with the thankful glance of parting praise; 
More mighty spots may rise — more glaring shine, 
But none unite in one attaching maze 
The brilliant, fair, and soft, — the glories of old days. 

LXI. 

The negligently grand, the fruitful bloom 
Of coming ripeness, the white city's sheen, 
The rolling stream, the precipice's gloom, 
The forest's growth, and Gothic walls between, 
The wild rocks shaped as they had turrets been 
In mockery of man's art; and these withal 
A race of faces happy as the Bcene, 
Whose fertile bounties here extend to all, 
Still sf ringing o'er thy banks, though empires near 
them fall. 



LXII. 

But these recede. Above me are the Alps, 
The palaces of nature, whoso vast walls 
Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy scalps, 
And throned eternity in icy halls 
Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls 
The avalanche — the thunderbolt of snow! 
All that expands the spirit, yet appals, 
Gather around these summits, as to show- 
How earth may pierce to heaven, yet leave vain m..n 
below. 

LXIII. 
But ere these matchless heights I dare to scan, 
There is a spot should not be pass'd in rain, — 
Moral! the proud, the patriot field ! where man 
May gaze on ghastly trophies of the slam, 
Nor blush for those who conquer'd mi that plain; 
Here Burgundy bequeath'd his tombless host, 
A bony heap, through ages to remain, 
Themselves their monument; — the Stygian coast 
Unsepulehred they roam'd, and shriek'd each w aiiderinj, 
ghost. 

LXIV. 
While Waterloo with Canno:'s carnage v.es, 
Morat and Marathon twin names shall stand ; 
They were true glory's stainless victories, 
Won by the unambitious heart and hand 
Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band, 
All unbought champions in no princely cause 
Of vice-entai'.'d corruption; they no land 
Doom'd to bewail the blasphemy of laws 
Making kings' rights divine, by some, Draconic clause. 

LXV. 

By a lone wall a lonelier column rears 
A gray and grief-worn aspect of old days ; 
'T is the last remnant of the wreck of years, 
And looks as with the wild bcwildcr'd gaze 
Of one to stone converted by amaze, 
Yet still with consciousness ; and there it stands 
Making a marvel tiiat it not decays, 
When the coeval pride of human hands, 
Levell'd Aventicum, 15 hath strew'd her subject lands. 

LXVI. 

And there — oh ! sweet and sacred be the name ! — 
Julia — the daughter, the devoted — gave 
Her youth to Heaven ; her heart, beneath a claim 
Nearest to heaven's, broke o'er a father's grave. 
Justice is sworn 'gainst tears, and hers would crave 
The life she lived in ; but the judge was just, 
And then she died on him she could not save. 
Their tomb was simple, and without a bust, 
And held within their urn one mind, one neart, om- 
dust. IC 

LXYII. 
But these arc deeds which should not pass away, 
And names that must not wither, though the eartli 
Forgets her empires with a just decay, 
The enslavi ra and tin- enslaved, their death and birth, 
The high, the mountain-majesty of worth 
Should be, and shall, survivor of its woe, 
And from its immortality look forth 
In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow, '* 
Impenshably pure beyond all things below. 



64 



BYRON S WORKS. 



LXVIII. 
Lake Leman WOOS me with its crystal face, 
The mirror where the stars ami mountains view 
The stillness of their aspect, in each trace 
Its clear depth yields of their fair height and hue: 
There is too much of man here, to look through 
With a 111 mind the might which 1 behold; 
Hut soon in me shall loneliness renew 
Thoughts hid, but not less cherish'd than of old, 
Ere mingling with the herd had penn'd me in their fold. 

LXIX. 

To fly from, need not be to hate, mankind ; 

All are not lit with them to stir and toil, 

Nor is it discontent to keep the mind 

Deep in its fountain, lest it overboil 

In the hot throng, where we become the spoil 

Of our infection, till too late and long 

We may deplore and struggle with the coil, 

In wretched interchange of wrong for wrong, 

'Midst a contentious world, striving where none are 
strong. 

LXX. 
There, in a moment, we may plunge our years 
In fatal penitence, and in the blight 
Of our own soul, turn all our blood to tears, 
And colour things to come with hues of night; 
The race of life becomes a hopeless flight 
To those that walk in darkness : on the sea, 
The boldest steer but where their ports invite, 
Hut there are wanderers o'er eternity, 

Whose bark drives on and on, and anchor'd ne'er shall be. 

LXXI. 

Is it not better, then, to be alone, 
And love earth only for its earthly sake ? 
By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone, 18 
Or the pure bosom of its nursing lake, 
Which feeds it as a mother who doth make 
A fair but froward infant her own care, 
Kissing its cries away as these awake ; — 
Is it not better thus our lives to wear, 
Than join the crushing crowd, doom'd to inflict or bear? 

LXXII. 

Nive not in myself, but I become 
Portion of that around me ; and to me, 
High mountains are a feeling, but the hum 
Of human cities torture : I can see 
Nothing to ioathe in nature, save to be 
A link reluctant in a fleshy chain, 
Class'd among creatures, when the soul can flee, 
And with the sky, the peak, the heaving plain 
Of ocean, or the stars, mingle, and not in vain. 

LXXIII. 

And thus I am absorb'd, and this is life : 
I look upon the peopled desert past 
As on a place of agony and strife, 
Where, for some sin, to so-row was I cast, 
To act and suffer, but remount at last 
With a fresh pmion; which I feel to spring, 
Though young, yet waxing vigorous as the blast 
Which V would cope with, on delighted wing, 
Spurning the eluy-cold bonds which round our being 
cling. 



LXXIV. 
And when, at length, the' mind shall be all free 
From wh,,t It hates iii this degraded form, 

Ri R ofitt Carnal life, save what shall be 

Existent happier in the fly and worm, — 
When elements to elements conform, 
And dust is as it should be, shall I not 
Feel all I sec, less dazzling, hut more warm? 
The bodiless thought 1 the spirit of each spot, 
Of which, even now, I share at times the immortal lot? 

LXXV. 

Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, a part 
Of me and of my soul, as I of them? 
Is not the love of these deep in my heart 
With a pure passion? should I not contemn 
All objects, if compared with these? and stem 
A tide of suffering, rather than forego 
Such feelings for the hard and worldly phlegm 
Of those whose eyes are only turn'd below, 

Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts which dare not 
glow ? 

LXXVI. 
But this is not mv theme ; and I return 
To that which is immediate, and require 
Those who find contemplation in the urn, 
To look on One, whose dust was once all fire, 
A native of the land where I respire 
The clear air for a while — a passing guest, 
Where he became a being, — whose desire 
Was to be glorious ; 't was a foolish quest, 

The which to gaui and keep, he sacrificed all rest. 

LXXVII. 

Here the self-torturing sophist, wild Rousseau, 
The apostle of affliction, he who threw 
Enchantment over passion, and from woe 
Wrung overwhelming eloquence, first drew 
The breath which made him wretched ; yet he knew 
How to make madness beautiful, and cast 
O'er erring deeds and thoughts a heavenly hue 
Of words, like sunbeams, dazzling as they past 
The eyes, which o'er them shed tears feelingly and fast. 

LXXVIII. 

His love was passion's essence — as a tree 
On fire by lightning ; with ethereal flame 
Kindled he was, and blasted ; for to be 
Thus, and enamour'd, were in him the same. 
But his was not the love of living dame, 
Nor of the dead who rise upon our dreams, 
But of ideal beauty, which became 
In him existence, and o'crflowing teems 
Along his burning page, distemper'd though it seems. 

LXXIX. 

Thin breathed itself to life in Julie, this 
Invested her with all that's wild and sweet; 
This hallow'd, too, the memorable kiss 
Which every morn his fever'd lip would greet, 
From hers, who but with friendship his would meet : 
But to that gentle touch, through brain and breast 
Flash'd the thrill'd spirit's love-devouring heat; 
In that absorbing sigh perchance more blest, 
Than vulgar minds may be with all they seek posscsL 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



Go 



LXXX. 

His life was one long war with self-sought foes, 
Or friends by him self-banish'd ; for his mind 
Had grown suspicion's sanctuary, and chose 
For its own cruel sacrifice, the kind, 
'Gainst whom he raged with fury strange and blind. 
Hut he was phrenzied, — wherefore, who may know ? 
Since cause might be which skill could never find ; 
But he was phrenzied by disease or woe, 
To that worst pitch of all which wears a reasoning show. 

LXXXI. 

For then he was inspired, and from him came, 
As from the Pytliian's mystic cave of yore, 
Those oracles which set the world in flame, 
Nor ceased to burn till kingdoms were no more: 
Did he not this for Fiance ? which lay before 
Bow'd to the inborn tyranny of years ? 
Broken and trembling, to the yoke she bore, 
Til' by the voice of him and his compeers, 

Roused up to too much wrath which follows o'crgrown 
fears ? 

LXXXII. 
They made themselves a fearful monument ! 
The wreck of old opinions — things which grew 
Breathed from the birth of time : the veil they rent, 
And what behind it lay, all earth shall view. 
But good with ill they also overthrew, 
Leaving but ruins, wherewith to rebuild 
Upon the same foundation, and renew 
Dungeons and thrones, which the same hour re-fill'd, 

As heretofore, because ambition was self-will'd. 

LXXXIII. 

But this will not endure, nor be endured ! 
Mankind have felt their strength, and made it felt. 
They might have used it better, but, allured 
By their new vigour, sternly have they dealt 
On one another ; pity ceased to melt 
With her once natural charities. But they, 
Who in oppression's darkness caved had dwelt, 
They were not eagles, nourish'd with the day ; 
What marvel then, at times, if they mistook their prey? 

LXXX IV. 

What deep wounds ever closed without a scar? 
The hearts bleed longest, and but heal to wear 
That which disfigures it; and they who war 
With their own hopes, and have been vanquish'd, bear 
Silence, but not submission : in his lair 
Fix'd passion holds his breath, until the hour 
Which shall atone for years ; none need despair : 
It came, it cometh, and will come, — the power 
To punish or forgive — in one we shall be slower. 

LXXXV. 

Clear, placid Lcman ! thy contrasted lake, 
With the wild world I dwell in, is a thing 
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake 
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring. 
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing 
To waft me from distraction ; once I loved 
Torn ocean's roar, but thy sort murmuring 
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved, 
Thatl with stern delights should e'er have been so moved. 
14 



LXXXVI. 

It is the hush of night, and all between 
Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet dear, 
Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen, 
Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear 
Precipitously steep ; and, drawing near, 
There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, 
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more ; 

LXXXVII. 

He is an evening reveller, who makes 
His life and infancy, and sings his fill ; 
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes 
Starts into voice a moment, then is still. 
There seems a floating whisper on the hill ; 
But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 
All silently their tears of love instil, 
Weeping themselves awav, till they infuse 
Deep into nature's breast the spirit of her hues. 

LXXXVIII. 

Ye stars ! which are the poetry of heaven ! 
If in your bright leaves we would read the fate 
Of men and empires, — 'tis to be forgiven, 
That in our aspirations to be great, 
Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state, 
And claim a kindred with you ; for ye are 
A beauty and a mystery, and create 
In us such love and reverence from afar, 

That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves 
a star. 

LXXXIX. 
All heaven and earth are still — though not in sleep, 
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most; 
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep : — 
All heaven and earth are still : from the high host 
Of stars, to the lull'd lake and mountain-coast, 
All is concenter'd in a life intense, 
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost, 
But hath a part of being, and a sense 

Of that which is of all Creator and defence. 

xc. 

Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt 
In solitude, where we are least alone ; 
A truth, which through our being then doth melt, 
And purifies from self: it is a tone, 
The soul and source of music, which makes known 
Eternal harmony, and sheds a charm, 
Like to the fabled Cytherea's zone, 
Binding all things with beauty; — 't would disarm 
The spectre Death, had he substantial power to harm 

XCI. 

Not vainly did the early Persian make 

His altar the high places and the peak 

Of earth-o'ergazing mountains, 20 and thus take 

A fit and imwallM temple, there to seek 

The spirit, in whose honour shrines are weak, 

Unrear'd of human hands. Come, and compare 

Columns and idol-mrelhngs, Goth or Greek, 

With nature's realms ot worship, earth and air, 

Nor fix on fond abodes to circumscribe thy praye> 



66 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XCH. 

The sky is changed ! — and such a change ! Oh night, 5 ' 
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong, 
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light 
Of a dark eye in woman ! Far along, 
From peak lo peak, the rattling crags among 
Leaps the live thunder ! Not from one lone cloud, 
But every mountain now hath found u tongue, 
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud, 
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud ! 

XCIII. 

And this is in the night: — most glorious night! 
Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let me be 
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight, — 
A portion of the tempest and of thee ! 
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea, 
An. I the big ruin comes dancing to the earth ! 
And now again 'tis black, — and now, tin: glee 
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth, 
As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's birth. 

xcrv. 

Now, where the swift Rhone cleaves his way between 
Heights which appear as lovers who have parted 
In hate, whose mining depths so intervene, 
That they can meet no more, though broken-hearted ; 
Though in their souls, which thus each other thwarted, 
Love was the very root of the fond rage 
Which blighted their life's bloom, and then departed ; 
Itself expired, but leaving them an age 
Of years all winters, — war within themselves to wage. 

xcv. 

Now, where the quick Rhone thus has cleft his way, 
The mightiest of the storms hath ta'en his stand : 
For here, not one, but many, make their play, 
And fling their thunder-bolts from hand to hand, 
Flashing and cast around : of all the band, 
The brightest through these parted hills hath fork'd 
His lightnings, — as if he did understand, 
That in such gaps as desolation work'd, 
There the hot shaft should blast whatever therein lurk'd. 

XCVI. 

Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings ! ye ! 
With night, and clc qds, and thunder, and a soul 
To make these felt and feeling, well may be 
Things that have made me watchful ; the far roll 
Of vour departing voices is the knoll 
Of what in me is sleepless, — if I rest. 
But where of ye, oh tempests ! is the goal ? 
Are ye like those within the human breast? 
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, some high nest? 

XCVII. 
Could I embody and unbosom now 
That which is most within me, — could I wreak 
My thoughts upon expression, and thus throw 
Soul, heart, mind, passions, feelings, strong or weak, 
All that I would have sought, and all I seek, 
Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe — into one word, 
And that one word were Lightning, I would speak; 
J5ut as it is, I live and die unheard, 
VVilb a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as t Bword. 



XCVIII. 
The morn is up again, the dewy mom, 
Willi breath all incense, and with cheek all bloom, 
Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn, 
And living as if earth contain'd no tomb, — 
And glowing into day : we may resume 
The march of our existence : and thus I, 
Still on thy shores, fair Leman ! may find room 
And food for meditation, nor pass by 
Much that may give us pause, if ponder d fittingly. 

XCIX. 

Clarens! sweet Clarens, birth-place of deep love! 
Thine air is the young breath of passionate thought . 
Thy trees take root in love ; the snows above 
The very glaciers have his colours caught, 
And sunset into rose-hues s<es them wrought n 
By rays which sleep there I vingly : the rocks, 
The permanent crags, tell h sre of love, who sought 
In them a refuge from the worldly sho< -ks, 

Which stir and sting the soul with hope that woos, the* 
mocks. 

C. 
Clarens! by heavenly feet thy paths are trod, — 
Undying love's, who here ascends a throne 
To which the steps are mountains ; where the god 
Is a pervading life to light, — so shown 
ISot on those summits solely, nor alone 
In the still cave and forest ; o'er the (lower 
His eye is sparkling, and his breath hath blown, 
His soft and summer breath, whose tender power 

Passes the strength of storms in their most desolate hoir 

CI. 

All things are here of him ; from the black [lines, 
Which are his shade on high, and the loud roar 
Of torrents, where he listeneth, to the vines 
Which slope his green path downward to the shoie 
Where the bow'd waters meet him and adore, 
Kissing his feet with murmurs ; and the wood, 
The covert of old trees, with trunks all hoar, 
But light leaves, young as joy, sU'nds where it stood, 
Offering to him, and his, a populous solitude. 

on. 

A populous solitude of bees and birds, 
And fairy-form'd and many-colour'd th'tigs, 
Who worship him with notes n-ore sweet that; words, 
And innocently open their glad wings, 
Fearless and full of hie: the gush of springs, 
And fall of lofty fountains, and the bend 
Of stirring branches, and the bud which brings 
The swiftest thought of beauty, here extend, 
Mingling, and made by love, unto or.e mighty end. 

CHI. 

He who hath loved not, here would learn that lore, 
And make his heart a spirit ; he who knows 
That tender mystery, will love the more, 
For this is love's recess, where vain nun's woes, 
Ami the world's waste, havedriven him far from those, 
For 't is his nature to advance or die ; 
He stands not still, but or decays, or grows 
Into a boundless blessing, which may vie 
With the immortal lights, in its eternity ' 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



G7 



CIV. 

'Twas not for fiction chose Rousseau this spot, 
Peopling it with affections ; but he found 
It was the scene which passion must allot 
To the mind's purified beings ; 'twas the ground 
Where early love his Psyche's zone unbound, 
And hallow'd it with loveliness : 't is lone, 
And wonderful, and deep, and hath a sound, 
And sense, and sight of sweetness ; here the Rhone 
Hath spread himself a couch, the Alps have rear'd a 
throne. 

cv. 

Lausanne ! and Forney ! ye have been the abodes 23 
Of names which unto you bequeath'd a name ; 
Mortals, who sought and found, by dangerous roads, 
A path to perpetuity of fame : 
They were gigantic minds, and their steep aim 
Was, Titan-like, on daring doubts to pile 
Thoughts which should call down thunder and the 

flame 
Of Heaven, again assail'd, if Heaven the white 
On man and man's research could deign do more than 

smile. 

CVT. 
The one was fire and fickleness, a child, 
Most mutable in wishes, but in mind 
A wit as various, — gay, grave, sage, or wild,— 
Historian, bard, philosopher combined ; 
He multiplied himself among mankind, 
The Proteus of their talents : but his own 
Breathed most in ridicule, — which, as the wind, 
Blew where it listed, laying all things prone, — 
Now to o'erthrow a fool, and now to shake a throne. 

CVII. 

The other, deep and slow, exhausting thought, 
And hiving wisdom with each studious year, 
In meditation dwelt, with learning wrought, 
And shaped his wea; on with an edge severe, 
Sapping a solemn creed with solemn sneer: 
The lord of irony, — that master-spell, 
Which stung his foes to wrath, which grew from fear, 
And doom'd him to the zealot's ready hell, 
Which answers to all doubts so eloquently well. 

CVIII. 

Yet, peace be with their ashes, — for by them, 
If merited, the penalty is paid ; 
It is not ours to judge, — far less condemn ; 
The hour must come when such things shall be made 
Known unto all, — or hope and dread allay'd 
By slumber, on one pillow, — in the dust, 
Which, thus much we are sure, must lie decay'd ; 
And when it shall revive, as is our trust, 
'T will be to be forgiven, or suffer what is just. 

CIX. 

But let me quit man's works, again to read 
His Maker's spread around me, and suspend 
This page, which from my reveries 1 feed, 
Until it seems prolonging without end. 
The clouds above me to the white Alps tend, 
And I must pierce them, and survey whate'er 
May be permitted, as mv steps I bend 
To their most great and growing region, where 
The earth to her embrace compels the power of air. 



CX. 

Italia ! too, — Italia ! looking on thee, 
Full flashes on the soul the light of ages, 
Since the fierce Carthaginian almost won thee, 
To the last halo of the chiefs and sages, 
Who glorify thy consecrated pages ; 
Thou wort the throne and grave of empires ; still, 
The fount at which the parting mind assuages 
Her thirst of knowledge, quaffing there her fill, 
Flows from the eternal source of Rome's imperial hill 

CXI. 

Thus far I have proceeded in a theme 
Renew'd with no kind auspices : — to fi el 
We are not what we have been, and t<> deem 
We are not what we should be, — and t,, steel 
The heart against itself; and to conceal, 

With a proud caution, love, or hate, or aught, 

Passion or feeling, purpose, grief or zeal, — 
Which is the tyrant spirit of our thought ; 
Is astern task of soul : — No matter, — it is tau>dit. 

cm 

And for these words, thus woven into song, 
It may be that they are a harmless wile, — 
The colouring of the scenes which fleet along, 
Which I would seize, in passing, to beguile 
My breast, or that of others, for a while. 
Fame is the thirst of youth, — but I am not 
So young as to regard men's frown or smile, 
As loss or guerdon of a glorious lot ; 
I stood and stand alone, — remtmber'd or forgot. 

CXIII. 

I have not loved the world, nor the world me ; 
I have not flatter'd its rank breath, nor bow'd 
To its idolatries a patient knee, — 
Nor coin'd my cheek to smiles, — nor cried aloud 
In worship of an echo ; in the crowd 
They could not deem me one of such ; I stood 
Among them, but not of them ; in a shroud 
Of thoughts which were not their thoughts, and stiP 
could, 
Had I not filed 24 my mind, which thus itself subdued. 

CXIV. 

I have not loved the world, nor the world mc, — 
But let us part fair foes ; I do believe 
Though I have found them not, that there may be 
Words which are things, — hopes which will not an 

ceive, 
And virtues which are merciful, nor weave 
Snares for the failing : I would also deem 
O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve ; 2S 
That two, or one, are almost what they seem, — 
That goodness is no name, and happiness no dream. 

CXV. 

My daughter! with thy name this song begun — 
My daughter! with thv name thus much shall entf- 
I see thee not, — I hear thee not, — but none 
Can be so wrapt in thee ; thou art the friend 
To w horn the shadows of far years extend ■ 
Albeit my brow thou never shouldst behold, 
My voice shall with thy future visions bh n I, 
And reach into thy heart, — when mine is cold, . 
A token and a tone, even from thy father's mcuUL 



f.8 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CXVI. 

To aid thy mind's developement, — to watch 
Thv dawn of little joys, — to sit and see 
Almost thy very growth, — to view thee catch 
Knowledge of objects, — wonders yet to thee ! 
To hold thee lightly on a gentle knee, 
And print on thy soft check a parent's kiss, — 
This, it should seem, was not reserved for me ; 
Yet this was in my nature: — as it is, 
[ know not what is there, yet something like to this. 

CXVII. 

Yet, though dull hate as duty should be taught, 
I know that thou wilt love me ; though my name 
Should be shut from thee, as a spell still fraught 
With desolation, — and a broken claim: 
Though the grave closed between us, 't were the 

same — 
I know that thou wilt love mc ; though to drain 
My blood from out thy being, were an aim, 
Ami an attainment, — all would be in vain, — 
Still liiou wouldst love me, still that more than life retain. 

CXVIII. 

The child of love, — though born in bitterness, 
And nurtured in convulsion. Of thy sire 
These were the elements, — and thine no less. 
As yet such are around thee, — but thy fire 
Shall be more temper'd, and thy hope far higher. 
Sweet be thy cradled slumbers ! O'er the sea, 
And from the mountains where I now respire, 
Fain would I waft such blessing upon thee, 
As, with a sigh, I deem thou might's! have been to me! 



CANTO IV. 



Visto ho Toscana, Lombardia, Romagna, 
Uuul monte clie divide, c quel che serra 
Itulia, e un mare e 1' altio, die la bagna. 

ARIOSTO, Satira Hi. 



JOHN HOBHOUSE, ESQ. A.M. F.R.S. 
etc. etc. etc. 

Alv DEAR HoBHOCSE, 

After an interval of eight years between the com- 
position of the first and last cantos of Childe Harold, 
the conclusion of the poem is about to be submitted to 
the public. In parting with so old a friend, it is not ex- 
traordinary that I should recur to one still older and 
better, — to one who has beheld the birth and death of 
the other, and to whom I am far more indebted for the 
social advantages of an enlightened friendship, than — 
though not ungrateful — I can, or could be, to Childe 
Harold, for any public favour reflected through the 
poem on the poet, — to one, whom I have known long, 
and accompanied far, whom I have found wakeful over 
my sickness, and kind in my sorrow, glad in my pros- 
perity, and firm in my adversity, true in counsel, and 
trusiy in peril — to a friend often tried, and never found 
wanting; — to yourself. 

In so doing, I recur from fiction to truth, and in dedi- 
cating to vou in its complete, or at least concluded 



state, a poetical work which is the longest, the most 
thoughtful, and comprehensive of my compositions, I 
wish to do honour to myself by the record of many 
years' iiuimacv with a man of learning, of talent, of 
steadiness, and of honour. It is not for minds like ours 
to give or to receive flattery ; yet the praises of sin- 
cerity have ever been permitted to the voice of friend- 
ship, and it is not for you, nor even for others, but to 
relieve a heart which has not elsew here, or lately, bean 
so much accustomed to the encounter of good-will as 
to withstand the shock firmly, that I thus attempt to 
commemorate your good qualities, or rather the ad- 
vantages which I have derived from their exertion. 
Even the recurrence of the date of this letter, the an- 
niversary of the most unfortunate day of my past ex- 
istence, but which cannot poison my future, while I 
retain the resource of your friendship, and of my own 
faculties, will henceforth have a more agreeable recol- 
lection for both, inasmuch as it will remind us of this 
my attempt to thank you for an indefatigable regard, 
such as few men have experienced, and no one could 
experience without thinking better of his species and 
of himself. 

It has been our fortune to traverse together, at vari- 
ous periods, the countries of chivalry, history, and 
fable — Spain, Greece, Asia Minor, and Italy : and 
what Athens and Constantinople were to us a few years 
ago, Venice and Rome have been more recently. The 
poem also, or the pilgrim, or both, have accompanied 
me from first to last ; and perhaps it may be a pardon- 
able vanity which induces me to reflect with compla- 
cency on a composition which in some degree connects 
me with the spot where it was produced, and the ob- 
jects it would fain describe ; and however unworthy it 
may be deemed of those magical and memorable abodes, 
however short it may fall of our distant conceptions 
and immediate impressions, yet as a mark of respect 
for what is venerable, and a feeling for what is glorious, 
it has been to me a source of pleasure in the produc- 
tion, and I part with it with a kind of regret, which I 
hardly suspected that events could have left me for 
imaginary objects. 

With regard to the conduct of the last canto, there 
will be found less of the pilgrim than in any of the 
preceding, and that little slightly, if at all, separated 
from the author speaking in his own person. The fact 
is, that I had become weary of drawing a line which 
every one seemed determined not to perceive : like the 
Chinese in Goldsmith's " Citizen of the World," whom 
nobody would believe to be a Chinese, it was in vain 
that I asserted, and imagined, that I had drawn a dis- 
tinction between the author and the pilgrim ; and trie 
very anxiety to preserve this difference, and disap- 
pointment at finding it unavailing, so far crushed my 
efforts in the composition, that I determined to abandon 
it altogether — and have done so. The opinions which 
have been, or may be, formed on that subject, are now 
a matter of indifference ; the work is to depend on it- 
self, and not on the writer ; and the author, who has no 
resources in his own mind beyond the reputation, tran- 
sient or permanent, which is to arise from his literary 
efforts, deserves the fate of authors. 

In the course of the following canto it was my inten- 
tion, either in the text or in the notes, to have touched 
jupon the present state of Italian literature, and nerhap* 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



G9 



of manners. But the tc\t, within the limits I proposed, 
I soon found hardly sufficient for the labyrinth of ex- 
ternal objects and the consequent reflections ; and for 
the whole of the notes, excepting a few of the shortest, 
[ am indebted to yourself, and these were necessarily 
limited to the elucidation of the text. 

It is also a delicate, and no very grateful task, to 
dissert upon the literature and manners of a nation so 
dissimilar ; and requires an attention and impartiality 
which would induce us, — though perhaps no inatten- 
tive observers, nor ignorant of the language or customs 
of the people amongst whom we have recently abode, 
—to distrust, or at least defer our judgment, and more 
larrowly examine our information. The state of lite- 
"ary, as well as political party, appears to run, or to 
hate run, so high, that for a stranger to steer impar- 
tially between them is next to impossible. It may be 
enough, then, at least for my purpose, to quote from 
iheir own beautiful language — "Mi pare che in un 
■aaese tutto poetico, che vanta la lingua la piu nobile ed 
insieme la piu dolce, lutte tutte le vie diverse si possono 
tentare, e che sinche la patria di Alrieri e di Monti non 
na perduto l'antico valore, in tutte cssa dovrebbe essere 
•a prima." Italy has great names still — Canova, Monti, 
UgoFoscolo, Pindemonti, Yisconti, Morelli, Cicognara, 
Adbrizzi, Nezzofanti, Mai, Musloxidi, Aglietti, and 
Vacca, will secure to the present generation an hon- 
ourable place in most of the departments of art, sci- 
ence, and belles-lettres ; and in some the very highest ; 
— Europe — the world — has but one Canova. 

It has been somewhere said by Allieri, that "La 
pianta uomo nasce piu robusta in Italia che in qualun- 
que altra terra — e che gli stessi atroci delitti che vi si 
commettono ne sono una prova." Without subscribing 
to the latter part of his proposition, a dangerous doc- 
trine, the truth of which may be disputed on better 
grounds, namely, that the Italians are in no respect 
more ferocious than their neighbours, that man must 
be wilfully blind, or ignorantly heedless, who is not 
struck with the extraordinary capacity of this people, 
or, if such a word be admissible, their capabilities, 
the facility of their acquisitions, the rapidity of their 
tonceptions, the fire of their genius, their sense of 
beauty, and, amidst all the disadvantages of repeated 
revolutions, the desolation of battles, and the despair 
of ages, their still unquenched " longing after immor- 
tality," — the immortality of independence. And when 
we ourselves, in riding round the walls of Rome, heard 
the simple lament of the labourers' chorus, "Roma! 
Roma ! Roma ! Roma non e piu come era prima," it 
was difficult not to contrast this melancholy dirge with 
the bacchanal roar of the songs of exultation still yelled 
from the London taverns, over the carnage of Mont St. 
Jean, and the betrayal of Genoa, of Italy, of France, 
and of the world, by men whose conduct you yourself 
have exposed in a work worthy of the better days of 
our history. For me, 

"Non mnvcro mai rnnla 

Ovc la turba di sue cianre assorda." 

What Italy has gained by the late transfer of nations, 
it were useless for Englishmen to inquire, till it becomes 
ascertained that England has acquired something more 
than a permanent army and a suspended Habeas Cor- 
pus ; it is enough for them to look at home. For what 
the\ have done abroad, and especially in the South, 
K 



" verily they will have their reward," and at no very 
Distant period. 

Wishing you, my dear Hobhouse, a safe and agree- 
able return to that country whose real welfare can be 
dearer to hone than to yourself, I dedicate, to you this 
poem in its completed state ; and repeal once more how 
truly I am ev( r 

Your obliged 

And affectionate friend, 

BYRON. 
Venice, January 2, 1818. 



I. 

I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs ; ' 

A palace and a prison on each hand : 

I saw from out the wave her structures rise 

As from the stroke of the enchanter's wand : 

A thousand years their cloudy wings expand 

Around me, and a dying glory smiles 

O'er the far times, when many a subject land 

Look'd to the winged Lion's marble piles, 

Where Venice sate in state, throned on her hundred 
isles ! 

II. 
She looks a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean, 2 
Rising with her tiara of proud towers 
At airy distance, with majestic motion, 
A ruler of the waters and their powers : 
And such she was ; — her daughters had their dowers 
From spoils of nations, and the exhaustlcss East 
Pour'd in her lap all gems in sparkling showers : 
In purple was she robed, and of her feast 

Monarchs partook, and deem'd their dignity increased. 

III. 

In Venice Tasso's echoes arc no more, 5 
And silent rows the songless gondolier; 
Her palaces are crumbling to the shore, 
And music meets not always now the ear : 
Those days are gone — but beauty still is here. 
States fall, arts fade — but Nature doth not die : 
Nor yet forget how Yenice once was dear, 
The pleasant place of all festivity, 
The revel of the earth, the masque of Italy ! 

IV. 

But unto us she hath a spell beyond 
Her name in story, and her long array 
Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms despono. 
Above the dogcless city's vanish'd sway ; 
Ours is a trophy which will not decay 
With the Rialto ; Shylock and the Moor, 
And Pierre, cannot be swept or worn away 
The keystones of the arch ! though all were o'er, 
For us re-peopled were the solitary shore. 

V. 

The beings of the mind arc not of clay ; 

Essentially immortal, they create 

And multiply in us a brighter ray 

And more beloved existence: that which taVc 

Prohibits to dull life, in this our state 

Of mortal bondage, by these spirits supplied 

First exiles, then replaces what we hale ; 

Watering the heart whose early flowers have di 

An 1 with a fresher growth replenishing the void. 



70 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



VI. 

Such is the refuge of our youth and age, 
The first from hope, the last from vacancy; 
And this worn feeling peoples many a page, 
And, may be, that which grows beneath mine eye: 
Yet thrre are things whose strong reality 
Outshines our fairy-land ; in shape and hues 
More beautiful than our fantastic sky, 
And the strange constellations which the muse 
O'er her wild universe is skilful to diffuse : 

VII. 

I saw or drcam'd of such, — but let them go — 
They came like truth, and disappear'd like dreams : 
And whatsoe'er they were — are now but so: 
I could replace them if I would, still teems 
My mind with many a form which aptly seems 
Such as I sought for, and at moments found ; 
Let these too go — for waking reason deems 
Such overweening phantasies unsound, 
And other voices speak, and other sights surround. 

VIII. 

I 've taught me other tongues — and in strange eyes 
Have made me not a stranger ; to the mind 
Which is itself, no changes bring surprise ; 
Nor is it harsh to make, nor hard to find 
A country with — ay, or without mankind ; 
Yet was I born where men are proud to be, 
Not without cause ; and should I leave behind 
The inviolate island of the sage and free, 
And seek me out a home by a remoter sea? 

IX. 

Perhaps I loved it well : and should I lay 
My ashes in a soil which is not mine, 
My spirit shall resume it — if we may 
Unbodied choose a sanctuary. I twine 
My hopes of being remember'd in my line 
With my land's language : if too fond and far 
These aspirations in their scope incline, — 
If my fame should be, as my fortunes are, 
Of hasty growth and blight, and dull oblivion bar 



My name from out the temple where the dead 
Are honour'd by the nations — let it be — 
And light the laurels on a loftier head ! 
And be the Spartan's epitaph on me — 
" Sparta hath many a worthier son than he." 4 
Meantime I seek no sympathies, nor need ; 
The thorns which I have reap'd are of the tree 
I planted ; — they have torn me, — and I bleed : 

I should have known what fruit would spring from such 
a seed. 

XI. 
The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord : 
And, annual marriage now no more renew'd, 
The Bucentaur lies rotting unrestored, 
Neglected garment of her widowhood ! 
St. Mark yet sees his lion where he stood s 
Stand, but in mockery of his withcr'd power, 
Over the proud Place where an emperor sued, 
And monarchs gazed and envied in the hour 

When Venice was a queen with an unequall'd dower. 



XII. 

The Suabian sued, and now the Austrian reign 
An emperor tramples where an emperor knelt , 
Kingdoms are shrunk to provinces, and chains 
Clank over sceptred cities ; nations melt 
From power's high pinnacle, when they have fe/ 
The sunshine for a while, and downward go 
Like lauwine loosen'd from the mountain's belt; 
Oh for one hour of blind old Dandolo ! 7 
Th' octogenarian chief, Byzantium's conquering fo* 

XIII. 

Before St. Mark still glow his steeds of brass, 
Their gilded collars glittering in the sun ; 
But is not Doria's menace come to pass ? * 
Are they not bridled ? — Venice, lost and won, 
Her thirteen hundred years of freedom done, 
Sinks, like a sea-weed, into whence she rose ! 
Better be whelm'd beneath the waves, and shun, 
Even in destruction's depth, her foreign foes, 
From whom submission wrings an infamous repose. 

xrv. 

In youth she was all glory, — a new Tyre, — 
Her very by-word sprung from victory, 
The " Planter of the Lion," 9 which through fire 
And blood she bore o'er subject earth and sea ; 
Though making many slaves, herself still free, 
And Europe's bulwark 'gainst the Ottomite ; 
Witness Troy's rival, Candia! Vouch it, ye 
Immortal waves that saw Lepanto's fight ! 
For ye are names no time nor tyranny can blight. 

XV. 

Statues of glass — all shiver'd — the long file 
Of her dead doges are declined to dust ; 
But where they dwelt, the vast and sumptuous pile 
Bespeaks the pageant of their splendid trust ; 
Their sceptre broken, and their sword in rust, 
Have yielded to the stranger : empty halls, 
Thin streets, and foreign aspects, such as must 
Too oft remind her who and what enthrals, l0 
Have flung a desolate cloud o'er Venice' lovely walls. 

XVI. 

When Athens' armies fell at Syracuse, 
And fetter'd thousands bore the yoke of war, 
Redemption rose up in the Attic Muse, " 
Her voice their only ransom from afar : 
See ! as they chant the tragic hymn, the car 
Of the o'ermastcr'd victor stops, the reins 
Fall from his hands — his idle scimitar 
Starts from its belt — he rends his captive's chains, 
And bids him thank the bard for freedom and his strains. 

XVII. 

Thus, Venice, if no stronger claim were thine, 
Were all thy proud historic deeds forgot, 
Thy choral memory of the bard divine, 
Thy love of Tasso, should have cut the knot 
Which ties thee to thy tyrants ; and thy lot 
Is shameful to the nations, — most of all, 
Albion ! to thee : the ocean queen should not 
Abandon ocean's children ; in the fall 
Of Venice think of thine, despite thy watery wall. 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



71 



XVIII. 

I loved her from rny boyhood — she to me 
Was as a fairy city of the heart, 
Rising like water-columns from the sea, 
Of joy the sojourn, and of wealth the mart ; 
Ami Otway, Radcliffe, Schiller, Shakspeare's art,' 2 
Had stamp'd her image m me, and even so, 
Although I found her thus, we did not part, 
Perchance even dearer in her day of woe, 
Than when she was a boast, a marvel, and a show. 

XIX. 

I can repeople with the past — and of 
The present there is still for eye and thought, 
And meditation chasten'd down, enough ! 
And more, it may be, than I hoped or sought : 
And of the happiest moments which were wrought 
Within the web of my existence, some 
From thee, fair Venice ! have their colours caught : 
There are some feelings time cannot benumb, 
Nor torture shake, or mine would now be cold and dumb. 

XX. 

But from their nature will the tannen grow n 
Loftiest on loftiest and least shelter'd rocks, 
Rooted in barrenness, where nought below 
Of soil supports them 'gainst the Alpine shocks 
Of eddying storms ; yet springs the trunk, and mocks 
The howling tempest, till its height and frame 
Are worthy of the mountains from whose blocks 
Of bleak, gray granite, into life it came, 
And grew a giant tree ; — the mind may grow the same. 

XXI. 

Existence may be borne, and the deep root 
Of life and sufferance make its firm abode 
In bare and desolated bosoms : mute 
The camel labours with the heaviest load, 
And the wolf dies in silence, — not bestow'd 
In vain should such example be ; if they, 
Things of ignoble or of savage mood, 
Endure and shrink not, we of nobler clay 
May temper it to bear, — it is but for a day. 

XXII. 
All suffering doth destroy, or is destroy'd, 
Even by the sufferer ; and, in each event 
Ends : — some, with hope replenish'd and rebuoy'd, 
Return to whence they came — with like intent, 
And weave their web again ; some, bow'd and bent 
Wax gray and ghastly, withering ere their time, 
And perish with the reed on which they leant ; 
Some seek devotion, toil, war, good or crime, 
According as their souls were form'd to sink or climb 

XXIII. 

But ever and anon of grief subdued 
There comes a token like a scorpion's sting, 
Scarce seen, but with fresh bitterness imbued ; 
And slight withal may be the things which bring 
Back on the heart the weight which it would fling 
Aside for ever : it may be a sound — 
A tone of music, — summer's eve — or spring, 
A flower — the wind — the ocean — which shall wound, 
Striking the electric chain wherewith we are quickly 
bound; 



XXIV. 

And how and why we know not, nor can trace 

Home to its cloud this lightning of the mind, 

But feel the shock renew'd, nor can efface 

The blight and blackening which it leaves behind, 

Which out of things familiar, undesign'd, 

When least we deem of such, calls up to v.ew 

The spectres whom no exorcism can bind, 

The cold — the changed — perchance the dead — anew 

The mourn'd, the loved, the lost — too many! yet liDW 
few! 

XXV. 
But my soul wanders ; I demand it back 
To meditate amongst decay, and stand 
A ruin amidst ruins ; there to track 
Fallen states and buried greatness, o'er a land 
Which was the mightiest in its old command, 
And is the loveliest, and must ever be 
The master-mould of nature's heavenly hand, 
Wherein were cast the heroic and the free, 

The beautiful, the brave — the lords of earth and sea, 

XXVI. 

The commonwealth of kings, the men of Rome ! 
And even since, and now, fair Italy ! 
Thou art the garden of the world, the home 
Of all art yields, and nature can decree; 
Even in thy desert, what b like to thee ? 
Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste 
More rich than other climes' fertility ; 
Thy wreck a glory, and thy ruin graced 
With an immaculate charm which cannot be defaced 

XXVII. 

The moon is up, and yet it is not night — 
Sunset divides the sky with her — a sea 
Of glory streams along the Alpine height 
Of blue Friuli's mountains ; heaven is free 
From clouds, but of all colours seems to be 
Melted to one vast Iris of the west, 
Where the day joins the past eternity ; 
While, on the other hand, meek Dian's cresr 
Floats through the azure air — an island of the blest f 

XXVIII. 

A single star is at her side, and reigns 
With her o'er half the lovely heaven ; but still ' 
Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and remains 
Roll'd o'er the peak of the far Rhstian hill, 
As day and night contending were, until 
Nature reclaim'd her order : — gently flows 
The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil 
The odorous purple of a new-born rose, 

Which streams upon her stream, and glass'd within K 
glows, 

XXIX. 
Fill'd with the face of heaven, which, from afar, 
Comes down upon the waters ; all its. hues, 
From the rich sunset to the rising star, 
Their magical variety diffuse: 
And now they change ; a paler shadow strews 
Its mantle o'er the mountains ; parting dav 
Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues 
With a new colour as it gasps away, 

The last still loveliest, till — 't is gone — and all is gra» 



72 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XXX. 
There is a tomb in Arqua ; — rear'il in air, 
Pillar'd in llit'ir sarcophagus, rej>ose 
The bones of Laura's lover ; here repair 
Many familiar with his well-sung woes, 
The pilgrims of lus genius. lie arose 
To raise a language, and his land reclaim 
From the dull yoke of her barbaric foes : 
Watering the Iree which hears his lady's name" 
With his melodious tears, he gave himself to fame. 

XXXI. 

They keep his dust in Arqua, where he died ; 16 
The mountain-village where his hitter days 
Went down the vale of years; and 'lis their pride — 
An honest pride — and let it be their praise, 
To offer to the passing stranger's gaze 
His mansion and his sepulchre ; both plain 
And venerably simple, such as raise 
A feeling more accordant with his strain 
Than if a pyramid form'd his monumental fane. 

XXXII. 

And ihe soft quiet hamlet where he dwelt 
Is one of that complexion which seems made 
/Tor those who their mortality have felt, 
And sought a refuge from their hopes decay'd 
In the deep umbrage of a green hill's shade, 
Which shows a distant prospect far away 
Of busy cities, now in vain display'd, 
For they can lure no further ; and the ray 
Of a bright sun can make sufficient holiday. 

XXXIII. 

Developing the mountains, leaves, and flowers, 
And shining in the brawling brook, wherc-by, 
Clear as its current, glide the sauntering hours 
With a calm languor, which, though to the eye 
Idlesse it seem, hath its morality. 
If from society we learn to live, 
'T is solitude should teach us how to die; 
It hath no flatterers ; vanity can give 
No hollow aid ; alone — man with his God must strive. 

XXXIV. 

Or, it may be, with demons, 1T who impair 
The strength of better thoughts, and seek their prey 
In melancholy bosoms, such as were 
Of moody texture from their earliest day, 
And loved to dwell in darkness and dismay, 
Deeming themselves predestined to a doom 
Which is not of the pangs that pass awav ; 
Making the sun like blood, the earth a tomb, 
The tomb a hell, and hell itself a murkier gloom. 

XXXV. 

J 1 errara ! in thy wide and grass-grown streets, 
Whose symmetry was not for bolitude, 
There seems as 't were a curse upon the scats 
Of former sovereigns, and the antique brood 
• •f Este, which for many an age made good 
Its strength within thy walls, and was of yore 
Patron or tyratft, as the changing mood 
Of petty power impell'd, of those who wore 
Hie w-ei-'h which Dante's brow alone had worn before. 



XXXVI. 

And Tasso is their glory and their shame. 
Hark to his strain ! and then survey his cell ! 
And see how dearly carn'd Torquato's fame, 
And where Alfonso bade his poet dwell : 
The miserable despot could not quell 
The insulted mind he sought to quench, and blend 
With the surrounding maniacs, in the hell 
Where he had plunged it. Glory without end 
Scatter'd the clouds away — and on that name attend 

XXXVII. 

The tears and praises of all time ; while thine 
Would rot in its oblivion — in the sink 
Of worthless dust, which from thy boasted line 
Is shaken into nothing ; but the link 
Thou formest in his fortunes bids us think 
Of thy poor malice, naming thee with scorn- 
Alfonso ! how thy ducal pageants shrink 
From thee ! if in another station born, 
Scarce fit to be the slave of him thou mad'st to mourn. 

XXXVIII. 
T7io« .' form'd to eat, and be despised, and die, 
Even as the beasts that perish, save that thnu 
Hadst a more splendid trough and wider sly : 
He! with a glory round his furrow'd brow, 
Which emanated then, and dazzles now 
In face of all his foes, the Cruscan quire, 
And Boileau, whose rash envy could allow ,s 
No strain which shamed his country's creaking Ivre, 
That whetstone of the teeth — monotony in w ire ! 

XXXIX. 

Peace to Torquato's injured shade ! 'twas his 

In life and death to be the mark where Wrong 

Aim'd with her poison'd arrows ; but to miss. 

Oh, victor unsurpass'd in modern song ! 

Each year brings forth its millions ; but how long 

The tide of generations shall roll on, 

And not the whole combined and countless throng 

Compose a mind like thine ! though all in one 

Condensed their scatter'd rays, they would not form u 
sun. 

XL. 
Great as thou art, yet parallel'd by those, 
Thy countrymen, before thee born to shine, 
The bards of hell and chivalry : first rose 
The Tuscan father's Comedy Divine ; 
Then, not unequal to the Florentine, 
The southern Scott, the minstrel who call'd forth 
A new creation with his magic line, 
And, like the Ariosto of the north, 

Sang ladye-lovc and war, romance and knightly wort! . 

XLI. 

The lightning rent from Ariosto's bust " 
The iron crown of laurel's mimick'd leaves ; 
Nor was the ominous element unjust, 
For the true laurel-wreath which glory weaves 80 
Is of the tree no bolt of thunder cleaves, 
And the false semblance but disgraced his brow ; 
Yet still, if fondly superstition grieves, 
Know that the lightning sanctifies below ai 
Whate'er it strikes ; — yon head is doubly sacred now. 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



73 



XLII. 

Italia ! oh Itana ! thou who hast S2 
The fatal gift of beauty, which became 
A funeral dower of present woes and past, 
On thy sweet brow is sorrow plough'd by shame, 
And annals graved in characters of Same. 
Oh God ! that thou wert in thy nakedness 
Less lovely or more powerful, and couldst claim 
Thy right, and awe the robbers back who press 
To siied thy blood, and drink the tears of thy distress ; 

XLIII. 

Then might'st thou more appal ; or, less desired, 
Be homely and be peaceful, undepWed 
For thy destructive charms ; then, still untired, 
Would not be seen the armed torrents pour'd 
Down the deep Alps ; nor woidd the hostile horde 
Of many-nation'd spoilers from the Po 
Quaff blood and water ; nor the stranger's sword 
Be thv sad weapo i of defence, and so, 
Victor or vanquish'd, thou the slave of friend or foe. 

XLIV. 

Wandering in youth, I traced the path of him,- 3 
The Roman friend of Rome's least mortal mind, 
The friend of Tullv : as my bark did skim 
The bright blue waters with a fanning wind, 
Came Megara before me, and behind 
j*Egina lay, Piraus on the right, 
And Corinth on the left; I lay reclined 
Along the prow, and saw all these unite 
la ruin, even as he had seen the desolate sight; 

XLV. 

For time hath not rebuilt them, but uprear'd 
Barbaric dwellings on their shatter'd site, 
Which only make more niourn'd and more endear'd 
The few last rays of their far-scatter'd light, 
And the crush'd relics of their vanished might. 
The Roman saw these tombs in his own age, 
These sepulchres of cities, which excite 
Sad wonder, and his yet surviving page 
The moral lesson bears, drawn from such pilgrimage. 

XL VI. 
That page is now before me, and on mine 
His country's ruin added to the mass 
Of perish' d states he niourn'd in their decline, 
And I in desolation: all that was 
Of then destruction w; and now, alas! 
Rome — Rome imperial, hows her to the storm, 
In the same dust and blackness, ami we pass 
The skeleton of her Titantic form,- 11 
Wrecks of another world, whose ashes still are warm. 

XLVII. 
Yet, Italy ! through every other land 
Thy wrongs should rim.', and shall, from side to side 
Mother of arts ! as once of arms; thy hand 
Was then our guardian, and is still our guide ; 
Parent of our religion ! whom the wide 
Nations have knell to for the keys of heaven! 
Europe, repentant of her parricide, 
Sliill yet redeem thee, and, all backward driven, 
Roll die barbarian tide, and sue to be forgiven. 
k 2 15 



XLVIII. 

But AmO wins us to the lair white walls, 
Where the Etrurian Athens claims and keeps 
A softer feeling for her fairy halls. 
Girt by her theatre of hills, she reaps 
Her corn, and wine, and oil, and plenty leaps 
To laughing life, with her redundant horn. 
Along the banks where smiling Arno sweeps 
Was modern luxury of commerce born, 
And buried learning rose, redeem" d to a new morn. 

XL1X. 

There, too, the goddess loves in stone, and tills 2 * 
The air around with beauty; we inhale 
The ambrosial aspect, which, beheld, instils 
Part of its immortality J the veil 
Of heaven is half undrawn ; within the pale 
We stand, and in that form and face behold 
What mind can make, when nature's self would fa* , 
And to the fond idolaters of old 
Envy the innate Hash which such a soul could mould: 

L. 

We gaze and turn away, and know not where, 
Dazzled and drunk with beauty, till the heart 
Reels with its fulness ; there — for ever there — 
Chain'd to the chariot of triumphal art, 
We stand as captives, and would nut depart. 
Away ! — there need no words, nor terms precise, 
The paltry jargon of the marble mart, 
Where pedantry gulis folly — we have eyes: 

Blood — pulse — and breast, confirm the Dardan shep 
herd's prize. 

LI. 
Appear'dst thou not to Paris in this guise ? 
Or to more deeply blest Anchises? or, 
In all thy perfect goddess-ship, when lies 
Before thee thy own vanquish'd lord of war? 
And gazing in thy face as toward a star, 
Laid on thy lap, his eyes to thee upturn, 
Feeding on thy sweet cheek! 2ti while thy lips are 
With lava kisses melting while they burn, 

Shower'd on his eyelids, brow, and mouth, as from an 
urn? 

LII. 
Glowing, and circumfuscd in speechless love, 
Their full divinity inadequate 
That feeling to express, or to improve, 
The gods become as mortals, and man's fate 
Has moments like their brightest; but the weight 
Of earth recoils upon us; — let it go! 
We can recall sueh visions, and ereati , 
From what has been or might be, things which srow 

Into thy statue's form, and look like gods below. 

LIII. 
I leave to learned fingers, and wise hands, 
The artist and his ape, to tench and ti II 

How will his c( nnoisseurship understands 

The graceful bend, and the voluptuous swell 

Let these describe the undeeoribable : 
I would not their vile breath should crisp the strenn. 
Wherein that image shall for ever dwell ; 
The unruffled mirror of the loveliest dr< am 
That ever left the sky on the deep sou! to beam. 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LIV. 

In Santa Croce's holy precincts lie 2 ' 
Ashes which make it holier, dust which is 
Even in itself an immortality, 

Though there were nothing save the past, anil this, 
The particle of those sublimities 
Which have relapsed to chaos : — here repose 
Angelo's, Altieri's hones, 48 and his, 
The starry Galileo, with his woes ; 
Here Machiavelli's earth returned to whence it rose. 59 

LV. 

These are four minds, which, like the elements, 

Might furnish forth creation: — Italy! 

Time, which hath wrong'd thee with ten thousand 

rents 
Of thine imperial garment, shall deny, 
And hath denied, to every other sky, 
Spirits which soar from nun : — thy decay 
Is still impregnate wiih divinity, 
Which gilds it with revivifying ray; 
Such as the great of yore, Canova is to-day. 

LVI. 

But where repose the all Etruscan three — 
Dante, and Petrarch, and, scarce less than they, 
The Bard of Prose, creative spirit! he 
Of the Hundred Tales of love — where did they lay 
Their bones, distinguish'd from our common clay 
In death as life ? Arc they resolved to dust, 
And have their country's marbles nought to say? 
Could not her quarries furnish forth one bust ? 
Did they not to her breast their filial earth entrust ? 

LVI*. 

Ungrateful Florence ! Dante sleeps afar, 30 
Like Scipio, buried by the upbraiding shore; 3I 
Thy factions, in their worse than civil war, 
Proscribed the bard whose name for evermore 
Their children's children would in vain adore 
With the remorse of ages ; and the crown 32 
Which Petrarch's laureate brow supremely wore, 
Upon a far and foreign soil had grown, 

His life, his fame, his grave, though ritled — not thine 
own. 

LVIII. 
Boccaccio to his parent earth bequeath'd 3J 
His dust, — and lies it not her great among, 
With many a sweet and solemn requiem breathed 
O'er him who form'd the Tuscan's siren tongue? 
That music in itself, whose sounds are song, 
The poetry of speech? No ; — even his tomb 
Uptorn, must bear the hynena bigot's wrong, 
No more amidst the meaner dead find room, 

tsor claim a passing sigh, because it told for whom ! 

LIX. 

And Santa Croce wants their mighty dust; 
Yet for this want more noted, as of yore 
The Caesar's pageant, shorn of Brutus' bust, 
Did but of Rome's best son remind her more : 
Happier Ravenna ! on thy hoary shore, 
Fortress of falling empire ! honour'd sleeps 
The immortal exile ; — Arqua, too, her store 
Of tuneful relics proudly claims and keeps, 
While Florence vauily begs her banish'd dead and weeps. 



LX. 
What is her pyramid of precious stones? 34 
Of porphyry, jasper, agate, and all hues 
Of gem and marble, t" encrust the bones 
Of merchant-dukes ? the momentary dews 
Winch, sparkline to the twilight stars, infuse 
Freshness in the green turf that wraps the dead, 
Whose names are mausoleums of the muse, 
\i : cntlv prest with far more reverent tread 
Than ever paced the slab which paves the princely head 

LXI. 

There he more things to greet the heart and eyes 
In Arno's dome of art's most princely shrine, 
Where sculpture with her rainbow sister vies ; 
There be more marvels yet — but not for mine; 
For I have been aocpstom'd to entwine 
My thoughts with nature rather in the fields, 
Than art in galleries : though a work divine 
Calls for niv spirit's homage, yet it yields 
Less than it feels, because the weapon which it wields 

LXII. 

Is of another temper, and I roam 
By Thrasiir.ene's lake, in the defiles 
Fatal to Roman rashness, more at home ; 
For there tile Carthaginian's warlike wiles 
Come back before me, as his skill beguiles 
The host between the mountains and the shore, 
Where courage falls in her despairing files, 
And torrents, swoln to rivers with their gore, 
Reek through the sultry plain, with legions scaltcr'd o'er 

LXI1I. 

Like to a forest fell'd by mountain winds ; 
And such the storm of battle on this day, 
And such the phrenzv, whose convulsion blinds 
To all save carnage, that, beneath the fray 
An earthquake reel'd unheededly away! 3:> 
None felt stern nature rocking at his feet, 
And yawning forth a grave for those who lay 
Upon their bucklers for a winding-sheet; 
Such is the absorbing hate when warring nations meet! 

LX1V 

The earth to them was as a rolling bark 

Which bore them to eternity ; they saw 

The ocean round, but had no time to mark 

The motions of their vessels ; nature's law 

In them suspended, reck'd not of the awe 

Which feigns when mountains tremble, and the birds 

Plunge in the clouds for refuge, and withdraw 

From their down-toppling nests; and bellowing herds 

Stumble o'er heaving plains, and man's dread hath ne 
words. 

LXV 
Far other scene is Thrasimcnc now ; 
Her lake a sheet of silver, anil her plain 
Rent by no ravage save the gentle plough ; 
Her aged trees rise thick as once the slain 
Lay where their roots are; but a brook hath ta'on~- 
A little rill of scanty stream and bed — 
A name of blood from that day's sanguine rain ; 
And Sanguinelto tells ye where the dead 

Made the earth wet, and tum'd the unwilling waters red. 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



75 



LXVI. 

But thou, Clitumnus ! in thy sweetest wave 34 
Of the most living crystal that was e'er 
The haunt of river nymph, to gaze and lave 
Her limbs where nothing hid them, thou dost rear 
Thy grassy banks whereon the milk-white steer 
Grazes ; the purest god of gentle waters ! 
And most serene of aspect, and most clear ; 
Surely that stream was unprofaned by slaughters — 
A mirror and a bath for beauty's youngest daughters ! 

LXVII. 

And on thy happy shore a temple still, 
Of small and delicate proportion, keeps, 
Upon a mild declivity of hill, 
Its memory of thee ; beneath it sweeps 
Thy current's calmness ; oft from out it leaps 
The finny darter with the glittering scales, 
Who dwells and revels in thy glassy deeps ; 
While, chance, some scatter'd water-lily sails 

Down where the shallower wave still tells its bubbling 
talcs. 

LXVIII. 
Pass not unblest the genius of the place ! 
If through the air a zephyr more serene 
Win to the brow, 't is his ; and if ye trace 
Along his margin a more eloquent green, 
If on the heart the freshness of the scene 
Sprinkle its coolness, and from the dry dust 
Of weary life a moment lave it clean 
With Nature's baptism, — 't is to him ye must 

Pay orisons for this suspension of disgust. 

LXIX. 

The roar of waters ! — from the headlong height 
Velino cleaves the wave-worn precipice ; 
The fall of waters ! rapid as the light 
The flashing mass foams shaking the abyss ; 
The hell of waters ! where they howl and hiss, 
And boil in endless torture ; while the sweat 
Of their great agony, wrung out from this 
Their Phlcgcthon, curls round the rocks of jet 
That gird the gulf around, in pitiless horror set, 

LXX. 

And mounts in spray the skies, and thence again 
Returns in an unceasing shower, which round, 
With its unemptied cloud of gentle rain, 
Is an eternal April to the ground, , 
Making it all one emerald : — how profound 
The gulf! and how the giant element 
From rock to rock leaps with delirious bound, 
Crushing the cliffs, which, downward worn and rent 
With his fierce footsteps, yield in chasms a fearful vent 

LXXI. 

I'o the broad column which rolls on, and shows 
More like the fountain of an infant sea 
Tom from the womb of mountains by the throes 
Of a new world, than enly thus to be 
Parent of rivers, which flow gushingly, 
With many windings, through the vale: — look back! 
Lo ! where it comes like an eternity, 
As if to sweep down all things in its track, 
Charming the eye with dread, — a matchless cataract, " 



LXXII. 

Horribly beautiful ! but on the verge, 
From side to side, beneath the glittering morn, 
An Iris sits, amidst the infernal surge, ,8 
Like hope upon a death-bed, and, unworn 
Its steady dyes, while all around is torn 
By the distracted waters, bears serene 
Its brilliant hues with all their beams unshorn : 
Resembling, 'mid the torture of the scene, 
Love watching madness with unalterable mien. 

LXXI1I. 

Once more upon the woody Apennine, 
The infant Alps, which — had I not before 
Gazed on their mightier parents, where the pine 
Sits on more shaggy summits, and where roar 
The thundering lauwine 39 — might be worshipp'd 

more ; 
But I have seen the soaring Jungfrau rear 
Her never-trodden snow, and seen the hoar 
Glaciers of bleak Mont-Blanc both far and near, 
And in Chimari heard the thunder-hills of fear, 

LXXIV. 

Th' Acroceraunian mountains of old name ; 
And on Parnassus seen the eagles fly 
Like spirits of the spot, as 't were for fame, 
For still they soar'd unutterably high : 
I 've look'd on Ida with a Trojan's eye ; 
Athos, Olympus, iEtna, Atlas, made 
These hills seem things of lesser dignity, 
All, save the lone Soracte's height, display'd 
Not now in snow, which asks the lyric Roman's aid 

LXXV. 

For our remembrance, and from out the plain 
Heaves like a long-swept wave about to break, 
And on the curl hangs pausing: not in vain 
May he, who will, his recollections rake 
And quote in classic raptures, and awake 
The hills with Latian echoes ; I abhorr'd 
Too much, to conquer for the poet's sake, 
The drill'd dull lesson, forced down word by word ** 
In my repugnant youth, with pleasure to record 

LXXVI. 

Aught that recalls the daily drug which turn'd 
My sickening memory ; and, though time hath taught 
My mind to meditate what then it learn'd, 
Yet such the fix'd inveteracy wrought 
By the impatience of my early thought, 
That, with the freshness wearing out before 
My mind could relish what it might have sought, 
If free to choose, I cannot now restore 
Its health ; but what it then detested, still abhor. 

LXXVII. 
Then farewell, Horace ; w horn I hated so, 
Not for thy faults, but mine ; it is a curse 
To understand, not feel thy lyric flow, 
To comprehend, but never love thy verse, 
Although no deeper moralist rehearse 
Our little life, nor bard prescribe his an, 
Nor livelier satirist the conscience pierce, 
Awakening without wounding the touch'd heart, 
Yet fare thee well — upon Soracte's ridge we nart. 



76 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXXVIII. 
Oh Rome ! my country ! city of the soul ! 
The orphans of the heart must turn to thee, 
Lone mother of dead empires ! and control 
In their shut breasts their petty misery. 
What arc our woes and sufferance I Come and see 
'J'li' 1 cypres* bear the owl, and plod your "ay 
O'er steps of broken thrones and temples, ye ! 
Whose agonies are evils of a day — 
A world is at our feet as fragile as our clay. 

LXXIX. 

The Niobe of nations ! there she stands, 
Childless and crownlcss, in her voiceless woe; 
An empty urn within her wither'd hands, 
Whose holy dust was scatter'd long ago ; 
The Scipios' tomb contains no ashes now ; *' 
The very sepulchres lie tenantless 
Of their heroic dwellers : dost thou flow, 
Old Tiber! through a marble wilderness? 
Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle her distress ! 

LXXX. 

The Goth, the Christian, time, war, flood, and fire, 
Have dealt upon the seven-hill'd city's pride; 
She saw her glories star by star expire, 
And up the steep barbarian monarchs ride, 
Where the car climb'd the capitol ; far and wide 
Temple and tower went down, nor left a site : — 
Chaos of ruins ! who shall trace the void, 
O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar light, 
And say, " here was, or is," where all is doubly night? 

LXXXI. 

The double night of ages, and of her, 
Night's daughter, ignorance, hath wrapt and wrap 
All round us ; we but feel our way to err : 
The ocean hath his chart, the stars their map, 
And knowledge spreads them on her ample lap; 
Rut Rome is as the desert, where we steer 
Stumbling o'er recollections; now we clap 
Our hands, and cry "Eureka!" it is clear — 
When but some false mirage of ruin rises near. 

LXXXII. 

Alas ! the lofty city ! and alas ! 
The trebly hundred triumphs ! ** and the day 
When Brutus made the dagger's edge surpass 
The conqueror's sword in bearing fame away! 
Alas, for Tally's voice, and Virgil's lay, 
And Liyy's pictured page ! — but these shall be 
Her resurrection ; all beside — decay. 
Alas, for earth, for never shall we see 

That brightness in her eye she bore when Rome was 
free ! 

LXXXIII. 
Oh thou, whoso chariot roll'd on fortune's wheel, 43 
Triumphant Sylla! thou who didst subdue 
Thy country's foes ere thou would pause to feel 
The wrath of thy own wrongs, or reap the due 
Of hoarded vengeance till thine eagles Hew 
O'er prostrate Asia; — thou, who with thy frown 
Annihilated senates — Roman, too, 
With all thy vices, for thou didst lav down 

With an stoning smile a more than earthly crown — 



LXXXiV. 

The dictatorial wreath, — couldst thou divine 

To what would one ''av dwindle that which made 

Thee more than mortal ? and that so supine 

By aught than Romans Rome should thus be laid? 

She who was named eternal, ami array'd. 

Her warriors hut to conquer — she who veil'd 
Earth witli her haughty shadow, and displav'd, 
Until (lie o*er-canopied horizon fail'd, 

Her rushing wings — Oh ! she who was almighty hail'iM 

LXXXV. 

Sylla was first of victors ; but our own 
The sagesl of usurpers, Cromwell; he 

Too swept off senates while he. hew'd the throne 
Down to a block — immortal rebel ! See 
W hat crimes it costs to be a moment free 
And famous through all ages ! but beneath 

His fate the moral lurks of destiny; 
His day of double victory and death 
Beheld linn win two realms, and, happier, yield his 
breath. 

LXXXVI. 

The third of the same moon whose former course 
Had all hut crown'd him, on the selfsame day 
Deposed him gently from his throne o' force, 
And laid him with the earth's preceding clay. 4 * 
And show'd not fortune thus how fame and sway, 
And ail we deem delightful, and consume 
Our souls to compass through each arduous way, 
Are in her eyes less happy than the tomb? 
Were they but so in man's, how different were his doom! 

Lxxxyn. 

And thon, dread statue ! yet existent in 
The austercst form of naked majesty, 4i 
Thou who beheldest, 'mid the assassins' dm, 
At thy bathed base the bloody Caesar lie, 
Folding his robe in dying dignity, 
An offering to thine altar from the queen 
Of coils and men, great Nemesis? did he die, 
And thou, too. perish, Pompey .' have ve been 
Victors of countless kings, or puppets of a scene ? 

LXXXVIII. 
And thou, the thunder-stricken nurse of Rome! *• 
She-wolf! whose brazen-imaged dugs impart 
The milk of conquest yet within the dome 
Where, as a monument of antique art, 
Thou standest : — mother of the mighty heart, 
Which the' great founder suek'd from thy wild teat, 
Scorch'd by the Roman Jove's ethereal dart, 
And thy limbs black with lightning — dost thou yet 
Guard thine immortal cubs, nor thy fond charge forgtt? 

LXXXIX. 

Thou dost ; — but all thy foster-babes are dead — 
The men of iron ; and the world hath rear'd 
Cities from out their sepulchres : men bled 
In imitation of the things they fear'd, 

Andfoughl andconquer'd, and the same course steer' d 
At apish distance ; but as yet none have, 
Nor could, the same supremacy have near'd, 
Save one vain man, who is not in the crave, 
But, vanquish'd by himself, to his own slaves a slave- 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



77 



xc. 

The fool of false dominion — and a kind 
Of bastard Ca?sar, following him of old 
With steps unequal ; for the Roman's mind 
Was modcll'd in a less terrestrial mould,*' 
With passions fiercer, yet a judgment cold, 
And an immortal instinct which redeem'd 
The frailties of a heart so soft, yet bold ; 
Alcides with the distaff now he seem'd 
At Cleopatra's feet, — and now himself he beam'd, 

XCI. 

And came — and saw — and conquer'd ! But the man 
Who would have tamed his eagles down to flee, 
Like a train'd falcon, in the Gallic van, 
Which he, in sooth, long led to victory, 
With a deaf heart which never seem'd to.be 
A listener to itself, was strangely framed ; 
With but one weakest weakness — vanity, 
Coquettish in ambition — still he aiin'd — 
At what : can he avouch — or answer what he claim'd ? 

XCII. 

And would be all or nothing — nor could wait 
For the sure grave to level him ; few years 
Had fix'd him with the Ca?sars in his fate, 
On whom we tread : for this the conqueror rears 
The arch of triumph ! and for this the tears 
And blood of earth flow on as they have flow'd, 
A universal deluge, which appears 
Without an ark for wretched man's abode, 
And ebbs but to reflow ! — Renew thy rainbow, God ! 

XCIII. 

What from this barren being do we reap ? 

Our senses narrow, and our reason frail, 48 

Life short, and truth a gem which loves the deep, 

And all things weigh'd in custom's falsest scale ; 

Opinion and omnipotence, — whose veil 

Mantles the earth with darkness, until right 

And wrong are accidents, and men grow pale 

Lest their own judgments should become too bright, 

And their free thoughts be crimes, and earth have too 
much light. 

XCIV. 
And thus they plod in sluggish misery, 
Rotting from sire to son, and age to age, 
Proud of their trampled nature, and so die, 
Bequeathing their hereditary rage 
To the new race of inborn slaves, who wage 
War for their chains, and, rather than be free, 
Bleed gladiator-like, and still engage 
Within the same arena where they see 

Their fellows fall before, like leaves of the same tree. 

xcv. 

I speak not of men's creeds — they rest between 
Man and his Maker — but of things allow'd, 
Averr'd, and known, — and daily, hourly seen, — 
The yoke that is upon us doubly bow'd, 
And the intent of tyranny avow'd, 
The edict of earth's rulers, who are grown 
The apes of him who humbled once the proud, 
And shook them from their slumbers on the throne ; 
Too glorious, were this all his mighty arm had done. 



XCVT. 

Can tyrants but by tyrants conquer'd be, 
And freedom find no champion and no child 
Such as Columbia saw arise when she 
Sprung forth a Pallas, arni'd and undefiled? 
Or must such minds be nourish'd in the wild, 
Deep in the unpruned forest, 'midst the roar 
Of cataracts, where nursing Nature smiled 
On infant Washington? Has earth no more 
Such seeds within her breast, or Europe no such shorc7 

XCVII. 

But France got drunk with blood to vomit crime, 
And fatal have her Saturnalia been 
To freedom's cause, in every age arid clime ; 
Because the deadly days which we have seen, 
And vile ambition, that built up between 
Man and his hopes an adamantine wall, 
And the base pageant last upon the scene, 
Are grown the pretext for the eternal thrall 
Which nips life's tree, and dooms man's worst — his 
second fall. 

xcvur. 

Yet, freedom! yet thy banner, tom, but flying, 
Streams like the thunder-storm against the wind: 
Thy trumpet voice, though broken now and dying 
The loudest still the tempest leaves behind ; 
Thy tree hath lost its blossoms, and the rind, 
Chopp'd by the axe, looks rough and little worth, 
But the sap lasts, — and still the seed we find 
Sown deep, even in the bosom of the north ; 
So shall a better spring less bitter fruit bring forth. 

XCIX. 

There is a stern round tower of other days, 43 
Finn as a fortress, with its fence of stone, 
Such as an army's baffled strength delays, 
Standing with half its battlements alone, 
And with two thousand years of ivy grown, 
The garland of eternity, where v. ave 
The green leaves over all bv time overthrown ; — 
What was this tower of strength ? within its cave 
What treasure lay so iock'd, so hid ! — A woman's gra\ e. 

C. 

But who was she, the lady of the dead, 
Tomb'd in a palace? Was she chaste and fair? 
Worthy a king's — or more — a Roman's bl I .' 
What race of chiefs and heroes did she hear? 
What daughter of her beauties was the hi ir ! 
How lived — how loved — how died she ? Was she viol 
So honour' d — and conspicuously there, 
Where meaner relics must not dare to rot, 
Placed to commemorate a more than mortal lot? 

CI. 

Was she as those who love their lords, or they 
Who love the lords of others? such have been, 
Even in the olden time, H nine's annals say. 
Was she a matron of Cornelia's mini, 
Or the light air of Egypt's graceful queen, 
Profuse of joy — or 'gainst :t did she war, 
Inveterate in virtue? Did she lean 
To the soft side of the heart, or wisely bar 
Love from amongst her griefs'? — for such the silucbAkt 
are. 



en. 

Perchance she died in youth : it may be, bow'd 
With woes far heavier than the ponderous tomb 
That weigh'd upon her genllo dust, a cloud 
Might gather o'er her beauty, and a gloom 
In her dark eye, prophetic of the doom 
Heaven gives its favourites — early death ; i0 yet shed 
A sunset charm around her, and illume 
With hectic light, the Hesperus of the dead, 
Ot her consuming cheek the autumnal leaf-like red. 

CHI. 

Perchance she died in age — surviving all, 
Charms, kindred, children — with the silver gray 
On her long tresses, which might yet recall, 
It may be, still a something of tho day 
When they were braided, and her proud array 
And lovely form were envied, praised, and eyed 

By Rome But whither would conjecture stray ? 

Thus much alone we know — Metella died, 
The wealthiest Roman's wife ; behold his love or pride ! 

CIV. 

I know not why — but standing thus by thee 
It seems as if I had thine inmate known, 
Thou tomb ! and other days come back on me 
With recollected music, though the tone 
Is changed and solemn, like the cloudy groan 
Of dying thunder on the distant wind : 
Yet could I seat me by this ivied stone 
Till 1 had bodied forth the heated mind 
Forms f , om Cne floating wreck which ruin leaves behind; 

cv. 

And from the planks, far shatter'd o'er the rocks, 
Built me a little bark of hope, once more 
To battle with the ocean and the shocks 
Of the loud breakers, and the ceaseless roar 
Which rushes on the solitary shore 
Where all lies founder'd that was ever dear: 
But could I gather from the wave-worn store 
Enough for my rude boat, where should I steer? 
There woos no home, nor hope, nor life, save what is here. 

CVI. 

Then let the winds howl on ! their harmony 
Shall henceforth be my music, and the night 
The sound shall temper with the owlet's cry, 
As I now hear them, in the fading light 
Dim o'er the bird of darkness' native site, 
Answering each other on the Palatine, 
With their large eyes, all glistening gray and bright, 
And sailing pinions. — Upon such a shrine 
What are our petty griefs ? — let me not number mine. 

CVH. 

Cypress and ivy, weed and wall-flower grown 
Matted and mass'd together, hillocks heap'd 
On what were chambers, arch crush'd, column strown 
In fragments, choked-up vaults, and frescos steep'd 
In subterranean damps, where the owl peep'd, 
Deeming it midnight: — temples, batlw, or halls? 
Pronounce who can ; for all that learning reap'd 
From her research hath been, that these are walls — 
Heboid the Imperial Mount ! 't is thus the mighty falls. 11 



CVIII. 

There is the moral of all human tales ; w 
'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past, 
First freedom, and then glory — when that fails, 
Wealth, vice, corruption, — barbarism at last. 
And history, with all her volumes vast, 
Hath but one page, — 'tis better written here, 
Where gorgeous tyranny had thus amass'd 
All treasures, all delights, that eye or ear, 

Heart, soul, could seek, tongue ask Away with wordsl 

draw near, 

CIX. 
Admire, exult — despise — laugh, weep, — for here 
There is such matter for all feeling : — man ! 
Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear, 
Ages and realms are crowded in this span, 
This mountain, whose obliterated plan 
The pyramid of empires pinnacled, 
Of glory's gewgaws shining in the van, 
Till the sun's rays with added flame w ere fill'd ! 

Where are its golden roofs? where those who dared to 
build? 

ex. 

Tully was not so eloquent as thou, 
Thou nameless column with the buried base ! 
What are the laurels of the Caesar's brow? 
Crown me with ivy from his dwelling-place. 
Whose arch or pillar meets me in the face, 
Titus, or Trajan's? No — 'tis that of time : 
Triumph, arch, pillar, all he doth displace 
Scoffing ; and apostolic statues climb 
To crush the imperial urn, whose ashes slept sublime," 

CXI. 

Buried in air, the deep-blue sky of Rome, 
And looking to the stars : they had contain'd 
A spirit which with these would find a home, 
The last of those who o'er the whole earth reign'd, 
The Roman globe, for after none sustain'd, 
But yielded back his conquests : — he was more 
Than a mere Alexander, and, unstain'd 
With household blood and wine, serenely wore 
His sovereign virtures — still we Trajan's name adore. 54 

CXII. 

Where is the rock of triumph, the high place 
Where Rome embraced her heroes ? where the steep 
Tarpeian? fittest goal of treason's race, 
The promontory whence the Traitor's Leap 
Cured all ambition. Did the conquerors hepp 
Their spoils here ? Yes : and in yon field below, 
A thousand years of silenced factions sleep — 
The forum, where the immortal accents glow, 
And still the eloquent air breathes — burns with Cp'to* 

CXIII. 

The field of freedom, faction, fame, and blood : 
Here a proud people's passions were exhaled, 
From the first hour of empire in the bud 
To that when further worlds to conquer fail'd; 
But long before had freedom's face been veil'd, 
And anarchy assumed her attributes ; 
Till every lawless soldier who assail'd 
Trod on the trembling senate's slavish muted, 
Or raised the venal voice of baser prostitutes. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



*U 



CXIV 

Then turn wo to her latest tribune's name, 
From her ten thousand tyrants turn to thee, 
Redeemer of dark centuries of shame — 
The friend of Petrarch — hope of Italy — 
Rienzi ! last of Romans ! bS While the tree 
Of freedom's wither'd trunk puts forth a leaf, 
Even for thy tomb a garland let it be — 
The forum's champion, and the people's chief— 
Her new-born Numa thou — with reign, alas ! too brief. 

cxv. 

Egeria ! sweet creation of some heart ie 
Which found no mortal resting-place so fair 
As thine ideal breast ; whate'er thou art 
Or wert, — a voting Aurora of the air, 
The nympholepsy of some fond despair; 
Or, it might be, a beauty of the earth, 
Who found a more than common votary there 
Too much adoring; whatsoe'er thy birth, 
Thou wert a beautiful thought, and softly bodied forth. 

CXVI. 

The mosses of thy fountain still are sprinkled 
With thine Elysian water-drops; the face 
Of thy cave-guavded spring, with years uuwrinklcd, 
Reflects the meek-eyed genius of the place, 
Whose green, wild margin now no more erase 
Art's works ; nor must the delicate waters sleep, 
Prison'd in marble ; bubbling from the base 
Of the cleft statue, with a gentle leap 
The rill runs o'er, and round, fern, flowers, and ivy creep, 

CXVII. 

Fantastically tangled ; the green hills 
Are clothed with early blossoms, through the grass 
The quick-eyed lizard rustles, and the bills 
Of summer-birds sing welcome as ye pass ; 
Flowers fresh in hue, and many in their class, 
Implore the pausing step, and with their dyes 
Dance in the soft breeze in a fairy mass; 
The sweetness of the violet's deep-blue eyes, 

Kiss'd by the breath of heaven, seems colour'd by its 
skies. 

C XVIII. 
Here didst thou dwell, in this enchanted cover, 
Egeria! thy all-heavenly bosom beating 
For the far footsteps of thy mortal lover ; 
The purple midnight veil'd that mystic meeting 
With her most starry canopy, and seating 
Thyself by thine adorer, what befell ? 
This cave was surely shaped out for the greeting 
Of an enamour'd goddess, and the cell 

Haunted by holy love — the earliest oracle ! 

CXIX. 

And didst thou not, thy breast to his replying, 
Blend a celestial with a human heart ; 
And love, which dies as it was born, in sighing, 
Share with immortal transports ? could thine art 
Make them indeed immortal, and impart 
The purity of heaven to earthly joys, 
Expei the venom and not blunt the dart — 
The dull satiety which all destroys — 
And root from out the soul the deadly weed which cloys ? 



cxx. 

Alas! our young affections run to waste, 
Or water but the desert ; whence arise 
But weeds of dark luxuriance, tares of haste, 
Rank at the core, though tempting to the eyes, 
Flowers whose wild odours breathe but agonies, 
And trees whose gums are poison; such the plants 
Which spring beneath her steps as passion Hies 
O'er the world's wilderness, and vainly punts 

For some celestial fruit forbidden to our wants. 
CXXI. 
Oh love ! no habitant of earth thou r.rt — 
An unseen seraph, we believe in thee, 
A faith whose martyrs are the broken heart, 
But never yet hath seen, nor e'er shall see 
The naked eve, thy form, as it should be ; 
The mind hath made thee, as it peopled heaven, 
Even with its own desiring phantasy, 
And to a thought such shape and image, given, 

As haunts the unquench'd soul — parch'd — wearied— 
wrung — and riven. 

CXXII. 

Of its own beauty is the mind diseased, 
And fevers into false creation: — where, 
Where are the forms the sculptor's soul hath seized'' 
In him alone. Can nature show so fair? 
Where are the charms and virtues which we dare 
Conceive in boyhood and pursue as men — 
The unreach'd paradise of our despair, 
Which o'er-informs the pencil and the pen, 
And overpowers the pane where it would bloom again ) 
CXXIII. 
Who loves, raves — 't is youth's frenzy — hut the curv 
Is bitterer still ; as charm by charm unwinds 
Which robed our idols, and we see too sure 
Noi worth nor beauty dwells from out the mind's 
Idtal shape of such, yet still it binds 
The fatal spell, and still it draws us on, 
Reaping the whirldwind from the oft-sown winds ; 
The stubborn heart, its alchemy begun, 
Seems ever near the prize, — wealthiest when most u» 
done. 

CXXIV. 
We wither from our youth, we gasp away — 
Sick — sick ; unfound the boon — unslaked the thirst. 
Though to the last, in verge of our decay, 
Some phantom lures, such as we sought at first — 
But all too late, — so are we doubly curst. 
Love, fame, ambition, avarice — 'tis the same, 
Each idle — and all ill — and none the worst — 
For all are meteors with a different name, 
And death the sable smoke where vanishes the flame. 

exxv. 

Few — none — find what they love or could have loved, 
Though accident, blind contact, and the strong 
Necessity of hiving, have removed 
Antipathies — but to recur, ere long, 
Envenom'd with irrevocable wrong : 
And circumstance, that unspiritual god 
And miscreator, makes and helps along 
Our coming evils with a crutch-like rod, 
Whose touch turns hope to dust — the dust we all nave 
trod. 



RO 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CXXVI. 

Our life is a fulsc nature — 'l is not in 
Tlic harmony of things, — this hard decree, 
This (ineradicable taint of sin, 
This bdundless upas, this all-blasting tree, 
Whose root is earth, whose leaves and branches he 
The skies which rain their plagues 00 men like dew — 
Disease, death, bondage — all the woes we sec — 
And worse, the woes we see not — which throb through 
The immedicable soul, with heart-aches ever new. 

C XXVII. 

Yet let us ponder boldly b ' — 't is a base 

Abandonment of reason to resign 

Our right of thought — our last and only place 

Of refuge ; this, at least, shall still be mine : 

Though from our birth the faculty divine 

Is chain'd and tortured — cahiu'd, crihb'd, confined, 

And bred in darkness, lest the truth should shine 

Too brightly on the unprepared mind, 

The beam pours in, for time and skill will couch the 
blind. 

CXXVIII. 
Arches on arches ! as it were that Rome, 
Collecting the chief trophies of her line, 
Would build up all her triumphs in one dome, 
Her Coliseum stands ; the moon-beams shine 
As "t were its natural torches, for divine 
Should be the light which streams here, to illume 
This long-explored but still exhaustless mine 
Of contemplation ; and the azure gloom 

Of an Italian night, where the deep skies assume 

CXXIX. 

Hues which have words, and speak to ye of heaven, 
Floats o'er this vast and wondrous monument, 
And shadows forth its glory. There is given 
Unto the things of earth, which time hath bent, 
A spirit's feeling, and where he hath leant 
His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power 
And magic in the ruined battlement, 
For which the palace of the present hour 
Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages are its dower. 

CXXX. 

Oh time ! the bcautifier of the dead, 
Adorner of the ruin, comforter 
And only healer when the heart hath bled — 
Time! the corrector where our judgments err, 
The test of truth, love, — sole philosopher, 
For all beside are sophists, from thy thrift, 
Which never loses though it doth defer — 
Time, the avenger ! unto tnce I lift 
My hands, and eyes, and heart, and crave of thee a gift : 

CXXXI. 

Amidst this wreck, where thou hast made a shrine 
And temple more divinely desolato, 
Among thy mightier offerings here are mine, 
Ruins of years — though few, yet full of fate : — 
If thou has* ever seen me too elate, 
Hear me not: but if calmly I have borne 
Goon, and reserved my pricte against the hate 
Which shall not whelm me, let me not have worn 
Tlus iron in »iy soul in vain — shall they not mourn? 



CXXXII. 

And thou, who never yet of human wrong 
Left (ha unbalanced scale, great Nemesis ! i9 
Here, where the ancient paid thee homage long— 
Thou, who didsl call the furies from the abyss, 
And round Or, stes hade them howl ami ln-s 

For that unnatural retribution — just, 
Had it but been from Hands less near — in this 
Thy former realm, I call thee from the dust ! 
Dost thou not hear my heart? — Awake ! thou shah, ana 
must. 

CXXXIII. 

It is not that I may not have incurr'd 

For my ancestral faults or mine the wound 

I bleed withal, and, had it been conferr'd 

With a just weapon, it had flow'd unbound ; 

But now my blood shall not sink in the ground; 

To thee I do devote it — thou shall take 

The vengeance, which shall yet be sought and found 

Which if / have not taken for the sake 

But let that pass — I sleep, but thou shalt yet awake. 

CXXXIV. 

And if my voice break forth, 't is not that now 
I shrink from what is sutfer'd: let him spi ak 
Who hath beheld decline upon my brow, 
Or seen mv mind's convulsion leave it weak ; 
But in this page a record will I seek. 
Not in the air shall these my words dispi rse, 
Though I be ashes ; a far hour shall wreak 
The deep prophetic fulness of tins verse. 
And pile on human heads the mountain of my curse. 

exxxv. 

That curse shall be forgiveness — Have I not — 
Hear me, my mother Earth ! behold it, Heaven!— 
Have I not had to wrestle with my lot / 
Have I not sutfer'd things to be forgiven? 
Have I not had my brain sear'd, my heart riven, 
Hopes sapp'd, name blighted, life's life lied away" 
And only not to desperation driven, 
Because not altogether of such clay 
As rots into the souls of those whom I survey. 

CXXXVI. 

From mighty wrongs to petty perfidy, 
Have I not seen what human things could do ? 
From the loud roar of foaming calumny 
To the small whisper of the as paltry few, 
And subtler venom of the reptile crew, 
The Janus glance of whose significant eye, 
Learning to lie with silence, would seem true, 
And without utterance, save the shrug or sigh, 
Deal round to happy fools its speechless obloquy. 

C XXXVII. 

But I have lived, and have not lived in vain: 
My mind may lose its force, my blood its tire, 
And my frame perish even in conquering pain, 
But there is that within me which shall tire 
Torture and time, and breathe when I expire ; 
Something unearthly, which they deem not of, 
Like the remember'd tone of a mute lyre, 
Shall on their soften'd spirits sink, and move 
In hearts all rocky now the late remorse of love. 






CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



81 



CXXXVIII. 

The seal is set. — Now welcome, thou dread power ! 
Nameless, yet thus omnipotent, which here 
Walk'st in the shadow of the midnight hour 
With a deep awe, yet all distinct from fear ; 
Thy haunts are ever where the dead walls rear 
Their ivy mantles, and the solemn scene 
Derives from thee a sense so deep and clear 
That wc become a part of what has been, 
And grow unto the spot, all-seeing but unseen. 

CXXXIX. 

And here the buzz of eager nations ran, 
In murmur'd pity, or loud-roar'd applause, 
As man was slaughter'd by his fellow man. 
And wherefore slaughter'd? wherefore, hut because 
Such were the bloody Circus' genial laws, 
And the imperial pleasure. — Wherefore not ? 
What matters where we fall to fill the maws 
Of worms — on battle-plains or listed spot? 
Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot. 

CXL. 

I see before me the gladiator lie : 59 
He leans upon his hand — his manly brow 
Consents to death, but conquers agony, 
And his droop'd head sinks gradually low — 
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow 
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one, 
Like the first of a thunder-shower ; and now 
The arena swims around him — he is gone, 

Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hail'd the wretch 
who won. 

CXLI. 
He heard it, br.t he heeded not — his eyes 
Were with his heart, and that was far away ; 
He reck'd not of the life he lost nor prize, 
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay 
There were his young barbarians all at play, 
There was their Dacian mother — he, their sire, 
Butchcr'd to make a Roman holiday — 6U 
All this rush'd with his blood — Shall he expire, 

And unavenged? — Arise! ye Goths, and glut your ire! 

CXLII. 

But here, where murder breathed her bloody steam ; 
And here, where buzzing nations choked the ways, 
And roar'd or murmur'd like a mountain stream 
Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ; 
Here, where the Roman million's blame or praise 
Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd, 61 
My voice sounds much — and fall the stars' faint rays 
On the arena void — seats crush d — walls bow'd — 
And galleries, where my steps seem echoes strangely- 
loud. 

cxlih. 

A ruin — yet what ruin ! from its mass 
Walls, palaces, half-cities, have been rear'd ; 
Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass 
And marvel where the spoil could have appear'd. 
Hath it indeed been plunder'd, or but clear'd ? 
Alas ! developed, opens the decay, 
When the colossal fabric's form is n6ar'd . 
It will not bear the brightness of the day, 
vVliich streams too much on all years, man, havf red 
away. 

16 



CXLIV. 

But when the rising moon begins to climb 
Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there; 
When the stars twinkle throSgh the loops of time. 
And the low night-breeze waves along the air 
The garland-forest, which the gray walls wear, 
Like laurels on the bald first ('a sar's head ; 8a 
When the lighl shines si rene but doth not glare, 
Then in I his magic circle raise the dead : 
Heroes have trod this spot — 't is on their dust ye tread. 

CXLV. 

"While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand; 03 

When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; 

And when Rome falls — the world." From our own 

land 
Thus spake the pilgrims o'er this mighty wall 
In Saxon times, which we are wont to call 
Ancient ; and these three mortal things are still 
On their foundations, and unalter'd all ; 
Rome and her ruin past redemption's skill, 

The world, the same wide den — of thieves, or what ve 
will. 

CXLVT. 
Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime — 
Shrine of all saints, and temple of all gods, 
From Jove to Jesus — spared and blest by time ; 6 * 
Looking tranquillity, while falls or nods 
Arch, empire, each thing round thee, and man plods 
His way through thorns to ashes — glorious dome! 
Shall thou not last? Time's sevthe and tyrants' rodj 
Shiver upon thee — sanctuary and home 

Of art and piety — Pantheon ! — pride of Rome ! 
CXLVII. 
Relic of nobler days, and noblest arts ; 
Dcspoil'd yet perfect, with thy circle spreads 
A holiness appealing to all hearts — 
To art a model ; and to him who treads 
Rome for the sake of ages, glory sheds 
Her light through thy sole aperture; to those 
Who worship, here are altars for their beads ; 
And they who feel for genius may repose 

Their eyes on honour'd forms, whose busts around 
them close. 65 

CXLVIII. 
There is a dungeon, in whose dim drear light C6 
What do I gaze on ? Nothing : Look again ! 
Two forms are slowly shadow'd on my sight — 
Two insulated phantoms of the brain : 
It is not so ; I see them full and plain — 
An old man, and a female young and fair, 
Fresh as a nursing-mother, in whose vein 
The blood is nectar: — but what doth she there, 

With her unmantled neck, and bosom white and bare/ 

CXLIX. 

Full swells the deep pure fountain of young life, 
Where on the heart and jnnn the heart we took 
Our first and sweetest nurture, when the wife 
Blest into mother, in the innocent Iook, 
Or even the piping cry of lips that brook 
No pain and small suspense, a joy peve'eivea 
Man knows not, when from out its cradled nooR 
She sees her little hud put forth its leaves — 
What may the fruit be yet ? — I know not — Cain waa 
Eve's. 



82 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CL. 
Rut hero youth offers to old age the food, 
The milk iif his own gift: — it is her sire, 
To whom she renders buck the debt of blood 
Bora with her birth. No : he shall not expire 
in those warm and lovely veins the tire 
Of health and holy feeling can provide 
Great Nature's Nile, whose deep stream rises higher 
Than Egypt's river: — from that gentle side 

Drink, drink and live, old man ! Heaven's realm holds 
no such tide. 

CLI. 
The starry fable of the milky way 
Has not thy story's purity ; it is 
A constellation of a sweeter ray, 
And sacred Nature triumphs more in this 
Reverse of her decree, than in the abyss 
Where sparkle distant worlds: — Oh, holiest nurse! 
No drop of that clear stream its wav shall miss 
To thy sire's heart, replenishing its source 

\V r ith life, as our freed souls rejoin the universe. 

CLII. 

Turn to the mole which Adrian rear'd on high, 6T 
Imperial mimic of old Egypt's piles, 
Colossal copyist of deformity, 
Whose travcll'd phantasy from the far Nile's 
Enormous model, doom'd the artist's toils 
To build for giants, and, for his vain earth, 
His shrunken ashes raise this dome : How smiles 
The gazer's eye with philosophic mirth, 
To view the huge design which sprung from such a birth. 

CLIII. 

Rut 10 ! the dome — the vast and wondrous dome, 68 
To which Diana's marvel was a cell — 
Christ's mighty shrine above his martyr's tomb! 
I have beheld the Ephesian's miracle — 
Rs columns strew the wilderness, and dwell 
The hyaena and the jackal in their shade ; 
I have beheld Sophia's bright roofs swell 
Their glittering mass i' the sun, and have survey'd 
Its sanctuary the while the usurping Moslem pray'd ; 

CUV. 

But thou, of temples old, or altars new, 
Slandest alone — with nothing like to thee — 
Worthiest of God, the holy and the true. 
Since Zion's desolation, when that He 
Forsook his former city, what could be, 
Of earthly structures in his honour piled, 
Of a sublimcr aspect ? Majesty, 
Power, glory, strength, and beauty, all are aisled 
In this eternal ark of worship undefiled. 

CLV. 

Enter: its grandeur overwhelms thee not, 
And why ? it is not lessen'd ; but thv mind, 
Expanded by the genius of the spot, 
Has grown colossal, and can only find 
A fit abode wherein appear enshrined 
Thv hopes of immortality ; and thou 
Shalt one day, if found worthy, so defined, 
Sec thy God face to face, as thou dost now 
IR* Holy of Holies, nor be basted by his brow. 



CLVI. 

Thou moves? — but increasing with the aiKancc, 

Like climbing some great Alp, which still doth rise, 

Deceived by its gigantic elegance ; 

Vastness which grows — but grows to harmonize — 

All musical in its immensities: 

Rich marbles — richer panning — shrines where flame 

The lamps of goW — and haughty dome which vies 

In air with earth's chief structures, though their framn 

Sits on the firm-set ground — and this the clouds musrf 
claim. 

CLV II. 
Thou seest not all ; but piecemeal thou must break, 
To separate contemplation, the great whole ; 
And as the ocean many bays will make, 
That ask the eve — so here condense thy soul 
To more immediate objects, and control 
Thy thoughts until thy mind hath got by heart 
Its eloquent proportions, and unroll 
In mighty graduations, part by part, 

The glory which at once upon thee did not dart, 

CLVIII, 

Not by its fault — but thine : our outward sense 
Is but of gradual grasp — and as it is 
That what we have of feeling most inter.se 
O itstrips our faint expression ; even so this 
Outshining and o'erw helming edifice 
Fools our fond gaze, and, greatest of the great, 
Defies at first our nature's littleness, 
Till, growing with its growth, we thus dilate 
Our spirits to the size of that they contemplate. 

CLIX. 

Then pause, and be enlighten'd ; there is more 
In such a survey than the sating gaze 
Of wonder pleased, or awe which would adore 
The worship of the place, or the mere praise 
Of art and its great masters, who could raise 
What former time, nor skill, nor thought could plan ; 
The fountain of sublimity displays 
Its depth, and thence may draw the mind of man 
Its golden sands, and learn what great conceptions can 

CLX. 

Or, turning to the Vatican, go see 
Laoeoon's torture dignifying pain — 
A father's' love and mortal's agony 
With an immortal's patience blending : — vain 
The struggle; vain, against the coiling slum 
And sripe, and deepening of the dragon's grasp, 
The old man's clench ; the long-enrenom'd chain 
Rivets the living links, — the enormous asp 
Enforces pang on pang, and stiP.es gasp on gasp. 

CLXI. 

Or view the Lord of the unerring bow, 
The God of life, and poesy, and light — 
The sun in human limbs urrav'd, and brow 
All radiant from his triumph in the Bghl ; 
The shaft hath just been shot — the arrow bright 
With an immortal's vengeanee ; in his eye 
And nostril beautiful disdain, and might, 
And majesty, Hash their full lightnings by, 
Developing in that one glance the Deity. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



S3 



CLXII. 

But in his delicate form— a dream of love, 
Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast 
Long'd for a deathless lover from above, 
And madden'd in that vision — are exprest 
All that ideal beauty ever bless'd 
The mind with in its most unearthly mood, 
When each conception was a heavenly guest — 
A rav of immortality — and stood, 
Star-like, around, until they gather'd to a god! 
CLXIII. 
And if it be Prometheus stole from heaven 
The fire which we endure, it was repaid 
By him to whom the energy was given 
Which this poetic marble hath arrav'd 
With an eternal glory — which, if made 
By human bands, is not of human thought ; 
And Tune himself hath hallow'd it, nor laid 
One riuglet in the dust — nor hath it caught 
A tin^e of years, but breathes the flame with which 
't was wrought. 

CLXIV. 
But where is he, the Pilgrim of my song, 
The being who upheld it through the past? 
Methinks he cometh late and tarries long. 
He is no more — these breathings are his last; 
His wanderings done, his visions ebbing fast, 
And he himself as nothing: — if he was 
Aught but a phantasy, and could be class'd 
With forms which live and suffer — let that pass — 
His shadow fades away into destruction's mass, 
CLXV. 
Which gathers shadow, substance, life, and all 
That we inherit, in its mortal shroud, 
And spreads the dim and universal pall 
Through which all things grown phantoms ; and the 

cloud 
Between us sinks, and all which ever glow'd, 
Till glory's self is twilight, and displays 
A melancholy halo scarce allow'd 
To hover on the verge of darkness ; rays 
Sadder than saddest night, for they distract the gaze, 
CLXVI. 
And send us prying into the abyss, 
To gather what we shall be when the frame 
Shall be resolved to something less than this 
Its wretched essence ; and to dream of fame, 
And wipe the dust from ofT the idle name 
We never more shall hear, — but never more, 
Oh, happier thought! can we be made the same: 
It is enough in sooth that once we bore 
These fardels of the heart — the heart whose sweat was 
gore. 

CLXVII. 
Hark ! forth from the abyss a voice proceeds, 
A long low distant murmur of dread sound, 
Such as arises when a nation bleeds 
With some deep and immedicable wound ; 
Through storm and darkness yawns the rending ground, 
The gulf is thick with phantoms, but the chief 
Seems royal still, though with her head discrown'd, 
And pale, but lovely, with maternal grief 
She clasps a babe, to whom her breast yields no relief. 



CLXVIII. 

Scion of chiefs and monarchs, where art thou ? 

Fond hope of many nations, art thou dead ? 

Could not the grave forgel thee, and lay '-ow 

Some less majestic, less beloved head ! 

In the sad midnight, while thy heart still bled, 

The mother of a moment, o'er thy b"v, 

Death hush'd that pang for ever: with thee tied 

The present happiness and promised joy 

Which fill'd the imperial isles so full it seem'd to cloy. 

CLXIX. 

Peasants bring forth in safety. — Can it be, 
O thou that wert so happy, so adored! 
Those who weep not for kings shall weep for thee, 
And Freedom's heart, grown heavy, cease to hoard 
Her many griefs for One ; for she had pour'd 
Her orisons for thee, and o'er thy head 
Beheld her Iris. — Thou, too, lonely lord, 
And desolate consort — vainly werl thou wed! 
The husband of a year ! the lather of the dead ! 

CLXX. 

Of sackcloth was thy wedding garment made ; 
Thy bridal's fruit is ashes : in the dust 
The fair-hair' d daughter of the isles is laid, 
The love of millions ! How we did intrust 
Futurity to her ! and, though it must 
Darken above our bones, yet fondly deem'd 
Our children should obey her child, and bless'd 
Her and her hoped-for seed, whose promise seem'd 

Like stars to shepherds' eyes : — 't was but a meteor 
beam'd. 

CLXXI. 
Woe unto us, not her ; for she sleeps well : 
The fickle wreath of popular breath, the tongue 
Of hollow counsel, the false oracle, 
Which from the birth of monarchy hath rung 
Its knell in princely ears, till the o'erstung 
Nations have arm'd in madness, the strange fate 
Which tumbles mightiest sovereigns, 60 and hath flung 
Against their blind omnipotence a weight 

Within the opposing scale, which crushes soon or lato, — 

CLXXII. 

These might have been her destiny ; but no, 
Our hearts deny it : and so young, so fair, 
Good without effort, great without a foe ; 
But now a bride and mother — and now there ! 
How many ties did that stern moment tear: 
From thy sire's to his humblest subject's breast 
Is link'd the electric chain of that despair, 
Whose shock was as an earthquake's, and oppres 

The land which loved thee so that none could love thee 
t best. 

CLXXIII. 
Lo, Nemi ! ,0 navell'd in the woody hills 
So far, that the uprooting wind, which tears 
The oak from his foundation, and which spills 
The ocean o'er its boundary, and bears 
Its foam against the skies, reluctant spares 
The oval mirror of thy glassy lake ; 
And, calm as cherish'd hate, its surface wea.s 
A deep cold settled aspect nou-iit can shak<v 

All coil'd into itself and round, as sleeps the siuko 



84 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CLXXIV. 

And, near, Albano's scarce divided waves 
Shine from a sister valley ; — and af;ir 
The Tiber winds, and the broad ocean laves 
The Latian coast where sprung the Epic war, 
"Anns and the man," whose re-ascending star 
Rose o'er an empire ; — but beneath thy right 
Tally reposed from Home ; — and where yon bar 
Of girdling mountains intercepts the si<;ht, 
The Sabine farm was till'd, the weary bard's delight." 

CLXXV. 

But I forget. — My Pilgrim's shrine is won, 
And he and I must part, — so let it be, — 
I lis task and mine alike are nearly done ; 
Yet once more let us look upon the sea ; 
The midland ocean breaks on him and me, 
And from the Alban Mount we now behold 
Our friend of youth, that ocean, which when we 
Beheld it last by Calpc's rock unfold 
Those waves, we foUow'd on till the dark Euxine roll'd 

CLXXVI. 

Upon the blue Symplcgades : long years — 
Long, though not very many, since have done 
Their work on both ; some suffering and some tears 
Have left us nearly where we had begun : 
Yet not in vain our mortal race hath run, 
We have had our reward — and it is here ; 
That we can yet feel gladden'd by the sun, 
And reap from earth, sea, joy almost as dear 
As if there were no man to trouble what is clear. 

CLXXVII. 

Oh ! that the desert were my dwelling-place, 
With one fair spirit for my minister, 
That I might all forget the human race, 
And, hating no one, love but only her ! 
Ye elements ! — in whose ennobling stir 
I feel myself exalted — can ye not 
Accord me such a being ? Do T err 
I., deeming such inhabit many a spot? 
Though with them to converse can rarely be our lot. 

CLXXVIII. 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, 
There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
There is society, where none intrudes, 
By the deep sea, and music in its roar : 
I love not man the less, but nature more, 
From these our interviews, in which I steal 
From all I may be, or have been before, 
To mingle with the universe, and feel 
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. 

CLXXIX. 

Boll on, thou deep and dark-blue ocean — roll ! 
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; 
Man marks the earth with ruin — his control 
Stops with the shore ; — upon the watery plain 
Tne wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain 
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, 
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, 
flu sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, 
Without a grave, unkrti'l'd uncoffin'd, and unknown. 



CLXXX. 

His steps are not upon thy paths, — thy fields 
Arc not a spoil for him, — thou dost arise 
And shake him from thee ; the vile strength he wields 
For earth'? destruction thou dost all di 
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, 
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray 
And howling, to his sods, where haply lies 
His petty hope in some near port or bay, 
And dashest him again to earth : — there let him lay. 

CLXXXI. 

The armaments which thunder— tike the walls 
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, 
And monarchs tremble in their capitals, 
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make 
Their clay creator the vain title take 
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war ; 
These are thy toys, and, as the snow v Make, 
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which m.ir 
Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar. 

CLXXXII. 

Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thec- 
Assvria, Greece, Borne, Carthage, what are they 7 
Thy waters wasted them while (hey were free, 
And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey 
The stranger, slave, or savage; their decay 
Has dried up realms to deserts : — not so thou, 
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' piay — 
Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow — 
Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. 

CLXXXIII. 

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almignty's form 
Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time, 
Calm or convulsed — in breeze, or gale, or storm, 
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 
Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless, and sublime— 
The image of eternity — the throne 
Of the Invisible ; even from out thy slime 
The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone 
Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fadiomless, alone 

CLXXXIV. 

And I have loved thee, ocean ! and my .,'oy 
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be 
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward : from a boy 
I wanton'd with thy breakers — they to me 
Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea 
Made them a terror — 't was a pleasing fear, 
For I w -as as it were a child of thee, 
And trusted to thy billows far and near, 
And laid my hand upon thy mane — as I do here. 

CLXXXV. 

My task is done — my song hath ceased — my theme 
Has died into an echo ; it is fit 
The spell should break of this protracted dream. 
The torch shall be extinguish'd which hath lit 
My midnight lamp — and what is writ, is writ. — 
Would it were worthier! but I am not now 
That which I have been — and my visions flit 
Less palpably before me — and the glow 
Which in my spirit dwelt is fluttering, faint, and low 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE 



85 



CLXXXVI. 

Farewell ! a word that must be, and hath been — 
A sound which makes us linger, — yet — farewell ! 
Ye ! who have traced the Pilgrim to the scene 
Which is his last, if in your memories dwell 
A thought which once was his, if on ye swell 
A single recollection, not in vain 
He wore his sandal-slioon. and scallop-shell ; 
Farewell ! with him alone may rest the pain, 
[f such there were — with you, the moral of his strain. 



NOTES. 



CANTO I. 

Note 1. Stanza i. 
Yes! sish'do'er Delphi's loag-deserted shrine. 
The little village of Castri stands partly on the site of 
Delphi. Along the path of the mountain, from Chrysso, 
are the remains of sepulchres hewn in and from the 
rock: "One," said the guide, "of a king who broke 
his neck hunting." His Majesty had certainly chosen 
the fittest spot for such an achievement. 

A little above Castri is a cave, supposed the Pythian, 
of immense depth : the upper part of it is paved, and 
now a cow-house. 

On the other side of Castri stands a Greek rnonas- 
terv ; some way above which is the cleft in the rock, 
with a range of caverns difficult of ascent, and ap- 
parently leading to the interior of the mountain; prob- 
ably to the Coryclan Cavern mentioned bv Pausanias. 
From this part descend the fountain and the "Dews of 
Castalie." 

Note 2. Stanza \.\. 
And rest ye at "our Lady's house of woe." 
The convent of " Our Lady of Punishment," Nossa 
Serwra de Pena, ' on the summit of the rock. Below, 
at some distance is the Cork Convent, where St. Ho- 
norius dug his den, over which is his epitaph. From 
the hills, the sea adds to the beauty of the view. 
Note 3. Stanza xxi. 
Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life. 
It is a well-known fact, that in the year 1809, the 
assassinations in the streets of Lisbon and its vicinity 
were not confined by the Portuguese to their country- 
men, but that Englishmen were daily butchered : and, 
so far from redress being obtained, we were requested 
not to interfere if we perceived any compatriot defend- 
ing himself against his allies. I was once stopped in 
16 theatre at eight o'clock in the evening, 
when the streets were not more empty than they gener- 
ally are at thai hour, opposite to an open shop, and in 
a carriage with a friend; had we not fortunately been 
armed, I have not the, hast doubt that we should have 
adorned a tale instead of telling one. The crime ol 



1 Since the publication of this poem I have been informed 
of the i:i an of the term Watsa Senora de Pena. 

Ii wag (wing to the want of the tilt/e.nr mark over the n, 
which nit ars the signification of the word: with it, I'ma BJg- 
tii (!■•- a n«k; without it. Pena has the sense I adopted. I do 
not think n nt Bsory to alter the passage, as though thecom- 
ii.en accepts hi alfixed to it is "our Lady of the Koch," I may 
»cll assume ,e i it her sense, from the severities practised there. 
1 2 



assassination is not confined to Portugal : in Sicily 
and Malta we are knocked on the head at a handsome 
average nightly, and not a Sicilian or Maltese is ever 
punished ! 

Note 4. Stanza xxiv. 
Behold the hall where duel's were late convened I 
The convention of C intra was signed in the palace 
of the Marchese Marialva. The [at ! exploits of Lord 
Wellington have effaced the follies of Cintra. He has, 
indeed, done wonders : he lias perhaps changed the 
character of a nation, reconciled rival superstitions, 
and baffled an enemy who never retreated before his 
predecessors. 

Note 5. Stanza xxix. 
Vet Mafra shall one moment claim di by. 
The extent of Mafra is prodigious ; it contains a pal 
ace, convent, and most superb church. The six organs 
are the most beautiful I ever beheld in point of deco- 
ration ; we did not hear them, hut, were told that their 
tones were correspondent to their splendour. Mafra is 
termed the Eseurial of Portugal. 

Note 6. Stanza xxxiii. 

Well doth the Spanish hind the difference know 

"1 wixt him and Lusian slave, the lowest of the low. 

As I found the Portuguese, so I have characterized 
them. That they have since improved, at least in cou- 
rage, is evident. 

Note 7. Stanza xxxv. 

When Oava's traitor-sire first call'd the heed 
That dyed thy mountain streams with Gothic gore? 

Count Julian's daughter, the Helen of Spain. Pela- 
gius preserved Ins independence in the fastnesses of the 
Asturias, and the descendants of his followers, after 
some centuries, completed their struggle by the conquest 
of Grenada. 

Note 8. Stanza xlviit. 
No ! as he speeds he chaunts: — " Viva el Roy !" 

"Viva el Rev Fernando!" — Long live King Ferdi- 
nand ! is the chorus of most of the Spanish patriotic 
songs ; they are chiefly in dispraise of the old King 
Charles, the Queen, and the Prince of Peace. I have 
heard many of them ; some of the airs are beautiful. 
Godoy, the Pnncipe de la Paz, was bom at Badajoz, 
on the frontiers of Portugal, and was originally in the 
ranks of the Spanish Guards, till his person attracted 
the queen's eyes, and raised him to the dukedom of 
Alcudia, etc. etc. It is to this man that the Spaniards 
universally impute the ruin of their country. 

Note 9. Stanza 1. 
Bears in his cap the badge of crimson hue. 
Which tells you whom to shun and whom to greet. 

The red cockade, with "Fernando Septkno" in the 
centre. 

Note 10. Stanza li. 
The ball-piled pyramid, the ever-blazing match. 

All who have seen a battery will recollect the p>ra- 
midal form in which shot and shells arc piled. The 
Sierra Morena was fortified in every defile ihrotlgn 
which I passed in my way to Seville. 

Note 11. Stanza Ivi. 
Foil'd by a woman's hand before a battel d wal:. 
Such were the e] ploits of the Maid of Saragoza. 
I When the author was at Seville she walked dailvon the 



86 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Prado, decorated with medals and orders, by command 
of the Junta. 

Note 12. Stanza lviii. 

The seal love's dimpling finger halh impressed 
Denotes how soft that chin that bears Ins touch. 
" Sigilla in mento impressa amoris digitulo 
Vestigio demonstrant molhtudinem." — jJul. Gel. 

Note 13. Stanza lx. 
Oh, thou Purnassus! 
These Stanzas were written in C astri (Delphos) , at the 
foot of Parnassus, now called Aianvpa — Liakura. 

Note 14. Stanza Lxv. 
Fair is proud Seville; let her country boast 
Her strength, her wealth, her site of ancient days. 

Seville was the Hispalis of the Romans. 

Note 15. Stanza lxx. 
Ask ye, Bosotian shades ! the reason why 7 
This was written at Thebes, and consequently in the 
best situation for asking and answering such a ques- 
tion ; not as the birth-place of Pindar, but as the capital 
of Boeotia, where the first riddle was propounded and 
solved. 

Note 16. Stanza Ixxxii. 
Some bitter o'er the flowers its bubbling venom flings. 

" Medio de fonte leporum 
Surgit atnari aliquid.quod in ipsis fluribus angat." — Luc. 

Note 17. Stanza lxxxv. 
A traitor only fell beneath the feud. 
Alluding to the conduct and death of Solano, the 
Governor of Cadiz. 

Note 18. Stanza lxxxvi. 
" War even to the knife !" 
'War to the knife ;" Palafox's answer to the French 
General at the siege of Saragoza. 

Note 19. Stanza xci. 
And thou, my friend ! etc. 
The honourable I*. W**. of the Guards, who died of 
a fever at Coimbra. I had known him ten years, the 
better half of his life, and the happiest part of mine. 

In the short space of one month I have lost her who 
gave mc being, and most of those who had m.tde that 
being tolerable. To me the lines of Young are no 
fiction : 

Insatiate archer! could not one suffice? 
Thy shaft (lew thrice, and thrice my peace was slain. 
And thrice ere thrice yon moon had fill'd her horn." 

I should have ventured a verse to the memory of the 
Kite Charles Skinner Matthews, Fellow of Downing Col- 
lege, Cambridge, were he not too much above all praise 
of mine. His powers of mind, shown in the attainment 
of greater honours, against the ablest candidates, than 
those of any graduate on record at Cambridge, have 
sufficiently established his fame on the spot where it 
was acquired, while his softer qualities live in the recol- 
lection of friends who loved him too well to envy his 
superiority. 



CANTO II. 

Note 1. Slanza i. 
—despite of war and wasting fire — 
Part of the Acropolis was destroyed by the explosion 
•' a magazine during the Venetian siege. 



Note 2. Stanza i. 

Rut worse than steel, and flame, and ages slow, 
Is the dread sceptre anil dominion dire 
Of men who never felt the sacred alow 
That thoughts of thee and thine on pohsh'd breasts bestow. 

We can all feel, or imagine, the regret with which 
the ruins of cities, once the capitals of empires, are 
beheld ; the reflections suggested by such objects are 
loo trite to require recapitulation. But never did the 
littleness of man, and the vanity of his very best virtues, 
of patriotism to exalt, and of valour to defend his 
country, appear more conspicuous than in the record 
of what Athens was, and the certainty of what she now 
is. This theatre of contention between mighty factions, 
of the struggles of orators, the exaltation and deposition 
of tyrants, the triumph and punishment of generals, is 
now become a scene of petty intrigue and perpetual 
disturbance, between the bickering agents of certain 
British nobility and gentry. "The wild foxes, the owls 
and serpents in the ruins of Babylon," were surely less 
degrading than such inhabitants. The Turks have the 
plea of conquest for their tyranny, and the Greeks have 
only suffered the fortune of war, incidental to the 
bravest ; but how arc the mighty fahen, when two 
painters contest the privilege of plundering the Par- 
thenon, and triumph in turn, according to the tenor of 
each succeeding lirman ! Sylla could but punish, Philip 
subdue, and Xerxes burn Athens ; but it remained for 
the paltry antiquarian, and his despicable agents, to 
render her contemptible as himself and his pursuits. 

The Parthenon, before its destruction in part, by fire, 
during the Venetian siege, had been a temple, a church, 
and a mosque. In each point of view it is an object of 
regard : it changed its worshippers ; but still it was a 
place of worship thrice sacred to devotion: its violation: 
is a triple sacrilege. But 

" Man, vain man, 
Prest in a little brief authority, 
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven, 
As make the angels weep." 

Note 3. Stanza v. 
Far on the solitary shore he sleeps. 
It was not always the custom of the Greeks to burr 
their dead ; the greater Ajax in particular was interrca 
entire. Almost all the chiefs became gods after theit 
decease, and he was indeed neglected who had not an- 
nual games near his tomb, or festivals in honour of his 
memory by his countrymen, as Achilles, Brasidas, etc., 
and at last even Antinous, whose death was as heroic as 
his life was infamous. 

Note 4. Stanza x. 
Here, son of Saturn I was thy fav'rite throne. 
The temple of Jupiter Olvtnpius, of which sixteen 
columns entirely of marble yet survive : originally there 
were 150. These columns, however, are by many sup- 
posed to have belonged to the Pantheon. 

Note 5. Stanza xi. 
And bear these altars o'er the long-reluctant brine. 
The ship was wrecked in the Archipelago. 

Note 6. Stanza xii. 

To rive whnt Goth, and Turk, and time hath spared. 

At this moment (January 3, 1809), besides what has 

been already deposited in London, a Hydriot vessel is 

in the PinBUB to receive every possible relic. Thus, as I 

heard a young Greek observe, in common with mariv of 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



87 



his countrymen — for, lost as they are, they yet feel on 
this occasion — thus may Lord Elgin boast of having 
ruined Athens. An Italian painter of the first eminence, 
named Lusieri, is the agent of devastation ; and, like 
the Greek Jinder of Verres in Sicily, who followed the 
same profession, he has proved the able instrument of 
plunder. Between this artist and the French consul 
Fauvel, who wishes to rescue the remains for his own 
government, there is now a violent dispute concerning 
a car employed in their conveyance, the wheel of which 
— I wish they were both broken upon it — has been 
locked up by the consul, and Lusieri has laid his com- 
plaint before the Waywode. Lord Elgin has been ex- 
tremely happy in his choice of Signor Lusieri. During 
a residence of ten years in Athens, he never had the 
curiosity to proceed as far as Sunium, ' till he accom- 
panied us in our second excursion. However, his works, 
as far as they go, are most beautiful : but they are al- 
most all unfinished. While he and his patrons confine 
themselves to tasting medals, appreciating cameos, 
sketching columns, and cheapening gems, their litde 
absurdities are as harmless as insect or fox-hunting, 
maiden-speechifying, barouche-driving, or any such 
pastime ; but when they carry away three or four ship- 
loads of the most valuable and massy relics that time 
and barbarism have left to the most injured and most 
celebrated of cities ; when they destroy, in a vain at- 
tempt to tear down, those works which have been the 
admiration of ages, I know no motive which can ex- 
cuse, no name which can designate, the perpetrators of 
tills dastardly devastation. It was not the least of the 
crimes laid to the charge of Verres, that he had plun- 
dered Sicily, in the manner since imitated at Athens. 
The most unblushing impudence could hardly go fur- 
ther than to affix the name of its plunderer to the walls 
of the Acropolis ; while the wanton and useless deface- 
ment of the whole range of the basso-relievos, in one 
compartment of the temple, will never permit that name 
to be pronounced, by an observer, without execration. 



1 Now Cape Colonna. In all Attica, if we except Athens 
itself und Murathon, Ihere is no scene more interesting than 
Cape Colonna. To the antiquary and artist, sixteen columns 
are an inexhaustible source of observation and design ; to the 
philosophcc the supposed scene of some of Plato's conversa- 
tions will not be unwelcome ; and the traveller will be struck 
with the beauty of the prospect over " Isles that crvwn the 
JF.gean rf/ep;" but for an Englishman. Culonna has yet an 
additions I inteiest, as the actual sput of Falconer's Shipwreck. 
Pallns and Plato are forgotten in the recollection of Falconer 
and Campbell : 

" Hera in the dead of night, by Lonna's steep. 
The seaman's cry was heard along the deep." 
This temple of Minerva may be been at sea from a great dis- 
tance. In two jnurneys which I made, and One voyage to Cape 
Colonna, the view from either side, by land, was less striking 
I ban lb.,' approach from the isles. In our second land excursion, 
we had a narrow escape from a party of Mainotes, concealed 
in the caverns beneath. We wero told afterwards, by one of 
their prisoners subsequently ransomed, that they were At )■ iired 
from attacking us by the appearance of my two Albanians: 
conjecturing very sagaciously, but falsely, that we had a com- 
pete guard of tbese Arnaouts at hand, they remained station- 
ary, and thus saved our party, which was too small to have 
Opposed any effectual resistance. 
Colonna is no less a resort of painters than of pirates; there 
" The hireling artist pMnta bis paltry desk, 
And makes degraded Nature picturesque." 

(Sec Hodgson's Lady Jane Grey, etc.) 
But there Nature, with the aid of art, has done that for her- 
self. 1 wa« fortunate enough to engage a very superior German 
artist; and hope to renew my acquaintance with this and many 
ether Levantine .ccnes, by the arriva 1 of his performances. 



On this occasion I speak impartially : I am not a col- 
lector or admirer of collections, consequently no rival ; 
but I have some early prepossessions in favour of Greece, 
and do not think the honour of England advanced by 
plunder, whether of India or Attica. 

Another noble Lord has done better, because he has 
done less : but some others, more or less noble, yet 
" all honourable men," have done best, because, after 
a dial of excavation and execration, bribery to the 
Waywode, mining and countermining, they have done 
nothing at all. We had such ink-shed, and wine-shed, 
which almost ended in blood-shed ! Lord E.'s " prig," 
— see Jonathan Wylde for the definition of " priggism,?' 
— quarrelled with another, Gropius ' by name (a very 
good name too for his business), and muttered some- 
thing about satisfaction, in a verbal answer to a note of 
the poor Prussian : this was stated at table u, Gropius, 
w ho laughed, but could eat no dinner afterwards. The 
rivals were not reconciled when I left Greece. I have 
reason to remember their squabble, for they wanted to 
make me their arbitrator. 

Note 7. Stanza xii. 
Her sons too weak the sacred shrine to guard, 
Yet felt some portion of their mother's pains. 

I cannot resist availing myself of the permission of 
my friend Dr. Clarke, whose name requires no com- 
ment with the public, but whose sanction will add ten- 
fold weight to my testimony, to insert the following ex- 
tract from a very obliging letter of his to me, as a note 
to the above lines : 

" When the last of the Metopes was taken from the 
Parthenon, and, in moving of it, great part of the su- 
perstructure, with one of the triglvphs, was thrown 
down by the workmen whom Lord Elgin employed ; 
the Disdar, who beheld the mischief done to the build- 
ing, took his pipe from his mouth, dropped a tear, and, 
in a supplicating tone of voice, said to Lusieri, Tt'Aoj' 
— I was present." 

The Disdar alluded to was the father of the present 
Dis.lar. 

Note 8. Stanza xiv. 
Where was thine a^gis, Pallas '. that nppall'd 
Stem Alaric and havoc on their way? 

According to Zozimus, Minerva and Achilles fright- 
oned Alaric from the Acropolis ; but others relate that 
the Gothic king was nearly as mischievous as the Scot- 
tish peer. — See Chandler. 

Note 9. Stanza xviii. 

the netted canopy. 

The netting to prevent blocks or splinters from fall- 
ing on deck during action. 

Note 10. Stanza xxix. 

But not in silence pass Calypso's isles. 

Goza is said to have been the island of Calypso. 



1 This Sr. Gropius was employed by a noble Lord for the 
sole purpose of sketching, in which he excels ; but I am sorry 
to say, that he has, through the abused sanction of that most 
respectable name, been trending at an humble distance in the 
steps of Sr. Lusieri. A shipfnll of his trophies was detained, 
and, I believe, confiscated at Constantinople, in 1810. I am 
most happy to be now enabled to state, that "this was not in 
his bond ;" that he was employed solely as a painter, and that 
his noble patron disavows all connexion with him, except as 
an artist. If the error in the first and second edition of this 
poem has given the noblo Lord a moment's pain. I am very 
sorry fat it; Sr. Gropius has assumed fur years the name of 
ilia agent; and, though I cannot much condemn myself fm 
sharing in the mistake of so many, 1 am happy in being on» 
of the first to bo undeceived. Indeed, I have as much p casiire 
in contradicting this us I felt regret in stating it 



88 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Note 11. Stanza xx.wiii. 

Land of Vlbania! let me bend roine eyes 
(in thee, thou rugged nurse of savage men! 

Albania comprises part of Macedonia, Illyria, Cha- 
nrria, and E pints. Iskunder is the Turkish word for 
Alexander; and the celebrated Scanderbeg '(Lord Al- 
exander) is alluded to in the third and fourth lines of 
the thirty-eighth stanza. I do not know whether I am 
correct in making Scanderbeg the countryman of Alex- 
ander, who was born at Pella in Macedon, but Mr. 
Gibbon terms him so, and adds Pyrrhus to the list, in 
apeaking of his exploits. 

Of Albania, Gibbon remarks, that a country " within 
sight of Italy, is less known than the interior of Ame- 
rica." Circumstances, of little consequence to men- 
tion, led Mr. Hobhouse and myself into that country, 
before we visited any other part of the Ottoman domin- 
ions ; and with the exception of Major Leake, then 
officially resident at Joannina, no other Englishmen 
have ever advanced beyond the capital into the interior, 
as that gentleman very lately assured me. Ali Pacha 
was at that time, (October, 1S09), earning on war 
against Ibrahim Pacha, whom he had driven to Berat, 
a strong fortress, which he was then besieging : on our 
arrival at Joannina we were invited to Tepaleni, his 
Highncss's birth-place, and favourite Serai, only one 
day's distance from Berat; at this juncture the Vizier 
had made it his head-quarters. 

After some st^y in the capital, we accordingly fol- 
lowed ; but though furnished with every accommoda- 
tion, and escorted by one of the Vizier's secretaries, we 
were nine davs (on account of the rains) in accom- 
plishing a journey which, on our return, barely occu- 
pied four. 

On our route we passed two cities, Argyrocastro and 
Libochabo, apparently little inferior to Yaniria in size ; 
and no pencil or pen can ever do justice to the scenery 
in the vicinity of Zitza and Dclvinachi, the frontier vil- 
lage of Epirus and Albania Proper. 

On Albania and its inhabitants, I am unwilling to 
descant, because this will be done so much better by 
my fellow-traveller, in a work which may probably 
precede this in publication, that I as little wish to follow 
as I would to anticipate him. But some few observa- 
tions are necessary to the text. 

The Arnaouts, or Albanese, struck me forcibly by 
their resemblance to the Highlanders of Scotland, in 
dress, figure, and manner of living. Their very moun- 
tains seemed Caledonian, with a kinder climate. The 
kilt, though white ; the spare, active form ; <heir dia- 
lect, Celtic in its sound, and their hardy habits, all car- 
ried me back to Morven, No nation arc so detested 
and dreaded by their neighbours as the Albanese : the 
Greeks hardly regard them as Christians, or the Turks 
as Mo lems ; and in fact tiu-y are a mixture of both, 
and sometimes neither. Their habits are predatory: 
all are armed ; and the red-shawled Arnaouts, the 
Montenegrins, Chimariots, and Gegdes, arc treacherous; 
le others ditfer somewhat in garb, and essentially in 
wharacter. As .'ar as my own experience goes, I can 
speak favourably. I was attended by two, an Infidel 
and a Mussulman, to Constantinople and every other 
part of Turkey which came within my observation ; and 
more faithful in peril, or indefatigable in service, are 
.-are to I i found. The Inti li 1 was named Basilius, the 
Moslem, Dervish Tahiti ; the former a man of middle 



age, and the latter about my own. Basili was strictly 
cha.'ged by Ali Pacha in person to attend us ; and Dcr- 
vi-di was one of fifty who accompanied us through the 
forests of Acarnania to the banks of Acheloiis, and on- 
ward to Messalunghi in .rEtolia. There I took him into 
my own service, and never had occasion to repent it till 
the moment of my departure. 

When in 1810, after the departure of my friend Mr. 
H. for England, I was seized with a severe fever in the 
Morea, these men saved my life by frightening away 
my physician, whose throat they threatened to cut if 1 
was not cured within a given time. To this consola 
tory assurance of posthumous retribution, and a reso- 
lute refusal of Dr. Romanelli's prescriptions, I attributed 
my recovery. I had left my last remaining English 
servant at Athens ; my dragoman was as ill as myself, 
and my poor Arnaouts nursed me with an attention 
which would have done honour to civilization. 

They had a variety of adventures ; for the Moslem, 
Dervish, being a remarkably handsome man, was al- 
ways squabbling with the husbands of Alliens ; inso- 
much that four of the principal Turks paid me a visit 
of remonstrance at the Convent, on the subject of his 
having taken a woman from the bath — whom he had 
lawfully bought however — a thing quite contrary to 
etiquette. 

Basil! also was extremely gallant amongst his own 
persuasion, and had the greatest veneration for the 
church, mixed with the highest contempt of church- 
men, whom he cuffed upon occasion in a most hetero- 
dox manner. Yet he never passed a church without 
crossing himself; and I remember the risk he ran in 
entering St. Sophia, in Slambol, because it had once 
beon a place of his worship. On remonstrating with 
him on his inconsistent proceedings, he invariably an- 
swered, "our church is holy, our pric sts are thieves;" 
and then he crossed himself as usual, and boxed the 
ears of the first "papas" who refused to assist in any 
required operation, as was always found to be neces- 
sary where a priest had any influence with the Cogia 
Bashi of his village. Indeed a more abandoned race 
of miscreants cannot exist than the lower orders of the 
Greek clergy. 

When preparations were made for my return, my 
Albanians were summoned to receive their pay. Basili 
took his with an awkward show of regret at my in- 
tended departure, and marched away to his quarters 
with his bag of piastres. I sent for Dervish, but for 
some time he was not to be found; at last he entered, 
just as Signor Logothcti, father to the ci-devant Ang'o- 
consul of Athens, and some other of my Greek ac- 
quaintances, paid me a visit. Dervish took the money, 
hut on a sudden dashed it to the ground ; and clasping 
his hands, which he raised to his forehead, rushed out 
of the room weeping bitterly. From thai moment to 
the hour of mv embarkation, he continued Ins lament- 
ations, and all our efforts to console him only produced 
this answer, " M' atpctvet," " He leaves me." Signor 
Logothcti, who never wept before for any thing less 
than the loss of a para, 1 melted; the padre of the 
convent, my attendants, mv visitors — and I verilv be- 
lieve that even " Sterne's foolish fat scullion" would 
have left h( r " fish-kettle" to sympathize with the un 
affected and unexpected sorrow of this barbarian. 



1 P about the fourth of a fartliin™. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



89 



For my own part, when I remembered thai, a short 
time before my departure from England, a noble and 
most intimate associate had excused himself from tak- 
ing leave of me because he had to attend a relation 
"to a milliner's," I felt no less surprised than humili- 
ated by the present occurrence and the past recollec- 
tion. 

That Dervish would leave me with some regret was 
to be expected : when master and man have been 
scrambling over the mountains of a dozen provinces to- 
gether, they are unwilling to separate ; but his presenl 
feeliiiis, contrasted with his native ferocity, improved 
my opinion of the human heart. I believe this almost 
feudal fidelity is frequent amongst them. One day, on 
our journey over Parnassus, an Englishman in my ser- 
vice gave him a push in some dispute about the bag- 
gage, which he unluckily mistook for a blow ; he spoke 
not, but sat down, leaning his head upon his hands. 
Foreseeing the consequences, we endeavoured to ex- 
plain away the affront, which produced the following 
answer : — " I have been a robber, I am a soldier ; no 
captain ever struck me ; you are my master, I have eaten 
your bread ; but by that bread ! (a usual oath) had it 
been otherwise, I would have stabbed the dog your ser- 
vant, and gone to the mountains." So the affair ended, 
but from that day forward he never thoroughly forgave 
the thoughtless fellow who insulted him. 

Dervish excelled in the dance of his country, conjec- 
tured to be a remnant of the ancient Pyrrhic : be that as 
it may, it is manly, and requires wonderful agility. It is 
very distinct from the stupid Romaika, the dull round- 
about of the Greeks, of which our Athenian party had 
so many specimens. 

The Albanians in general (I do not mean the cultiva- 
tors of the earth in the provinces, who have also that 
appellation, but the mountaineers) have a fine cast of 
countenance ; and the most beautiful women I ever be- 
held, in stature and in features, we saw levelling the 
road broken down by the torrents between Delvinachi 
and Libochabo. Their manner of walking is truly the- 
atrical ; but this strut is probably the effect of the ca- 
pote, or cloak, depending from one shoulder. Their 
long hair reminds you of the Spartans, and their cour- 
age in desultory warfare is unquestionable. Though 
they have some cavalry amongst the Gegdes, I never 
saw a good Arnaout horseman : my own preferred the 
English saddles, which, however, they could never keep. 
But on foot they are not to be subdued by fatigue. 

Note 12. Stanza xxxix. 



— an.l pass'd tho barren spot, 

Where sad Penelope u'erlook'd tliu wave. 

Ithaca. 

Note 13. Stanza xl. 

Action], Lepanto, fiital Trafalgar. 

Actium and Trafalgar need no further mention. The 

battle of Lepanto, equally bloody and considerable, but 

less known, was fbnght in the gulf of Patras; here the 

author of Don Quixote lost his left hand. 

Note 14. Stanza xli. 
And liailM the last resotl of fruitless lore. 
Leucadia, now Santa Maura. From the promontory 
(the Lover's Leap) Sappho is said to have throw n her- 
self. 

17 



Note 1 j. Stanza xlv. 

many a Roman chief and Asian kin?. 

It is said, that on (he day previous to the battle of 
Actium, Anthony had thirteen kings ut his levee. 

Note 16. Stanza xlv. 
Look when' the second Ccesar'a trophies rose. 
Nicopolis, whose ruins tire most extensive, is at some 
distance from Actium, where the wall of the Hippo- 
drome survives in a few fragments. 

Note 17. Stanza xlvii. 
Acherusia's lake. 



According to Pouqueville, the Lake of Yanina ; bat 
Pouqueville is always out. 

Note 18. Stanza xlvii. 
To greet Albania's cliief. 
The celebrated Alt Pacha. Of this extraordinary man 
there is an incorrect account in Pouqueville's Travels. 

Note 19. Stanza xlvii. 

Yethere nm! there lonte daring mountain band 
Disdain his power, and from their ■rocky hold 

Hurl their defiance Tar, nor yield, unless to gold. 

Five thousand Su'iotes, among the rocks and in the 
castle of Suli, withstood 30,000 Albanians for eighteen 
years: the castle at last was taken by bribery. In this 
contest there were several acts performed not unworthy 
of the better days of Greece. 

Note 20. Stanza xlviii. 
Monastic Zitza, etc. 
The convent and village of Zitza arc four hours' jour- 
ney from Joannina, or Yanina, the capital of the Pa- 
chalick. In the valley the river Kalamas (once the Ache- 
ron) Hows, and not far from Zitza forms a fine cataract. 
The situation is perhaps the finest in Greece, though 
ihe approach to Delvinachi and parts of Acarnania and 
-Flu! hi may contest the palm. Delphi, Parnassus, and, 
in Attica, even Cape Colonna and Port Raphti, are 
very inferior ; as also every scene in Ionia or the Troad : 
I am almost inclined to add the approach to Constanti- 
nople, but, from the different features of the last, a 
comparison can hardly be made. 

Note 21. Stanza x!ix. 
Here dwells the caloyer 
The Greek monks are so called. 

Note 22. Stanza li. 
Nature's volcanic amphitheatre. 
The Chimariot mountains appear to have been vo 
came. 

Note 23. Stanza h. 

behold black Acheron : 

Now called Kalamas. 

Note 24. Stanza hi. 

in his white capote — 

Albanese cloak. 

Note 2o. Stanza lv. 
The sun had sunk behind vast Tomwit. 

Anciently Mount Tomarus. 

Note W. Stanza lv. 
And Laos wide and fierce came roaring by. 
The river Laos was full at the time the author passeo 
it ; and, immediately above Tepaleen, was to the »>e n> 



90 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



(ride as the Thames at Westminster ; at least in the 
opinion of the author and his fellow-traveller, Mr. 
Hobhousc. In the summer it must he much narrower. 
It certainly is the finest river in the Levant ; neither 
AcIh l"iK, Al|iheus, Acheron, Scamander, nor Cayster, 
approached it in breadth or beauty. 

Note 27. Stanza lxvi. 
And fellow-countrymen have stood uloof. 
Alluding to the wreckers of Cornwall. 
Note 28. Stanza bod. 

the red wine circling fast. 

The Albanian Mussulmans do not abstain from wine, 
and indeed very few of the others. 

Note 29. Stanza lxxi. 

Each Palikar his sabre from him cast. 

Palikar, shortened when addressed to a single person, 

from n<iX()C(i/j(, a general name for a soldier amongst 

the Greeks and Albanese who speak Romaic — it means 

properly " a lad." 

Note 30. Stanza lxxii. 
While thus in concert, etc. 
As a specimen of the Albanian or Arnaout dialect of 
the Illyric, I here insert two of their most popular choral 
songs, which are generally chaunted in (lancing by men 
or women indiscriminately. The first words are merely 
a kind of chorus, without meaning, like some in our 
own and all other languages. 
Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Lo, Lo, I come, I come ; 



Naciarura, popuso. 

Naciarura na civin 
Ha pe uderini ti bin. 
Ha pe uderi escrotini 
Ti vin ti mar servetini. 

Caliriote me surme 
Ea ha pe pse dua tive. 

Buo, Bo, Bo, Bo, Bo, 

Gi egem spirta esiniiro. 
Caliriote vu le funds 
Ede vete tunde tundc. 

Caliriote me surme 
Ti mi put e poi mi le. 
Se ti puta citi mora 
Si mi ri ni veti udo gia 



Va iC ni il chc cadale 
Celo more, more celo. 

Piu hari ti tirete 

Plu huron cia Dra seti. 



be thou silent, 
I come, I run ; open the 

door that I may enter. 
Open the door by halves, 
that I may take my tur- 
ban. 

Caliriotes 1 with the dark 
eyes, open the gate that 
I may enter. 

Lo, lo, I hear thee, my 

soul. 
An Arnaout girl, in costly 

garb, walks with graceful 

pride. 

Caliriot maid of the dark 

eyes, give me a kiss. 
If I have kissed thee, what 

hast thou gained ? Mj* 

soul is consumed with 

fire. 
Dance lightly, more gently, 

and gently still. 
Make not so much dust to 

destroy your embroidered 

hose. 

The lasV stanza would puzzle a commentator : the men 
nave certainly buskins of the most beautiful texture, 
but the ladies (to whom the above is supposed to be 
addressed) have nothing under their little yellow boots 



and slippers but a well-turned and sometimes very white 
ancle. The Arnaout girls are much handsomer than the 
Cheeks, and their dress is far more picturesque. They 
preserve their shape much longer also, from being al- 
ways in the open air. It is to be observed that the 
Arnaout is not a written language ; the words of this 
song, therefore, as well as the one which follows, are 
spelt according to their pronunciation. They are copied 
by one who speaks and understands the dialect per- 
fectly, and who is a native of Athens. 

I am wounded by thy love, 
and have loved but to 
scorch myself. 

Thou hast consumed me ! 
Ah, maid ! thou hast 
struck me to the heart. 

I have said I w ish no dow- 
ry, but thine eyes and 
eyelashes. 

The accursed dowry I want 
not, but thee only. 

Give me thy charms, and 
let the portion feed the 
flames. 

I have loved thee, maid, 
with a sincere soul, but 
thou hast left me like a 
withered tree. 

If I have placed my hand 
on thy bosom, what have 
I gained ? my hand is 
withdrawn, but retains 
the flame. 



Ndi sefda tinde ulavossa 
Vetthni upri vi lofsa. 

Ah vaisisso mi privi lofse 
Si mi rim mi la vosse. 

yti tasa roba stua 
Sitti eve tulati dua. 

Roba stinori ssidua 
Qu mi sini vetti dua. 
Qtirmiui dua civileni 
Roba ti siarmi tildi eni. 

Utara pisa vaisisso me simi 

rin ti bapti. 
Eti mi bire a piste si gui 

dendroi titta.fi. 
Udi vura udorini udiri ci- 

cova cilti mora 
Udorini talti hollua u ede 

caimoni mora. 



I The Albanese, particularly the women, are frequently 
trnuvd ' Calirio'ei ," for what reason I inquired in vain. 



I believe the two last stanzas, as they are in a differ- 
ent measure, ought to belong to another ballad. An 
idea something similar to the thought in the last lines 
was expressed by Socrates, whose arm having come in 
contact with one of his " {ii70KoX77iot," Critobulus or 
Cleobulus, the philosopher complained of a shooting 
pain as tar as his shoulder for some days after, and 
therefore very properly resolved to teach his disciples 
in future without touching them. 

Note 31. Seng, stanza 1. 
Tambourgi ! Tambourgi ! thy 'larum afar, etc. 
These stanzas are partly taken from different Alba- 
nese songs, as far as I was able to make them out by 
the exposition of the Albanese in Romaic and Italian. 

Note 32. Song, stanza 8. 
Remember the moment when Previsa fell. 
It was taken by storm from the French. 

Note 33. Stanza lxxiii. 
Fair Greece ! sad relic ofdcparled worth, etc. 
Some thoughts on this subject will be found in the 
subjoined papers. 

Note 34. Stanza lxxiv. 

Pnirit of freedom ! when on Thyle's brow 
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train. 

Phylc, which commands a beautiful view of Athens, 

has still considerable remains ; it was seized by Thrasy 

bulus previous to the expulsion of the Thirty. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



91 



Note 35. Stanza Ixxvii. 
Receive the fiery Frank, her former guest 
When taken by the Latins, and retained for several 
years. See Gibbon. 

Note 36. Stanza lxxvii. 
The prophet's tomb of all its pious spoil. 
Mecca and Medina were taken some time ago by the 
Wahabces, a sect yearly increasing. 

Note 37. Stanza lxxxv. 
Thy vales of ever-green, thy hills of snow — 
On many of the mountains, particularly Liakura, the 
snow never is entirely melted, notwithstanding the in- 
tense heat of the summer ; but I never saw it lie on the 
plains, even in winter. 

Note 38. Stanza lxxxvi. 

Save where some solitary column mourns 

Above its prostrate brethren of the cave. 

Of Mount Pentelicus, from whence the marble was 

dug that constructed the public edifices of Athens. 

The modern name is Mount Mendeli. An immense 

cave formed by the quarries still remains, and will till 

the end of time. 

Note 39. Stanza lxxxix. 
When Marathon became a magic word — 
" Siste, viator — heroa calcas!" was the epitaph on 
the famous Count Merci ; — what then must be our 
feelings when standing on the tumulus of the two 
hundred (Greeks) who fell on Marathon? The prin- 
cipal barrow has recently been opened by Fauvel ; few 
or no relics, as vases, etc. were found by the excavator. 
The plain of Marathon was offered to me for sale at 
the sum of sixteen thousand piastres, about nine hun- 
dred pounds ' Alas ! — " Expende — quot libras in duce 
summo — invenics?" — was the dust of Miltiades worth 
no more ? it could scarcely have fetched less if sold by 
weight. 



PAPERS REFERRED TO BY NOTE 33. 
1. 

Before I say any thing about a city of which every 
body, traveller or not, has thought it necessary to say 
something, I will request Miss Owenson, when she next 
borrows an Athenian heroine for her four volumes, to 
have the goodness to marry her to somebody more of 
a gentleman than a " Disdar Aga" (who by the by is 
not an aga), the most impolite of petty officers, the 
greatest patron oflarceny Athens ever saw (except Lord 
E.), and the unworthy occupant of the Acropolis, on a 
handsome annual stipend of loO piastres (eight pounds 
sterling), out of which he has only to pay his garrison, 
the most ill-regulated corps in the ill-regulated Otto- 
man Empire. I speak it tenderly, seeing I was once 
the cause of the husband of "Ida of Athens" nearly 
suffering the bastinado ; and because the said " Disdar" 
is a turbulent husband, and beats his wife, so that I 
exhort and beseech Miss Owenson to sue for a separate 
maintenance in behalf of " Ida." Having premised 
thus; much, on a matter of such import to the readers 
of romances, I may now leave Ida, to mention her 
birth-place. 

Setting aside the magic of the name, and all those 
associations which it woidd be pedantic and super- 
fluous to recapittdate, the very situation of Athens 



would render it the favourite of all who have eves for 
art or nature. The climate, to me at least, appeared a 
jerpetual spring ; during eight months I never passed a 
lay without being as many hours on horseback ; rain 
is extremely rare, snow never lies in the plains, and a 
cloudy day is an agreeable rarity. In Spain, Portugal, 
and every part of the East which I visited, except Ionia 
and Attica, I perceived no such superiority of climate 
to our own; and at Constantinople, where I passed 
May, June, and part of July (1810), you might "damn 
the climate, and complain of spleen," five days out of 
seven. 

The air of the Morea is heavy and unwholesome, but 
the moment you pass the isthmus in the direction of 
Megara, the change is strikingly perceptible. But I fear 
Hesiod will still be found correct in his description of 
a Boeotian winter. 

We found at Livadia an " esprit fort" in a Greek 
bishop, of all free-thinkers ! 1 iis worthy hypocrite 
rallied his own religion with great intrepidity (but not 
before his flock), and talked of a mass as a " coglio- 
neria." It was impossible to think better of him for 
this : but, for a Boeotian, he was brisk with all his ab- 
surdity. This phenomenon (with the exception indeed 
of Thebes, the remains of Cha?ronea, the plain of 
Platea, Orchomenus, Livadia, and its nominal cave of 
Trophonius), was the only remarkable thing we saw 
before we passed Mount Cithaeron. 

The fountain of Dirce turns a mill : at least, my com- 
panion (who, resolving to be at once cleanly and clas- 
sical, bathed in it) pronounced it to be the fountain of 
Dirce, and any body who thinks it worth while may 
contradict him. At Castri we drank of half a dozen 
streamlets, some not of the purest, before we decided 
to our satisfaction which was the true Castalian, and 
even that had a villanous twang, probably from the 
snow, though it did not throw us into an epic fever 
like poor Doctor Chandler. 

From Fort Phyle, of which large remains still exist, 
the Plain of Athens, Pentelicus, Hymettus, the JEgean, 
and the Acropolis, burst upon the eye at once ; in my 
opinion, a more glorious prospect than even C intra or 
Istambol. Not the view from the Troad, with Ida, 
the Hellespont, and the more distant Mount Athos, can 
equal it, though so superior in extent. 

I heard much of the beauty of Arcadia, but, except- 
ing the view from the monastery of Mcgaspclion (which 
is inferior to Zitza in a command of country), and tlio 
descent from the mountains on the way from Tripolitza 
to Argos, Arcadia has little to recommend it beyond 
the name. 

" Sternitur, et duhes moriens reminiscitur Argos." 
Virgil could have put this into the mouth of none but 
an Argive ; and (with reverence be it spoken) it doc« 
not deserve the epithet. And if the Polynices of Sta- 
tins, " In mediis audit duo littora campis," did actually 
hear both shores in crossing the isthmus of Corinth, he 
had better ears than have ever been worn in sucn a 
journey since. 

"Athens," says a celebrated topographer, " is stiU tin 
most polished city of Greece." Perhaps it may u. 
Greece, but not of the Greeks; for Joannina, in Epiiud, 
is universally allowed, amongst themselves, to be supe- 
rior in the wealth, refinement, learning, and dialect of 
its inhabitants. The Athenians are remarkable o« 



92 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



their cunning ; and the lower orders are not improperly 
characterized in that proverb, which classes them with 
"the Jews of Salonica, and the Turks of the Negro- 
pont." 

Among the various foreigners resident in Athens, 
French, Italians, Germans, Itagusans, etc., there was 
never a difference of opinion in their estimate of the 
Gtreek character, though on all other topics they dis- 
puted with great acrimony. 

M. Fauvcl, the French consul, who has passed thirty 
years principally at Athens, and to whose talents as an 
artist, and manners as a gentleman, none who have 
known him can refuse their testimony, has frequent! 
declared in my hearing; that the Greeks do not deserve 
to be emancipated ; reasoning on the {rounds of their 
" national and individual depravity," while he forgot 
that such depravity is to he attributed to causes whicl 
can only he removed by the measure he reprobatea 

M. Roque, a French merchant of respectability lone 
settled in Athens, asserted with the most amusing 
gravity: " Sir, they are the same canaille that existed 
in. the days of Themistoclcs .'" an alarming remark to 
the " Laudator temporis acti." The ancients banished 
Themistoclcs; the moderns cheat Monsieur Roque : 
thus great men have ever been treated ! 

In short, all the Franks who are fixtures, and most 
of the Englishmen, Germans, Danes, etc. of passage, 
came over by degrees to their opinion, on much the 
same grounds that a Turk in England would condemn 
the nation by wholesale, because he was wronged In 
his lacquey, and overcharged by his washerwoman. 

Certainly it was not a little staggering, when the 
SicursFauvel and Lusieri, the two greatest demagogues 
of the day, who divide between them the power of 
Pericles and the popularity of C Icon, and puzzle the 
poor Waywode with perpetual differences, agreed in 
the utter condemnation, " nulla virtute redemptum," 
of the Greeks in general, and of the Athenians in par- 
ticular. 

For my own humble opinion, I am loth to hazard it, 
Knowing, as I do, that there be now in MS. no less 
than five tours of the first magnitude and of the most 
threatening aspect, all in typographical arrav, by per- 
sons of wit, and honour, and regular commonplace 
books : but, if I may say this without offence, it seems 
to me rather hard to declare so positively and pertina- 
ciously, as almost every body has declared, that the 
Greeks, because they are very had, will never be better. 
Eton and Sonnini have led us astray by their pane- 
gyrics and projects ; but, on the other hand, De Pauw 
and Thornton have debased the Greeks beyond their 
demerits. 

The Greeks will never be independent; they will 
tiever be sovereigns, as heretofore, and God forbid they 
ever should ! but they may be subjects without being 
slaves. Our colonies are not independent, but they 
are free and industrious, and such may Greece be 
nercafler. 

At present, like the Catholics of Ireland, and the 
Jews throughout the world, and such other cudgelled 
and heterodox people, they suffer all the moral and 
physical ills that can afllict humanity. Their life is a 
Blruggle against truth; they are vicious in their own 
defence. They are so unused lo kindness, that when 
>cy occasionally meet with it, they look upon it with 



on, as a dog often beaten snaps at your fingers 
If you attempt to caress him. " They ar# ungrateful, 

notoriously, abominably ungrateful!" — this is the gen- 
eral cry. Now, in the name of Nemesis ! for what are 
they to be grateful? Where is the human being that 
ever conferred a benefit on Greek or Greeks? They 
are to be grateful to the Turks for their fetters, and to 
the Franks for their broken promises and lying coun- 
sels. They are to be grateful to the artist who engraves 
their ruins, and to the antiquary who carries them 
away: to the traveller whose janissary flogs them, and 
to the scribbler whose journal abuses them ! This is the 
amount of their obligations to foreigners. 

II. 

Franejrrrtn Convent, Athens, January 23, 1811. 

Amongst the remnants of the barbarous policy of the 
earlier a^'cs, are the traces of bondage which yet exist 
in different countries ; whose inhabitants, however di- 
vided in religion and manners, almost all agree in op- 
pression. 

The English have at last compassionated their ne- 
groes, and, under a less bigoted government, may 
probably one dav release their Catholic brethren : but 
the interposition of foreigners alone can emancipate the 
Greeks, who, otherwise, appear to have as small a 
chance of redemption !Vom the Turks, as the Jews have 
from mankind in general. 

Of the ancient Greeks we know more than enough; 
at hast the younger men of Europe devote much of 
their time to. the study of the Greek writers and history, 
which would he more usefully spent in mastering their 
own. Of the moderns, we are perhaps more neglectful 
than they deserve ; and while every man of any pre- 
tensions to learning is tiring out his youth, and often his 
age, in the study of the language and of the harangues 
of the Athenian demagogues, in favour of freedom, the 
real or supposed descendants of these sturdy republicans 
are left to the actual tyranny of their masters, although 
a very slight «;flbrt is required to strike off their 
chains. 

To talk, as the Greeks themselves do, of their rising 
again to their pristine superiority, would be ridiculous; 
as the rest of the world must resume its barbarism, after 
re-asserting the sovereignty of Greece : but there seems 
to be no very great obstacle, except in the apathy of the 
Franks, to their becoming a useful dependency, or 
even a free state with a proper guarantee ; — under 
correction, however, be it spoken, for many and well- 
informed men doubt the practicability even of this. 

The Greeks have never lost their hope, though they 
are now more divided in opinion on the subject of their 
probable deliverers. Religion recommends the Russians; 
but they have twice been deceived and abandoned by 
that power, and the dreadful lesson they received after 
the Muscovite desertion in the Morea has never been 
forgotten. The French they dislike ; although the 
subjugation of the rest of Europe will, probably, be 
attended by the deliverance of continental (. 
The islanders look to the English for succour, as they 
have very lately possessed themselves of the Ionian 
republic, Corfu excepted. Rut whoever appear with 
arms in their hands will be welcome ; and when that 
day arrives, Heaven have mercy on the Ottomans ; they 
cannot expect it from the Giaours. 

Rut instead of considering what they have been, and 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



93 



speculating on what they may be — let us look at them 
as they are. 

An 1 here it i3 impossible to reconcile the contrariety 
of opinions : some, particularly the merchants, decry- 
ing tin' Greek* in the strongest language ; others, gen- 
erally travellerSs^urning periods in their eulogy, and 
publishing veiy curious speculations grafted on their 
former state, which can have no more effect on their 
present lot, than the existence of the Incas on the fu- 
ture fortunes of Peru. 

One very ingenious person terms them the " natural 
allies" of Englishmen ; another, no less ingenious, will 
not allow them to be the allies of any body, and denies 
their very descent from the ancients ; a third, more in- 
genious than eillier^builds a Greek empire on a Russian 
foundation, and realizes (on paper) all the chimeras of 
Catherine II. As to the question of their descent, what 
can it import whether the Mainotes are the lineal La- 
coniaus or not? or the present Athenians as indigenous 
as the bees of Hymettus, or as the grasshoppers, to 
which they once likened themselves? What English- 
man car^-s if he be of a Danish, Saxon, Norman, or 
Trojan blood? or who, except a Welchinan, is afflicted 
with a desire of being descended from Caractacus ? 

The poor Greeks do not so much abound in the good 
things of this world, as to render even their claims to 
antiquity an object of envy ; it is very cruel then in Mr. 
Thornton, to disturb them in the possession of all that 
time has left them; viz. their pedigree, of which they 
are the more tenacious, as it is all they can call their 
own. It would be worth while to publish together, and 
compare, the works of Messrs. Thornton and De Pauw, 
Eton and Sonnini ; paradox on one side, and prejudice 
on the other. Mr. Thornton conceives himself to have 
claims to public confidence from a fourteen years' resi- 
dence at Pera ; perhaps he may on the subject of the 
Turks, but this can give him no more insight into the real 
6tate of Greece and her inhabitants, than as many years 
spent in Wapping, into that of the Western Highlands. 

The Greeks of Constantinople live in Fanal ; and if 
Mr. Thornton did not oftener cross the Golden Horn 
than his brother merchants are accustomed to do, I 
should place no great reliance on his information. I 
actually heard one of these gentlemen boast of their 
httle general intercourse with the city, and assert of 
himself, with an air of triumph, that he had been but 
four times at Constantinople in as many years. 

As to Mr. Thornton's voyages in the Black Sea wilh 
Greek vessels, they gave him the same idea of Greece 
as a cruise to Berwick in a Scotch smack would of 
Johnny Grot's house. Upon what grounds then does 
he arrogate the right of condemning by wholesale a body 
of men, of whom he can know litt le ! It is rather a cu- 
rious circumstance that Mr. Thornton, who so lavishlv 
dispraises Pouquevdle on every occasion of mentioning 
the Turks, has yet recourse to him as authority on the 
Greeks, and terms him an impartial observer. Now Dr. 
Foiiquoville is as little entitled to that appellation, as 
Mr. Thornton to confer it on him. 

The fact is, we are deplorably in want of information 
on the subject of the Greeks, and in particular their 
literature ; nor is there any [probability of our being bet 
ter acquainted, till our intercourse becomes more inti- 
mate, or their independence confirmed : the relations of 
passing travellers aro as little to be depended on as the 

M 



invectives of angry factors ; but till something more 
can be attained, we must be content with the little to 
be acquired from similar sources. 1 

However defective these may be, they are preferable 
to the paradoxes of men who have read superficially of 
the ancients, and seen nothing of the moderns, such as 
DePauw; who, when he asserts that the British breed 
of horses is ruined by Newmarket, and that the Spar- 
tans were cowards in the field, betrays an equal know- 
ledge of English horses and Spartan men. His "phi- 
losophical observations'' h:ive a much better claim to 
the title of " poetical." It could not be expected that 
he who so liberally condemns some of the most cele- 
brated institutions of the ancient, should have mercy on 
the modern Greeks: and it fortunately happens, that 
the absurdity of his hypothesis on their forefathers re- 
futes his sentence on themselves. 

Let us trust, then, that in spite of the prophecies of 
De Pauw, and the doubts of Mr. Thornton, there is a 
reasonable hope of the redemption of a race of men, 
who, whatever may be the errors of their religion and 
policy, have been amply punished by three centuries 
and a half of captivity. 

III. 
Athens, Franciscan Convent, March 17, 1811. 
" I must have some talk with this learned Theban." 

Some time after my return from Constantinople to 
this citv, I received the thirty-first number of the Edin 
burgh Review as a great favour, and certainly at this 
distance an acceptable one, from the Captain of an 
English frigate off" Salamis. In that number, Art. 3, 
containing the review of a French translation of Strabo, 
there are introduced some remarks on the modern 
Greeks and their literature, with a short account of 
Coray, a co-translator in the French version. On those 
remarks I mean to ground a tew observations, and 
the spot where I now write will, I hope, be sufficient 
excuse for introducing them in a work in some degree 
connected with the subject. Coray, the most celebrated 
of living Greeks, at least among the Franks, was born 

1 A won!, en passant, with Mr. Thornton atirl ])r. Pouque- 
ville, win, luxe i„ , ii guilty between thorn of sadly clipping 
the Sultan's Turkish. 

])r. Poaqueyille tells a Ion? story of a Moslem who swa'l 
lowed corrosive sublimate, in such quantities that lie acquired 
the name of " Sutepman Yet/en," i. e. quoth the doctor, 
" Suit ihnan, the Inter of corrosive sublHnate." "Aha." 
thinks Mr. Thornton, fungry with the doctor for the fiftieth 
time) "have I caught you?" — Then, in a note twice t lie 
thickness of the doctor's anecdote, be questions the doctor's 
proficiency hi the Turkish tongue, and his veracity in hi- own. 
— "For," observes Mr. Thornton, (utter indicting on us the 
tough participle of a Turkish verb), " it means nothing mora 
than Suiet/tnart the eater," Bnd unite cashiers (he supple- 
mentary "sublimate." Now both are ri;;ht anil both are 
wrong. If Mr. Thornton, when he next resides " fourteen 
years in the factory," will consult Ins Turkish dictionary, or 
ask any of bis Stamboline acquaintance, he will discover that 
" Suleuma'n veiien," put together discreetly, mean tho 
" Sicallower of sublimate," without any " Suit vtnan" in tho 
case ; " Sulri/ma" signifying "eorrositit sublimate?' and not 
being a proper name on this occasion, although it he an or- 
thodox name enough With the addition of n .After Mr 
Thornton's frequent hints of profound orientalism, lie might 
have found this out before he sam: such pagans over Dr 
Pouqqcville. 

After this. 1 think " Travellers versus Factors" shall no 
our motto, though the above Mr. Thornton has com 
" hoc genus omne," mr mistake and misroprewrttation, " No 
Sutor ultra crepidam," "No merchant beyond his boles " 
N. H. For the benefit of Mr. Thornton 'Sutor" in m t 
proper name. 




at Scio (in the Review Smyrna 13 stated, I have reason 
to think, incorrectly), and, besides the translation of 
Beccaria, and other works mentioned hv the reviewer, 
has published a lexicon in Romaic and French, if I may 
trust the assurance of some Danish travellers lately 
arrived from Paris ; but the latest we have seen here 
in French and Greek is that of Gregory Zolikoglonn. ' 
Coray has recently been involved in an unpleasant 
controversy with M. Gail, 2 a Parisian commentator and 
editor of some translations from the Greek poets, in 
consequence of the Institute having awarded him the 
prize for his version of Hippocrates " Ucpi tc^'rui-," 
etc. to the disparagement, and consequently displeasure, 
of the said Gail. To his exertions, literary and patriotic, 
great praise is undoubtedly due, but a part of that praise 
ought not to be withheld from the two brothers Zosimado 
(merchants settled in Leghorn), who sent him to Paris, 
and maintained him, for the express purpose of eluci- 
dating the ancient, and adding to the modern researches 
of his countrymen. Coray, however, is not considered 
by his countrymen equal to some who lived in the two 
last centuries : more particularly Dorotheas of Mity- 
lene, whose Hellenic writings arc so much esteemed by 
the Greeks, that Meletius terms him, " M/ra tuv 
QovKvFi&tivKa'i s.evo<pii>VTa upiaro; 'EXXi/m>v." (P. 224. 
Ecclesiastical History, vol. iv.) 

Panagiotes Kodrikas, the translator of Fontenelle, 
and Kamarases, who translated Ocellus Lucanus on 
the Universe into French, Christodoulus, and more 
particularly Psalida, whom I have conversed with in 
Joannina, are also in high repute among their literati. 
The last-mentioned has published in Romaic and Latin 
a work on " True Happiness," dedicated to Catherine 
II. But Polyzois, who is stated by the reviewer to be 
the only modern except Coray, who has distinguished 
himsek" by a knowledge of Hellenic, if he be the Poly- 
zois Lampanitziotes of Yanina, who has published a 
number of editions in Romaic, was neither more nor 
less than an itinerant vender of books ; with the con- 
tents of which he had no concern beyond his name on 
the title-page, placed there to secure his property in the 
publication, and he was, moreover, a man utterly des- 
titute of scholastic acquirements. As the name, how- 
ever, is not uncommon, some other Polyzois may have 
edited the Epistles of Aristoenetus. 

It is to be regretted that the system of continental 
blockade has closed the few channels through which 
the Greeks received their publications, particularly 
Venice and Trieste. Even the common grammars for 
children are become too dear for the lower orders. 
Amongst their original works, the Geography of Mele- 
tius, Archbishop of Athens, and a multitude of theo- 
logical quartos and poetical pamphlets, are to be met 
with: their grammars and lexicons of two, three, and 
four languages, are numerous and excellent. Their 



1 I have in my possession an exultant Lexicon " rp«- 
■yXwaaov, which I received in exchange from S. G — , Esq., 
for a small gem : my antiquarian friends have never forgotten 
l, or forgiven me. 

? In Gail's pamphlet against Coray, he talks of " throwing 
the insolvent Hcllcniste out of tho windows." On this a 
French critic exclaims, "Ah, my God! throw a Helleniste 
out of the window ! what sacrilege !" It certainly would be 
u serious business foi those authors who dwell in the attics: 
but I have quotej the passage merely to prove the similarity 
•jf style among the controversialists of all polished countries : 
Londor or Edinburgh could hardly parallel this Parisian 
tUullition. 



poetry is in rhyme. The most singular piece I have lately 
seen, is a satire in dialogue .between'a Russian, Eng- 
lish, and French traveller^ aud the Waywode of Wal- 
lachia (or Blackbey, as they term himfr;\fm archbishop, 
a merchant, and Cogia Bachi (or primate), in succes- 
sion ; to all of whom under the Tufkj^ffe writer attrib- 
utes their present degeneracy. Their songs are some- 
times pretty and pathetic, but their tunes generally 
impleading to the ear of a' Frank : the best is the famous 
" Aci'tc laities tcov 'EXXi'/i'iuv," by the unfortunate Riga. 
But from a catalogue of 'more than sixty authors, now 
before me, only fifteen can be found w ho have touched 
on any theme except theology. 

I am intrusted with -a commission, by a Greek of 
Athens, named Marmarotouri, to rnrTke arrangements, 
if possible, lor printing in London a translation of Bar- 
thclemi's Anacharsis in Romaic, as hi has no other 
opportunity, unless he despatches tlTfe MS. to Vienna 
by the Black Sea and Danube. 

The reviewer mentions a school established at Heca- 
toncsi, and suppressed at the instigation of Sebasliani; 
he means Cidonies, or, in Turkish, Haivali ; a town 
on the continent where that institution, for a hundred 
students and three professors, still exists. It is true, 
that this establishment was disturbed by the Porte, under 
the ridiculous pretext that the Greeks were constructing 
a fortress instead of a college; but on investigation, 
and the payment of some purses to the Divan, it has 
been permitted to continue. The principal professor, 
named Veniamin (i. e. Benjamin), is stated to be a 
man of talent, but a free-thinker. He was born in 
Lesbos, studied in Italy, and is master of Hellenic, 
Latin, and some Frank languages, besides a smattering 
of the sciences. 

Though it is not my intention to enter farther on this 
topic than may allude to the article in question, I can- 
not but observe that the reviewer's lamentation over the 
fall of the Greeks appears singular, when he closes it 
with these words : " the change is to be atl-.ibuled to 'heir 
misfortunes, rather than to any physical degradation." 
It may be true, that the Greeks are not physically de- 
generated, and that Constantinople contained, on the 
day when it changed masters, as many men of six feet 
and upwards, as in the hour of prosperity ; but ancient 
history and modern politics instruct us that something 
more than physical perfection is necessary to preserve, 
a state in vigour and independence ; and the Greeks, 
in particular, are a melancholy example of the near con- 
nexion between moral degradation and national decay. 
The reviewer mentions a plan, "we believe," by Po- 
temkin, for the purification of the Romaic, and I have 
endeavoured in vain to procure any tidings or traces of 
its existence. There was an academy in St. Petersburg 
for the Greeks : but it was suppressed by Paul, and has 
not been revived by his successor. 

There is a slip of the pen, and it can only be a slip of the 
pen, in p. 58, No. xxxi, of the Edinburgh Review, where 
these words occur : — " We are told that when the capi- 
tal of the East yielded to Snh/innit" — It may be pre- 
sumed that this last word will, in a future edition, be 
altered to Mahomet II. 1 The "ladies of Constantinople," 



1 In a former number of the Edinburgh Review, IPO?, it is 
observed, "Lord liyron passed some of his early years in 
Scotland, where he might Have learned that pibrcch does not 
menu a bagpipe, any more thatt/uet means ajidiilr.'' Query, 
— Was it in Scotland that the young gentlemen of tha Edin- 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



it seems, at that period spoke a dialect, " Which would 
not have disgraced the lips of an Athenian." I do not 
know how that might be, but am sorry to say the ladies 
in general, and the Athenians in particular, are much 
altered ; being far from choice either in their dialect or 
expressions, as the whole Attic race are barbarous to a 
proverb : 

" li Adiiva r.parn xupa 

T( yaiinpovt rpapcti rupa ;" 

In Gibbon, vol. x. p. 161, is the following sentence: — 
" The vulgar dialect of the city was gross and barbarous, 
though the compositions of the church and palace some- 
limes Affected to copy the purity of the Attic models." 
Whatever may be asserted on the subject, it is difficult 
to conceive that the " ladies of Constantinople," in the 
reign of the lust Caesar, spoke a purer dialect then Anna 
Comnena wrote three centuries before : and those royal 
pages are not esteemed the best models of composition, 
although the princess yXuiTTav ei^ci' A K 1MB £12 Arn«i- 
£ouo-ay. In the Fanat, and in Yanina, the best Greek 
is spoken: in the latter there is a flourishing school 
tinder the direction of Psalida. 

There is now in Athens a pupil of Psalida's, who is 
making a tour of observation through Greece: he is in- 
telligent, and better educated than a fellow-commoner 
of most colleges. I mention this as a proof that the 
spirit of inquiry is not dormant amongst the Greeks. 

The reviewer mentions Mr. Wright, the author of the 
beautiful poem " Horse lohicse," as qualified to give de- 
tails of these nominal Romans and degenerate Greeks, 
ami also of their language: but Mr. Wright, though a 
good port and an able man, has made a mistake where 
he states the Albanian dialect of the Romaic to approxi- 
mate nearest to the Hellenic: for the Albanians speak 
» Romaic as notoriously corrupt as the Scotch of Abcr- 
leensfiire, or the Italian of Naples. Yanina (where, 
nexl to Fanal, the Greek is purest), although the 
capital of Ali Pacha's dominions, is not in Albania but 
Epirus ; and beyond Delvinachi in Albania Proper up 
to Argyrocastro and Tepaleen (beyond which I did not 
advance), they speak worse Greek than even the Athen- 
ians. I was attended for a year and a half by two of 
these singular mountaineers, whose mother tongue is 
Illvric, and I never heard them or their countrymen 
(whom I have seen, not only at home, but to the amount 
of twenty thousand in the army of Veil Pacha) praised 
for their Greek, but often laughed at for their provincial 
barbarisms. 

I have in my possession about twenty-five letters, 
amongst which some from the Bey of Corinth, written 
to me by Notaras, the Cogia Bachi, and others by the 
dragoman of the Caimacam of the Morea (which last 
governs in Veli Pacha's absence) are said to be favour- 



burgh Review learned that Snlvwan means Mahomet If. any 
mora than criticism means infallibiliti;? — but thus it is, 
"Csdimus inque viccm prxbemus crura sagittis." 
The mistake teemed so completely a lapse of the i>en (from 
the crest i imU&rity of the two words, and the total abscna 
in. mi the former pages of the literary leviathan , that 

1 - I have posted il oi er as in the text, had I not perceived 

in the Edinburgh Review roach facetious exaltath all 

such detections, particularly a recent one, where words anil 
syllables are subjects ol disquisition and transposition . aorl the 
nentioned parallel passage in my own esse irresistibly 
-I me to hint how much easier II is to be critical than 
correct. The gentlemen, having enjoyed many a triumph on 
■acta victories, will hardly begrudge me u slight uvatiun for 
the present, 



able specimens of their epistolary style. I also received 
some at Constantinople from private persons, written 
in a most hyperbolical style, but in the true antique 
charajcter. 

The reviewer proceeds, after some remarks on the 
tongue in its past and present state, to a paradox (page 
59) on the great mischief the knowledge of his own 
language has done to Coray, who, it seems, is less likely 
to understand the ancient Greek, because he is perfect 
master of the modem ! This observation follows a para- 
graph, recommending, in explicit terms, the study cf 
the Romaic, as " a powerful auxiliary," not only to the 
traveller and foreign merchant, but also to the classical 
scholar ; in short, to every body except the only person 
who can be thoroughly acquainted with its uses: and 
by a parity of reasoning, our old language is conjectured 
to be probably more attainable by "foreigners" than 
by ourselves ! Now I am inclined to think, that a Dutch 
Tyro in our tongue (albeit himself of Saxon bloood) 
would be sadly perplexed with "Sir Tristrem," or any 
other given " Auchiiileeh MS." with or without a oram- 
mar or glossary ; and to most apprehensions it seems 
evident, that none but a native can acquire a competent, 
fur less complete, knowledge of our obsolete idioms. 
We may give the critic credit for his ingenuity, but no 
more believe hint than wc do Smollett's Lismahago, who 
maintains that the purest English is spoken in Edin- 
burgh. That Coray may err is very possible ; but if he 
does, the fault is in the man rather than in his mother 
tongue, winch is, as it ought to be, of the greatest aid 
to the native student. — Here the Reviewer proceeds to 
business on Strabo's translators, and here I close my 
remarks. 

Sir. W. Drummond, Mr. Hamilton, Lord Aberdeen 
Dr. Clarke, Captain Leake, Mr. Gell, Mr. Walpole 
and many others now in England, have all the requisite* 
to furnish details of this fallen people. The few obser- 
vations I have offered I should have left where I made 
them, had not the article in question, and, above all, 
the spot where I read it, induced me to advert to those 
pages, which the advantage of my present situation 
enabled me to clear, or at least to make the attempt. 

I have endeavoured to waive the personal feelings 
which rise in despite of me in touching upon any part of 
the Edinburgh Review ; not from a \\ ish to conciliate 
the favour of its writers, or to cancel the remembrance 
of a syllable I have formerly published, but simply from 
a sense of the impropriety of mixing up private resent- 
ments with a disquisition of the present kind, and more 
particularly at this distance of time and place. 

ADDITIONAL NOTE, ON THE TUEKS. 

The difficulties of travelling in Turkey have been muctl 
exaggerated, or rather have considerably diminished of 
late years. The Mussulmans have been beaten into a 
kind of sullen civility, very comfortable to voyageis. 

It is hazardous to say much on the subject of Turks 
and Turkey ; since it is possible to live amongst them 
twenty years without acquiring information, at least 
from themselves. As far as my own slight experience 
carried mc, I have no complaint to make ; but am in- 
debted for many civilities (I might almost say iot 
friendship), and much hospitality, to Ali Pacha, his son 
Veli Pacha of the Morea, and several others of high ran* 
in the provinces. Suleyman Aga, late Governor of 



DC 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Athens, and now of Thebes, was a hon moon*, and as 

social a being ;ts ever Bat cross-legged at a tray or a 
table. During the carnival, when our English party 
were masquerading, both himself ami lus successor were 
more happy to "receive masks" than any dowager in 
Grosvcnor- square. 

On one occasion of his supping at the convent, his 
friend and visitor, the. Cadi of Thebes, was carried from 
tahle perfectly qualified tor any club in Christendom, 
while the worthy Waywode himself triumphed in his 
fall. 

In all money transactions with the Moslems, I ever 
found the strictest honour, the highest disinterestedness. 
In transacting business with them, there are none of 
those dirty peculations, under the name of interest, dif- 
ference of exchange, commission, etc. etc., uniformly 
found in applying to a Greek consul to cash bills, even 
on the first houses in Pera. 

With regard to presents, and established custom in 
the East, vou will rarclv find voursell a loser; as one 
worth acceptance is generally returned by another of 
similar value — a horse or a shawl. 

In the capital and at court the citizens and courtiers 
are formed in the same school with those of Christian- 
ity ; but there does not exist a more honourable, 
friendly, and high-spirited character than the true Turk- 
ish provincial Aga, or Moslem country gentleman. It 
is not meant here to designate the governors of towns, 
but those Agas who, by a kind of feudal tenure, possess 
lands and houses, of more or less extent, in Greece and 
Asia Minor. 

The lower orders are in as tolerable discipline as 
the rabble in countries with greater pretensions to 
civilization. A Moslem, in walking the streets of our 
country towns, would be more incommoded in England 
than a Frank in a similar situation in Turkey. Regi- 
mentals are the best travelling dress. 

The best accounts of the religion, and different sects 
of Islamism, may be found in D'Olisson's French ; of 
their manners, etc., perhaps in Thorton's English. The 
Ottomans, with all their defects, are not a people bo be 
despised. Equal, at least, to the Spaniards, they are 
superior to the Portuguese. If it be difficult to pronounce 
what they are, we can at least say what they arc not : 
they are not treacherous, they are not cowardly, they 
do not burn heretics, they are not assassins, nor has an 
er.emy advanced to their capital. They arc faithful to 
•neir sultan till he becomes unfit to govern, and devout 
to tneir God without an inquisition. Were they driven 
from St. Sophia to-morrow, and the French or Russians 
enthroned in their stead, it would become a question, 
whether Europe would gain by the exchange. England 
would certainly be the loser. 

With regard to that ignorance of which they are so 
generally, and sometimes justly, accused, it may be 
doubted, always excepting France and England, in what 
useful points of knowledge they are excelled by other 
nations. Is it in the common arts of life ? In their 
manufactures ? Is a Turkish sabre inferior to a Toledo ? 
ur is a Turk worse clothed or lodged, or fed and 
■aught, than a Spaniard ? Are their Pachas worse edu- 
cated than a grandee? or an Effendi than a Knight of 
St. JagO ? 1 think not. 

1 remember Mahmout, the grandson of Ali Pacha, 
Biking whether my fellow-traveller and myself were in 



the upper or lower House of Parliament. Now this 
question from a boy of ten years old proved that his 
edueatiofl had not been neglected. It may be doubted 
if an English boy at that age knows the difference of 
the Divan from a College of Dervises ; but I am very 
sure a Spaniard does not. How little Mahmout, sur- 
rounded, as he had been, entirely by his Turkish tutors, 
had learned that there was such a thing as a parlia- 
ment, it were usi less lo conjecture, unless we suppose 
that his instructors did not confine lus studies to the 
Koran. 

In all the mosques there are schools established 
which are very regularly attended; and the poor are 
taught without the church of Turkey being put into 
peril. I believe the system is not yet printed (though 
there is such a thing as a Turkish press, and books 
printed on the late military institution of the Nizam 
Gedidd): nor have I heard, whether the Mufti and the 
Mollas have subscribed, or the Caimacam and the 
Tefterdar taken the alarm, for fear the ingenuous 
youth of the turban should be taught not to " pray to 
God their way." The Greeks, also — a kind of Eastern 
Irish papists — have a college of their own at Maynoolh 
— no, at Haivali ; where the heterodox receive much 
the same kind of countenance from the Ottoman as 
the Catholic college from the English legislature. Who 
shall then affirm that the Turks are ignorant bigots, 
when they thus evince the exact propoition of Chris- 
tain chanty which is tolerated in the most prosperous 
and orthodox of all possible kingdoms ? But, though 
they allow all this, they will not sutler the Greeks to 
participate in their privileges; no, let them fight their 
battles, and pay their haratch (taxes), be drubbed in 
this world, and damned in the next. And shall we 

then emancipate our Irish Helots? Mahomet forbid ] 

We should then be bad Mussulmans, and worse Chris- 
tians; at present we unite the best of both — Jesuitical 
faith, and something not much inferior to Turkish 
toleration* 



APPENDIX. 



Amoncst an enslaved people, obliged to have recourse 
to foreign presses even for their books of religion, it is 
less to be wondered at that wc find so few publications 
on general subjects, than that we find any at all. The 
whole number of the Greeks, scattered up and down 
the Turkish empire and elsewhere, may amount, at 
most, to three millions ; and yet, for so scanty a num- 
ber, it is impossible to discover any nation with so 
great a proportion of books and their authors, as the 
Greeks of the present century. "Ay," but say the 
generous advocates of oppression, who, while they as- 
sert the ignorance of the Greeks, wish to prevent them 
from dispelling it, " ay, but these arc mostly, if not 
all, ecclesiastical tracts, and consequently good for 
nothing." Well! and pray what else can they write 
abpul I It is pleasant enough to hear a Frank, partic- 
ularly an Englishman, who may abuse the govern- 
ment of his own country ; or a Frenchman, w ho may 
abuse every government except his own, and who may 
range at will over every philosophical, religious, scien- 
tific, sceptical, or moral subject, sneering at the G reek 
legends. A Greek must not write on politics, and can- 
not touch on science for want of instruction: if he 



CIIILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



97 



jenbts, he is excommunicated and damned ; therefore 
his countrymen are not poisoned with modern philoso- 
phy ; and, as to morals, thanks to the Turks! there are 
no Buch things. What (hen is left hitp, if he has a turn 
for scribbling? Religion and holy biography : audit is 
natural enough that those who have so little in this life 
ghoul I look to the next. It is no grp at wonderthpn thai 
in a catalogue now before me of fifty-five Greek wri- 
ters, many pftvhqnj were lately living, not above fifteen 
should have touched on any thitig but religion. The 
catalogue alluded to is contained in the twenty-si\th 
chapter of .the fourth volume of-Meletius's Ecclesiastical 
History, From this I subjoin an extract of those who 
have written on general subjects ; which will be followed 
by some specimens of the Romaic. 

LIST OF ROMAIC AUTHORS.' 

Neophitus, Diakonos (the deacon) of the Morca, has 
published an extensive grammar, and also some politi- 
cal regulations, which last were left unfinished at his 
death. 

Prokopius, of Moscopolis (a town in Epirus), has 
written and published a catalogue of the learned Greeks. 

Seraphin, of Periclea, is the author of many works 
in the Turkish language, but Greek character, for the 
Christians of Caramania, who do not speak Romaic, 
but read the character. 



lie removed to St. Petersburg the immense rock on 
which the Btatue of Peter the Great was fixed in 1769. 
See th dissertation which he published in Puns, 1777. 

George Constantine has published a fburvtongueil 
lexicon. 

George Ventote ; a lexicon in French, Italian, and 
Romaic. 

There exist several other dictionaries in Latin and 
Romaic, French, etc., besides grammars, in every 
modern language, except English. 

Amongst the living authors the following are most 
celebrated :' — 

Athanasius Parios has written a treatise on rhetoric 
in Hellenic. 

Christodoulos, an Acarnanian, has published, in Vi- 
enna, some physical treatises in Hellenic. 

Panagtotes Kodrikas, an Athenian, the Romaic trans- 
lator of Font enelle's '> Plurality of Worl Is" (a favourite 

work an i on est ibe Greeks), is stati d to be a teachl r of 

the Hellenic and Arabic languages in Pans, in both of 
which he is an adept. 

Athanasius, the Parian, author of a treatise on rhet- 
oric. 

Viconzo Damodos, of Cephalonia, has written "tij 
to pEaoSapSapov,* on logic and physics. 

John Kamarases, a Byzantine, has translated into 
French Ocellus on the Universe. He is said to be ac 



Eustathius Psalidas, of Bucharest, a physician, made excellent Hellenist and Latin scholar. 



the tour of England for the purpose of study (%apiv 
paBi'iotws) : but though his name is enumerated, it is 
not stated that he has written any thing. 

Kallinikus Torgeraus, Patriarch of Constantinople: 
many poems of his arc extant, and also prose tracts, 
and a catalogue of patriarchs since the last taking of 
Constantinople. 

Anastasius Macedon, of Naxos, member of t'.e royal 
academy of Warsaw. A church biographer. 

Demetrius Pampercs, a Moscopolite, has Written 
many works, particularly " A Commentary on Fiesiod's 
Shield of Hercules," ami two hundred talcs (of what is 
not specified), and has published his correspondence 
with the celebrated George of Trebizond, his contem- 
porary. 

Mclctius, a celebrated geographer; and author of the 
book from whence these notices are taken. 

Dorotheus, of Mitylene, an Aristotelian philosopher : 
nis Hellenic works are in great repute, and he is esteemed 
by the moderns (I quote the words of Meletius) pint 
rdv BovK\)Slii)V Kal 'Ecrofuvra apt^os EXXrivuVi I 
adil further, on the authority of a well-informed 
Greek, that he was so famous amongst his countrymen, 
that they were accustomed to say, if Thucydides and 
Xcnophon were wanting, he was capable of repairing 
the loss. 

Marimis Count Tharboures, of Cephalonia, professor 
of chemistry in the academy of Padua, and member of 
that academy and those of Stockholm and Upsal. 
He has published, at Venice, an account of some 
marine animal, and a treatise on the properties of 
iron. 

Marcus, brother to the former, famous in mechanics 



1 It is to he observed that the names civen are not in chro- 
nological order, hut consist of some selected at a venture from 
anion:-'-! tliese who Bourished from the taking of Constanti- 
nople to the time of Meletius. 
K2 13 



Gregorio Demetrius published, in Vienna, a gco 

graphical work : he has also translated several Ilahan 
authors, and printed his versions at Venice. 

Of Coray and Psalida some account has been already 
giyen. 



GREEK WAR SONG. 1 

1. 

AEY TE vaUcs rdv 'EXXiJvu)*, 

o Katpu; ri)s cb^tii li\0iv. 
Aj ipavuiptv (I'flOl tKClvillV 

770D ;i(<5 iwaav rfjv ap%>}v* 
As irtiTijawptv ai'<\pci(j>s 

ran ^vyov t!";{ rvpai i itus. 
t^K^tKt'iatDpcv itarpi&os 

KiWr. ovuiui alc^pdv. 

Ta orXa its Xa'Cu/itv' 

Trnickj 'EXX/Ji'uji', nyuiptv. 

Xlorapuouv ivOpCiv rb utpa 
as Tpify uno xudibv. 

2. 

OOcv tiaOt. rail' EXXi/i'uv 

KfSk-K'iXa uvipctupiva ; 
Tivtipara tmcopvicpiva, 

Tiopa XiiGcre xi'Oi'iv ; 
'2 ti/v (puivfiv tTh aakmyytt pov 

avvayOijTC oXn bpuv. 
Tin* hzrdXo&ov £>/r£?rr, 

Kal ViKOTt TTj'O TTUl'TOV, 

Tu oVXa us XdGuipcv, etc. 



1 These names are not !akcn from any publication. 

2 A translation of this song will bo found ut pago 5M 



a 8 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Tlrrdpra, T-rrdpra, ri Koipaaai 

v-iov X>)0apyov, (iaOuv ; 
£vnrj<rov, Kpd^c AOi'/vas, 

Bvppa^ov ltavTOTuvtjv* 

tiOn/jj/irou Acwi'i(5ou 

ripuiof TOO '^HKOV^Uli, 

tuv ivStivs (Trmi'cpii'OVj 

(puCcpov Kill TpOpCpun. 

TVi cS:rXa uj XdSoipcv, etc. 

4. 

O 7T0U ci? ray Gcpporrt'Xay 

roXcpov avrbs Kporu, 
Kal Tuitf Mipaas a<[iavi^ei 

Kul airuiv KaTiiKfiuru. 
Mf TpitiKoolnvf av$pas, 

tlf tu Kfvrpov TTpo^wpelf 
(cui, oj; \iuiv 5i)«ai//(i'0{, 

tit TO alftd TU1V ftoVTtt, 

TU otX<j as XdCuptv, etc. 



ROMAIC EXTRACTS. 

Pdircns, AyyX»s> ICa! IVAXos Kd/ivtrvrts rrjv Trtpitiyriaiv 
tos 'EXXu^us, zeal (JXittovtcs t!)v dOXiav rfpi KtlTa- 
craaiv, tipoiTtjaav Karap^ds tva TpniKuv (piXiXXrjva 
iid id pdlhvv TflV atrtav, per avrbv tva pr/Tpo-oXiTi/v, 
etra tva fikdyuTtcriv, firetra tva npaypaTtvTijv Kal tva 
TrpocoTGira. 

ErVf pa;, w (jiiX{XXt]va, JrSs r/if/)£ts Tr\v axXaliiaV 
•cat ti)v dzap>iy6pi)Tov twv TovpXtov rvpavvlav, 
jiciis rat; 1-vXais Kal bBpiapovs Kal awrjpODttrulaV 
nat&aiVf irapOivuv, yvvaiK&v dvfjKoyarov (pOopuav. 
Aiv ilXd' talis AirSyovot (kuviov tuv \ZXX>)vii)v 
TUV iXtvQipuv Kal aoifiiov Kal tuv <]>tXoirarpiv'u>v 1 
Kal rug ikcTvoi d-iQvrjo-Kov yid ripi iXcvOeplav 
Kal rupa latts liroKtiaOc SIS TiTotav rvpavvlav, 
Kal tuiov yivos £>s tveis frrTafb; tpuTin-pivov 
tl; tijv <7<xp(nv, I'vvapiv, ti\" It' bXa fyiKovapivov 
7rc3; vvv juaTaaTi'/aaTt ti)v <f)UTtvriv EXXioVi. 
j3a6« ! <I>s tva axiXcQpov, us okotciviiv XupzdSav 
OjiiXct, tptXjari VpatKt, titl pas riju dlrtav t 
pfi KpVTiTjis riiroTts >'ipuv, Xvt t>]v diropiav. 

b 'MAE'AAHNOJ.'. 

'T woc-ayyXo-ydXXoi, KXX«s, Kal oy_i dXXoi, 

7jTov, us Xf'rs, Ttuoov ptydXt/. 

rvt Si SBXia, Kal ava$la 

&(p ov SpYtat}/ r\ dpaOia. 

'6<j* lipTTupoVaav vd Tqv ^vtvf/iTT] 

tout' fis TO X C ~'P 0V T *< v o&riyonai. 

aliii artvdtyi, rd reicva Kpd^si, 

orb vd vpnxdirTovv HXa irpooTd^tlf 

KOI TOT iXlTt^tl !>Tt Kipfiifyt 

ivpuv ixtivo zoo tiiv tjiXoyi^tt. 
M« oirns ToXpf/nti vd t>/v £vxvfyrfl 
*dyci ctov dhrjv YOiplf Tiva Kplaiv. 

j lie above is the commencement of a long dramatic 
dadie on the Greek priesthood, princes, and gentry ; ii 
is contemptible as a composition, but perhaps curious 
us a specimen of their rhyme ; I have the whole in MS. 



but this extract will be found sufficient. The Romaic 
in this composition is so easy as to render a version an 
insult to a scholar ; but those who do not understand 
the original will excuse the following bad translation of 
what is in itself indifferent. 

TRANSLATION. 
A Russian, Englishman, and Frenchman, making the 
tour of Greece, and observing the miserable state of 
the country, interrogate, in turn, a Greek patriot, to 
learn the cause ; afterwards an Archbishop, then a 
VTaekbey,' a Merchant, and Cogia Bachi or Primate. 

Thou friend of thy country! to strangers rerord 
Why bear ye the yoke of the Ottoman lord ? 
Why bear ye these fetters thus tamely diBploy'd, 
The wrongs of the matron, the stripling, and maid! 
The descendants of Hertas'a race are not ye! 

The patriot sons of the sage and the lief, 

Thus sprung from the blood of the nohle and brave, 

To vilely exist as the Mussulman slave! 

Not sued were the fathers your annals can boast. 

Who eoii(|uer'd and died for the freedom you lest ! 

Not such was your land in her earlier hour. 

The day-star of nations in wisdein and power! 

And still will you thus anresisting increase, 

Oh shameful dishonour! the darkness of Greece 1 

Then tell us, beloved Achtrao I reveal 

The cause of the woes which you cannot conceal. 

The reply of the Philellenist I have not translated, as 
it is no better than the question of the travelling trium- 
virate; and the above will sufficiently show with what 
kind of composition the Greeks are now satisfied. I 
trust I have not much injured the original in the few 
lines given as faithfully, and as near the " Oh, Miss 
Railey! unfortunate Miss Bailey!" measure of the 
Hniuaie, as I could make them. Almost all their pieces, 
above a song, which aspire to the name of poetry, con- 
tain exactly the quantity of feet of 
" A captain bold of Halifax who lived in country quarters," 

which is, in fact, the present heroic couplet of the Ro- 
maic. 



SCENE FROM 'O KA*ENES. 

TRANSLATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF GOLDO.NI BY 
SPIRIKON VLANTI. 

XKIINH Kf. 

TIA ATZIAA tis t>iv TropTav too fcavtov, Kal o\ avwfttv, 

FIAA. ii (3;/! drb rJ rapaOt'pt pov fi/i"' 1 ''/ •''' aKoi'au. 
Tnv <p:oi'!iv TuT' av&pSf pnV 'dv «eros livat (id), C(<tOuaa oi 
Kaipbv vd tuv ctyrpoviderott [Kvyauxi cvae 'VrXos drri 
r'i tpyaaTJfpi.] MaXtKdpt, vis pov, at mipQKaXo). troths 
aval fKu els txclvovs rot's dvra'rks J 

AOYA. Tptis xp^jm/iot (iVi'/irs. Eras 6 Kip Ki'yi- 
1'ios, h (VXXos o Kvp Mdjiirios VsalroXirdvoS) Kul S rpiros 
b Kip lCoiTE AiavtipQi ApttvTtiS' 

II A A. Kvdpiau tr's ahrovs &iv civa. o '\>Xaul'<os, uv 
5pmS &(V dXXa^tV ovopa. 

AEA. N« $ij <i KaXi) rti / Y ¥ >/ too Kiip flvycviov 
vurr^s-J 

6AOI. Nri §h ^ ?'"/• 

11AA. Ai'^Os ctvai b avSfaf pov ^io, ic dXXo 
81 Sflti rrr, Kupt pov tijv -^nplv vd pi CVJT t afevot) 



K«Xf 

TTdVU 



1 Vlackbej Trince of Walla'-liia 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



99 



eis avrovs roii; d<piVTubcs, birovSiXw vd tov; Trai'^w piuv. 
[Ylpbs rbv <)ov\ov.] 

AOY> OpitTjtdi aaf (avvrjQiapivov drjjfptKtov r&v Aov- 
Xcvtwv. ) [Tijv ipird^a d~b to ipyaarijpt tov irat- 
yvibiov.] 

PIA. Kapiia, Kapha, Kaprrc Ka\;jv mtpotav, civ nvat 
Ttjrorcf. [llpbg rfiv Btrrbpiav.] 

BIT. Eyo alaOdvopat riij a-tOuino. [Zwip^trai 
CIS rbv iavTov n/j.] 

[\~b rd TTttptiOvptX Ttov dvrd&wv (paivovrat SXni, 
b-oii at/nii'toi'Tiii a«o to rpa—i^i cvy^iapivoi, ina 
rbv fyitpviapliv tov Aidvbpov SXimavTaf ri)v 
nAu'r^icu, Kai Siafi auroc id^vci iraij &i\ci vd 
t!)v <povefoi).\ 
ETT. 6x>, oruOhrc. 
MAP. Mr)v KiipvcTe... 
AEA. XrJKu>, ipvye rt7r' e&iA. 

IlAA. But'iOna, 0o>'/Oita ['Vcvyti drro rrjv imd\nv, b 
Aim pOfS i\it vd t>iv ukuXovOi'/cji pi rb a-aodi, Kai u Eiy. 

TOV f>IMTTa. ] 

[TPA. M< iva vtdro pi (payi 11; plav Trer^/ra Irwfia 
d-b rb Trapadvpt, Kai tptvyu eh tov Kaipivi.] 

[nAA. Kvynivci d~u to ipyuarfjpi tov -zaiyvihiov 
rpi^uii'Ta;, Kai (pivytt els rb \&vt.] 

[EYT. Mf uppaTix ds Tb ylpl vpbs hiaipivrtvaiv rijj 
nXa'r^irluc, ivavTiov tov Aidvepov, b-ov t!]v Kararpi- 

[MAP. Elyaivet Kai airoc oiyd criyd d~b rb ipya- 
BTripi, Kai tpivyci \iyuivras' Rumores fugc] [Vovpopcs 
QcTyc] ' 

[Oi AouXot d-b Tb cpyaar/jpi a-cpvovv elf Tb yon, 
Kai k\;iovv tijv iroprav.] 

[BIT. MfVa ds tov Kaipeve fionOnphni dzb tov 
Pio'rfX^ov.l 

AEA. AbatTC rizov' SAu> va epSoj va cpSui ds 
ikcIvo to %dvi. [Mf ro oiruBi ci{ rb %ipi Ivavriov tou 
Euyfi'iov.] 

EYI\ O^i, p>i yivoiro t.otv uaat cvas o-K\iipoKapSos 
ivavriov i% yvvatKb; aov, Kaiiyu>$i\u ti)v Sia<pcvTivau> 
(«s £i{ to varcpov alpa. 

AEA. Sow Kipvm SpKov nrjs $i\u rb ptTavoiwatjf. 
[Kvvnyif rbv Evytviov pi rb o-rraOL] 

EYF. Aiv ai tboSovpai. [KaTaTpi^a rbv AiavApot; 
Kai tov (lid^ci vd avpOij i-Kiaui tucov, btrov cvpio-KoivTa; 
tvottCT&v to o-77>jn Ttjs ^opcirpias, ipGaivci ds aiiTo, Kai 
otivcTai.] 

TRANSLATION. 

rintzifla,from the door of the Hold, and the Others. 

Pla. Oh God ! from the window it seemed tliut I 
heard my husband's voice. If he is here, I have arrived 
in time to make him ashamed. [A servant enters from 
the Shop.] Boy, tell me, pray, who are in those cham- 
bers? 

Serv. Three Gentlemen : one Signor Eugenio ; the 
other Signor IMartio, the Neapolitan; and "the third, 
my Lord, the Count Leander Ardcnti. 

Pla. Flaminio is not amongst these, unless he has 
changed his name. 

Leander. [IVithin, drinking.] Long live the good 
fortune of Signer Eugenio. 



1 A<Syoj Xani'iKof, bvov S/Xci vd dun- deDys raic 
•vyX'oa. 



[Tlie whole company.] Lang live, etc. (Literally, 
N4 y;, vd (!j, May be live.) 

Pla, Without doubt that is my husband. [To the 
Serv.] My good man, do me the favour to accompany 
me above to those gentlemen : I have some business. 

Serv. At your commands. \ Aside] The old oliico 
of us waiters. \ll<- gpit out <>/ tin- Gamktg-house.] 

Ridoiphe. [To Victoria on another pari oj'tlie stage] 
Courage, courage, be of good cheer, it is nothing. 

I r ict .ria. I feel as if about to die. [Leaning on him 
as if fainting.] 

[From the windows above all ivithin are seen rising 
from the table in confusion: Leander starts at 
the sight of Plattida, and appears by his gestures 
to threaten her life. ] 

Eugenio. No, stop 1 

1 larlio. Don't attempt 

Leander. Away, fly from hence: 

Pla. Help! Help! [Flies down the stairs: Leander 
attempting to follow with his sword, Eugenio hinders 
him.] 

[Trappola wSh a plate of men! leaps over the balcony 
from the Window, ami runs into the Coffte-house. 

[Platzida runs out of the Gaming-house, and takes 
shelter i» (he Hold.] 

[Martio steals softly out of the Gaming-house, and 
goes off exclaiming, " Rumores fuge." Tlie Sen ants 
from the Gaming-house enter the Hotel, and shut the 
door.] 

[Victoria remains in the C<i/fee-house assisted by 

Rldolpho.] 

[ Leander, sword in hand, opposite Eugenio, exclaims,] 
Give way — I will enter that hotel. 

Eugenio. No, that shall never be. You are a scoun- 
drel to your wife, and I will defend her to the last drop 
of my blood. 

Leander. I will give you cause to repent this. [Men- 
acing with hrs sword.] 

Eng cnio. 1 fear you not. [He attacks Leander, and 
makes him give buck so much (hat, fading the door of 
the dancing girl's house open, Leander escapes through, 
and sofnishes.]' 



AIA'AOrOI OiKIAKOI. FAMILIAR DIALOGUES. 

Aid va^nT)'ic-i)s iva vpiiypa. To ask for any thing. 
5.'<Tf TTopaKaXlb, boo-tri pi 'dv I pray you, give me if you 

bpl^irt. please. 

'tipiri pc. Bring me. 

Aavdo-tri pt. Lend me. 

llnyaiviTi vd fyrt'ictTe. Go to seek. 



-«>vtTai — "finishes" — awkwardly enough, but it is 
the literal translation of the Roimiie. The original of this 
comedy of Golrioni's I never rend, hill it does nol appear one 
of his best. "11 Bugi&rdo" is one of the most lively; hut 1 
do not think it has been translated into Romaic: it is much 
more nmtising than our own "Liar,' by Foote. The char- 
acter ofLelio is heller drawn than Yuana Wilding. Gol 
doni's comedies amount U) fiftj I some perhaps the best in 
Europe, and others the worst. His lite i< also one of ihe host 
specimens of autobiography, and, as Gibbon has observed, 
"more dramatic than any of his plays." The above BcerM 
was selected as containing some of the most familiar Romaic 
idioms, not for any wit which it displays, sineo there is more 
done than said, the greater pari Consisting of stage direction* 
The original is one of the few comedies by GoUoni which is 
without the hull'ooiiery of the speuking llarlcuuin. 



Tiipa cvOv;. Now directly. 

C ixptSi, pov KCpte, KdjUTi My dear Sir, do me this 

pt avr?iv Tiiv %dpiv. favour. 

Eyii ads -apaKa\u>. I entreat you. 

F.yl> cds i^opKi^u). I conjure you. 

K; Cj r/aj -« {ijrfi ( T i»i yrfjMVi I ask it of you as a favour. 

X-u ^iwairi pc ds rbaov. Oblige me so much. 

ASyia ipuriKa, !j dyditrjS' Affectionate expressions. 



Zulrj pov. 

AKplGtj pOV \\/V)(fl. 

Aynniri pov, dxpi6i uov. 
Kap6ir^a pov. 
A ydrrti pov. 

Aid vd iv^apiaTijcrr,s, va 

Ktiptis TtpnroiiiatS) Kill 

ipiXiKats ot^iiaats. 
E}<i cds ev^apirrrit). 
Xas yvuipl^io %dpiv. 
XiiS tlpni v-n6^pios Kara 

lroWd. 
Eyw v/Xu rb K&pti pt-rd 

X<ipds. 
JM* u\i]v pov r>iv KapStav. 
JMf KaXfiv pov napciav. 
Xiis tipit v^d^pcos. 
Eipni b\os t$tKOS cas- 
JUipai <5oDXo's cas. 
T«Tt(i htiitos ioTXos. 
EiaTCKard iruWd ebycviKd;. 
nu.\X<> 7T( tpd^taOt. 
To £^oj did ^apdv pov vd 

ads iovXtiaio. 
Er<TTt tvyiviK'os <al iv-poc- 

Vyopos. 
Avto cuai irpt-ov. 
Ti ZiXitc ; 
Ti opi^f-TC ; 
2uf napuKaXS) va pi pt- 

Tavctpi^taOt iXtvOtpa. 
Xoi/iis KtpivuiriaiS. 
2<7s dyaTrii f| bX>is pov Kap- 

iias- 
Kal IXSi hpoiws. 
Ttpi'iaiTi pt pi ra?f 7rpo- 

criiya'is cas- 
Ttx tTe Tixorts va pi vpo- 

ard^trt ; 
TIpoaTafcrc rhv ootXuv aas- 
Hpnijptvia tus TTpocayds 

cits- 
Mf KapvtTt ptydXijv Ttpi'jV. 
4>0iivovv>i xcpnruincts, ads 

TTupaKaXii. 

YlpOCKVV>']CCTC IK plpOVS 
pOV TOV Up%0VTd, >} 70V 
KVfJlOV. 

BcRiitwacTe tov Truif rbv 

ivOvpoup.il. 
JtiGaiwatri tov iriiif rbv 

iyavH. 



My life. 
My dear soul. 
My dear. 
My heart. 
My love. 

To thank, pay compliments, 
and testify regard. 

I tliank you. 

I return you thanks. 

I am much obliged to you. 

I will do it with pleasure. 

With all my heart. 
Most cordially. 
I am obliged to you. 
I am wholly yours. 
I am your servant. 
Your most humble servant. 
You are too obliging. 
You take too much trouble. 
I have a pleasure in serv- 
ing you. 
You are obliging and kind. 

That is right. 
yi hat is your pleasure? 
What are your commands? 
I beg you will treat me 

freely. 
Without ceremony. 
I love you with all my 

heart. 
And I the same. 
Honour mc with your 

commands. 
Have you any commands 

for me ? 
Command your servant. 
I wait your commands. 

You do me great honour. 

Not so much ceremony, I 
beg. 

Present my respects to the 
gentleman, or his lord- 
ship. 

Assure him of my remem- 
brance. 

Assure him of my friend- 
ship. 



Ah ${Xui \ti\}.ti va tov rb 
tliru. 

WpocKvit'ipard pov ds tiiv 

dp^ovrtccav. 
Tltiyalvtrc ipirpoaOa nai ads 
ukoXovOw. 

H£ci'pu KaXdrn %pios pov. 
H^tvpta rb nvai pov. 
Mf Ktipvirc vd iirpiTTOjpat 

pi ruts rocais (jiiXoippo- 

avvais cas. 
BiXtrt Xoi-bv va xdpu piav 

ixpttdrnTa; 
tzdyw ip-poaOd iid vd cas 

viraKovcio. 
Aid vuKupu) rfjv TrpocTayt'iv 

ens- 
Aiv dya-zZ rocais ircpuroi- 

ncts. 
Aiv ctpai TtXduij vcpi- 

xoi']Tik6s. 
A.Ti-0 elvai to KaXi'jTtpov. 

TOCOV TO KaXt'lTCpUV. 

E^trc \6yov, t^crt lixaiov. 

Aid vd (ZtSattZciis, vd dp- 
vt]Qjjs, vd cvyKuravcvcris, 
kt\. 

Elvai aXnOivbvj tivai d\n- 

UiaraTov. 
Aid va ads tiru Trr uXj;- 

Betav. 
Ovtids, crty civai. 
YluTos dpipit'idXXti ; 
Aiv tivai Tzocws dpi]>i6o\ia. 
To nioTciii), Siv to -ia- 

Tti'ui. 
A/yw to val. 
A(yu> to <$^i. 
Ba'XXui CTi^'ipa Zti uvai. 
BdWoiarixnpa OTtiiv tivai 

IJrtl, pd TIIV TACTIV pOV 

E('s T'^v ovvz'ihr)civ pov. 

Mii TT\v farjv pov. 

Nal t o\7j Spvvw. 

Suf 6pvvu> iLadv Tiprjpevos 

dvQpuMOS. 
Si7{ dpvvia tTrdvoi ds ri/v 

Ttpi'jV pOV. 
TltCTtVCLTl pt. 

Upizopu) vd cas rb jStfiano- 

Gtl). 

IlOtXa 0d\n crt^npa S, Ti 

SiXtrt Std TOVTO. 
Mi) tv xa Ku'i dacTcl^tjdo 

(XOptlTCVlTl); 

OptXurt pi rd bXa cas ', 
Kyui ads bpiXd pi rd 6X ' 

pov, Kai ads X/yoj rijv 

aXijOituv. 
Eyi ads rb (itGaiuva. 



I will not fail to tell him 

of it. 
My compliments to her 

ladyship. 

Go before and I will follow 

you. 
I well know my duty. 
I know my situation. 
You confound me with so 

much civility. 

Would you have me then 
be guilty of an incivility? 
I go before to obey you. 

To comply with your com- 
mand. 

I do not like so much cer 
emony. 

I am not at all ceremoni- 
ous. 

This is better. 

So much the better. 

You are in the right. 

To affirm, deny, consen', 

etc. 



It is true, it is very true. 

To tell you the truth. 

Really, it is so. 
Who doubts it? 
There is no doubt. 
I believe it, I do not be- 
lieve it. 
I say yes. 
I say no. 
I wager ii is. 
I wager ii is not so. 

Yes, by my faith. 

In conscience. 

By my life. 

Yes, I swear it to you. 

I swear to you as an hon- 
est man. 

I swear to you on my hon- 
our. 

Believe me. 

I can assure you of it. 

I would lay what bet you 

please on this. 
You jest by chance? 

Do you speak seriously ? 

I speak seriously to vou, 

and tell you thn truth, 

1 assure v ou 0i iu 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



101 



To tTpOif>l]TtVGlTC. 

To tnireiytre. 
Sas jtjoti Sid. 

Upinet I'd CTUJ T/ICTCVGO). 

Avrb i if aval d'wvarov. 
Tt Xm-rbv uj iliat pi KaXi)i> 

£>pav. 
KaXd, KaX&. 
Atv uvu dXijOivdv. 
Eiwi J 

A;v uval rhoTCf dxb aiird. 
Eirai ji a ipcuSof, pia 

Eyu) iiGTil^opovv (i^npd- 

rsva). 
Ey<4 tu n-aciii va ytXaVui. 
Tg dX..".' r,l. 
Mf ipiat I (card roXXa'. 
Svvxaravsf>(i) tis roEro. 
An u r.'/r \jt))<p6v pov. 
Aiv avrtoriKOptli tls tovto. 
Ei/iai cvpipoivos, tK cvp- 

<P<!»ov. 
Eyu i'ti' 0{Xu>. 
fcyui ivaiTiiLxopai tt$ tovto. 

Aid I'd GvpfiOvXzvOrjs, va 
OTO^auOjJf, !j I'd airoipa- 

Ti rpi-u vn Kapwptv ; 

Ti od xd n<i)fiei) ; 

Ti jue cT'/i'j'ou.XtvtTE va <ca- 

uw; 
6-o(oi' ?p6itov $i'\opcv ptTa- 

■^ItptcOi) ;;yif7; ; 
"A; Ki'ipioptv 1Y£»;. 

Eivai (.(jXi'/rrpo)/ (yd va 

SraSirrc dXryov. 

Afi' ijIrXtv tZvai KaX?r£^oi> 

''' ' 

Eyci uyarroSo-a KaSi'jTtpa. 

, ipn kuXi'/tcjhi av — 

rt pz. 

Av ftpovv il$ rbv touov aa{, 



You have guessed it. 
You have hit upon it. 
I believe you. 
I must believe you. 
This is not impossible. 
Then it is very well. 

Well, well, 

It is not true. 
It is false. 

There is nothing of this. 
It is a falsehood, an impos- 
ture. 
I was in joke. 

I said it to laugh. 

Indeed. 

It pleases me much. 

I agree with von. 

I give my assent. 
I ilo not oppose this. 
I agree. 

I will not. 

I object to this. 

To consult, consider, or re- 
solve. 

What ought we to do ? 
What shall we do? 
What do you advise me to 

do ? 
What part shall we take 7 

Let us do this. 

It is better that I 

Wait a little. 

Would it not be better 

that ? 

I wish it were better. 

You will do better if 

Let me got 

If I were in your place, 

I 

It is the same. 



The rerulcr by the specimens hclmv via he enabled to 
compare the modern with the ancient tongue. 

PARALLEL PASSAGES FROM ST. JOHN'S 
GOSPEL. 

NfOV. AvOtl'TlKOV. 

Kc^a'X. d. KtipdX. d. 

1. El'S t>iv dpy>)v ?,rov o 1. EN ipjjfij tjv b Xoyos, 
Aoyoj* Kal b Xoyos iJtov ptTa Kai b Adyof Ijv rpb; tov 
Gtoo" kiii Qtbi !/tov b Xoyos. Qibv, Kal 6cb$ i/v b Xoyos. 

2. trouros Itov ck rl)y 2. Oi^oj %v /v upyij 
io\riv ptra Qcov. itpbs rbv Oi'ov. 



3. OX« [ti jrpdyftara] Zta 
piaov tov [Xd°you] lylvno-av, 
mil yu/pii airbv Aiv cyivt 
Kin t ya tin tytve. 

4. Kh avrbv i/Tov fan' 

Kill 7) (,(,»'/ l/TOV TO <j/U>{ TU)V 

ivftpwrrw. 

5. Kal rb <pZ$ cU t1;v 

O-KOTlillV (/>/)■)','(, Kill I/ GKO- 

Ttia iev rb KaTdXaSe. 

6". tfyivtv tin; HyOpavos 
a-zaruXpi Vof (i-o tov Otov, 
to ovopd tov Itittfvvns. 



3. riuVra il avTiw lye- 
vcto' Kal xuph iivtov eyiv- 
lto obit ci', <5 ytyovev. 

). i",v avnp ^ui) ?/v, Kal 
i'l {,ioi) i)v rb ipui tCiv dtOpdr- 
truy. 

5. Kai rb <pS,i tv rfj gko~ 
tiii ipiiiiit, Kal lj CKo-la avrb 
oil KitrtXuBcv. 

6. Kyiviro dvOpwuos a-' 
tGTaXpiviis -apii (3eow, bvo~ 
pa aiiTip iuiaii-vj. 



THE INSCRIPTIONS AT ORCHOMENUS, FROM 
MELETIUS. 

OPXOMEN6S, Koiv&f TKpixov, iri5X(f irnri -Xovatio- 
tiiti/ Kai iirxvpiDTdrn, rpbrtpov KaXovpivn CoiwtikuI 
M)i)vm, £i'f ti)v b-oiav t^rov b NuDf riov Xapiruv, el; 
rdv b-iilov ixXi'ipoivov ti\>/ u't Qn6a2ot f ovtivds ru eiatpos 
avcGKatpQn t:otI vr.b twv Aa-zaXdyKOJV. Eizavnyvpi^ov 

£lf ai)Tl)v T))v TTdXlV Til Xil(HTl'lGtll, TOO OTOl'oU <1)<UJ1'»J 

Eupov trTiypa(ffdi iv GTi'/Xat; ti'iW tov KTio-QivTos vadt i~' 
Ovdpart riji Ocotokov, i-rrb tov -KpuiToa-aOapiov Aiavros, 
fir! twv fiaaiXf'uH' Eao-iXci'ou, A/01T05, Kal Kuii'orai'Tii'Ou, 
i^'oi'ovi; ovtvjs' (v piv tij piq KOtVVg* 

" Oi'ot iiUiov riiv iySva twv XapiTqciuv. 

SaX-iOT/;j. 
Mi/i'if AroXXwii'ou Ai'Tio^YEiif a~o Maidvipov* 

K'Vi.f. 
ZwiXo; Zu/iXov Tldtfto;. 

Yu'jwidi. 
Nouuiji'ioj Novptivlov AOnvalog. 

\Jvir]Tiii ixQv, 
, Apnrias £>ipoK\iovs OnSalo;. 

Al'Xi]ri'is. 
A~oXX6^0Tos AvoXXoSotov Kpl'l$. 
A.''Xu)^f. 

PfJ^ITTTOJ PofUVTTOU Apyi/OJ. 
KlOlipttTTtJS. 

Farias XzoXXoSdrov tov tfai'fo'j AioXn; iiri Kvpyf. 

KiOapiiti'ii;. 
Aqpt'irpios YlappaictKOv KaX^ijc'dnoy. 

Tpayi;>i6s. 
IvnoKpdrns ApiGTOpivovs Piic'io?. 

Kojpip&o's. 
KaXXiGTparos Efati/oTou ©j/Guiof. 

IIuii7ri); Etrrvpuv. 
Apnvlas AnpoKXiovs 6q$atC{. 

"inoKpirfis. 
AvipdOco; AiopoOiov TapavriVds. 

XloojTiig Xpayiphimv. 
HoifioKXijs "ZofioKXiovs A'9/;i'a7o;. 

Yt7okvit>'is. 
KaGlpt^oi BsoSi&pov Q>il>iuo$. 

IIoi»;r>)f Kw/' 
ILAil;avSpos AptoTiavog A0nva7oc 

TvOKplTlji. 

ArraXos ArrdXov AOtjvalof. 



Oii'f ivbctov rbv vfiprjrov dy&va ruv Ipobiioiv* 

Tlatiaf avXr)ards. 
AiokXTjs KaXX<pi5<5ou G»;6aioy. 

IIa<<5a? i/yfpoVa?. 
Trpar7vo; Evvikov Qrj6a7os. 

kvbpaf avXriords. 
AiokXtjs KaXX<pi}(5ov 6>;(jcioj. 

Avbpa; f/ycpdvas. 
Tdbiiriros VoSiirrrov kpydos. 

Tpaytpbis. 
IswoKpaTris ApiaropfVou? T6bio$. 

Kiopi/ibig. 
KaXXlcrrparos E^aKearov Gijfjaioj. 
Ta emviKia. 

Koiptpbiuiv Xlotrjrrjg. 
kXe^avbpo; Apiariwvos kOrjvaios. 

Ev be tjj eripa iwptKios. 
Mvaolvia dpy^ovros dyoivoOcriovro; rb 
Xaptniriov, tvapidoTU) vdvruiv o\ rut bt eviKuiaav tu 
Xaptrdrta. 

TaXrciyKrds. 
i'iXivo; QiXivu) kQdvtios. 

Ka'pouf. 
Elpi'obas Ew/cpa'no? BtiSciof* 

Tlocird;. 
Mi/crru>p Mr/aropo? <J>o>Kai£iJ?. 

Kpdruv KXfWo? Ga'fiao?. 

AvXcird;. 
TlcpiytvtU UpaKXcibao Kou^ikjjvo'j. 

AvXacvbb;, 
AapijvcTOi YXavKio Apyio?. 

Ki8api<TTd;. 
Tdparpo; ApaXiAw AioXtbs dirb MoupiVaf. 

T payaevbds. 
AaKXavidbiopos XlovBido TapavTiv6%. 

Ktopaivhds. 
HtKiarparos "WXooTpurw BetSttof. 
Tu evivUtia Koipacvbos. 
Euap^o? Hpo<5<Jraj Kopujwvy." 

Ev SXXtp X/9(|). 

" Mtipi^os IToXu/cparov? iapioi'iipo? <5(oyfrwi>o? avbptaai 

yapaydnavrts vucdaavTCS biovvaov dveflrjKav ripo)vos dp- 

j^hitos avXiovros K\io( abovros dXKloQevlOS. ,, 

Ev erepip Xffltp. 

" $vvdpx<a ap^ovTos, (invbf SeiXovQiio, dp%i (Ii? Eu- 

6a>Xi dp^ebdpio qju>Ktia 8? aitlfciaKa dm) rd? ow>y- 

YpaibH xiba rdv r/oXcpdp)(wv, Kri rfflv Karorcrduiv, di^Xd- 
pfvo? r<i? covyypatp&s rd; Kipevas rrdp evtppSva, xr) <pibiav 

Kt) vaaixXctv k>] ripbpcibov (jxvxcia;, Krj bapo- 

rrXilv Xvcibdpio, ki) biovvcov Ka<picobu>o> ^rjpoive'ia Kar 
rb ^.diptapa rS> bdpo>. 



Wfl*7WET>m 



Svvdpya) Xpyovrof, p£(Vfl? dXaXKoptvlio F dpvSv, ttoXv- 
dXao? rapla; direboiKe ev6o)Xv dp%cbdpv (pWKui d~b rd? 
sovyy\,aip3> rb KaraXvnov Kdr rd ipd<pttrpa rS> ldpu>, dvt- 
\onevos rds <Tovyyp* r iit rd; Ktixtvas Trap cuxptXov, Kr) 



tvippova $<i)«/af. K^ irap iiwvvatov tuufiicobibpoi ^ijpwv/a, 
Kti Xvuifiajxov iaporiXiot viia tuiv rroXt/ia'p^uJi', nil run 
/carojirdW. 

" Ap^ovTOf Iv ip^Ofavb Swap^u), pcrbs AXaXifopcifui 
iv be F iXarin Mivoirao 'Ap^tXrfw pcivbs Trparu. OpoX- 
oy« Ei!6u)Xu F iXarirj, o xfi rfj Tr<iX( ep^opcviuiv. E~ub% 
KLKopiary EiifiwXof 7T«p T^f ti-<5Xio{ to bdvaov lirrav »tut 
ru? hpoXoyias rdg TtOiaug &vvdp^u> dp^tiVTOf, pttvdi 
SuXovdiw, k!) ovt i<pu\lrri avTu crt oi'div ndp rdv ttoXiv, 
dXX' o~f^' iravra rrcpt Karros, xr) dirobcbdavOi rfj iroXt rb 
t^oi'Tff Tvif hpoXoylas, tl piv ttoti btbopivov ypdvov 
Evfiu)\v c~i vopias F trt dvirrapa flovtaai aovv ixirv$ t'td 
Kiirtris Fi k«t< vpofidrv; aovv >jyvs ^tiXi'^; <'p\'' ru> ^poio) 
iimvrbi 6 ptrii Ovvapy^ov dpy^ovra tp-^optvlos dvoypa- 
(picrBtj be Ei'/?u)Xoi/ tear eviavrbv cKaarov rap rbv raptav 
Ktj rbv vopu)v ilv rare Ka'ipara rdv Trpofidroiv, k>i r<3j> 
>iywv, Kri rSiv (ioviov, Ktj ruiv Tmriov, kij Kariva daapaiwv 
3-U>] to vXeWuf pd aT7oypd<p£<TO wbe nXiova rwv ycypap- 

plvoiv ev tjj (rovyy^oipdat >i bexari; 7/ to evvopiov 

EvfluiXov 3(/i£i'Xc( Xi; T&v ipy^opevioiv dpyovpto) 

TtTTapaKovra EiifjajXu ko.8' cKaarov eviavrbv, 

kii t6kov tpeperu) bpaypdi rai pvus eKdaraf Kara 

puva rbv *») 'ipvpaKTo; carui rbv Ipyopiviov 

KaX rd f'si?S-" 

Er aXXoij Xi'Ooij. 

" kvobwpa cviapopov X"'/ '" NOKYES. " KaXXi-irov 
dp<pdpiy_oi, Ka'i a'XXui." El' ovbtpiq eTiypatyrj ibov rovov, 
\) TTvciJpa, a b'( >ipdi viroypdfoptv, o't rraXaioi irpoveypa- 
tf>ov, Ka'i rd j$fi 



The following is the prospectus of a translation of 
Anacharsis into Romaic, by my Romaic master, Mar- 
marotouri, who wished to publish it in England. 

Ei'aHEIS TYnorPA'MKH. 

Ilpd? roi>; fV (piXoycvds Kai (piXcXXrjvas. 

OSOI eh tJiSXta TravTobaird evrpvipdaiv, li^eipovv 
tSgov elvai rb ypijaipov Tt)i IcToptaf, bi' airi/f yap 
e^evptaKirai ij rrXf'oi' pepaKpvap'.vrj 7ruXaidr>K, Kai Sew- 
povvrai aij ev KaTtiirrpip SjQri, TTpd^ci; (cai btoiKrjoas ttoX- 
X&v Kai bia<p6po>v eOviitv Kai ytv&v oiv tijv pv^pr f v Sitaojit' 
aro Kai biaaiiaei !/ ItfroptKr) Siijyriais els ai&va rbv 
a iravra. 

Mi'a reroia Imar-i'ipTi r ivai cvairSKTriro;, Kai ev rairip 
oxjiiXtprj, lj Kpdrrn-> enreXv dvayKaia' biari Xonrbv fipcis 
pdvot va ri)v {ortpovpzQa, prj t^cvpovrts ovre. rd; dpx"S 
riov -npoyovuv pa?, ttoQcv ndre Kai rraJj tlpeOtjaav ds rd; 
narpibas pa?, oute rd IjOi], rd KaropQuipara Kai r!)v 
bioiKTjm'v ruiv ; Av epiort'iaiopev rovs dXXoytvus, h^eipovv 
va p<J? bi'oaovv 3^1 pdvov (VropiKw? r»;v dpynv Kai rfft 
npdobov riov -rrpoydvuiv ua{, dXXd Kai ToiroypdipiKuis pa; 
Sttvvovv rdf ?/o-£i? twv itarpibiuv pas, Kai otovd y^eip- 
ayiayoi yivdpevoi pi robs ycwypaipiKOi's tojv itivaKaf, piis 
Xeyovv, ebd dvai a\ AOiivai, f<5u> !/ Sra'prr;, Iku ai OijBat, 
rdo-a crdbta »} piXia dve^ci >i pia eitap-^ta d-rb ri)v dX- 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



103 



Ar/v. Tootos iiKoS6prjct rfjv piav tx6\iv, ixcivos tvv ii\- 
\i]v, Kal rX. Tlpaairt uv ipuT^aiiipcv abrovs tovs pn 
EXX»;i«s ytipayiiiyovs pas, rdOcv lirapaxivifincav vd 
i^tpivvijirovv apY^ds T&aov vraXatds, dvvnocrbXdis pas 
d^oxpivovTai pi avroiis tovs \6yovs- " Ka9u>s b ix 
Zxvdius kvd%apcis, !iv Siv inepiip^tro rd iravcvippbavva 
ixuva xXipara rrjs kXXdSos, uv Siv iptpopiiro rd dS,idipa- 
ra, rd ijOn xal roiis vbpovs twv EXXi'/voiv, ijtfsXe pitvij 
'ZxiOtis Ktil -b b'vopa Kal rb -r pay pa' ovtoi km b r/piTipos 
larpbs, uv Siv IpdvOavt rd tov lniroxpaTovs, Siv iSvvaTo 
vd ttpaytap/jcrj) els t^v rtYvtjv tov. Av b ev i/piv vopo9iTi;s 
Siv iiira^c rd tov YoXuvos, Avxovpyov, xal ntTTuxov, 
iiv ISivaTO >d pvOp/jafl Kal vd KaXicpyi'icr) rd ijOi/ t£>v 
bpoytvdv tov' Av b I'iJTiap Siv a~>iv9i$tTo tus ti<ppaScias 
Kal Tois ^apttvTtcrpovs tov ArjpooOivovs, Siv ivcpyovccv 
lis T&S djWaj tuiv aKpoaTdv tov' Av b Nf'oj Avd^ap- 
cis, o Kvpios A.66ds Bap9oXopalos Siv dvcyivoicxc pi 
piydXi/v eirtuovfiv Kal oki t iv Tois irXiov lyKpirovs cvy- 
ypatpus tu)v kXXi'/vioi', i^ipcvvdv avTois Kara fidOos iirl 
TpiaKovra Svu> errj, Siv ijOcXcv i^vipdvr] Tovrr/v t!)v vcpl 
EXXr/vuv ItTTOpiav tov, t'lTts Kiptijyricis tov Niov Ava- 
ydpceuis imp' avrov npocwvopdc9tj, Kal els bXas rds 
ei'pui-tuKds SiuXiKTovs ptTcy\u)TTi<jd>i." Kal iv ivl X6yip, 
ol viwTcpoi, dv Stv Zntpvav Sid bSrjyovs tovs npoyAvovs 
pas, !j9iXav icuis ircpi<pipwvTai paraiuts p^XP 1 T0 " v " v ' 
Avtu Siv tivai Xdyia ivOovaiacpivov Sid to qjtXoyzvis 
TpatKoti, civai Si (piXaX>'/9ovs Fcppavov, bans iptrdijipaac 
tov ISiov Avd^apciv enrb tov TaXXixov els to Vippavixov. 

Av Xotxbv Kal !}pus SiXwpcv vd pe9i^iopcv Tqs yvdauo; 
royv XapizpSv KiiT0p9u>pdTwv birov exapav ol Savpacrol 
txuvoi irpoTrdrnpcs ripiov, uv £7ri9vpwpcv vd pd9u>pzv rf)v 
irp6oSov Kal av^rjalv rur tls Tas rivvas Kal l-rriaTrjpas Kal 
lis Kd9c dWo tiSos pa9rjacij>s, uv c^upcv ircpiipyciav vd 
yviaplamptv rro9cv Ka.Tay6pt.9a, Kal birolovs Savpaarovs 
Kal ptydXovs dvSpas, d Kal irpoy6vovs I'lpoiv, ipcv, rjpils 
Siv yvupi^opcv, els Kaipbv brrov o'l uWoy evils Savpd^nvaiv 
avToi's, Kal wj naripas iravroiaoovv pu9t)inij>s acSovrai, 
Ss avvSpdpwpcv a-rravTts Tpo9ipws ch t?iv IkSooiv tov 
Suvpaaiov tovtov cvyypdppaTOS Tov Nfou Avaydpaiws- 

llpcls ovv o'l vTToyrypappivot $e\oprv CKTiXiact irpo- 
6vpu>s Ti]v pcrdippaciv tov BitiXiov pi t!)v xard to Svva- 
Tbv jjpiv KaXt/v (ppdciv rrjf vvv KaO' i/pus bpiXias, Kal 

IxSiVTlS TOVTO ds TVTTOV, SlXnpCV TO KuXXu77i'lJC( pi TOVS 

ytMypafyiKovs rlvakas, pi arXu; Piopaixas Xf'fcis iyKcy- 
apaypivovs ds iSixd pas ypdppara, -irpo<TTt9ivTCS o , ti 
£\\o xpf/aipov Kal 6\pp6Siov ds t!/v iaropiav. 

OXoi' rb aiyypappa $i\a yivci ds r6povs SuiScxa KaTa 
plprioiv tT/s IraXcK/jj tKSf>aio>s- H Tip!) b\ov Toij avyypdp- 
paTos uvai iptoplvia Sexai^n ti)s Btivvris Sid rijv -xpoa- 
9riKt}V twv ycoiypatpixuiv ttwukuv. 6 <pi\oycvfis ovv aw- 
Spopririis irplxtt vd vXrjpuxxrj ds Ku9t rbpov ftpptvt Iva 
Kul Kapniravia UKOct Tqs Bi/h'w, xal tovto Y(|>p2$ xap- 
ulav TrpbSoaiv, dXX' tiiOOj bnov 9iXu Tip T!apaSo9ij b rdpos 
TVTtuipivos xal Scpivos- 

t.pjiiLi pivot xal cvSalpoves SiaGiwotrc, i±\\ijvv)v raicJtj. 
Tqj bptTipas ayaTtqs i^ijpTripivai, 

luidvvrjs yiappapoTovptjs. 

AnpnTpios Hcvu'piis. 

J.rvpiSiDV IlpcSfTos* 

tiV TpltCTllp, TJ) TrpwTfl ()XTO)l'ipl0V, 1799. 



THE LORD'S PRAYER IN ROMAIC. 

H riATKPA pas bnov iiaai ds tovs olpavovs, u{ 
ayiaoOjj Tb Svopd aov. Af t\9t) t) PuotXtia ooi . A{ 
ylvjl rb SiXrjpd cov, Ka9Z>s ds rbv ovpavbv, cr^/ xnl ds 
t>)v yr'/v. Tb \^u>pi pas to KaBripeptvbv, Sds pas to cfip- 
tpov. Kal avy\i!)piiai pas r/i %pi>i pas, KaO&s xui ipus 
ovyxiapovptv tovs xpco<<iu\has pas- Kal pnv pas (pips 
ds -KUpaapbv, «XXu i\iv9ipu>ai pas omb Tbv irovtipdv. 
On iSixrj oov c7vai t) fiaatXda Si, f) Sivapts, xal i) iSEoj 
ds tovs al&vas. Aui'iv. 

IN GREEK. 

IlATEP fipHv, o fV Tois ovpavols, o.yiao-Ot'iTw rb ovopd 
cov. LAOtViu j; /JaaiXtia voV ycvrj9i'iTti> rb 5/Xr/<« cov, 
(lis iv ohpavu), xal irrl tTjs yT)s. Tbv dprov rjpiav tov i-iov- 
ciov Sbs iip'tv oi'ipcpov. Kai uipcs >iplv rd otpcAfipaTQ iipiov, 
ws xui i;pus CHJiizptv to'is (tynX/ruis t'/pun'. Kul prj 
dcEviyxris i/pds its -ncipaapbv, d\\d pvaat ypus dxb tob 
novripov. Oti cov ictiv ;; jiaaiXda, xai q Sivupis, xalj) 
S6%a, lis tovs aldvas. 



CANTO III. 



Note 1. Stanza xviii. 

In "pride of place" here last the eagle flew. 

" Pride of place" is a term of falconry, and means 

the highest pitch of (light See Macbeth, etc. 

" An easle towering in hin pride of ptace 
Was by a mousing owl hawk'd at and kill'd." 

Note 2. Stanza x.x. 
Such ns Harmodius drew on Athens' tyrant lord. 
See the famous Song on Harmodius and Aristogiton. 
— The best English translation is in Bland's Anthology 
by Mr. Denman : 

" With myrtle my sword will I wreathe," etc. 

Note 3. Stanza .\.\i. 
And all went merry as a marriage-bell. 
On the night previous to the action, it is said that a 
ball was given at Brussels. 

Notes 4 and 5. Stanza xxvi. 
And Evan's, Donald's fume rings in each clansman's ears. 

Sir Evan Cameron, and his descendant Donald, the 
"gentle Lochiel" of the "forty-five." 

Note 6. Stanza xxvii. 
And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves. 
The wood of Soignies is supposed to be a remnant of 
the " forest of Ardennes," famous in Boierdo's Orlando, 
and immortal in Shakspcare's " As you like it." It in 
also celebrated in Tacitus as being the spot of successful 
defence by the Germans against the Rom in encroach- 



104 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



ments. — I have ventured to ail<>|>t the name connected 

with QobU r associ ttions than tliosc of mere slaughter. 

Note 7. Stanza x.\.\. 

I tiin.M fmm all Bhe brought to those she could not bring. 
Liide from Mont St. Jean over the field seemed 
intelligent and accurate. The place where Major How- 
ard fell was not far from two tall and solitary trees (there 
third cut down, or shivered in the battle) which 
stand a few yards from each other at a pathway's side. 
— Beneath these he died and was buried. The body 
has since been removed to England. A small hollow 
for the present marks where it lay; but will probably 
soon be effaced ; the plough has been upon it, and the 
grain is. 

After pointing out the different spots where Picton 
and other gallant men had perished, the guide said, 
" Here Major Howard lay ; I was near him when 
wounded." 1 told him my relationship, and he seemed 
then still more anxious to point out the particular spot 
and circumstances. The place is one of the most 
marked in the field, from the peculiarity of the two 
trees above-mentioned. 

I went on horseback twice over the field, comparing 
it with my recollection of similar scenes. As a plain, 
Waterloo seems marked out for the scene of some great 
action, though this maybe mere imagination: I have 
viewed with attention those of Platea, Troy, Mantinea, 
Leuctra, Cha?ronea, and .Marathon; and the field around 
Mont St. Jean and Hougoumont appears to want little 
but a better cause, and that undefinabie but impressive 
halo which the lapse of ages throws around a celebrated 
spot, to vie in interest with any or all of these, except 
perhaps the last mentioned. 

Note 8. Stanza xxxiv. 
Like to the, apples on the Dead Sea's shore. 
The (fabled) apples on the brink of the lake Asphdltes 
were said to be fair without, and within ashes. — Vide 
Tacit. Histor. 1. v. 7. 

Note 9. Stanza xli. 
For £ ccptred cynics earth wore far too wide a den. 

The great error of Napoleon, "if we have writ our 
annals true," was a continued obtrusion on mankind 
of his want of all community of feeling for or with 
tnem; perhaps more offensive to human vanity than 
the active cruelty of more trembling and suspicious 
tyranny. 

Such were his speeches to public assemblies as well 
as individuals; and the single expression which he is 
said to have used on returning to Paris after the Russian 
winter had destroyed his army, rubbing his hands over 
a fire, " This is pleasanter than Moscow," would prob- 
ably alienate more favour from his cause than the 
destruction and reverses which led to the remark. 

Note 10. Stanza xlviii. 

What want these outlaws conquerors should have ? 

"What wants that knave 

That king should have V 

was King James s question, on meeting Johnny Arm- 
strong and his followers in full accoutrements. — See 
the Ballad. 

Note 11. Song, stanza 1. 
The cnstlc, crag of DrarhenfcU. 
The castle of Drachenfels stands on the highest sum- 
mit of " the Seven Mountains," over the Rhine banks ; 



it is in ruins, and connected with some singular tradi- 
tions : it is the first in view on the road from Bonn, 
but on the opposite side of the river ; on this bank, 
nearly facing it, are the remains of another called the 
Jew's Castle, and a large cross commemorative of the 
murder of a chief by his brother. The number of castles 
and cities along I be course of the Rhine on both sides 
is very great, and their situations remarkably beautiful. 

Note 12. Stanza lvii. 

The whiteness of bis 60ul, and thuB men o'er him wept. 

The monument of the young and lamented General 
Marceau (killed by a rifle-ball at Alterkirchen, on the 
last day of the fourth year of the French republic) still 
remains as described. 

The inscriptions on his monument are rather too 
long, and not required ; his name was enough ; France 
adored, and her enemies admired ; both wept over him. 
— His funeral was attended by the generals and detach- 
ments from both armies. In the same grave General 
Hoche is interred, a gallant man also in every sense of 
the word ; but though he distinguished himself greatly 
in battle, he had not the good fortune to die there ; his 
death was attended by suspicions of poison. 

A separate monument (not over his body, which is 

buried by Marcoau's) is raised for him near Andernach, 

opposite to which one of his most memorable exploits 

was performed, in throwing a bridge to an island on 

the Rhine. The shape and style are different from 

that of Marceau's, and the inscription more simple and 

pleasing : 

"The Army of the Sambre and Me use 
to its Commander-in-Chief, 

HOCHE." 

This is all, and as it should he. Hoche was esteemed 
among the first of France's earlier generals, before 
Buonaparte monopolized jier triumphs. — He was the 
destined commander of the invading army of Ireland. 

Note 13. Stanza lviii. 
Here Ehrenhreitstein, with her shatter'd wall. 

Ehrenbreitstein, i. e. " the broad Stone of Honour," 
one of the strongest fortresses in Europe, was dis- 
mantled and blown up by the French at the truce of 
Lcoben. — It had been and could only be reduced by 
famine or treachery. It yielded to the former, aided 
by surprise. After having seen the fortifications of 
Gibraltar and Malta, it did not much strike by compar- 
ison, but the situation is commanding. General Mar- 
ceau besieged it in vain for some time, and 1 slept in a 
room where I was shown a window at which he is said 
to have been standing, observing the progress of the 
siege by moonlight, when a ball struck immediately 
below it. 

Note 14. Stanza lxiii. 
Unsepulchred they roani'd, and shriek'd each wandering ghost. 

The chapel is destroyed, and the pyramid of bones di- 
minished to a small number by the Burgnndian legion in 
the service of France, who anxiously effaced ibis record 
of their ancestors' less successful invasions. A few still 
remain., notwithstanding the pains taken by the Burginv- 
didns ( iir ages (all who passed that way moving a bone to 
their owi, country) and the less justifiable larcenies of the 
Swiss postilions, who carried them off to sell tor knife- 
handles ; a purpose for which the whiteness imbibed by 
the bleaching of years had rendered them in gnat re- 
quest. Of these relics I ventured to bring away as much 



CIIILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



106 



as may have made the quarter of a hero, for which the 



iole e\cu>e is, that if I had not, the next passer-by might 
liave perverted them to worse uses than the careful pre- 
servation which 1 Intend for them; 

Note 15. Stan/a Ixv. 

LevelTd Aventicum, hath strew'd her subject lands. 

Aveuticum (near Morat) was the Roman capital of 

Helvetia, where Avenches now stands. 

Note lfi. Stanza lxvi. 

And held within their urn one mind, one heart, one dust, 

Julia Alpinula, a young Aventian priestess, died seon 
after a vain endeavour to save her father, condemned 
to death as a traitor by Aulus Caicina. Her epitaph was 
discovered many years ago ; — it is thus — 

Julia Alpinula 
I lie jaceo, 
InfeliCtS patns iut'elix proles, 
I >es \ \ < -i 1 1 1 :■• BaceKTos. 
Exorare patria necem non potui; 
Mal« mori in f:> t is ille cat. 
Vixi Annoa XXIII. 
I know of no human composition so affecting as 
this, nor a history of deeper interest. These are the 
names and actions which ought not to perish, and to 
which we turn with a true ami healthy tenderness, from 
the wretched and flittering detail of a confused mass 
of conquests and buttles, with which the mind is roused 
for a time to a false and feverish sympathy, from 
whence it recurs at length with all the nausea conse- 
quent on such intoxication. 

Note 17. Stanza lxvii. 
In the sun's face, like yonder Alpine snow. 
This is written in the eye of Mont Blanc (June 3d, 
181i'>), which even at this distance dazzles mine. 

(July 20th.) I this day observed for some lime the 
distinct reflection of Mont Blane and Mont Argentiere 
in the calm of the lake, which I was crossing in my 
boat ; the distance of these mountains from their mir- 
ror is sixty miles. 

Note 18. Stanza lxxi. 

By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone. 

The colour of the Rhone at Geneva is blue, to a depth 

of tint which 1 have never seen equalled in water, salt 

or fresh, except in the .Mediterranean and Archipelago. 

Note 19. Stanza l.xxix. 
Than vulgar minds may be with all they seek possest. 
This refers to the account in his " Confessions" of his 
passion for the Comtesse d'Houdetol (the mistress of St. 
Lambert), and his long walk every morning for the sake 
of the single kiss which was tin- common salutation of 
French acquaintance. — Rousseau's description of his 
feelings on this occasion maybe considered as the most 
passionate, yet nM impure description and expression 
of love that ever kindled into words; winch after all 
must be felt, from their very folic, to he inadequate 

to the delineation: a painting can give no sufficient 
idea of the ocean. 

Note 20. Stanza xci. 
Of earth o'er-gazing mountains, 

It is to be recollected, tli.it the most beautiful and 
"mpressive doctrines of tiie divine Founder of Chris- 
tianity were delivered, not in the Temple, hut on the 
Mount. 

To waive the question of devotion, and turn t j human 
IV 19 



eloquence, the most elfectual and splendid specimens 
were po' pronounced within walls. Demosthenes ad- 
dressed the publick and popular assemblies. Cicero 
spoke in lite forum. That this added to their effect on 
the mind of both orator and hearers, may be conceived 
from the difference between what we read of the emo- 
tions then and there produced, and those we ourselves 
experience in the perusal in the closet. It is one thing 
to read the Iliad at Sigceum and on the tumuli, or by 
the springs with mount Ma above, and the plain am 1 

rivers and Archipelago around you ; and another to trim 
your taper over it in a snug library — this I know. 

Were the early and rapid progress of what is called 
Methodism to be attributed to any cause beyond the 
enthusiasm excited by its vehement faith and doctrines 
(the truth or error of which I presume neither to canvass 
nor to question), I should venture to ascribe it to the. 
practice of preaching in the fields, and the unstudied 
and extemporaneous effusions of its teachers. 

The Mussulmans, whose erroneous devotion (at least 
in the lower orders 1 is most sincere, and therefore im 
pressive, are accustomed to repeat their prescribed 
orisons and prayers wherever they may be at the slated 
hours — of course frequently in the open air, kneeling 
upon a light mat (which they carry for the purpose ot 
a bed or cushion as required); the ceremony lasts some 
minutes, during which they are totally absorbed, and 
only living in their supplication; nothing can disturb 
them. On me the simple and entire sincerity of these 
men, and the spirit which appeared to be within and 
upon them, made a far greater impression than any 
general rite which was ever performed in places of 
worship, of which I have seen those of almost every 
persuasion under the sun; including most of our own 
sectaries, and the Greek, the Catholic, the Armenian, 
the Lutheran, the Jewish, and the Mahometan. M; ny 
of the negroes, of whom there are numbers in the 
TurkiLii empire, are idolaters, and have free exercise of 
their belief and its rites: some of these I had a distant 
view of at I'atras, and from what I COUld make out ol 
them, tliev appeared to be of a truly Pagan descr.p- 
tion, and noi vcrv agreeable to a spectator. 
Note 21. Stanza xcii. 
The slty is changed '.— anil such it change! Oh pistil 
The thunder-storms to which these lines refei <*- 
eurrcd on the 13th of June, lSln, at midnight. I have 
seen among the Acroceraunian mountains of Chunar' 
several more terrible, but none more beautiful. 
Note 22. Stanza xci:;. 
Anil sunset into rose-hues sees them wrought. 
RoussemiV Heloise, Letter 17, part 4, note. — "Cce 
montagries boiW si hautes, qu'une demi-ueure apres lc 
soloil coiiehe, leurssonimcts sonl encore co'.airos de sea 
rayons ; dont le rouge forme sur ces cimos blanches 
una betie eouleur de rose qu'on apercoil dc fort loin." 
This applies more particularly to the heights over 

Melllcrie. 

"J'aRara Vevaylogera la Clef, et pendant deux jouri 

que j'y rostai sans voir persoimo, je pris pour retie 
vilie un amour qui m'a suivi dans tons lues Voyages, 

ei qui ui'v a fail etaulir enfln lea hdros de mon romam 

volontii is a ceux qui out du gofll el qui soot 

sensibles : Allez a Vevay— visitei le p-\j s, eaainine* lea 

sues, proioeocz-vous sa' I" lac, el dikes si la nature 
n'a pas fait ce beau pays pour unc Julie, pour nr.« 



10G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Claire ct pour un Saint-Prcux ; mats nc lcs y chcrchez 
pas." Let Cmfessions, Uure iv. page 306. lafan. 
1795. 

In July, lSIfi, I made a voyage round the lake of 
Geneva ; and .is fur as my own observations have led 
me in a not uninterested nor inattentive survey of all 
(nc seenefi most celebrated by Rousseau in his "Ile- 
lolse,'' I can safely say, that in this there is DO exagge- 
ration. It would he difficult to see Clarens (with the 
scenes around it, V'evay, Chilloti, Boveret, St. Gingo, 
Meillerie, Eviati, and the entrances of the Rhone), with- 
out being forcibly struck with its peculiar adaptation 
to the persons and events with which it has been peo- 
pled. Rut this is not all ; the feeling with which all 
around Clarens, and the opposite rocks of Meillerie, is 
invested, is of a still higher and more comprehensive 
order than the mere sympathy with individual passion ; 
it is a sense of the existence of love in its most extended 
and sublime capacity, and of our own participation of 
its good and of its glory : it is the great principle of the 
universe, which is there more condensed, but not less 
manifested ; and of which, though knowing ourselves a 
part, we lose our individuality, and mingle in the beauty 
of the whole. 

If Rousseau had never written, nor lived, the same 
associations would not less have belonged to such 
scenes. He has added to the interest of his works by 
their adoption ; he has shown his sense of their beauty 
by the selection ; but they have done that for him 
which no human being could do for them. 

I had the fortune (good or evil as it might be) to sail 
from Meillerie (where we landed for some time) to St. 
Gingo during a lake-storm, which added to the magni- 
ficence of all around, ail hough occasionally accompa- 
nied by danger to the boat, which was small and over- 
loaded. It was over this very part of the lake that 
Rousseau has driven tlie boat of St. Proux and Madame 
Wolmar to Meillerie for shelter during a tempest. 

On gaining the shore at St. Gingo, I found that the 
wind had been sufficiently strong to blow down some 
fine old chesnut trees on the lower part of the moun- 
tain-;. On the opposite height is a seat culled the Cha- 
teau de Clarens. The hills are covered with vineyards, 
and interspersed with some small but beautiful woods; 
one of these was named the " Bosquet de Julie," and it 
is -emaikable that, though long ago cut down by the 
brutal selfishness of the monks of St. Bernard (to whom 
the land appertained), that the ground might be in- 
closed into a vineyard for the miserable drones of an 
execrable superstition, the inhabitants of Clarens still 
point out the spot where its trees stood, calling it by 
the name which consecrated and survived them. 

Rousseau has not been particularly fortunate in the 
preservation of the "local habitations" he has given to 
" airy nothings." The Prior of Great St. Bernard has 
cut down some of his woods for the sake of a few 
casks of wine, and Buonaparte has levelled part of the 
rocks of Meillerie in improving the road to the Simplon. 
The road is an excellent one, but I cannot quite agree 
with a remarn which I heard made, that "La route 
vi ut mieux que les souvenirs." 

Note 23. Stanza cv. 

Lausanne and Forney ! ye have been the abodes. 
» ol'airc and Gibbon. 



Note 24. Stanza cxiii. 
Had I not till il my mind, which thus itself subdued. 

" if it be thus, 

For Bftnquo's issue have I filed my mind." 
Macbeth. 

Note 25. Stanza cxiv. 
O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve. 
It is said by Rochefoucault that " there is always 
something in the misfortunes of men's best friends not 
displeasing to them." 



CANTO IV. 



Note 1. Stanza i. 

T stootl in Venice, on the Bridge of Highs; 
A palace and a prison fa each hand. 

The communication between the Ducal palace and the 
prisons of Venice is by a gloomy bridge, or covered gal- 
lery, high above the water, and divided by a stone wall 
into a passage and a cell. The state dungeons, called 
" poz/.i," or wells, were sunk in the thick walls of the 
palace; and the prisoner when taken out to die was 
conducted across the gallery to the other side, and being 
then led hack into the other compartment, or cell, upon 
the bridge, was there strangled. The low portal through 
which the criminal was taken into this cell is now walled 
up; but the passage is still open, and is still known by 
the name of the Bridge of Sighs. The pozzi are under 
the flooring of the chamber at the foot of the bridge. 
Thev were formerly twelve, but on the first arrival of the 
French, the Venetians hastily blocked or broke up the 
deeper of these dungeons. You may still, however, de- 
scend by a trap-door, and crawl down through holes, 
half choked by rubbish, to the depth of two storeys 
below the first range. If you are in want of consolation 
for the extinction of patrician power, perhaps you may 
find it there; scarcely a ray of light glimmers into the 
narrow gallery which leads to the cells, and the places of 
confinement themselves are totally dark. A small hole 
in the wall admitted the damp air of the passages, and 
served for the introduction of the prisoner's food. A 
wooden pallet, raised a foot from the ground, was the 
only furniture. The conductors tell you that a light 
was not allowed. The cells are about five paces in length, 
two and a half in width, and seven feet in height. They 
are directly beneath one another, and respiration is 
somewhat difficult in the lower holes. Only one prisoner 
was found when the republicans descended into these 
hideous recesses, and he is said to have been confined 
sixteen years. But the inmates of the dungeons beneath 
hid tefl traces of their repentance, or of their despeir, 
which are still visible, and may perhaps owe something 
to recent ingenuity. Some of the detained appear to 
have offended against, and others to have belonged to, 
the sacred body, not only from their signatures, but from 
the churches and belfries which they have scratched 
upon the nails. The reader may not object to see a spe- 
cimen of the records prompted by so terrific a solitude. 
As nearly as thev could be copied by more than one 
pencil, three of them are as follows: 
1. 

NON Tl FIDAU AI) ALCUNO, PF.NSA c TAC1 
i tSE FUG 111 VUOI DI SPION1 INSIDIE e LACCi 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



107 



Hi PENT1RTI PENTIRTI NULLA GIOVA 
MA BEN DI VALOR TUO LA VERA PROVA 

1607. ADI 2. GENARO. FUI RE 
TENTO P' LA BESTIEMMA P' AVER DATO 
DA MANZAR A UN MORTO 

IACOMO. GR1TTI. SCRISSE. 

UN PARLAR PC-CO et 
NEGARE PRONTO et 
. UN PENSAR AL FINE PUO DARE LA VITA 
A NOl ALTR1 MESCHINI 

1005. 
EGO IOHN BAPTISTA AD 
ECCLESIAM CORTELLARIUS. 
3. 
DI CHI MI FIDO GUARDAMI DIO 
DI CHI NON MI FIDO MI GUARDERO IO 

V*. LA Sta. ch. K>. Rna. 
The copyist has followed, not corrected, the solecisms; 
some of which are however not quite so decided, since the 
letters were evidently scratched in the dark. It only 
need be observed, that Bextcmmia and Mangiar may 
be read in the first inscription, which was probably 
written by a prisoner confined for some act of impiety 
committed at a funeral : the Cortellariun is the name of 
a parish on terra firma, near the sea : and that the last 
initials evidently are put for Viva la Santa Chiesa 
Kattulica Romana. 

Note 2. Stanza ii. 

She looks a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean. 
Rising with her liara of proud towers. 

An old writer, describing the appearance of Venice, 
has made use of the above image, which would not be 
poetical were it not true. 

"Quo Jit id qui superne urbem contempletur, tufritam 
teHurii imnginem medio oceano Jiguratam se putet in- 
spicere." ' 

Note 3. Stanza iii. 
In Venice Tasso's echoes are no more. 
The well-known song of the gondoliers, of alternate 
stanzas, from Tasso's Jerusalem, has died with the inde- 
pendence of Venice. Editions of the poem, with the 
original on one column, and the Venetian variations on 
the other, as sung by the boatmen, were once common, 
and are still to be found. The following extract will serve 
to show the difference between the Tuscan epic and the 
"Canta alia Barcariola." 

Original. 
Canto 1' armi pietose, e 'I capitano 

Che 'I gran scpulcro libero di Cristo. 
Mulin egli oprt> col senno, e con la mano 

Molto soffri nel glorioso aequisto; 
E in van l" Inferno a lui s' oppose, e in vano 

S 1 arrnb d' Asia, e di Libia il popol misto, 
( IM il < 'ii'l L'li did favore, o sotlo a i santi 
Segni ridusse i suoi compagni erranti. 

Venetian. 
L' nrme pietose de cantar gho vogia, 

E do Goffredo la immortal braura, 
Che el tin I' ha libera co strassia, e dogia 

Del nostra buon Gesii la sepoltura; 
De mezomondo unito, e de quel Bogia 

Mistier Pluton no I* ha bu mai paura; 
Die I' ha aeiuta, e i compagni sparpagnai 
Tutti '1 gh' i ha messi insieme i di del Dai. 



1 Marci AntoniiSabelli, do Vcncta:Urbis situ, narratio. edit 
Taurin. ISB7, lib. 1. fol. 202. 



Some of the elder gondoliers will, however, take up 
and continue a stanza of their once familiar bard. 

On the 7lh of last January, the author of Childe 
Harold, and another Englishman, the writer of this 
notice, rowed to the Lido with two singers, one of whom 
was a carpenter, and the other a gondolier. The former 
placed himself at the prow, the latter at the stem of the 
boat. A little after leaving the quay of the Piazetta, they 
began to sing, and continued their exercise until we 
arrived at the island. They gave us, amongst other 
essays, the death of Clorinda, and the palace of Armida; 
and did not sing the Venetian, but the Tuscan verses. 
The carpenter, however, who was the cleverer of the two, 
and was frequently obliged to prompt his companion, 
told us that he could translate the original. He added, 
that he could sing almost three hundred stanzas, but had 
not spirits (morbin was the word he used), to learn any 
more, or to sing what he already knew : a man must 
have idle time on his hands to acquire, or to repeat, and, 
said the poor fellow, "look at my clothes and at mc, I 
am starving." This speech was more affecting than his 
performance, which habit alone can make attractive. 
The recitative was shrill, screaming, and monotonous, 
and the gondolier behind assisted his voice by holding 
his hand to one side of his mouth. The carpenter used a 
quiet action, which he evidently endeavoured to restrain, 
but was too much interested in his subject altogether to 
repress. From these men we learnt that singing is not 
confined to the gondoliers, and that, although the chaunt 
is seldom, if ever, voluntary, there are still several amongst 
the lower classes who are acquainted with a few stanzas. 

It does not appear that it is usual for the performers to 
row and sing at the same time. Although the verses of 
the Jerusalem are no longer casually heard, there is yet 
much music upon the Venetian canals ; and upon holi- 
days, those strangers who are not near or informed 
enough to distinguish the words, mayfancj that many of 
the gondolas still resound with the strains of Tasso. The 
writer of some remarks which appeared in the Curiosities 
of Literature must excuse his being twice quoted ; for, 
with the exception of some phrases a little too ambitious 
and extravagant, he has furnisned a very exact, as well 
as agreeable, description. 

"In Venice the gondoliers know by heart long pas- 
sages from Ariosto and Tasso, and often chaunt them with 
a peculiar melody. But this talent seems at present on 
the decline : — at least, after taking some pains, I could 
find no more than two persons who delivered to me in 
this way a passage from Tasso. I must add, that the late 
Mr. Berry once chaunted to me a passage in Tasso in the 
manner, as he assured me, of the gondoliers. 

"There are always two concerned, who alternately 
sing the strophes. We know the melody eventually bv 
Rousseau, to whose songs it is printed ; it has properly no 
melodious movement; and is a sort of medium between 
the canto fermo and the canto figurato ; it approaches to 
the former by recitativical declamation, and to the latter 
by passages and course, by which one syllable is detained 
and embellished. 

" I entered a gondola by moonlight ; one singer placed 
himself forwards, and the other aft, and thus proceeded 
to St. Georgio. One began the song : when he had ended 
his strophe, the other took up the lay, and so continued 
the song alternately. Throughout the whole of it, tne 
same notes invariably returned, but, according to th» 



subject matter of the strophe, they laid a greater or a 
smaller stress, sometimes on one, and sometimes on 
another note, and indeed changed the enunciation of the 
whole strophe as the object of the poem altered. 

" On the whole, however, the sounds were hoarse an 1 
screaming: they seemed, in the manner of all rude un- 
! men, to make the excellency of their sinking in 
tie; force of their voice : one seemed desirous of conquer- 
ing tie; other by the strength of his Lungs ; and so far 
from receiving delight from this scene (shut up as I was 
in the box of the gondola), I found myself in a very un- 
pleasant situation. 

" My companion, to whom I communicated this cir- 
cumstance, being very desirous to keep up the credit of 
his countrymtn, assured me that this singing was very 
delightful when heard at a distance. Accordingly we 
got out upon the shore, leaving one of the singers in the 
gondola, while the other went to the distance of some 
hundred paces. They now began to sing against one 
another, and I kept walking up and down between them 
both, so as always to leave him who was to begin his part. 
I frequently stood still and hearkened to the one and to 
the other. 

" Here the scene was properly introduced. The strong 
declamatory, and, as it were, shrieking sound, met the 
ear from far, and called forth the attention ; the quickly- 
succceding transitions, which necessarily required to be 
sung in a lower tone, seemed like plaintive strains suc- 
ceeding the vociferation of emotion or of pain. The 
other, who listened attentively, immediately began where 
the former left off, answering him in milder or more 
vehement notes, according as the purport of the strophe 
required. The sleepy canals, the lofty buildings, the 
splendour of the moon, the deep shadows of the few- 
gondolas, that moved like spirits hither and thither, in- 
creased the striking peculiarity of the scene ; and, amidst 
all these circumstances, it was easy to confess the char- 
acter of this wonderful harmony. 

" It suits perfectly well with an idle solitary mariner, 
lying at length in his vessel a! rest on one of these canals, 
waiting for his company, or for a fare, the tiresomeness 
of which situation is somewhat alleviated by the songs 
and poetical stories he has in memory. He often raises 
his voice as loud as he can, which extends itself to a vast 
distance over the tranquil mirror, and as all is still around, 
he is, as it were, in a solitude in the midst of a large and 
populous town. Here is no rattling of carnages, no noise 
of foot passengers: a silent gondola glides now and then 
by him, of which the splashing of the oars is scarcely 
to be heard. 

"At a distance he hears another, perhaps utterly un- 
known to him. Melody and verse immediately attach 
the two strangers ; be becomes the responsive echo to the 
former, and exerts himself to be heard as he had heard 
the other. By a tacit convention they alternate verse for 
verse ; though the song .should last the whole night 
through, t.iey entertain themselves without fatigue; the 
hearers, who are passing between the two, take part in 
the amusement. 

" Tins vocal performance sounds best at a great dis- 
tance, and is then inexpressibly charming, as it only 
Uilfils its des.gn in the sentiment of remoteness. It is 
plaintive, but not dismal in its sound, and at limes it is 
tcarcelv possible to refrain from tears. My companion, 
who otherwise was not a very delicately organized person, 



said quite unexpectedly: ' e singolarc come quel canto 
intenorisce, e molto pill quando lo eantano meglio.' 

"I was toll that the women of Libo, the long row 
of islands that divides the Adriatic from the Lagoiins, > 
particularly the women of the extreme districts of Mala- 
mooca and Palestrina, sing in like manner the works of 
T.iss,. to these and similar tunes. 

"They have the custom, when their husbands are 
1 1 -. 5 1 i 1 1 u qui at sea, lo sit along the shore in the evenings 
and vociferate these songs, and continue to do so with 
great violence, till each of them can distinguish the 
responses of her own husband at a distance^" - 

The love of music and of poetry distinguishes all classes 
of \ enetians, even amongst the tuneful sons of Italy. 
The city itself can occasionally furnish respectable au- 
diences I! >r two and even three opera-houses at a time; 
and there are few events in private life that do not call 
forth a printed and circulated sonnet. Does a physician 
or a lawyer take his degree, or a clergyman preach his 
maiden sermon, has a surgeon performed an operation, 
would a harlequin announce his departure or his benefit, 
are you to he congratulated on a marriage, or a birth, or a 
law-suit, the Muses are invoked to furnish the same num- 
ber of syllables, and the individual triumphs blaze abroad 
in virgin white or party-coloured placards on half the cor- 
ners ofthe capital. The last curtsy of a favourite "prima 
donna" brings down a shower of these poetical tributes 
from those upper regions, from which, in our theatres, 
nothing but cupids and snow-storms are accustomed to 
descend. There is a poetry in i he very Life of a Venetian, 
which, in its common course^ is varied with those surprises 
and changes so recommend able in fiction, but so dith rent 
from the sober monotony of northern existence ; amuse- 
ments are raised into duties, duties are softened into 
amusements, and every object bein;r considered as equal- 
ly making a part ofthe business of life, is announced and 
performed with the same earnest indifference and gay 
assiduity. The Venetian gazette constantly closes iu 
columns with the following triple advertisement: 
Charade, 



Exposition of the most Holy Sacrament in Hie church of St. - 



'J'krutfCS. 
St. Moses, opera. 

Si. Benedict, a comedy of charactcre. 
St. Luke, repose. 

When it is recollected what the Catholics believe then 
consecrated wafer to he, we may perhaps think it worth) 
of a more respectable niche than between poetry and the 
playhouse. 

Note 4. Stanza x. 
Sparta hath many a worthier son than he. 
The answer of the mother of Brasidas to the strangers 
who praised the memory of her son. 

Note 5. Stanza xi. 
St. Mark yet sees Ins lion where he stood 
Stand,— 

The lion has lost nothing by his journey to the In 
valides, bul the gospel which supported the paw thai is 
now on a level with the other foot. The horses, also, 
are returned to the i]l-chosen spot whence they set out, 
and are, as before, half hidden under the porch window 
of St. Mark's church. 



1 The writer meant l.nln. which is not a long row of is!a..ds. 
hut a lorn? island — lulus, the shore. 

'J Curiosities of Literature, vol. ii. p. 156. edit. 1807; ano 
Appendix x\ix. to lilack's Life of Tantso. 



CHILD E HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



109 



Their history, after a desperate straggle, has been 
satisfactorily explored. The decisions and doubts of 
Erizzo and Zanetti, and lastly, of the Count Leopold 
Cicognara, would have given them a Roman extraction, 
ami a pedigree not more ancient than the reign of Nero. 
Bjt M. de Sehtegel stepped in to teach the Venetians 
the value of their own treasures, and a Greek vindicated, 
at last and for ever, the pretension of his countrymen 
to this Doble production. 1 .Mr. Mustoxidi has not been 
left without a reply; but, as yet, he has received no 
answer. It should seem that the horses are irrevocably 
Chian, and were transferred to Constantinople by The- 
adosilis. Lapidary writing is a favourite play of the 
Italians, and has conferred reputation on more than 
one of their literary characters. One of the best speci- 
mens of Boiloni's typography is a respectable volume 
of inscriptions, all written by Ins friend Pacciaudi. 
Several were prepared for the recovered horses. It is 
to be hoped that the best was not selected, when the 
following words were ranged in gold letters above the 
cathedral porch : 

QUATUOR . EQUORUM . SIGNA . A . VF.NETIS . BY- 
ZANTIO . CAPTA . AD . TEMP . D . MAR . A . R . S . 
MCCIV . POSITA . O.U.E . HOSTILJS . CUPIDITAS . A . 
MDCCCin . ABSTULERAT . FRANC . I . IMP . PACIS . 
ORBI . SATjE . TROPHiUSI . A . MDCCCXV . VICTOR . 
RED"XIT. 

Nothing shall be said of the Latin, but it may be per- 
mitted to observe, that the injustice of the Venetians in 
transporting the horses from Constantinople was at 
least equal to that of the French in carrying them to 
Paris, and that, it would have been more prudent to have 
avoided all allusions to either robbery. An apostolic 
prince should, perhaps, have objected to affixing, over 
the principal entrance of a metropolitan church, an in- 
scription having a reference to any other triumphs than 
those of religion. Nothing less than the pacification 
of the world can excuse such a solecism. 

Note 6. Stanza xii. 
The Suabiaq sued, and now die Austrian reiens— 
An emperor tramples where an ediperor knelt. 

After many vain efforts on the part of the Italians, 
entirely to throw off the yoke of Frederic Barbsrossa, 
an I as fruitless attempts of the emperor to make him- 
self absolute master throughout the whole of his Cisal- 
pine dominions, the bloody struggles of four-and-twentv 
years were happily brought to aclose in the city of Ven- 
ice. The articles of a treaty Had been previously- 
agreed upon between Pope Alexander III. and Harha- 
rossa, and the former, having received a safe-conduct, 
had already arrived at Venice from Ferrara, in com- 
pany with the ambassadors of the king of Sicily and the 
consuls of the Lombard league. There still remained, 
however, many points to adjust, and for several days 
the peace was believed to be impracticable. At this 
juncture it was suddenly reported that the emperor 
had arrived at Chioza, a town fifteen miles from the 
capital. The Venetians rose tumultuously, and insisted 
Upon immediately conducting him to the city. The 
Lombards took the alarm, and departed towards Tre 
viso. The Pope himself was apprehensive of some dis 
aster if Frederic should suddenly advance upon him, 
but was re-assured by the prudence and address of 

1 Pin rpinttrn caval.i delln Rasilica di a. Marco in Yenc/ia 
Letters di Andrea Mustoxidi C'orcircsu. I'uduva per Hetunn 
e compagni, Iflii 



Sebastian Ziani, the Doge. Several embassies passed 
between Chioza and the capital, until, at last, the emperor 
relaxing somen hat of his pretensions, "laid aside his 
leonine ferocity, and put on the mildness of the lamb." ' 
On Saturday the 23;l of July, in the year 1177, six 
Venetian galleys transferred Frederic, in great pomp, 
from Chioza to the island of Lido, a mile from Venice. 
Early the next morning, the Pope, accompanied by the 
Sicilian ambassadors, and by the envoys of Lombardy, 
whom he had recalled from the main land, together 
with a great concourse of people, repaired from the 
patriarchal palace to Saint Mark's church, and solemnly 
absolved the emperor and his partisans from the ex- 
communication pronounced against him. The chan- 
cellor of the empire, on the part of his master, re- 
nounced the anti-popes and their schismatic adherents. 
Immediately the doge, with a great suite both of the 
clergy and laity, got on board the galleys, and waiting 
on Frederic, rowed him in mighty state from the Lido 
to the capital. The emperor descended from the galley 
at the quay of the Piazetta. The doge, the patriarch, 
his bishops and clergy, and the people of Venice, with 
their crosses and their standards, marched in solemn 
procession before him to the church of Saint Mark. 
Alexander was seated before the vestibule of the ba- 
silica, attended by his bishops and cardinals, by the 
patriarch of Aquileja, by the archbishops and bishops 
of Lombardy, all of them in state, and clothed in their 
church robes. Frederic approached — " moved by the 
Holy Spirit, venerating the Almighty in the person of 
Alexander, laying aside his imperial dignity, and throw- 
ing off his mantle, he prostrated himself at full length 
at the feet of the Pope. Alexander, with tears in his 
eyes, raised him benignanlly from the ground, kissed 
him, blessed him; and immediately the Germans of the 
train sang, with a loud voice, ' We praise thee, O Lord. 
The emperor then taking the Pope by the right hand, 
led him to the church, and, having received his bene- 
diction, returned to the ducal palace." 2 The ceremony 
of humiliation was repeated the next day. The Pjpe 
himself, at the request of Frederic, said mass at Saint 
.Mark's. The emperor again laid aside his imperial 
mantle, and, taking a wand in his hand, officiated as 
i rrgcr, driving the laity from the choir, and preceding 
the pontiff to the altar. Alexander, after reciting the 
gospel, preached to the people. The emperor put him- 
self close to the pulpit in the attitude of listening ; ttnd 
the pontilT, touched by this mark of his attention, for 
he knew that Frederic did not understand a word he 
said, commanded the patriarch of Aquileja to translate 
the Latin discourse into the German tongue. The creed 
was then chaunted. Frederic made his oMatinn, and 

kissed the Pop'e's feet, and, mass being over, led hip by 

the hand to his white horse. He held the stirrup, and 
would have held the horse's rein to the water side, had 
not the Pope accepted of the inclination for the per- 
formance, and affectionately dismissed him with his 
ben diction. Such is the substance of the account left 
by the archbishop of Salerno, who was present at the 
ceremony, and whose story is confirmed by every sub- 
sequent narration. It would not he worth so minute 
a record, were it not the triumph of liberty as well us 



1 ''Quibua iindiiis. imperator, opernnte so, nui cards prin- 
cipum gicul mil el quande villi humiliter inclmat, leonine 
PeritHte deposits, ovipam manBuetudioem iinlint." Romoaldj 
Belernitani. < 'linmicon. upud Script. Ker. Hal. torn. VII. p.'-i9 

3 Ibid. p. 23L 



of superstition. The states of Lombardy owed to it the 
confirmation of their privileges ; and Alexander had 
reason to th&Ak the Almighty, who had enabled an in- 
firm, unarmed old man to subdue a terrible and potent 
sovereign. ' 

Note 7. Stanza xii. 

Ob, for one hour of blind old Dandolo! 

Tli' octogenarian chief, Byzantium's conquering foe. 

The reader will recollect the exclamation of the high- 
lander, Oh, fur one hour of Dundee! Henry Dandolo, 
when elected doge, in 1 192, -was eighty-five years of age. 
Whin he commanded the Venetians at the taking of 
Constantinople, he was consequently ninety-seven years 
old. At this age he annexed the fourth and a half of 
the whole empire of Romania, 2 for so the Roman em- 
pire was then called, to the title and to the territories of 
the Venetian Doge. The three-eighths of this empire 
were preserved in the diplomas until the dukedom of 
Giovanni Dolfino, who made use of the above designa- 
tion in the year 1367. ^ 

Dandolo led the attack on Constantinople in person : 
two ships, the Paradise and the Pilgrim, were tied to- 
gether, and a drawbridge or ladder let down from their 
higher yards to the walls. The doge was one of the first 
to rush into the city. Then was completed, said the 
Venetians, the prophecy of the Erythraean sybil. " A 
gathering together of the powerful shall be made amidst 
the Waves of the Adriatic, under a blind leader: they 
shall beset the goat — they shall profane Byzantium — 
they shall blacken her buildings — her spoils shall be dis- 
persed ; a new goat shall bleat until they have measured 
out and run over fifty-four feet, nine inches, and a half.'" 

Dandolo died on the first day of June, 1205, having 
reigned thirteen years, six months, and five days, and 
was buried in the church of St. Sophia, at Constanti- 
nople. Strangely enough it must sound, that the name 
of the rebel apothecary who received the doge's sword, 
and annihilated the ancient government in 1796-7, was 
Dandolo. 

Note 8. Stanza xiii. 
Put is not Doris's menace come to pass? 
Are they not bridled ? 

After the loss of the battle of Pola, and the taking of 
Chioza on the 16th of August, 1379, by the united 
armament of the Genoese and Francesco da Carrara, 

1 See the above-cited Romunld of Salerno. In a second 
sermon which Alexander preached, on the first day of Au- 
gust, hefore the emperor, he compared Frederic to the prodigal 
son, and himself to the forgiving father. 

2 Mr. Gibbon has omitted the important b, ami has written 
Roman! instead of Romania: — Decline and Fall, chap. Ixi. 
note (I. lint the title acquired by Dandolo tuns thus in the 
chronicle of his namesake, the Doge Andrew Dandolo: — 
Ducali titulo addidit, " Quarto pat-tis ri dimidm totius im- 
perii liomavit." And. Dnnd. Chronicon. cap. iii. pars xwv'u. 
np. Script. Rer. [tal. torn. xii. page 331. And tin- Romania; 
is Observed in the subsequent acts of the doges. Indeed the 
continental possessions of the Greek empire in Europe, were 
then generally known by the name of Romania, and that ap- 
pellation is still seen in the maps of Tuikcy as applied to 

Thrace. 

1 See the continuation of Dandolo's Chronicle, ibid. p. 4D8. 
Mr. (iilih.ni appear." not Id include Dolfino, follow ing Sanudo, 
who says, " il oval titnla ti turn fin ol Doge Giovanni Dol- 
fino." See Vita de' Duchi de Venezia, np. Script R6r. ttal. 
torn. wii. 530. (ill. 

4 " I'et notentiurfl in rniuis Adriaticis congregatio, c;rco 
prteduce, Hircum amhigend Byzantium prophanabunt, redi- 
licin deniL-r iliiint ; spolia dispergentur, Hircus novus bnlnbit 
usune duni 1,1 V. penes et IX. polliccs et semis, praemensurati 
i!iB»-ur-ar.t." Chronicon. ibid, pars xxxiv. 



Signer of Padua, the Venetians were reduced to the &v- 
most despair. An embassy was sent to the conquerors 
with a blank sheet of paper, praying Them to prescribe 
what terms they pleased, and leave to Venice only her 
independence. The Prince of Padua was inclined to 
listen to these proposals, but the Genoese, who, after 
the victory at Pola, had shouted, " to Venice, to Ven- 
ire, and long live St. George," determined to annihilate 
their rival, and Peter Doria, their commander-in-chief, 
returned this answer to the suppliants: "On God's 
faith, gentlemen of Venice, ye shall have no peace from 
the Signor of Padua, nor from our commune of Genoa, 
until we have first put a rein upon those unbridled horses 
of yours, that arc upon the porch of your evangelist St. 
Mark. When we have bridled them, we shall beep y.OU 
quiet. And this is the pleasure of us and oJ" our com- 
mune. As for these my brothers of Genoa, that you 
have brought with you to give up to us, I will not have 
them : take them back ; for, in a few days hence, 1 
shall come and let them out of prison myself, both these 
and all the others." ' In fact, the Genoese did advance 
as far as Malamocco, within five miles of the capital ; 
but their own danger, and the pride of their em 
gave courage to the Venetians, who made prodigious 
efforts, and many individual sacrifices, all of them care- 
fully recorded by their historians. Vettor Pisani was 
put at the head of thirty-four galleys. The Genoese 
broke up from Malamocco, and retired to Chioza in 
October; hut they again threatened Venice, which was 
reduced to extremities. At this time, the 1st of Janu- 
ary, 1380, arrived Carlo Zeno, who had been cruising 
on the Genoese coast with fourteen galleys. The 
Venetians were now strong enough to besiege the Ge- 
noese. Doria was killed on the 22d of January by a 
stone bullet a hundred and ninety-five pounds weight, 
discharged from a bombard called the Trevisan. Chioza 
was then closely invested ; five thousand auxiliaries 
amongst whom were some English Condottieri, com- 
manded by one Captain Ceccho, joined the Venetians. 
The Genoese, in their turn, prayed for conditions, but 
none were granted, until, at last, they surrendered at 
discretion; and, on the 24th of June, 13S0, the Doge 
Contarini made his triumphal entry into Chioza. Four 
thousand prisoners, nineteen galleys, many smaller 
vessels and barks, witli all the ammunition and arms, 
and outfit of the expedition, fill into the hands of the 
conquerors, who, had it not been for the inexorable 
answer of Doria, would have gladly reduced their do- 
minion to the city of Venice. An account of these 
transactions is found in a work called the War of 
Chioza, written by Daniel Chinazzo, who was in Ven 
ice at the time. 2 

Note 9. Stanza xiv. 
The " Planter of the Lion." 
Plant the Lion — that is, the Lion of St. Mark, the 



1 " Alia fedi Dio, Sujnori Veneziani, nou havered' mai pace 
dal Signore di Padoun, ne dal noatfu coniuue di Geneva, se 

primicranierite non ruelteino le hriglie a quelh -vostri cavalli 
sl'n nati, ilie Mum so la Ke/a del Yostro Bvaogelista :>. Marco. 
Infrenati che gli hnvreino, vi faremo stare in huona pace. E 
nucsta e. la inten/.ione nostra, e del nostro comiine. Quest) 
miei fratelli GenoveBJ, che havete monad con voi per donttrci 
nun li voglio ; rimanetegli in dielio perche io uilendo da qui 
a pochi giorni veuirgli a riseuoter dalle vostre prigioni, e lora 
e gli uliri." 

C! "Chronica della guerra di Chioza," etc. Script. Rer. lla 
torn. xv. p. 699 to cU4. 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



Ill 



Standard of the republic, which is the origin of the word 
pantaloon — Pianta-ieone, Pantaleone, Pantaloon. 
Note 10. Stanza xv. 

Tliin streets, -.ml foreign as its, such as must 

Too oft reirjiiit! her who and what enthrals. 
The population of Venice at the end of the seventeenth 
century amounted to nearly two hundred thousand 
souls. At the last census, taken two years ago, it was 
DO more than about one hundred and three thousand, 
and it diminishes daily. The commerce and the official 
employments, which were to be the unexhausted source 
of Venetian grandeur, have both expired. 1 Most of the 
patrician mansions are deserted, and would gradually 
disappear, had not the government, alarmed by the de- 
motion of seventy-two, during the last two years, ex- 
pressly forbidden this sal resource of poverty. Many 
remnants of die Venetian nobility are now scattered 
and confounded with the wealthier Jews upon the banks 
of the Uremia, whose palladian palaces have sun!;, or 
arc sinking, in the general decay. Of the " gentil uomo 
Ven. to," the name is still known, and that is all. Ik- 
is but the shadow of his former sen", but he is polite and 
kind. It surely may be pardoned to him if he is que- 
rulous. Whatever may have been the vices of the re- 
public, and although the natural term of its existence 
may be thought by foreigners to have arrived in the due 
course of mortality, only one sentiment can be expected 
from the Venetians themselves. At no time were the 
subjects of the republic so unanimous in their resolution 
to rallv round the standard of St. Murk, as when it was 
for the last time unfurled; arid the cowardice and the 
treachery of the few patricians who recommended the 
fatal neutrality, were confined to the persons of the 
traitors themselves. 

The present race cannot be thought to regret the 
loss of their aristocratical forms, an.! I lespoiic gov- 
ernment ; 'hey think only on their vanished indepen- 
dence. They pine away at the remembrance, and on 
this subject suspend f >r a moment their gay good-ihu- 
niour. Venice may be said, in the words of the scrip- 
ture, " to die daily ;" and so general and so apparent 
is the decline, as to become painful to a stranger, not 
reconciled to the sight of a whole nation expiring, as it 
were, before his eyes. So artificial a creation, having 
lost that principle which called it into life and sup- 
ported its existence, must fall to pieces at once, and 
sink more rapidly than it rose. The abhorrence of 
slavery, which drove the Venetians to the sea, has, 
since their disaster, forced them to the land, where 
they may be at least overlooked amongst the crowd 
of dependants, and not present the humiliating specta- 
cle of a whole nation loaded with recent chains. Their 
liveliness, their affability, and that happy indifference 
which constitution alone can give, for philosophy aspires 
to it in vain, have not sunk under circumstances'; but 
many peculiarities of costume and manner have bv 
degrees been lost, and the nobles, with a pride com- 
mon to all Italians who have been masters, have not 
been persuaded to parade their insignificance. That 
Splendour which was a proof and a portion of their 
power, they would not degrade into the trappings 



of their subjection. They retired from the space which 
they had occupied in the eyes of their fellow-citizens ; 
their continuance in which would have been a symptom 
of acquiescence, and an insult to those who suffered by 
the common misfortune. Those who remained in the 
degraded capital might be said rather to haunt the 
scenes of their departed power, than to live in them. 
The reflection, "who and what enthrals," will hardly 
bear a comment from one who is, nationally, the friend 
and the ally of the conqueror. It may, however, be 
allowed to say thus much, that, to those who wish to 
recover their independence, any masters must be an 
object of detestation ; and it maybe safely foretold that 
this unprofitable aversion will not have b"een corrected 
before Venice shall have sunk into the slime of her 
choked canals. 

Note 11. Stanza xvi. 
Redemption rose up in the Attic Muse. 
The story is told in Plutarch's Life of Nicias. 
Note 12. Stanza xviii. 
And Otway, Radcliffe. Schiller, Shakspeare's art. 
Venice Preserved ; Mysteries of Udolpho ; the Ghost- 
seer, or Armenian ; the Merchant of Venice ; Othello. 

Note 13. Stanza xx. 
But rronf their nature will the tannen prow 
Loftiest on Ipftiest an. I teasl srrelter'd rocks. 

Tannen is the plum] of turnip, a species of fir pecu- 
liar to the Alps, which only thrives in very rocky parts, 
where scarcelv soil sufficient for its nourishment can be 
found. On these spots it grows to a greater height than 
any other mountain tree. 

Note 14. Stanza xxviii. 

A single star is at hei side, and reigns 
With her o'er half the lovely heaven. 

The above description may seem fantastical or exag- 
gerated to those who have never seen an oriental or an 
Italian sky ; yet it is but a literal and hardly sufficient 
delineation of an August evening (the eighteenth)) as 
contemplated in one of many rides along the banks of 
the Brenta near La Mira. 

Note 15. Stanza xx?;. 
VVatPrina the tree which bears his lady's name 
Willi his melodious tears, he gave himself to lame. 

Thanks to the critical acumen of a Scotchman, we 
now know as little of Laura as ever. 1 The discoveries 
of the Abbe de Sade, his triumphs, his sneers, can no 
longer instruct or amuse. 2 We must not, however, 
think that these memoirs are as much a romance as 
Belisarius or the Incas, although we arc told so by Dr. 
Bcattie, a great name, but a little authority. 3 His "la- 
bour" has not been in vain, notwithstanding his "love" 
has, like most other passions, made him ridiculous.* 
The hypothesis which overpowered the struggling Ita- 



1 " Nniinullomiii e nobilitate Immensa sunt opes, adeo ut 
vix ajslimari pOBsint: id quod iribuscn bus oritur, iiarsinmnia, 
eommorcio. atqne ria emolument!*, qua e Bepub. percipient, 
quiE ham- ob caumifl iliuturnn fore creditur." — fee De l'rin- 
cipatibus Italia; Tractalut, edit. IGjI. 



1 See A historical and critical Essay on the Life and Char- 
acter of Petrarch ; and a Dissertation on a Historical Hy- 
pothesis of the Abbe de Sade: the first appeared about the 
year 17H4 ; the other is inserted in the fourth volume of the 
Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh ; and both 
haw been incorporated into a work, publishod under the first 
title, by BaUantyne in 1810. 

2 Memoirs pour la Vie de Petrnrque. 

:t Life of Beattie, by Sir. W. Forbes, t. ii. p. 106. 

4 Mr. Gibbon called Ins Memoirs " n tahjvr of lore," (see 
Decline nn.i Pall, cap. but, note 1.) and followed him witfi 
confidence and deliffit The compiler of a very vo.ummocs 
work must take much criticism upon trust: Mr. Gibbon has 
dune so, thoi'gh nut so readily as some oilier aulhois. 



112 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Hans, and carried along less interested critics in its 
current, is run out. We have another proof that we 
can never be sure that the paradox, the most singular, 
and therefore having the must agreeable and authentic 
air, will not give place to the re-established ancient 
preju Ii> :>•. 

It seems then, first, that Laura was hnrn, lived, died, 
and w;is buried, not in Avignon, but in the country. 
The fountains oF the Sorga, the thickets of Cabrjeres, 

may resume their pretensions, and the exploded de tu 

Ilustie again be heard with complacency. The hypo- 
thesis of the Abbe had no stronger props than the 
parchment sonnet and medal found on the skeleton of 
the wife of Hugo de Sade, anil the manuscript note to 
the \ irgil of Petrarch, now in the Ambrosial) library. 
If these proofs were both incontestable, the poetry was 
written, the medal composed, cast, and deposited, with- 
in the space of twelve hours ; an I 'ate du- 
ties were performed round the carcass of one who died 
of the plague, and was hurried to the grave on the day 
of her death, These documents, therefore, are LOO de- 
cisive: they prove, not the fact, but the forgery. Either 
the sonnet or the Virgiliaii note must be a falsification. 
The Ahhc cites both as incontestably true; the conse- 
quent deduction is inevitable — they are both evidently 
raise. 1 

Secondly, Laura was never married, and was a haughty 
virgin rather than that lender and prudent wife who 
honoured Avignon by making that town the theatre of 
an honest French passion, and played oil" for one-and- 
twenty years her little machinery of alternate favours 
and refusals- upon the first poet of die age. It was, 
indeed, rather too unfair that a female should be made 
responsible for eleven children upon the faith of a mis- 
interpreted abbreviation, and the decision of a librarian. 3 
It is, however, satisfactory to think that the love of 
Petrarch was not platonic. The happiness which he 
prayed to possess but once and for a moment was surely 
not of the mind," and something so very real as a mar- 
riage project, with one who has been idly called a 
shadowy nymph, may be, perhaps, detected in at least 
six places of his own sonnets. 6 The love of Petrarch 
was neither platonic nor poetical ; and, if in one passage 
of his works he calls it " amore veementeissimo ma 
unico ed onesto," he confesses, in a letter to a friend, 



1 The sonnet had before awakened the suspicions of Mr, 
Horace Walpole. See his letter to Wharton in 1763. 

2 "Par ce pi'tit manege, eette alternative de favenrs et de 
rigu&urs bien m&oagoe. one femme (entire et suue nmuse, 
pendant vingt-un mis, le plus grand poete rie Bnn Biecle, sans 
fairs la moindre breche a sun honneur." Mem. pour la 
Vie ili- Petrarque. Preface ailx Francais. The Italian editor 
of the London edition of Petrarch, who has translated Lord 
Woodhouselee, renders the " famine tend re et sage," "rif- 
fimitii rinitn" RihYssioni intorno a Madonna Laura, p. 2.A. 
vol. Bi.ed. 1811. 

!i In a dialogue with St. Augnslin, Petrarch has described 
Laura as having a body exhausted with repeated phthe. The 
old editors read and printed yerturtnit.itniihns; hui M. Capp t- 
pnier, librarian to the French King, in ITliJ, win, Baw the MS. 
in the Pans litirnry, made an attestation that " up III et qii'im 
doit lire, pnrtntus ex/iaiistum." IV Sade joined the names 
of Messrs, Boudot and Bejot with M. Capperonier, and in the 
whole discussion on (his ptu '<■«, showed himself a downright 
literary ruiau'. See llihVssioni. e'e, p. -1.7. Thomas Aquinas 
iv called in to settle whether Petrarch's mistress was a clutstc 
maid or a continent wife. 

4 " Piumnlion, qiiiinto lodarti dei 
Dell immagine tua, «•■ rnille volte 
N' avL'aii quel 'dr i' Knl una vorrei." 

Sun ito 58, (jtiaii'ln siunse a Simon V 
alio crincttlo. 1 .e. liime, etc., par. i. 
pag, IH'j. edit. Yen. 17olj. 
5 9c* Eiflessioni, etc., p. 201. 



that it was guilty and perverse, that i> absorbed htm 
quite, and mastered his heart. 1 

In this case, however, he was perhaps alarmed for 
the Culpability of his wishes; for the Abbe de Sade 
himself, who certainly would not have been scrupu- 
lously delicate, if he could have proved his descent from 
Petrarch as n ill as Laura, is forced into a stout d( fence 
of Ins virtuous grandmother. As far as relates to the 
poet, we have no security for the innocence, except 
perhaps in the constancy of his pursuit. He assures us, 
in his epistle to posterity, that, when arrived at his 
fortieth year, he not only had in horror, but had lost 
all recollection and image of any "irregularity." 2 But 
the birth of his natural daughter cannot be assigned 
earlier than his thirty-ninth year; and either the mem- 
ory or the morality of the poet must have failed him, 
when In; forgot or was guilty of this slip. 3 The weakest 
argument for the purilv of this love has been drawn from 
the permanence of effects, which survived the object of 
his passion. The reflection of M. dc la Bastie, that 
virtue alone is capable of making impressions which 
death cannot efface, is one of those which every body 
applauds, and every body finds not to be true, the mo- 
rn* nt he examines his own breast or the records of 
human feeling. 4 Such apophthegms can do nothing for 
Petrarch or for the cause of morality, except with the 
very weak and the very young. He that has made even 
a little progress beyond ignorance and pupilage, cannot 
be cdiiied with any thing but truth. What is called 
vindicating the honour of an individual or a nation, is 
the most futile, tedious, and iminstructive of all writing; 
although it will always meet with more applause than 
that sober criticism, which is attributed to the malicious 
desire of reducing a great man to the common standard 
of humanity. It is, after all, not unlikely, that our 
historian was right in retaining his favourite hypothetic 
salvo, which secures the author, although it scarcely saves 
the honour of the still "unknown mistress of Petraich. s 

Note 16. Stanza xxxi. 
They keep his dust in Arquii, where he died. 
Petrarch retired to Arqua immediately on his return 
from the unsuccessful attempt to visit Urban V. at Rome, 
in the year 1370, and, with the exception of his cele- 
brated visit to Venice in company with Francesco No- 
vello de Carrara, he appears to have passed the four last 
years of his life between that charming solitude and 
Padua. For four months previous to his death he was 
in a state of continual languor, and in the tnornino of 
July the 19th, in the vear 1374, was found dead in his 
library chair with his head resting upon a book. The 
chair is still shown amongst the precious relics of Arqun, 
which, from the uninterrupted veneration that has been 
attached to every thing relative to this great man, from 



1 " Qui din rca e perversa passione che solo tutto mi occu 
pava e mi regnara nel euore." 

2 Jiiion dlsonesti, arc bis words. 

3 " A quests confessions cosi sincern diene forse occasions 
una nuova caduta < h' ei free." Tiraboschi, Sloria, etc., torn. 
v. lib. iv. par. li. pas;. 49SJ. 

4 " 11 n'y a que hi vcrtu settle qui suit capable de faire des 
impressions que hi wort «' efface pas." M. de Bimard, Union 
ih' la Bastie, in the Memoiresde PAcademie des Inscriptions 
el Belles Lettres for 1740 and 1751. See also Uitlcssioni, etc.. 
p995. 

5 " And if the virtue or prudence of Laura wat inexorable 
he '■njoyed. and miu'lit boasl of enjoyini! the nj lipb of poi-i- 

ry." Decline and Fall, cap. Ixx. p. 387. vol. ziL oct Pej- 

baps the if is here meant for alt/touch. 



CIIILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



11.3 



(lie moment of his death to the present hour, have, it 
hoped, a better chance of authenticity than the 
tthakspearian memorials of Stratford-upon-Avon. 

Arquh (for the last syllable is accented in pronun- 
ciation, although the analogy of the English language 
lias been observed in the verse), is twelve miles from 
Pa lua, find about three miles on the right of ike high 
road to Rovtgo, in the bosom of the Euganean hills. 
After a walk of twenty minutes, across a flat well-wooded 

, JT9U come to a little blue lake, dear but I'.ilhom- 
less, and to the foot of a succession of acclivities and 
hills, clothed with vineyards and orchards, rich with fir 
and pomegranate trees, and every sunny fruit-shrub. 
From the banks of the lake, the road winds into the hills, 
and the church of Arqua is soon seen between a ctefl 
where two ridges slope towards each other, and nearly 
inclose the Village. The houses are scattered at intervals 
on the steep sides of these summits; and that of the 
poet is on the edge of a little knoll overlooking two de- 
icents, ami commanding a view not only of the glowing 
gardens in the dales immediately beneath, but of the 
wide plains, above whose low woods of mulberry and 
willow thickened into a dark mass by festoons of vines, 
tall single cypresses, and the spires of towns are seen 
m lie- distance, which stretches to the mouths of the Po 
and the shores of the Adriatic. The climate of ihese 
volcanic hills is warmer, and the vintage begins a week 
sooner than m the plains of Padua. Petrarch is laid, 
for he cannot be said to be buried, in a Sarcophagus of 
red marble, raised on four pilasters on an elevated base, 
and preserved from an association v.iih meaner tombs. 
It stands conspicuously alone, but will be soon over- 
shadowed by four lately-planted laurels. Petrarch's 
fountain, for here every thing is Petrarch's, springs and 
expands itself beneath an artificial arch, a little below 
the church, and abounds plentifully, in the driest season, 
wiili thai soft water which was the ancient wealth of 
the Euganean hills. It would be more attractive, were 
it not, in some seasons, beset with hornets and wasps. 
No other coincidence could assimilate the tombs of 
Petrarch and Archilochus. The revolutions of centu- 
ries have spared these sequestered valleys, and the 
only violence which has been offered to the ashes of 

■ h, was prompted, not by hate, hut veneration. 
An attempt was made to rob the sarcophagus of its 
treasure, and one of the arms was stolen by a Floren- 
tine, through a rent which is still visible. The injury is 
not forgotten, hut has served to identify the poet with 
the country where he was horn, but where he would 
not live. A peasant boy of Arqua being asked who 

ch was, replied, "that the people of the par- 
sonage knew all about him, but that he only knew that 
he was a Florentine." 

Mr. Forsyth ' was not quite correct in saying, that 
Petrarch never returned to Tuscany after he had once 
quitted it when a boy. It appears he did pass through 
Florence on his way from Parma to Rome, and on his 
return in the year 13"0, and remained there long i nough 
to form some acquaintance with its most distinguished 
inhabitants. A Florentine gentleman, ashamed of the 
aversion of the poet for his native country, was ea<*er to 
Dointout this trivial error in our accomplished traveller, 
whom he knew and respected for an extraordinary 



1 Romarks, etc. oo Italy, p, 9,i, rote, 2U edit. 
2U 



capacity, extensive erudition, and refined taste, joined 
to that engaging simplicity of manners which has been 
so frequently recognised as the surest, though it is cer- 
tainly not an indispensable, trait of superior genius. 

Every footstep of Laura's lover has been anxiously 
traced and recorded. The house in which be to 
shown in Venice. The inhabitants of Arezzo, in order 
to decide the ancient controversy between their city and 
the neighbouring Ancisa, win re Petrarch "as carried 
when seven months old, and r< mained until his sevc nth 

year, have designated, bv a lonn inscription, the spot 
where their grmi fellow-ejtizen was bom. A tablet has 
been raised to him at Parma, in the chapi I of :"t. Agatha, 
at the cathedral, ' because he was archdeacon of that 
society, and was only snatched from his intended sr pul- 
ture in their church by a.fordgn death. Another tablet 
with a bust has been erected to him at Pavia. on ac- 
count of his having passed the autumn of 1368 in that 
■itv, with his son-in-law Krossano. The political con- 
dition which has for ages precluded the Italians from 
the criticism of the living, has concentrate 1 their 
attention to the illustration of the dead. 

Note 17. Stanza xxxiv. 
Or, it may be, with demons. 
The strueale is to the full as likely to be with demon? 
as with our better thoughts. Satan chose the wilder- 
ness for the temptation of our Saviour. And our un- 
sullied John Locke preferred the presence of a child 13 
complete solitude. 

Note 18. Stanza xxxvm. 

In face of all his fees, the CruSCRti quire; 
And Buileau, whose rash envy, etc. 

Perhaps the couplet in which Boileau depreciates 
Tasso, may serve as well as any other specimen to jus- 
tify the opinion given of the harmony of French verse. 

A Malherhe, a Racan, preierer Theophile, 

El le clinquant duT&sse a tuui for de Wrgile. 

Bat. ix. verse 170. 
The biographer Serassi, 2 out of tenderness to the repu- 
tation either of the Italian or the French poet, is eager 
to observe that the satirist recanted or explained away 
this censure, and subsequently allowed the author of the 
Jerusalem to be a "genius sublime, vast, and happily 
born for the higher flights of poetry." To this we will 
add, that the recantation is far from satisfactory, when 



1 D. O. M. 

Francisco Petrarcha? 

Parmensl ^rcbidiacono. 

Parentibds prteclaris genere pernnlimio 

Etbices ( Inistiuia' scriptori exiraio 

$omaine lingua; rcstitutori 

Etrusce principi 

Africa; ob carmen bac in urbe peranum regibus accito 

S. P. Ct. K. lavrea donate. 

Tanti Viri 

Juveniliinn juvenis seiiiliuiii s-iie\ 

Btudtosissimus 

Comes Nicolaiis Canonicut Cicognt^ua 

Miuinorea proxima ara excitata. 

liliqui: eolllliUl 

Diva- Januariai Crucnto corpore 
11. U. P. 

t-lllb i llllll 

B '1 infra meriuiui Prancigci sepulchre 

Summa hec in nde efferri mandating 

^i Parma occumberet 

Extcru inorte hcu nobis ertpli. 

2 La vita del Tasso, lib. hi. p. 2S4. turn, u edit Isergum* 
17110. 



114 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



we examine the whole anecdote as reported by Olivet.' 
I utence pronounced against him by Bohours 2 is 

recorded only to Ihe confusion of the critic, whose pa- 
Unodia the Italian makes no effort to discover, and 
WQDld not perhaps accept. As to the opposition which 
the Jerusalem encountered from the Cruscan academy, 
who degraded Tasso from all competition with Ariosto, 
below Bojardoand Pulci, the disgrace of such opposition 
must also, in some measure, be laid to the charge of 
Alphonso, and the court of Ferrara. For Leonard Sal- 
viati, the principal and nearly the sole origin of this 
attack, was, there can be no doubt, 3 influenced by a 
hope to acquire the favour of the House of Este : an 
object which he thought attainable by exalting the repu- 
tation of a native poet at the expense of a rival, then a 
primmer of state. The hopes and efforts of Salviati 
must serve to show the cotemporary opinion as to the 
nature of the poet's imprisonment ; and will fill up the 
measure of our indignation at the tyrant jailor. 4 In 
fact, the antagonist of Tasso was not disappointed in the 
reception given to his criticism; he was called to the 
court of Ferrara, where, having endeavoured to heighten 
his claims to favour, by panegyrics on the family of his 
sovereign, 1 he was in his turn abandoned, and expired 
in neglected poverty. The opposition of the Cruscans 
was brought to a close in six years after the commence- 
ment of the controversy ; and if the academy owed its 
first renown to having almost opened with sueli a para- 
dox, 6 it is probable that, on the oilier hand, the care 
of his reputation alleviated rather than aggravated the 
imprisonment of the injured poet The defence of his 
father and of himself, for both were involved in the 
censure of Salviati, found employment for many of Ins 
solitary hours, and the captive could have been but little 
embarrassed to replv to accusations, where, amongst 
other delinquencies, he was charged with invidiously 
omitting, in his comparison between France and Italy, 
to maice any mention of the cupola of St. Maria del 
Fiore at Florence. 7 The late biographer of Ariosto 
seems as if willing to renew the controversy by doubting 
the interpretation of Tasso's self-estimation, 8 related 



1 Histoire do l'Acndamie Franc.aiso, depuis 1652 jusqu'a 
1700, par 1'abbe d'Olivet, p. 181. edit. Amsterdam, 17:«) 
"Mais, ensuite, venaut a l'usagu qu'il a fait, de scs talens, 
j'aiirais montre qui' le bon sens n'est pas toujours Ce qui do- 
mine chez lui," p. 189. Rnilenu said ho had not changed his 
Opinion : " J'cn aisi peu chance, dit-il," etc. p. 18f . 

2 La maniiiro de bieo penser dans les ouvrages de l'esprit, 
BCC. dial. p. 89. edit. 10!>2. Philunlhes is tor Tasso, and says, 
in the outset! "de tons lea beaux '.sprits que I'ltalie a ported, 
le Tasse est pcul-etre eclui qui pense le plus noblement." 
But liohnurs seems to speak in EliJoXUS, win, rinses with 
the absurd comparison, " Faites valoire le Tasse taut qu'il 
vons plaira, je m'en tiens pour mni a VirgilB," etc. it), p. ID 

3 La Vita, etc. lib. iii. p. i>0, turn. ii. The English reader 
may see an account of tin- opposition el' the CrUSCa to Tass 
in Dr. Black, Life, etc. cap. kvii. vol. ii. 

4 For further, and, it is hoped, decisive proof, that T:i-^> 
was neither more nor less than a prisoner of .stair, the reader 

is referred to "Historical Illustrations of the IVth Canto of 

Childe Harold," p. 5, and following. 

■ * i )i izioni funeliri. . . . Dalle lodi di Don Luigi Cardinal 
d'Estc . . . Deile lodi di Donno Alfunzo d'Este. Seo La 
Vita, lib. iii. pas. 117. 

6 It was founded in l. r >. Q 2, and the Crusenn answer to Pel 
togrtnol'fl Caraffti or ejiicn ptxxia, was published in I KM. 

7 "Cotanto pote sempre in lui il veleno della sua petisima 
"olonta centra alia nazion Fiurcntana." La Vita, lib. iii. pp. 
<*■ 'if. torn. ii. 

3 La Vila di M. L. Ariosto, scritta Ball' Abate Giro lam< 
Uarnlfaldi giuniore, etc., Ferrari:, ls>07. lib. iii. page 202 
6»!0 llisloncJ Illustrations, etc. p. 26. 



in Scrassi's life of the poet. ButTiraboschi had before 
laid that rivalry at rest, 1 by showing, that beMVcen 
Ariosto and Tasso it is not a question of comparison, 
but of preference. 

Note 19. Stanza xli. 
The lightning rent from Anoslo's bust 
Th" iron crown of laurel's OimiicVd leaves. 
Before the remains of Ariosto were removed from the 
Benedictine church to the library of Ferrara, his bust, 
which surmounted the tomb, was struck by lightning, 
and a crown of iron laurels melted away. The event 
has been recorded by a writer of the last <■■ rrtftfy. 8 The 
transfer of these sacred ashes on the 6lh of Jtiu< 
was one of the most brilliant spectacles of the short- 
lived Italian Republic, and to consecrate the memory of 
the ceremony, the once, famous fallen Intn/vii were 
revived and re-formed in the Ariostean academy. The 
iargo public place through which the procession paraded 
was then for the first time called Ariosto Square. Tho 
author ol the Orlando is jealously claimed as the Ho- 
mer, not of Italy, but Ferrara. 3 The mother ol' Ari- 
osto was of Heggio, and the house in which he was 
born is carefully distinguished by a tablet with these 
words! "Qui nqajue 'latdomco Afio&to il giortto 8 <ti 
Sellembre rtelV anno 1474." But the Ferrarese make 
light of the accident by which their poet was born 
abroad, and claim him exclusively for their own. They 
possess his bones, they show his arm-chair, and his 
ink-stand, and his autographs. 

" hie illius nrma. 

Hie ciirnis tint " 

The house where he lived, the room where he died, are 
designated by his own replaced memorial, 4 and by a 
recent inscription. The Ferrarese are more jealous of 
their claims since the animosity of Dtnina, arising from 
a cause which their apologists mysteriously hint is not 
unknown to them, ventured to degrade their soil and 
climate to a Boeotian incapacity for all spiritual pro luo- 
tions. A quarto volume has been called forth by the 
detraction, and this supplement to Baretli's Memoirs 
of the illustrious Ferrarese, has been considered a tri- 
umphant reply to the " Quadro Storico Stat islico dell' 
Alta Italia." 

Note 20. Stanza xli. 
For the true ladrel-wrealh which ^lory weaves 
Is of the tree no bolt of thunder cleaves. 
The eagle^ the sea-calf, the laurel, 1 ' and ttie white 
vine,' were amongst the most approved preservatives 
against lightning : Jupiter chose the first, Augustus Ca> 
sar the second," and Tiberius never failed to wear a 
wreath of the third when the sky threatened a thunder- 
storm. 8 These superstitions may be received without a 



1 Storia della Lett., etc. lrb. iii. torn. vii. par. iii. p. 1220 
sen. 4. . 

2 " Mi rnccontarnno que' monari, ch' essendo cadntn un 
I'nhnine nella lore cltiesa ichiarito esso dalle tempie la cprona 

di lauro a quell? i rortale poeta." Op. di Biajiconi, vol. iii. 

p. 17>i. ed. Milano, 1802 ; fettera al Sjgnor Guido Bavirii Ar- 
i itisiocr'nico, sull' indole di un fulinine caduto in Drpsda I' 
anno IT.'ill. 

3 ''Appassionato ammiratore rd invitro apologists dell' 
Om/ro h'n rm-isr." The title was first given by Ti i ' : 
is quoted to the confusion of the Tassisti, lil). iii. pp. 263 
265. La Vita di M. L. Ariosto. etc. 

4 " P-irva, sod apta mihi, sed nulli obilftxia, sed non 
Sordida, parta meo sed taincn aire domns." 

5 Axruila, > i'u'iis inarinns. et laurus. rulmioa uon fcriun'ut 
Plin. Nut. Hist. lib. ii. cap. Iv. 

6 Cola Ha, lib. x. 

7 Sueton. in Vit. August, cap. *c 

8 Id. in Vit. Tiberii. cap. btix. 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



115 



sneer in a country where the magical properties of the 
hazei-twig have not lost all their credit ; and perhaps the 
reader may not be much surprised to find thai a com- 
mentator on Suetonius has token upon himself gravel) 
to disprove the imputed virtues of the crown of Tibe- 
rius, by mentioning that, a few years before he wrote, 
a laurel was actually struck by lightning at Rome. 

Note L 21. Stanza xli. 
Know- thai the lightning sanctifies below. 

The Curtian lake and the Ruminal fig-tree in the 
Forurn, having been touched by lightning, were hold 
sacred, and the memory of the accident was preserved 
by a pvXedtj or altar, resembling the mouth of a well, 
with a little chapel covering the cavity supposed to be 
made by the thunderbolt. Bodies scathed and persons 
struck dead were thought to he incorruptible j 9 and a 
stroke not fatal conferred perpetual dignity upon the 
man so distinguished By HeaVen.' 

Those killed by lightning were wrapped in a white 
garment, and buried where they fell. The superstition 
was Del confined to the worshippers of Jupiter: the' 
Lombards believed in the omens furnished by lightning, 
and a Christian priest confesses that by a diabolical skill i 
in interpreting thunder, a seer foretold to Agilulf, duke 
of Turin, an event which came to pass, and gave him a 
(piet.j and a crown. 4 There was, however, something 
equivocal in this sign, which the ancient inhabitants of] 
Rome did not always consider propitious j and as the 
fears are likely to last longer than the consolations of 
Superstition, it is not strange that the Romans of the age 
of Leo X. should have been so much terrified at some 
misinterpreted storms as to require the exhortations of 
a scholar, who arrayed all the learning on thunder and 
lightning to prove the omen favourable ; beginning with 
}h which struck the walls of Whine, and includ- 
ing that which played upon a gate at Florence, and 
foretold the pontificate of one of its citizens. 1 

Note 22. Stanza Ixii. 
Italia, oh Italia, etc. 
The two stanzas, XLII. and XLIII., are, with the ex- 
ception of a line or two, a translation of the famous 
sonnet of Filicaja : 

" Italia, Italia, O tu cui feo la sorte." 
Note 23. Stanza xliv. 
Wandering in youth, 1 traced the path of him, 
The Roman friend of Rome's least mortal mind. 
The celebrated letter of Servius Sulpicius to Cicero, on 
the death of his daughter, describes as it then was, and 
now is, a path which I often traced in Greece, both by- 
sea arid land, in different journeys and voyages. 

" On my return from Asia, as I was sailing from 
/Egina towards Megan, I began to contemplate the 
prospect of the countries around me: ./Fgina was behind, 
i before me ; Piraeus on the right, Corinth on the 
left; all which towns, once famous and flourishing, now 
lie overturned and buried in their ruins. Upon this 
sight, I could not but think presently within myself, 



Alas ! how do we poor mortals fret and vex ourselves if 

any of our friends happen to die or be killed, whose 

life is yet so short, when the carcasses of so many nojle 

cities he here exposed before me in one view."' 

Note 24. Stanza xlvi. 

and we pass 

The skeleton of her Titanic form. 

It is Pogaio, who, looking from the Capitoline hill 

upon ruined Rome, breaks forth into the exclamation, 

'- l T t nunc onini deeoie nuilatn, prostrata jacet, mstar 

gigantei cadavi ris corrupt! atque tnidique exesi." 2 
Note 25. Stanza xlix. 
There, too, lire goddess loves in stone, 

The view of the Venus of Medicis instantly suggests 
the hues in the Seasons, an. I the comparison of the ob- 
ject with the description proves, net only the correct- 
ness of the portrait, hut the peculiar turn of thought, 
and, if the term may he u>ed, the si vial imagination ot 
the • " Criptiv.e poet. The same conch;-. mi may he de- 
duced from another hint in the same episode of Musi- 
dora ; for Thomson's notion of the privileges offavoured 
love must have been either very primitive, or rather 
deficient in d< licacy, when he made his grateful nymph 
inform her discreet Damon that in some happier mo- 
ment he might perhaps; be the companion of her bath: 
"The time may come you need not fly." 

The reader will recollect the anecdote told in the 
life of Dr. Johnson. We will not leave the Florentine 
gallery without a word on the IVhettcr. It seems strange 
that the character of that disputed statue should not be 
entirely decided, at least in the mind of any one who 
has seen a sarcophagus in the vestibule of the Basilica 
of St. Paul without the walls, at Rome, where the whole 
group of the fable of Marsvas is seen in tolerable pre- 
servation ; and the Scythian slave whetting the knife 
is represented exactly in the same position as this 
celebrated masterpiece. The slave is not naked ■ but 
it is easier to get rid of this dilticulty than to suppose 
the knife in the baud of the Florentine statue an in- 
strument for shaving, which it must be, if, as Lanzi 
supposes, the man is no other than the barber of Ju- 
lius Cfcsar. Winkelmann, illustrating a bas-relief of 
the same subject, follows the opinion of Leonard Agos- 
tini, and his authority might have been thought con- 
clusive, even if the re=eniblance did not strike the most 
careless observer. 3 

Amongst the bronzes of the same princely collection, 
is still tu be seen the inscribed tablet copied and com- 
mented upon by Mr. Gibbon. 4 Our historian found 
some difficulties, but did not desist from his illustra- 
tion : he might be vexed to hear thai his criticism has 
been thrown awav on an inscription now generally re- 
cognised to be a forgery. 

Note 26. Stanza !i. 



1 N - t. pag. 109. edit. Lugd. Hat. lnf-. 

2 Viil. J. 0. Hullengf r, de Terra; inuiu et Fulminibus, lib 
/, rap. ,\l. 

:! Oii'cif Ktpavvt>6c\s SrrfiQf itrrl, &9iv xnt fit Sibi 
rifi~fTni. 1'lui. Sjrmpos., vid, J. C, ltulleng. ut sup. 

■1 P mli Diaconi, rln _'i>tis Langdbard. !il>. in. cap. xiv. fo 
tv. eilll. Taiirin. 1527. 

5 1. P. Vatoiani.de fulminumsignjfcationihns declamatio, 
ip. draw A nth). Rom turn, v. p. 3U3. The declamation it 

addressed to Julian of Medici*. 



-his eyes to thee upturn, 



Pei ding on thy'aweel cheek. 
6<p0u\fiov^ icrtifv. 
. .Atque oculos pascal OB nine BOOS." — Ovid. Minor, lib. u 



1 Dr. Middletnn— History of the Life ofM. Tullius Cicero 
sect, in. pag, 371, vol. h. 

•J !>.■ fortune; vnrielute urbis RonMe et de ruinis ejuscleni 
descriptin, np, BaBengre, Theaaur. torn. i. pas. 301. 

:t Bee Monim. Ant. inod, par. i. cap. rvii. n. .\lii. pus. 30 
ami Stotia delle am. etc. lib. xi. cap. i, torn. ii. p. 314. not K 

4 Nomina geiitesque Antigua; Italia:, p. 201. edit. out. 



Nolo 27. Stanza liv. 
In Santa Croce's holy precincts lip. 
This name will recall the memory, not only of those 
rthose tombs have raised the Santa Croce into the 
centre of pilgrimage, the Mecca of Italy, but of her 
whose eloquence was poured over the illustrious ashes, 
and whose voice is now as mute as those she sung. 
Corix.na is no more ; and with her should expire the 
fear, the flattery, and the env}', which threw too daz- 
zling or too dark a cloud round the march of genius, 
and forbad the steady gaze of disinterested criticism. 
We have her picture embellished or distorted, as friend- 
ship or detraction has held the pencil: the impartial 
portrait was hardly to be expected from a contempo- 
rary. The immediate voice of her survivors will, it is 
probable, be far from affording a just eslimate of her 
singular capacity. The gallantry, the love of wonder, 
and the hope of associated fame, which blunted the 
edge of censure, must cease to exist. — The dead have 
no sex ; they can surprise by no new miracles ; they 
can confer no privilege : Corinna has ceased to be a 
woman — she is only an author : and it may be foreseen 
that many will repay themselves for former complai- 
sance, by a severity to which the extravagance of pre- 
vious praises may perhaps give the colour of truth. 
The latest posterity, for to the latest posterity they will 
assuredly descend, will have to pronounce upon her 
various productions ; and the longer the vista through 
which they are seen, tire more accurately minute will 
be the object, the more certain the justice of the deci- 
sion. She will enter into that existence in which the 
great writers of all ages and nations are, as it were, 
associated in a world of their own, and from that su- 
perior sphere shed their eternal influence for the con- 
trol and consolation of mankind. But the individual 
will gradually disappear as the author is more dis- 
tinctly seen : some one, therefore, of all those whom 
the charms of involuntary wit, and of easy hospitality, 
attracted within the friendly circles of Coppet, should 
rescue from oblivion those virtues which, although 
they are said to love the shade, are, in fact, more fre- 
quently chilled than excited by the domestic cares of 
private life. Some one should be found to portray 
the unaffected graces with which she adorned those 
dearer relationships, the performance of whose duties 
is rather discovered amongst the interior secrets, than 
seen in the outward management, of family inter- 
course ; and which, indeed, it requires the delicacy of 
genuine affection to qualify for the eye of an indiffer- 
ent spectator. Some one should be fou'td, not to 
celebrate, but to describe, the amiable mistress of an 
open mansion, the centre of a society, ever varied, and 
always pleased, the creator of which, divested of the 
ambition and the arts of public rivalry, shone forth only 
to give fresh animation to those around her. The mo- 
ther tenderly affectionate and tenderly beloved, the 
friend unboundedly generous, but still esteemed, the 
charitable patroness of all distress, cannot be forgotten 
by those whom she cherished, protected, and fed. Her 
loss will be mourned the most where she was known 
:hc best ; and, to the sorrows of very manv friends and 
•>iore dependants, may be offered the disinterested re- 
giet of a stranger, Avho, amidst the sublimer scenes of 
t lie Lemon lake, ieceived his chief satisfaction from 
contemplating the engaging qualities of the incompa- 
lablc Comma. 



Note 28. Stanza liv. 



-hire repose 



Angclo's, Allien's bones. 

Alfieri is the great name of this ag«-. The Italians, 
without waiting lor the hundred years, consider him as 
"a poet good in law." — His merr.ory is the more dk ai 
to them because he is the bard of freedom ; ami because, 
as such, his tragedies can receive no countenance from 
anv of their sovereigns. They are but very seldom, and 
but very few of them, allowed to be acted. It was ob- 
served by Cicero, that nowhere were the tr^ie opinions 
and feelings of the Romans so clearly shown as at the 
theatre.' In the autumn of 181fi, a celebrated luiprov- 
visatore exhibited his talents at the Opera-house of .Mi- 
lan. The reading of the theses handed in for the sub- 
jects of his poetry was received by a very numerous au- 
dience, for the most part in silence, or with laughter; 
but when the assistant, unfolding one of the papers, ex- 
claimed, " Tiie apotheosis of Victor Alfitri" the whole 
theatre burst into a shout, and the applause was con- 
firmed for some moments. The lot did not fall on Al- 
fieri ; and the Signor Sgricci had to pour forth his ex- 
temporary commonplaces on the bombardment of Al- 
giers. The choice, indeed, is not left to accident quite 
so much as might be thought from a first view of the 
ceremony ; and the police not only lakes care to look 
at the papers beforehand, but, in case of anv prudential 
after-thought, steps in to correct the blindness of 
chance. The proposal for deifying Allien was received 
with immediate enthusiasm, the rather because it was 
conjectured there would be no opportunity of carrying 
it into effect. 

Note 29. Stanza liv. 
Here Machiavelli's earth retpm'd to whence it rose. 

The affectation of simplicity in sepulchral inscrip- 
tions which so often leaves us uncertain whether the 
structure before us is an actual depository, or a ceno- 
taph, or a simple memorial not of death but life, has 
given to the tomb of Machiavelli no information as to 
the place or time of the birth or death, the age or pa- 
rentage, of the historian. 

TANTO XOMINI NVLLVM PAR ELOGIV.M 
NIGOOLAVS MACHIAVELLI. 

There seems at least no reason why the name should 
not have been put above the sentence which alludes 
to it. 

It will readily be imagined that the prejudices which 
have passed the name of Machiavelli into an epithet 
proverbial of iniquity, exist no longer at Florence. His 
memory was persecuted as his life had been for an at- 
tachment to liberty, incompatible with the new system 
of despotism, which succeeded the fall of the free gov- 
ernments of Italy. He was put to the torture for be- 
ing a " liiicrtinc," that is, for wishing to restore the re- 
public of Florence ; and such are the undying efforts 



] The free expression of their honest sentiments survived 
(heir liberties. Titus, the friend of Antony, presented them 
wiih mimes in the theatre of I'ompey. They iliil not suiter the 
brilliancy of the spectacle in efface from their memory thai tho 
niiin who furnished them wuh the entertainment bad mur- 
dered the son ol Pompey. They drove him from the theutru 
with curses. The moral sense of a populace spontaneously 
expressed, is never wrOrig. Even the soldiers of the triumvirs 
joined i" the execration ofthe citizens) by Bhouting round the 
chariots of Lepidus and Phuicus, who bad proscribed their 
brothers, l)e Oermanis nan 4t Oallie duo triumphant Con- 
sults; a Buying worlh a record, were it nothing hut a Rood 
nun. C. Veil. Piilerculi Hist. hh. ii. cap. lxxix, paj;. 78. edit 
Ll/.evir. 1G39. Ibid. lib. ii. cap. Ixxvii. 



CIIILDE HAROLD S PILGRIMAGE. 



117 



p<" those who are interested in the perversion not only 
of the nature of actions, hut the meaning of words, 
that what was once patriotism^ has by degrees come to 
signify debauch. We have ourselves outlived the old 
meaning of" liberality," which is now another word for 
treason in one country and for infatuation in all. It 
sei o have been a strange mistake to accuse the au- 

thor of the Prince, as beiag a pander to tyranny; and 
to think that the inquisition would condemn his work 
for such a delinquency. The fact is, in it Machiavelli, 
as is usual with those against whom no crime can be 
proved, was suspected of and charged with atheism ; 
and the tirst an i last most violent opposers of the Prince 
were both Jesuits, one of whom persuaded the inqui- 
sition "benche fosse tardo,'' to prohibit the treatise, 
and the other qualified the secretary of the Florentine 
republic as no better than a fool. The father Possevifl 
was proved never to have read the honk, and the father 
ini not to have understood it. It is clear, how- 
ever, that such critics must have objected not to the 
slavery of the doctrines, but to the supposed tendency 
of a lesson which shows how distinct are the interests 
of a monarch from the happiness of mankind. The 
Jesuits are re-established in Italy, and the last chapter 
of the Prince may again call forth a particular refuta- 
tion, from those who are employed once more in 
moulding the minds of the rising generation, so as to 
receive the impressions of despotism. The chapter 
bears for title, " Esortazione aliherarc la Italia dai Bar- 
ban," and concludes with a liter tine excitement to the 
future redemption of Italy. *' JVon si rfeve etdunque 
r questa occasione, acciocchi la Italia 
vegga dopo temto tempo apparire wi sun redentore. 
sVi posso csprimere con qual amore ei fusse rircrutu hi 
tutte quelle provincic, die hanno ]>atito per queste il- 
liiiinn esterne, con qual sele di vendetta, con rhe os- 
tinata fede, can eke lacrime. Quali jmrte se li perre* 
rebeno? Quuli popidi li negherebbeno la obbedienza? 
Quale Italinno li negherebbe C oasequio 1 ad ogscxo 

PIZZA O.UESTO BAKBABO D0MIMI0." ' 

Note 30. Stanza Ivii. 
T"n?rateful Florence ! Dante sleeps afar. 
Dante was born in Florence in the year 1261* He 
fought in two battles, was fourteen times ambassador, 
and once prior of the republic. When the parly of 
Charles of Anjou triumphed over the Bianchi, he was 
absent on an embassy to Pope Boniface VIII. and Was 
condemned Jo two years' banishment, and to a fine of 
eight thousand lire ; on the non-payment of which he 
was further punished by the sequestration of all his 
property. The republic, however, was rot content with 
this satisfaction, for in 1772 was discovered in the 
archives at Florence a sentence in which Dante is the 
h of a list of fifteen condemned in 1302 to be 
burnt alive; Talis pavement igne rnmhuralur sir quod 
■morinlur. The pretext for this judgment was a proof 
of unfair barter, extortions, and illicit u'ains: Baracte- 
riarum ifiiquarum, extorstonum, ct UlirUorum luero- 
ntm, 2 and with such an accusation it is not strange that 
Dante should have always protested Ins innocence, and 



1 II Prinr-i li Niecoln Machtnvelti, ate^ con h prefasione 

r b> note jgtoriche e politiche ib M. Amelol if' 1 i rlonraaye, e 
n * imei infntazione doll' opera.... Cotmopbli, I'ivi. 

2 Starts delln Lott. Ital. torn. v. Ii!>. iii. \mr. 2. pne. 4-4R. 
Tirnboichi i< ipcoi reel Iho datai or the three decrees against 
Dante are A. t). t:io_*. 1314, and 1310 

U 



the injustice of his fellow-citizens. His appeal to Flo- 
n nee wai accompanied by another to the Empcroi 
Henry, and the death of dtal sovereign, in 1313, was 
the signal for a«entenoe of irrevocable banishment. He 

had In lore lingered near Tuscany, with hopes of recall, 
then travelled into the north of Italy, where Verona 
had to boast of his longest residence, and he finally 
settled at Ravenna, which was his ordinary but not 
constant abode until his death. The refusal ol the Ve- 
netians to grant him a public audience, mi the part of 
Guide Novelkj da Polenta, his protector, is said to have 
been the principal cause of this event, which hap 
in 1821. He was buried (" in sacra minoram aede,") 
at Ravenna, in a handsome tomb, which was erected 
by Guido, restored by Rernardo Rembo in 1 183, pn tor 
for that republic which had refused to hear him. again 
restored by Cardinal Corsi in 1692, and repine, d by a 
more magnificent sepulchre, constructed in 1780 at the 
expense of the Cardinal Luigi Valenti Gonzaga. The 
offence or misfortune of Dante was an attachment to a 
defeated party, and, as his least favourable biographers 
allege against him, too great a freedom of speech and 
haughtiness of manner. But the next age paid honours 
almost divine to the exile. The Florentines, having in 
vain and frequently attempted to recover his bud'-, 
crowned his image in a church,' and his picture is stil. 
one of the idols of their cathedral. They struck medals, 
they raised statues to him. The cities of Italy, not 
being aide to dispute about his own birth, conti ndca 
for that of his great poem, and the Florentines thought 
it for their honour to prove that he had finished the 
seventh Canto, before they drove him from Ids native 
city. Fifty-one years after his death, they endowed a 
professional chair for the expounding of his verses, am 
Boccaccio was appointed to this patriotic employment. 
The example was imitated bv Bologna and Pisa, and the 
commentators, if the} - performed but little service to 
literature, augmented the veneration which beheld a 
sacred or moral allegory in all the images of his mvstic 
muse. His birth and his infancy were discovered to 
have "been distinguished above those of ordinary men ; 
the author of the Decameron, his earliest biographer, 
relates that his mother was warned in a dream of the 
importance of her pregnancy ; and it was found, bv 
others, that at ten years of age he had monifi sted his 
precocious passion for that wisdom or theology which, 
under the name of Beatrice, had been mistaken for a 
substantial mistress. When the Divine Comedy had 
been recognised as a mere mortal production, and at 
the distance of two centuries, when criticism and com- 
petition had sobered the judgment of Italians, Dante 
was seriously declared superior to Homer,' and though 
the preference appeared to some casuists " a heretical 
blasphemy worthy of the flames," the contest wn^ vig- 
orously maintained for nearly fifty years. In later 
tunes, it was made a question which of the lords of 
Verona could boast of having patronized him/ and the 
jealous scepticism of one writer would not allow Ra 
veniia the undoubted possession of his bones. Even 
the critical Tirahoschi was inclined to believe that the 

1 Sn relates Ficino, hut wmo think his coronation only ar 

IllleL'nrV. See Slorin. el'\. Ill rflip. B, 4.V1. 

2 !!v Varchi, in hia Ercolano. The controversy a 

friini 15*0 to 1616. Sep Storia, etc., tuni. vii. lib. i : \. par :ii 
o. 1380. 

3 Oio. Jocopo Dionisi eanonico di Vcrnnn. Sorts rti Anc' 
iloil, ii. 2. See Storia, etc,, torn. v. hb. .. put. p. 24. 



113 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



poet had foreseen and foretold one of the discoveries of 
Galileo. Like the great originals of other nations, his 
popularity has not always maintained the same level. 
The last age seemed inclined to undervalue him as a 
model and a study ; and Bettinelli one day rebuked his 
pupil Monti, for poring over the harsh and obsolete 
extravagancies of the Commedia. The present genera- 
tion, having recovered from the Gallic idolatries of 
Cesarotti, has returned to the ancient worship, and the 
Danleggaire of the northern Italians is thought even 
indiscreet by the more moderate Tuscans. 

There is still much curious information relative to 
the life and writings of this great poet, which has not 
as yet been collected even by the Italians ; but the cele- 
brated Ugo Foscolo meditates to supply this defect ; 
and it is not to be regretted that this national work 
has been reserved for one so devoted to his countrv 
and the cause of truth. 

Note 31. Stanza lvii. 

Like Sripio, buried by the upbraiding shore; 

Thy (actions, in their worse than civil wur. 

Proscribed, etc. 
The elder Scipio Africanus had a tomb, if he was not 
buried, at Liternum, whither he had retired to volun- 
tary banishment. This tomb was near the sea-shore, 
and the story of an inscription upon it, Ingruta P atria, 
having given a name to a modern tower, is, if not true, 
an agreeable fiction. If he was not buried, he certainly 
lived there. 1 

In cosi angusta e solitaria villa 

Era 'I grand' im che d' Africa s'appella 

Perclie prima col ferro al vivo apprilla. a 

Ingratitude is generally supposed the vice peculiar to 
republics ; and it seems to be forgotten, that, for one 
instance of popular inconstancy, we have a hundred 
examples of the fall of courtly favourites. Besides, a 
people have often repented — a monarch seldom or 
never. Leaving apart many familiar proofs of this fact, 
a short story may show the difference between even 
an aristocracy and the multitude. 

Vettor Pisani, having been defeated in 1354 at Porto- 
longo, and many years afterwards in the more decisive 
action of Pola, by the Genoese, was recalled by the 
Venetian government, and thrown into chains. The 
Avvogadori proposed to behead him, but the supreme 
tribunal was content with the sentence of imprison- 
ment. Whilst Pisani was suffering this unmerited dis- 
grace, Chioza, in the vicinity of the capital, 3 was, by 
the assistance of the Signor of Padua, delivered into 
the hands of Pietro Doria. At the intelligence of that 
disaster, the great bell of St. Mark's tower tolled to 
arms, and the people and the soldiery of the galleys 
were summoned to the repulse of the approaching 
enemy ; but they protested they would not move a 
step, unless Pisani were liberated, and placed at their 
head. The great council was instantly assembled: the 
prisoner was called before them, and the Doge, Andrea 
Contarini, informed him of the demands of the people 
and the necessities of the state, whose only hope of 
safety was reposed on his efforts, and who implored 
him to forgive the indignities he had endured in her 



service. "I have submitted," replied the magnanimous 
republican, "I have submitted to vour deliberations 
without complaint ; I have supported patiently the pain:) 
>f imprisonment, for they were inflicted at your com- 
mand: this is no time to inquire whether I deserved 
then — the good of the republic may have seemed to 
require it, and that which the republic resolves is always 
resolved wisely. Behold me ready to lay down my lil'o 
for the preservation of mv country." Pisani was rp- 
pointrjd generalissimo, and, by his exertions, in conjunc- 
tion with those of Carlo Zeno, the Venetians soon re- 
covered the ascendancy over their maritime rivals. 

The Italian communities were no less unjust to their 
citizens than the Greek republics. Liberty, both with 
the one and the other, seems to have been a national, 
not an individual object : and, notwithstanding the boast- 
ed equality before the laws, which an ancient Greek 
writer 1 considered the great distinctive mark between 
his countrymen and the barbarians, the mutual rights 
of fellow-citizens seem never to have been the. principal 
scope of the old democracies. The world may have not 
yel seen an essay by the author of the Italian Republics, 
in which the distinction between the liberty of former 
states, and the signification attached to that word by the 
happier constitution of England, is ingeniously devel- 
oped. The Italians, however, when they had ceased to 
be free, still looked back with a sigh upon those times of 
turbulence, when every citizen might rise to a share of 
sovereign power, and have never been taught fully to 
appreciate the repose of a monarehy. Spcrone Speroni, 
when Francis Maria II. Duke of Rovero proposed the 
question, " which was preferable, the republic or the 
principality — the perfect and not durable, or the less 
perfect and not so liable to change," replied, " that our 
happiness is to be measured by its quality, not by its 
duration ; and that he preferred to live for one day like 
a man, than for a hundred years like a brute, a stock, 
or a stone." This was thought, and called, a mag' 
nifrt nt answer, down to the last days of Italian ser 
vitude. 2 

Note 32. Stanza lvii. 



-anil the crown 



1 Vitam Literni egit sine desiderio urbis. See T. Liv. Hist, 
lib. xwviii. Livy reports tlia* some said lie was buried at 
Liternum, others at Rome. Ik cap. Iv. 

2 Trionfo Jella Castas. 

1 Kce note to stanza XIII. 



Which Petrarch's laureate brow supremely wore, 
Upon a far and foreign Boil hud grown. 

The Florentines did not take the opportunity of Pe 
trarch's short visit to their city, in 1350, to revoke the 
decree which confiscated the property of his father, 
who had been banished shortly after the exile of Dante. 
His crown did not dazzle them ; but when, in the next 
year, they were in want of his assistance in the formation 
of their university, they repented of their injustice, and 
Boccaccio was sent to Padua to entreat the laureat tc 
conclude his wanderings in the bosom of his native 
country, where he might finish his immortal Africa, and 
enjoy, with his recovered possessions, the esteem of all 
classes of his fellow-citizens. They gave him the op- 
tion of the book, and the science he might condescend 
to expound: they called him the glory of his countrj. 
who was dear, and would be dearer to them ; and they 
added, that if there was any thing unpleasing in their 
letter, he ought to return amongst them, were it only to 



1 The Greek boasted that he was icoio/ioi — See the last 
chapter of the first book of Dinnysiiis of llalearnassua. 

2 " E intorno alia magvijica risposta," etc. Serassi, V'U 
del Tasso, lib. iii. pug. 149. tnm. ii. edit. 2, Itergamu. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



119 



correct their style. 1 Petrarch seemed at first to listen to 
the flattery and to the entreaties of his friehd, but he did 
not return to Florence, and preferred a pilgrimage to 
the tomb of Laura and the shades of Vaucluse. 
Note 33. Stanza lviii. 

Boccaccio to his parent earth bequeath'd 

His ilust. 

Brycaceio was buried in the church of St. Michael and 
St. James, at Certaldo, a small town in the Valdelsa, 
which vvas by some supposed the place of his birth. 
There he passed the latter part of his life in a course of 
laborious study, which shortened his existence: and 
there mishthis ashes have been secure, if not of honour, 
at least of repose. But the "hyama bigots/' of Certbldo 
tore up the tombstone of Boccaccio, and ejected it from 
the holy precints of St. Michael and St. James. The 
occasion, and, it mavbe hoped, the excuse of this eject- 
ment, was the making of a new floor for the church : 
but the fact is, that the tombstone was taken up and 
thrown aside at the bottom of the building. Ignorance 
may share the sin with bigotry. It would be painful to 
relate such an exception to the devotion of the Italians 
for their great names, could it not be accompanied by a 
trait more honourably conformable to the general char- 
acter of the nation. The principal person of the district, 
the last branch of the house of Medicis, afforded thai 
protection to the memory of the insulted dead which 
her best ancestors had dispensed upon all cotemporary 
merit. The Marchioness Lenzoni rescued the tombstone 
of Boccaccio from the neglect in which it had some time 
lain, and found for it an honourable elevation in her own 
mansion. She has done more : the house in which the 
poet lived has been as little respected as his tomb, and 
is falling to ruin over tlie head of one indifferent to the 
name of its former tenant. It consists of two or three 
little chambers, and a low tower, on which Cosmo II. 
affixed an inscription. This house she has taken meas- 
ures to purchase, and proposes to devote to it thajt care 
and consideration which are attached to the cradle and 
to the roof of genius. 

This is not the place to undertake (he defence of Boc- 
caccio; but the man who exhausted his little patrimony 
in the acquirement of learning, who was amongst the 
fir-t, if not the first, to allure the science and the ooetry 
of Greece to the bosom of Italy ; — who not only invented 
a new style, but founded, or certainly fixed, a new 1 lan- 
guage ; who, besides the esteem of every polite court of 
Europe, was thought worthy of employment by the pre- 
dominant republic of his own country, and, what is 
more, of the friendship of Petrarch, who lived the life 
of a philosopher and a freeman, and who died in the 
pursuit of knowledge, — such a man might have found 
more consideration than he has met with from the 
priest of Certaldo, and from a late English traveller, who 
strikes off his portrait as an odious, contemptible, li- 
centious writer, whose impure remains should be suf- 
fered to rot without a record. 2 That- English traveller, 

1 " Arrinciti innoltre. ae ri e lecUo aneor I'esorlarti, n rom- 
pirc 1' immortal tun Africa.... Se ti avvieno d'incontrara nel 
nostro stile coaa che ti dispiaccia, cib debb' essere on aliro 
mntivo ad esati-Jirc i deaiderj delta tun patria." Storia. delle, 
) .<lt . [la!, tivm. v, pur. i. lib. i. pag. 76. 

'2 Classical Tour, can. i.\. vol. ii. p. 355. edit. Hd. "Of 
Boccaccio, the modern retronius, we say nothing : the abuse 
of genius ig more odious and more contemptible than its ab- 
sence; and it imports little where the impure remains of n li- 
centious author are consigned to their kindred tlnst. For the 
«nmc reason the traveller may pass unnoticed (lie tomb of the 
maliguatit Aretino." 



unfortunately for those who have to deplore the loss of 
a very amiable person, is beyond all criticism ; but the 
mortality which did not protect Boccaccio from Mr. 
Eustace, must not defend Mr. Eustace from the impar- 
tial judgment of his successors. Death may canonize 
his virtues, not his errors ; and it may be modestly pro- 
nounced that he transgressed, not only as an author, 
but as a man, when he evoked the shade of Boccaccio 
in company with that of Aretino, amidst the sepulchres 
of Santa Croce, merely to dismiss it with ind'gnity. As 
far as respects 

"TI fla?elln do' Principi. 
II divin IVtro Aretino," 

\t is of little import what censure is passed upon a cox- 
comb who owes his present existence to the above bur- 
lesque character given to him by the poet whose amber 
has preserved many other grubs and worms : but to 
classify Boccaccio with such a person, and to excom- 
municate his very ashes, must of itself make: us doubt 
of the qualification of the classical tourist for writing 
upon Italian, or, indeed, upon any other literature ; for 
ignorance on one point may incapacitate an author 
merely for that particular topic, but subjection to a pro- 
fessional prejudice must render him an unsafe directoi 
on all occasions. Any perversion and injustice may be 
made what is vulgarly called " a case of conscience," 
and this poor excuse is all that can be offered for the 
priest of Certaldo, or the author of the Classical Tour. 
It would have answered the purpose to confine the cen- 
sure to the novels of Boccaccio, and gratitude to that 
source which supplied the muse of Drydcn with her hist 
and most harmonious numbers, might perhaps have re- 
stricted that censure to the objectionable qualities of 
the hundred tales. At any rate, the repentance of Boc- 
caccio might have arrested his exhumation, and it should 
have been recollected and told, that in his old age be 
wrote a letter entreating his friend to discourage (he 
reading of the Decameron, for the sake of modesty, and 
for the sake of the author, who would not have an apolo- 
gist always at hand to state in his excuse that he wrote it 
when young, and at the command of his superiors. 1 It 
is neither the licentiousness of the writer, nor the evil 
propensities of the reader, which have given to the De- 
cameron alone, of all the works of Boccaccio, a perpet- 
ual popularity. The establishment of a new ami delight* 
ful dialect conferred an immortality on the works in 
which it was first fixed. The sonnets of Petrarch were, 
for the same reason, fated to survive his self-admirca 
Africa, the "favourite of lings." The invariable traits 
of nature and feeling, with which the novels, as well as 
the verses, abound, have, doubtless, been the chief source 
of the foreign celebrity of both authors ; but Boccaccio, 
as a man, is no more to be estimated by that work, than 
Petrarch is to be regarded in no other light than as tho 



This dubious phrase is hardly enough to snve the tourist 
from [ha suspicion of another blunder respecting the buriai- 
plaee of Aretino. whose tomll v. -as in the church of St. I.nko 
al Venice, and gave rise to tie- famous controversy of which 
some notice is taken in Bayle. Now 'lie words of .Mr. Eus- 
tace Would lead us to think the tomh was at Florence, or al 
least was to beaomdwhera recognised. Whether the nscrip 
lion so niurh disputed was ever written on the tome •.'.intuit 
now lie decided, for all Jiemor'ml of this author has disap- 
peared from the church of St. Luke, which is now changed 
into a lnmp warehouse. 

1 'Won eiiiin ubique est, qui in exousationem meani onn- 
snrgens dicat, juvems srri|isit. el majoris COactUS imnerio.' 

The letter was addressed to Maghinard cf CavaJcanti, mar 

fhal of tho kingdom of Sicily. See Tiruhosclii, Sloria hH 
torn. v. par. ii. lib. iii. pag. 525. cd. Ven. 17115. 



ISO 



BYRON S WORKS. 



lover of Laura. Even, however, bad the rather of the 
i n prose befn known only us the author of the 
Decameron, a considerate writer would have been feau 5 
pronounce a sentem with the 

voice of many ages and nations. An irrevoca- 
ble value has never been stamped uppn any work solely 
I ended by impurity. 

The true source of the outcry against Boccaccio, which 
began at a very early period, was the choice of hi* scan- 
dalous personages in the cloisters as well as the courts ; 
out the princes only laughed at the gallant adventures 
so unjustly oharged upon Queen Theodelinda, whilsl the 
priesthood cried shame upon the debauches drawn from 
the convent and Lhe hermitage; and, most probably, for 
the opposite reason, namely, that the picture was faithful 
to the life. Two of the novels are allowed to be facts 
usefully turned into tales, to deride the canonization of 
rogues an/] laymen. Ser Ciapdelhtto and MarceHinus 
are cited with applause even by the decent Muratqri. 1 
The great Arnaud, as he is quoted in Bayle, states, that 
a new edition of the novels was proposed, of which the 
expurgation consisted in orfiitting the words "monk" 
and "nuh,*' and tacking the immoralities to other 
names. The literary history of Italy particularizes no 
such edition; but it was not long before the whole of 
Europe had but one opinion of the Decameron ; and lhe 
ition of the author seems to have been a point set- 
tled a i I I a bun Ired yeajjiago: " On se ferait sillier 
51 1'on pr&endail convaincre Bocca.ce de n'avoir pas ete 
yonnete homme, puisqu'il^a fait le Decameron." Sosaid 
one of the best men, and perhaps the best critic, that 
ever lived— the very martyr to impartiality. 2 But as this 
infoimatibn, that in the beginning of the last century 
on" would have been hdoted at for pretending that Boc- 
caccio was not a good man, may seem to come from 
one of those enemies who arc to be suspected, even 
when they make US a present of trull-, a more accept. 
able contrast with the proscription of the body, soui, 
and muse of Boccaccio may be found in a few words 
from the righteous, the patriotic contemporary, wno 
thought one of the tales of this impure writer worthy a 
Latin version from his own pen. " I have remarked 
elsewhere" says Petrarch, writing to Boccaccio, "that 
the book itself lias been worried by certain dfjgs, hut 
stoutly defended by your staff and voire. Nor was J 
ft, d, for I hate had proof of the vigour of your 
mind, and I know you have fallen on thai unaccom- 
modating incapable rare of mortals who, whatever they 
either like not, or know not, or cannot iln, are sure to 
reprehend in others, and on those occasions only put on a 
ulnar of learning and eloquence, but otherwise are entirely 
dumb. 3 

It is satisfactory to find that all the priesthood do not 
resemble those of Certaldo, and that one of them who 
did not possess the bones of Boccaccio would not lose 
the opportunity of raising a cenotaph to bis memory. 



1 Dissertazioni sogtH le anticliita Italianc. Diss, lviii. p. 2a:!. 
turn. in. edit. Milan, 1751. . 

2 EcUUrcissemcnU etc, etc p. 638. edit. Baale, l.n, m the 
Supplement to Bayle's Dictionary. 

S ' Animadverti aticnhi librum ipsnm aimm dentiDus.ra- 
epggitum tuo tamon baoalo egregie tuaque voce aetensum. 

NeRiniratu»8iim nam cl vires ingenului novi, el bc *per- 

i,,. ,.. i 9 Imminum eenus insolens ol Ignavum, qui. quicquid 
; I4 j vol nolunt, vel neseiunt, vel Don possupt, m Una repre- 
liBDdunt' a.l ! .. >r- nnuni docti eVarguti^sed rdineueg ad rcn- 
iiio " Episl J«an Boccatio. opp. loin. i. u. 540. edit, Basil. 



Hevius, canon of Padua, at the beginning of the 1 6m 
century, erected at Arquh, opposite to the tomb of the 
laureat, a tablet, in which he associated Boccaccio to 
the equal honours of Dante and Petrarch. 

Note 34. Stanza b. 
What is her pyramid of precious Btoaes? 

Our veneration for the Medici begins with Cosmo, and 
expires with his grandson; that stream is pure only at 
the source; and ii is in search of some memorial of the 
virtuous republicans of the family, that we visit the 
church of St. Lor. nzoat Florence. The tawdry, glaring, 
unfinished chapel in that church, designed for the mau- 
soleum of the Dukes of Tuscany, set round with crowns 
and coffins, gives birth to no emotions but those of con- 
tempt for the lavish vanity of a race of despots^ whilst 
the pavement slab, simply inscribed to the Father of his 
Country, reconciles us to the name of Medici. 1 It was 
very natural for Corinna 2 to suppose lhat the slatue 
raised to the Duke of Urbino in the epotHi, 

was intended for his great namesake ; but the magnifi- 
cent Lorenzo is only the sharer of a coffin half hidden 
in a niche of the sacristy. The decay Of Tuscany dates 
from the sovereignty of the Medici. Of the sepulchral 
peace which succeeded to the establishment of the reign- 
ing families in Italy, our own Sidney has given us a 
glowing, hut a faithful picture. "Notwithstanding all 
the seditions of Florence, and other cities of Tuscany, 
the horrid factions of Guelphs and Ghibelins, Neri and 
Biaftchi, nobles and commons, they continued populous, 
stron", and exceeding rich ; but in the space of less than 
a hundred and fifty years, the peace able reign of the 
Medicos is thought to nave destroyed nine parts in ten 
of the people of that province. Amongst Other things 
it is remarkable, that when Philip the Second of Spain 
gave Sienna to the Duke of Florence, his ambassador 
then at Boine sent him word, that he bad given away 
more than 650,000 subjects ; and it is not believed there 
are now 20,000 souls inhabiting that city and terri- 
tory. Pisa, Pistoia, Arezzo, Cortona, and other towns, 
that were then good and populous, are in the like pro- 
portion diminished, and Florence more than any. 
When that city had been long troubled with seditions, 
tumults, and wars, for the most part unprosperbuPj they 
still retained such strength, that when Charles VIII. 
of France, beinn admitted as a friend with his whole 
army, which soon after conquered the kingdom of 
Naples, thought to master them, the people 'taking, arms 
struck such a terror into him, that he was glad to depart 
upon such conditions as they thought tit to impose. 
Machiavel reports, that, in that time, Florence alone, 
with the Val d'Arno, a small territory belonging to that 
city, could, in a few hours, by the sound of a bell, bring 
together 135,000 well-armed men ; whereas now lhat 
city, with all the others in that province, are brought to 
such despicable weakness, emptiness, poverty, ami base- 
ness, that they can neither resist the oppressions of their 
own prince, nor defend him or themselves if tiny were 
assaulted by a foreign enemy. The people are dispersed 
or destroyed, and the best families sent to seek habita- 
tions in Venice, Genoa, Home, Naples, and Lucca. This 
is not the effect of war or pestilence ; they enjoy a perfect 
peace, and suffer no other plague than the government 



1 Cogmus Medices. Decreto Publico. Toiler Ptttriea. 

2 Corinne, Liv. xviii. cap. iii. vol. iii. pa«e 84fi 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGR1MAGI 



121 



ihey are under. 1 From the usurper Cosmo dawn to the 
imbecile Gaston, we look in vain for any of those unmixed 
qualities which should raise a patriot to the command of 
his fellow-citizens. The Grand Dukes, and particularly 
the third Cosmo, had operati I so entire a change in the 
Tuscan character, that the candid Florehtini s, in excuse 
for some imperfections in the philanthropic system cf 
Leopold, are obliged to confess that the sovereign was the 
only liberal man in his dominions. Yet that excellent 
ince himself had no other notion of a- national as- 
sembly, than of a body to represent the wants and 
wishes, not the will of the people. 

Note 35. Stanza lxiii. 
An earthquake reel'd unheeileilly away! 

" Ami such was their mutual animosity, so intent 
were they upon the battle, that the earthquaki -, which 
overthrew in great part many of the cities of Italy, 
wliich turned the course of rapid streams, poured back 
the sea upon the rivers, and tore down the very moun- 
tains, was not Jilt by one of the combatants." 2 Such 
is the description of Livy. It may be doubted whether 
modern tactics would admit of such an abstraction. 

The site of the battle of Thrasimene is not to be mis- 
taken. The traveller from the village under Cortona to 
Jasa di Piano, the next stage on the way to Rome, has, 
for the first two or three miles, around him, but more 
particularly to the right, that Hat land which Hannibal laid 
waste in order to induce the Consul Flaminius to move 
from Arezzo. On his left, and in front of him, is a ridge 
of hills, bending down towards the lake of Thrasimene, 
called by Livy "montes Cortonenses," and now named 
the Gualandra. These hills he approaches at Ossaja, a 
village which the itineraries pretend to have been so de- 
nominated from the bones found there : but there have 
been no bones found there, and the battle was fought on 
the other side of the hill. From Ossaja the road begins 
to rise a little, but does not pass into the roots of the 
mountains until the sixty-seventh mile-stone from Flo- 
rence. The ascent thence is not steep but perpetual, and 
continues fir twenty minutes. The lake is soon seen 
below on the right, with Borghetto, a round tower close 
upon the water ; and the undulating hills partially covered 
with wood amongst which the road winds, sink by degrees 
into the marshes near to this tower. Lower than the 
road, down to the right amidst these woody hillocks, 
Hannibal placed his horse, 1 in the jaws of or rather above 
the pass, which was between the lake and the present 
road, and most probably close to Borghetto, just under 
the lowest of the " tumuli." 4 On a summit to the left, 
above the road, is an old circular ruin which the peasants 
call "the Tower of Hannibal the Carthaginian." Arrived 
at the highest point of the road, the traveller has a partial 
view of the fatal plain, which opens fully upon him as he 
descends the Gualandra. lie soon finds himsclfin a vale 
inclosed to (he left and in front and behind him bv the 
Gualandra hills, bending round in a segment larger than 



1 On Government, chap. ii. s,-,-t. xwi. page'208. edit 1751. 
Bidney is. tngethi r with Locks and Hoqotey, one of Mr. 
Uiiiiu'h "despicable" writers. 

2 "Tnntusque t'nit ardor anrniorom, aden intentua pngna 
animus, utouin terra- tnotum qui miiltarum urbmm Italia; 
magnas partes proatravit, svertiujne curau rapido annus, mare 
Bnminibaa invexrt, mnntafl lapsu ingenti proruit, nemu pug- 
nantium sanserif...." Tit. Liv. lib. xxn. cap. xii. 

3 " Eqiiitcs ad ipsaa Fauces -alius, tumulia apto tegentibus, 
locat." Tit Liv. lili. xxii. cap. iv. 

4 "Ubi maxima monies Cortonensaa Thrasimenua subit." 
Ibid. 



a semicircle, and running down a! each end to the lake, 
winch obliques to the right, and forms the chord of this 
mountain are. The position cannot be guessed at from 
the plains of Cortona, nor appears to be so completely 
inclosed unless to one who is fairly within the hills. It 
then, indeed, appears "a place mad" as it were on pur- 
pose lor a snare," "i " Borghetto is 
then found to stand in a narrow marshy pass close to 
the hill and to the lake, whilst there is no oilier outlet at 
the Opposite turn of the mountains than through the little 
town ofPasignanO, which is pushed into tin; water by the 
foot of a higl] rocky acclivity. 1 There is a woody emi- 
nence branching down from the mountains into the up- 
per end of the plain nearer to the side of'Passigp&no, and 
on this - 1 and:: a white- village a II, d Torre. Pol) bins seems 
to allude, to this eminence as the one on which Hannibal 

encamped and drew out his heavy-ar I Africans and 

Spaniards in a conspicuous position.-' From this .-pot he 
d patched Ins Balearic and light-armed troops round 
through the Gualandra heights to the right, so as to arrive 
unseen, and form an ambush amongst the broken accli- 
vities which the road now nisses, and to he n r.dy to act 
upon the left flank and above the enemy, whilst the horse 
shut up the pass behind. Flaminius came to the lake 
near Borghetto at sunset ; and, without sending any spies 
before him, marched through the pass the next morning 
before the day had quite broken, so that he perceived 
nothing of the horse and light troops above and about 
him, and saw only the heavy-armed Carthaginians in 
front on the- hill of Tone. 3 The consul began to draw 
out his army in die flat, ami in the mean time the horse 
in ambush occupied the pass behind him at Borghetto. 
Thus the Romans were completely inclosed, having the 
lake on the right, the main army on the hill of Torre in 
front, the Gualandra hills tilled with the light-armed on 
their left Hank, and being prevented from receding by 
the cavalry, who, the farther tin v advanced, stopped up 
all the outlets in the rear. A fog rising from the lake 
now spread itself over the army of the consul, but the 
high lands were in the sunshine, and all the different 
corps m ambush looked towards the hill of Torre for the 
order of attack. Hannibal gave the signal, an 1 moved 
down from his post on the height. At the same moment 
all his troops on the eminences behind and in the flank 
of Flaminius, rushed forward as it were with one accord 
into the plain. The Romans, who were forming their 
array in the mist, suddenly heard the shouts of the 
enemy amongst them, on every side, and, before they 
could fall into their ranks, or draw their swords, or see 
by whom thev were attacked, felt at once that they were 
surrounded and lost. 

There are two little rivulets which run from the Gua 
landra into the lake. The traveller cross, s the first of 
these at about a mile after he comes into the- plain, and 
this divid< 8 the Tuscan from the Papal territi ries. The 
second, about a quarter of It mile further on, i- 
"the bloody runlet, " and the peasants point out an 

open spot to the lefl between the "Sanguinelto" and 



1 " lmle collet aaaurgbnc" Tit. Liv. Kb, rxii. cap. iv. 

3 'I ,'ji ftev >.nrt) npiewaui r>is noptlas \6ij,ar avr&i 
Karskd&tTO, xai tuv$ AftJpas koI rois iflipm cyu>v <" ' 
avrov kutcbt paroTttotvat. HJst. lib. iii. rap. 83. The ac- 
count in Polybius is not ,-n easily reconcileable with preeeni 
■I, at in Livy ; h,- talks of hills t,, id,- right 
ami left el' the pass nhd valley ; bill u hen Flaminui.- i 

he hail the lake at the right oi both. 
3 "A lergo tt super caput dece^«•^einsilJi••c. ,, Tit Liv «io 



o2 



:i 



122 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



the hills, which, they say, was the principal scene of 
slaughter. The other part of the plain is covered With 
thick-set olive trees in corn-grounds, and is nowhere 
quite level except near the edge of the lake. It is, 
indeed, most probable that the battle was fought near 
this end of the valley, for the six thousand Romans 
whoj at the beginning of the action, broke through the 
enemy, escaped to the summit of an eminence which 
must have been in this quarter, otherwise they would 
have had to traverse the whole plain, and to pierce 
thro igh the main army of Hannibal. 

The Romans fought desperately for three hours, but 
the death of Flaminius was the signal for a general 
dispersion. The Carthaginian horse then burst in upon 
the fugitives, and the lake, the marsh about Borghetto, 
but chiefly the plain of the Sanguinetto and the passes 
of the Gualandra, were strewed with dead. Near some 
old walls on a bleak ridge to the left above the rivulet, 
many human bones have been repeatedly found, and 
this has confirmed the pretensions and the name of the 
" stream of blood." 

Every district of Italy has its hero. In the north some 
painter is the usual genius of the place, and the foreign 
Julie Romano more than divides Mantua with her native 
IrirgU. 1 To the south we hear of Roman names. Near 
Thrasimcnc tradition is stil faithful to the fame of an 
enemy, and Hannibal the Carthaginian is the only ancient 
name remembered on the hanks of the Perugian lake. 
Flaminius is unknown ; In t the postilions on that mad 
have been taught to show the very spot where il Console 
b was slain. Of all who (ought and fell in the 
battle of Thasimeiie, the historian himself has, besides 
the generals and Maharbal, preserved indeed only a 
single name. You overtake the Carthaginian again on 
the same road to Rome. The antiquary, that is, the 
hostler of the post-house at Spoleio, tells you that his 
town repulsed the victorious enemy, and shows you the 
gate still called Porta ili Amdhule. It is hardly Worth 
while to remark that a French travel-writer, well known 
by the name of the President Dupaty, saw Thrastmene 
in the lake of Rolscna, which lay conveniently on his 
way from Sien.ia to Rome. 

Note 36. Stanza lxvi. 
Hut thou, Clituuinus! 
No book of travels has omitted to expatiate on the 
temple of the Ciituninus, between Foligno and Spoleto ; 
and no site, or scenery, even in Italy, is more worthy a 
description. For an account of the dilapidation of 
this temple, the reader is referred to Historical Illustra- 
tions of the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold. 

Note 37. Stanza lxxi. 

Charming the eye with dread, — a matchless cataract. 

I saw the " Cascata del marmore" of Terni twice, at 
different periods ; once from the summit of the preci- 
pice, and again from the valley below. The lower 
view is far to be preferred, if the traveller has time 
for one only : but in any point of view, either from 
above or be'iow, it is worth all the cascades and tor- 
rents of Switzerland put together; the Staubach, Rei- 
chenbach, Pisse Vache, fall of Arpenaz, etc., are rills 



in comparative appearance. Of the fall of Schaff- 
hausen I cannot speak, not yet having seen it. 

Note 33. Stanza lxxii. 
An Iris sits, amidst die infernal surge. 

Of the time, place, and qualities of this kind of Ins, 
the reader may have seen a short account in a note to 
Manfred. The fall looks so much like "the hell of 
waters" that Addison thought the descent alluded to 
to be the gulf in which Alecto plunged into the in- 
fernal regions. It is singular enough that two of the 
finest cascades in Europe should be artificial — this of 
the Velino, and the one at Tivoli. The traveller is 
strongly recommended to trace the Velino, at least as 
high as the little lake called Pie'' di Lup. The Reatine 
territory was the Italian Tempo, ' and the ancient na- 
turalist, amongst other beautiful varieties, remarked 
the daily rainbows of the lake Velinus. 2 A scholar 
of great name has devoted a treatise to this district 
alone. 3 

Note 39. Stanza Ixxiii. 
The thundering lauwine. 

In the greater part of Switzerland the avalanches are 
known by the name of lauwine. 

Note 40. Stanza l\xv. 



1 About the middle of tine Xllth century, the coins of 
Mantua bore on one side the image and figure of Virgil. 
Zeecn d' lt:ilia, id. xvii. i. 6. . . Voyaire dans le Milauuis, 
«c, vit A Z. Miliin, torn n. p. 211 1. Paris, W\~. 



Too much, in conquer for the po\ Cs s.ike. 

The drill'd dull lesson, forced down word by word. 

These stanzas may probably remind the reader of 
Ensign Northerton's remarks: " D — n Homo," etc., but 
the reasons for our dislike are not exactly the same. 
I wish to express that we become tired of the task 
before we can comprehend the beauty ; that we learn 
by rote before we can get by heart ; that the freshness 
is worn away, and the future pleasure and advantage 
deadened and destroyed, by the didactic anticipation, 
at an age when we can neither feel nor understand 
the power of compositions which it requires an ac- 
quaintance with lite, as well as Latin and Greek, to 
relish or to reason upon. For the same reason we 
never can be aware of the fulness of some of the finest 
passages of Shakspeare ("To be or not to be," for 
instance), from the habit of having them hammered 
into us at eight years old, as an exercise, not of mind 
but of memory : so that when we are old enough to 
enjoy them, the taste is gone, and the appetite palled. 
In some parts of the continent, young persons are 
taught from more common authors, and do not read 
the best classics till their maturity. I certainly do not 
speak on this point from any pique or aversion to- 
wards the place of my education. I was not a slow, 
though an idle boy ; and I believe no one could, or 
can be more attached to Harrow than I have always 
been, and with reason ; — a part of the time passed 
there was the happiest of my life ; and my preceptor 
(the Rev. Dr. Joseph Drury) was the best and worthiest 
friend I ever possessed, whose warnings I have remem- 
bered but too well, though too late — when I have 
erred, and whose counsels I have but followed when 
I have done well or wisely. If ever this imperfect 



1 " Ueatini me ad sua Tempe duxerunt." Cicer. Epist. ad 
Altic. xv. lib. iv. 

2 " In eorlem lactl nullo non die apparerc arcus." Plin. 
Hist. Nat. lib. ii. cap. Ixii. 

D Aid. Manut. de^Reatina urbe agroque ap. Sollengre 
Thesaur. turn. i. p. 773. 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



12: 



record of my feelings towards him should reach his 
eyes, let it remind him of one who never thinks of 
him hut with gratitude and veneration — of one who 
would more gladly boast of having been his pupil, if, 
by more closely following his injunctions, he could 
reflect any honour upon his instructor. 
Note 41. Stanza lxxix. 
The Scipius' tomb contains no ashes now. 
For a comment on this and the two following stanzas, 
the reader may consult Historical Illustrations of the 
Fourth Canto of Childe Harold. 

Note 42. Stanza lxxxii. 

The trebly hundred triumphs ! 

Orosius gives three hundred and twenty for the 

number of triumphs. He is followed by Panvinius : 

and Panvinius by Mr. Gibbon and the modern writers. 

Note 43. Stanza lxxxiii. 

Oh thou, whose chariot roll'd on fortune's wheel, etc. 

Certainly were it not for these two traits in the life 

of Sylla, alluded to in this stanza, we should regard 

him as a monster unredeemed by any admirable quality. 

The atonement of his voluntary resignation of empire 

may perhaps be accepted by us, as it seems to have 

satisfied the Romans, who if they had not respected 

must have destroyed him. There could be no mean, no 

division of opinion ; they must have all thought, like 

Eucrates, that what had appeared ambition was a love 

of glory, and what had been mistaken for pride was a 

real grandeur of soul. 1 

Note 44. Stanza Ixxxvi. 
And laid him with the earth's preceding clay. 
On the third of September, Cromwell gained the vic- 
tory of Dunbar ; a year afterwards he obtained " his 
crowning mercy" of Worcester ; and a few years after, 
on the same day, which he had ever esteemed the most 
fortunate for him, died. 

Note 45. Stanza lxxxvii. 



And thou, drend statue ! still existent in 
The auatareat form of naked majesty. 

The projected division of the Spada Pompey has 
already been recorded by the historian of the Decline 
and Fall of the Roman Empire. Mr. Gibbon found it 
in the memorials of Flaminius Vacca, 2 and it may be 
added to his mention of it that Pope Julius III. gave 
the contending owners five hundred crowns for the 
statue ; and presented it to Cardinal Capo di Ferro, 
who had prevented the judgment of Solomon from 
being executed upon the image. In a more civilized 
age this statue was exposed to an actual operation : for 
the French, who acted the Rrutus of Voltaire in the 
Coliseum, resolved that their Ca;sar should fall at the 
base of that Pompey, which was supposed to have been 
sprinkled with the blood of the original dictator. The 
nine foot hero was therefore removed to the arena of 
the amphitheatre, and to facilitate its transport, suf- 
fered the temporary amputation of its right arm. The 
republican tragedians had to plead that the arm was a 
restoration : but their accusers do not believe that the 
integrity of the statue would have protected it. The 



1 " Seigneur, votis changez, toutes mes idees de la facon 
dont je viius vois agir. Je croyais que \ous aviez dc l'ambi- 
tion, mais nueun amour pour la gloire: je voyaia hicn quo 
votre aine etait haute; mais je ne souprnnnaia pas qu'ellc 
fitt grnnde." — Dialogue dc Sylla ct a" F.urrnte. 

- Mi'iiiurio, num. Ivii. pag. 9. ap. Montfuucon, Diarium 
Italicunc 



love of finding every coincidence has discovered the 
true Cesarean ichor in a stain near the right knee ; 
but colder criticism has rejected not only the blood 
but the portrait, and assigned the globe of power rather 
to the first of the emperors than to the last of the 
republican masters of Rome. Winkelmann ' is loth 
to allow a heroic statue of a Roman citizen, but the 
Gnmani Agrippa, a contemporary almost, is heroic ; and 
naked Roman figures were only very rare, not abso- 
lutely forbidden. The face accords much better with 
the " hominem integrum et castum et gravem," 3 than 
with any of the busts of Augustus, and is too stern for 
him who was beautiful, says Suetonius, at all periods 
of his life. The pretended likeness to Alexander the 
Great cannot be discerned, but the traits resemble the 
medal of Pompey. 3 The objectionable globe may not 
have been an ill-applied flattery to him who found 
Asia Minor the boundary, and left it the centre of the 
Roman empire. It seems that YVinkelmann has made 
a mistake in thinking that no proof of the identity of 
this statue, with that which received the bloody sacri- 
fice, can be derived from the spot where it was discov- 
ered. 4 Flaminius Vacca says sotto una cantina, and 
this cantina is known to have been in the Vicolo dc 
Leutari near the Cancellaria, a position correspondino 
exactly to that of the Janus before the basilica of 
Pompey's theatre, to which Augustus transferred the 
statue after the curia was either burnt or taken down. ' 
Part of the Pompeian shade, 6 the portico, existed in 
the beginning of the XVth century, and the atrium 
was still called Satrum. So says Blondus.' At all 
events, so imposing is the stern majesty of the statue, 
and so memorable is the story, that the play of the 
imagination leaves no room for the exercise of the 
judgment, and the fiction, if a fiction it is, operates 
on the spectator with an effect not less powerful than 
truth. 

Note 46. Stanza lxxxviii. 
And thou, the thunder-stricken nurse of Rome! 
Ancient Rome, like modern Sienna, abounded mos 
probably with images of the foster-mother of ha. 
founder; but there were two she-wolves of whom 
history makes particular mention. One of these, of 
brass in ancient work, was seen by Dionysius e at the 
temple of Romulus under the Palatine, and is uni- 
versally believed to be that mentioned by the Latin 
historian, as having been made from the money col- 
lected by a fine on usurers, and as standing under the 
Ruminal fig-tree. 9 The other was that which Cicero 1U 
has celebrated both in prose and verse, and which tho 



1 Storia delle arti, etc., lib. Ix. cap. i. p. 321, 322. torn. ii. 

2 Cicer. Epist. ad Atticum, xi. 6. 

3 Published by Causeus in his Museum Romanum. 

4 Storia delle arti, etc., ibid. 

5 Sueton. in vit. August, cap. 31. and in vit. C. J. CiTsnr. 
cap. P8. Appian says it was burnt down. See a note of I'll 
iscus to Suetonius, pag. 224. 

6 " Tu modo l'ompcia lenta spatiare sub umbra." 

Ovid -?r. Jlman. 

7 Roma instaurata, lib. ii. fob 31. 

8 Xd\xca Troifiitara xa\aia$ Ipyaolaf. Antiq. Rom. fib. i 

9 "Ad ficum Ruminalem simulacra infantium condilorum 
urbis sub ubenbus lupro posti6runt." Liv. Hist. lib. x cap. 
lxix. This was in the year U. C. 455, or 457. 

10 " Turn statua Nattm, turn simulacra Deorum, Romulua ■ 
que et Remus cum altricebellua vi fulminis icticon<'.iuVrimt." 
De Divinat. ii. SO. "Tactus est ilia etiain qui hanc urbera 
condidit Romulua, qucm inauratum in Capitolio purvum 



124 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



hi-torian Dion also records as having suffered the same 
it as is alluded to by the orator. 1 The question 
agitated by the antiquaries is, whether the wolf now 
in the conservator's palace is that of Livy and Dio- 
nysius, or that of Cicero, or whether it is neither 
one nor the other. The earlier writers differ as much 
as the moderns : Lucius Faunus 2 says, that it is the one 
alluded to by both, which is impossible, and also by 
\ iriiil, which may be. Fulvius Ursinus 3 calls it the 
wolf of Dionysius, and Marlianus 4 talks of it as the 
one mentioned by Cicero. To him Rycquius trem- 
blingly assents. 5 Nardini is inclined to suppose it may 
be one of the many Wolves preserved in ancient Rome; 
but of the two rather bends to the Ciceronian statue '• 
Montfaucon' mentions it as a point without doubt. 
Of the later writers the decisive Winkelmann 8 pro- 
claims it as having been found at the church of Saint 
Theodore, where, or near when;, was the temple of 
Romulus, and consequently makes it the wolf of 
Dionysius. His authority is Lucius Faunus, who, how- 
ever, only says that it am placed not found, at the 
Ficus Rum'malis by the Comitium, by which he does 
not seem to allude to the church of Saint Theodore. 
llycquius was the first to make the mistake, and 
Winkelmann followed Rycquius. 

Flaminius Vacca tells quite a different story, and says 



atone lactantcm, iibcribus lupinis irihiaiitem fuisse meininis- 

tis." In Catilin. iii. 8. 

" Hie sylvestris emt Romani nominis altrix 
Martia, una- parvos Mavoftis aemtne natoa 
(Tbsribus gravidis vilali rorc rigaleit. 
Que tun) cum pueria Bamraato luhuinis ictu 
Conculit, atquo avulsa pedum vestigia limiit." 
De Consulatu, lib. ii. (lib. i. de Divinat. cap. ii.) 

' 'Ef J"!/) Tijt KH-7]T0)Xiljl avfipiaVTtf Tl IToWoi {/TTO 

Kcpavvuv cvvt^oivivOiicrnv, kiii nyaXpara d'XXo r£, 
Kat Ai!>{ fTi kIovos wpvfitvov, etKuiv ri rif "kyKatwis 
evi'iTt rio Piaptfi Kai avv rJ PupvAtp \Spvjtiirn encGn- 
Dion. Hist. lib. xxxvii. pag. 37. edit. Rob. Bteph. 1548; He 
goes mi to mention that tlie letters of the columns on winch 
the laws were written were liquefied and become ajii)Sp4. 
All that the Roro'dhs did waB to erect a rarce statue to Jupiter, 
looking towards the east: no mention is afterwards made of 
the wolf. This happened in A. I'. ('.(Ml. The Abate Pea, 
in noticing this passage of Dion, [Storia delta arti, etc., torn, 
i. p. "vi 1 1 -_» . note x.) says, .\~mi ostante, aggjivgee hione, ihr 
fosst ben-fermata (the wolf), by which It is clear the Abate 
translated the Xylundro-Lenclavian version, which puts 
qnmnris stabilita for the original ISpvptiW) a word that does 
not mean ben-fermata. but only raised, as may be distinctly 
seen from another passage of the same Dion : H(>o«A<9jj 
ub> oov b hyptitlraf Kai tov Avyovarov IvrtwOa l&pfaat, 
Ilist. lib. Ivi. Dion says that Agrippa "wished to raise a 
ttatua of Augustus in the Pantheon. 

2 " In eadem porticu a-nea lupa, ciijus uberibus Romulus ac 
Remus laCtantoS iiihiant, conspicitur : do hac Cicerp Bt 
Virgibus semper intellcxere. Livius hoc M'.'iiiiih ab /lOdilibus 
ex pecuniis quilius muletati essent fieneratores'. position m- 
nuit. Antes in Comitiisad Ficum Riiminalem, quo loco pueri 
tin lint expositj locattnn pro certo est." JjUC. Fauin, de 
Antiq Orb. Horn. lib. ii. cap. vii. "?. Bailengre, torn. i. p. 
217. In his XVIIth chapter he repeats that the statues were 
there, |)Ut not that they were fiiunil there. 

'.' A p. Nardini, Roma Veins, lib. v. cap. iv. 

1 Marliani, l T rb. Rom. topograph, lib. ii. cap. ix. fie men- 
tions another wolf and twins in the Vatican, lib. v. cap. xxi. 

5 "fl lesunt qui banc Ipsam esse putent, qiinm adpinxi- 

inns. qua e eomitio in Basilieam I, uterinum, cum nonnullis 
hlits antiquitaium reliquiis, atque bine in Capjtolium poatca 
relets ait, quamvis Marlianus antiquani Capitolin&m esse 
maluil a Tnllio description, mi lit in re nimis duhia, trepnle 
assentunur." Just. Rycqiiii de Caprt. Roman. Comm. cap. 
Kiv. pag. 850, edit. Lugd. Hat. 1606. 

Nardini Roma Vetus, lib. v. cap. iv. 

7 " Lupa ho.liecpie in cupitolinis pro-tat ffidiboj, cum ves- 
tigio fulminis (iuo ictaiii narrat Cicero." Diarium Italic, torn. 
I. p. 174. 

8 Sloria dello arti, c,..., lib. iii. cap. iii. $ ii. note 10. Win- 
KeTmnnn has made a strange blunder in the note, by saying 
Iho Ciceronian wolf was not in the Capitol, ?T.d that Dam 
»u wrong in saying so. 



he had bean! the wolf with the twins was found ' near 
the arch of Septimiirs Severus. The coinmentator on 
Winkelmann is of the same opinion With that learned 
person, and is incensed at Nardini for not having re- 
marked that Cicero, in speaking of the wolf struck 
with lightning in the Capitol, makes use of the past 
tense, But, with the Ahate's leave, Nardini does not 
y assert the statue to be that mentioned by 
Cicero, and, if he had, the assumption would not per- 
haps have been so exceedingly indiscreet. The Abate 
himself is obliged to own that there are marks very 
like the scathing of lightning in the hinder legs of the 
present wolf! and, to get rid of ibis, adds, that the wolf 
seen by Dionysius might have been also struck by light- 
ning, or otherwise injured. 

Let us examine the subject by a reference to the 
words of Cicero. The orator in two places seems to 
particularize the Romulus and the Remus, especially 
the first, which his audience remembered to have been 
in the Capitol, as being struck with lightning. In his 
verses he records that the twins and wolf both fell, and 
that the latter left behind the marks of her feet. Cicero 
docs not say that the Wolf was consumed : and Dion 
only mentions that it fell down, without alluding, as 
the Abate has made him, to the force of the blow, or 
the firmness with which it had been fixed. The whole 
strength, therefore, of the Ahate's argument, hangs 
upon the past tense ; which, however, may be some- 
what diminished by remarking that the phrase only 
shows that the statue was not then standing in its 
former position. Winkelmann has observed, that the 
present twins are modern; and it is equally clear that 
there are marks of gilding on the wolf, which might 
therefore be supposed to make part of the ancient 
group. It is known that the sacred images of the Capi- 
tol were not, destroyed when injured by time or accident, 
but were put into certain underground depositories 
called favisstc. 2 It may be thought possible that the 
wolf had been so deposited, and had been replaced in 
some conspicuous situation when the Capitol was re- 
built by Vespasian. Rycquius, without mentioning his 
authority, tells that it was transferred from the Comi- 
tium to the Lateran, and thence brought to the Capitol. 
If it was found near the arch of Severus, it may have 
been one of the images which Orosius 3 says was thrown 
down in the Forum by lightning when Alaric took the 
city. That it is of very high antiquity the workman- 
ship is a decisive proof; and that circumstance induced 
Winkelmann to believe it the wolf of Dionysius. The 
Capitoline wolf, however, may have been of the same 
early dale as that at the temple of Romulus. Lactan- 
tius 4 asserts that, in his time, the Romans worshipped a 
wolf; and it is known that the Lupercalia held out to 



1 " Intcsi dire, che 1'F.rcole di hronzo. die oggi si trova nella 
sal'i del ( 'iimpidogho, fu trovato nel foro Romano appre.--o 
I'areo ill Si ttimio e vi fn troyala aiiche la lupa ill hronzo che 
allatta Romolo e Itemo, e st St nella Loggia de conaervatori." 
Pram, Vacca, Memorie, num. iii. pag. i. ap, Montfaucon, 
Diar. It a), torn. i. 

i.' Luc rami. ibid. 

:i See noie to stanza I. XXX. in Historical Illustrations. 

4 " Romiili nutrix Lupa honoribua eat atli da Bivjnis, et 
ferrem -a animal ipsum tinssei, cnjiis figurant gerii." Lac- 
tam, de fal-a ruligioiie. Lib. i. cap. 20. pag. 101. edit, v&rio" 
1680; that is to say, lie would rather adore a wolf than a 
prostitute. Mis coinmentator has observed, that the opinion 
of Livy concerning I, amentia being figured in this v. 
not universal, Btrabo thought so. Rycquius is wrong in say- 
ing thai Lactantius mentions the wolf was iii the Cupitol. 



CHILDE HAROLDS PILGRIMAGE. 



125 



a very late period ' after every other observance of the 
ancient superstition had totally expired. This may ac- 
count for the preservation of the ancient image longer 
than the other early symbols of paganism. 

It may be permitted, however, to remark that the 
wolf was a Roman symbol, but that the worship ol 
that symbol is an inference drawn by the zeal of Lac- 
taimus. The early Christian writers are not to be 
trusted in the charges which they make against the 
pagans. Eusebius accused the Romans to their faces 
of worshipping Simon Magus, and raising a statue to 
him in the island of thcTyber. The Romans had prob- 
ably never heard of such a person before, who came, 
however, to play a considerable, though scandalous part 
in the church nistory, and has left several tokens of his 
aerial combat with St. Peter at Rome ; notw ithstanding 
that an inscription found in this very island of the 
Tyher showed the Simon Magus of Eusebius to be a 
certain indigenal god, called Semo Sangus or Fidius. 2 

Even when the worship of the founder of Rome had 
been abandoned, it was thought expedient to humour 
the habits of the good matrons of the city by sending 
them with their sick infants to the church of St. Theo- 
dore, as they had before carried them to the temple of 
Romulus. 3 The practice is continued to this day ; and 
the site of the above church seems to be thereby iden- 
tified with that of the temple : so that if the wolf had 
been really found there, as Winkelmann says, there 
would be no doubt of the present statue being that 
seen by Dionysius.* Rut Faunus, in saying that it was 
at the Ficus Ruminalis by die Coinilium, is only talking 
of its ancient position as recorded by Pliny ; and even 
if he had been remarking where it was found, would 
not have alluded to the church of St. Theodore, but to 
a very different place, near which it was then thought 
the Ficus Ruminalis had been, and also the Comitmm ; 
that is, the three columns by the church of Santa Maria 
Libetatrice, at the corner of the Palatine looking on 
the Forum. 

It is, in fact, a more conjecture where the image was 
actually dug up,* and perhaps, on the whole, the marks 



1 Tn A. D. 4!lfi. "Quia credere poBsit." Bays Baronius, 
( \uu. Eocles. mm. viii. pag. 602. in an. 196 1 " viguisse adhuc 
Romae ad Qelasii tempora, qua- fuere ante exordia urbis ul- 
lata in Italian) Lupercaliat, Gelaaius wrote a Inter which 
occupies foui folio pages in Andromachus, the senator, ami 
pthen, to shew that the rites should be given up. 

2 Eusebius has these words-, kii AvoptAim ruj*' vfiiv &i? 
Sii{ rrrtjfinrtf, iv no Tifirpt fiorn/iui /tcra^v riv <5iio }'f</>- 
vptZv, c%u>v tT:iypn<p>>v ?ui)iaiKiiv riu'n/v, Xi'puvj bity 
TdyKT o. Ee.-les. Hist. lib. ii. cap. xiii. p. 40. Justin Martyr 
ha>l told the story before ; bat Baronius himself was obliged 
to detect this labia. See Nardmi Roma Vet. lib. vii. cap. xii. 

3 " In essn eli antichi pnntefiei per toglier la meinoria de* 
giuochi Lupercnli Utituiti in snore di Romolo, introdussero I' 
ago Hi portaryi Bambini pppreaai do in ermiuY occ,aIte, accio 
si libenno per I'intarceas di auesto Ejanto, oom 

tinuo si siieriine n t:i." Rione xii. Ripe, accurals at mla 

degcriziune, etc., di Roma Moderna dell' Au. Ridolf". V'enuti, 
1786. 

4 Nnrdini, lib. v. rnp. ii. convicts Pnmpnnius Latm emuri 
rmrri*, in putting the Ruminal fig-tree at the ohureo ofSnini 
Theodore: but as Livy says the wolf was at the Ficus Rumi- 
nalis, and Dionyaius at the temple of Romulus, he Ii 

(cup. iv.) to own that the two were elOM together, as well as 
tlie Lupercal cave, shaded, M it were, by the fig-tree. 

6 " Ad eomilinm ficus ohm Ruminalis germinabat, sub qua 
Inpre itimam, hue est. le.anunnin. docente Varrune, BUieranl 
ohm Romulus et Remus; non procul a tempio hodie D. 
Maris Liberatrii'is appi Halo, ubi fnrsau invents Dobilis ilia 
tinea statua lupre geininos puerulos lactantis, quam hodie in 



of the gilding, and of the lightning, are a better argu- 
ment in favour of its being the Ciceronian wolf than 
any that can be adduced for the contrary opinion. A\ 
any rate, it is reasonably selected in the text of the 
poem as one of the most Interesting relics of the ancient 
city, 1 aim is certainly the figure, if not the very animal 
to wnich Virgil alludes in his beautiful verses : 

"Gcminos huic ubera cirfum 

laulere pendente* pUi re* et I ainbere mairein 
Impavjdos : illam tereti eervne ri Ibvon 
Mulcere akernos, et fingerc corpora lingua." 2 

Note 47. Stanza xc. 

-for the Rinnan's mind 



Was modeQ'd in a less terrestrial mould. 

It is possible to be a very great man, and to bt? still 
very inferior to Julius Caesar, the most complete chai- 
acter, so Lord Bacon thought, of all antiquity. Nature 
seems incapable of such extraordinary combinations as 
composed his versatile capacity, which was the wonder 
even of the Romans themselves. The first general — 
the only triumphant politician — inferior to none in 
eloquence — comparable to any in the attainments of 
wisdom, in an age made up of the greatest commanders, 
statesmen, orators, and philosophers, that ever appeared 
in the world — an author who composed a perfect speci- 
men of military annals in his travelling-carriage — at 
one time in a controversy with Cato, at another writing 
a treatise on punning, and collecting a set of good say- 
ings — fighting ' and making love at the same moment, 
and willing to abandon both his empire and Ins mis- 
tress for a sight of the fountains of the Nile. Such 
did Julius Ca:sar appear to his contemporaries, and to 
those of the subsequent ages, who were the most in 
clined to deplore and execrate his fatal genius. 

But we must not be so much dazzled with his sur- 
passing glory or with his magnanimous, his amiable 
qualities, as to forget the decision of his impartial 
countrymen : 

HE WAS JUSTLY SLAIN.* 



Cnpitolio viilemus." Olai IWriehii anliqua frbis Humans 
facieS, cap. x. See also cap. xii. Borriehius wrote alter Nar- 
dini in Kir?. Ap. Gra5V.Aru.iq. Rom, torn. iv. p. 1582, 

1 DonatUB, lib. xi. cap. 18, given a medal representing on 
one vide tie- well' in the same position as that in the I 'apitol ; 
and in the reverse the won with the head not reverted. Ii is 
of Ihe time of Antoninus Pius. 

2 /lCneid, viii. 681, See Dr. Middleton, in his Letter from 
Rome, who undines to the Ciceronian wolf, but without ex 
umining the subject. 

It In hi* tenth book, T.uean shows him sprinkled with the 
blood of 1'harsalia in the arms of Cleopatra: 

" Sanguine Thesealics cladis perfusus adulter 
Adiuis.il Venerem euris, et miacuil arnus." 
After feasting with his mistress, he sirs up all night to con- 
verse with the Egyptian sages, and tells Achorens 
" Spes sit niihi eerta videndi 
Niliacoa I'ontes, helium civile relinqnam:" 
" Sie Velut ill tula seeuri pace train bant 
A'. "'tis iter medium." 
Immediately afterwards, he is figlitins again and defending 
every position : 

" Sed adest defensor uhique 
Ca>sar, ei bos aditus eladiis. hos ignibos arcet. 

< 'ies noote carinia 

Insiluit Csqer sompei C licitoi usus 
I'ra-eipili eiirsu bellornin et tempore rapto." 
4 ".lure eti'stis existinn tur.'' sav* Suetonius, after n fnir 
estimation of hja character, and malting use of a phrase which 
was a formula in l.iw '< tune. " Meluiin jure cii'siim pronun- 
tinvit. etiam si reeni crimiue inaons liierit." (lib. iv. rap. 4SJ 
and which was continued in the legal judgment! prrtiounceo 
in justifiable homicide*, such a* Silling housebreakers. Soa 
Suet on. ui viL C.J. Cicsans, witli the commentary of i'l'ucu* 
p. lc'4 



Note 48. Stanza xciii. 
What from this barren being do we reapl 
Our senses narrow, and our reason trail 

" . . . . Omnes pene veteres ; qui nihil cognosci, 
nihil percipi, nihil sciri posse dixerunt ; angustos sensus ; 
imbecilles animos, brevia curricula vit;e ; in profundo 
veritatem demersam ; opinionibus et instilutis omnia 
teneri ; nihil veritati relinqui : deinceps omnia tenebris 
circunifusa esse dixerunt." ' The eighteen hundred 
years which have elapsed since Cicero wrote this have 
not removed any of the imperfections of humanity : 
and the complaints of the ancient philosophers mav, 
without injustice or affectation, be transcribed in a 
poem written yesterday. 

Note 49. Stanza xc'lx. 
There is a stern round tower of oilier days. 
Alluding to the tomb of Cecilia Motella, called Capo 
di Bove, in the Appian Way. See Historical Illustra- 
tions of the IVtli Canto of Child a Harold. 
Note 50. Stanza cii. 



-•prophetic of the doom 



Heaven gives its favourites — early death. 
Oi' o\ Scot (pt\ouaiv, aTToOl'l'iCTKtl l'£Of. 

To yap Savciv ovk ata^pov, «A,V ala^pw; &avuv. 

Rich. Franc. Phil. Brunck. l'oeta: Gnomici, p. 
231. edit. 1784. 

Note 51. Stanza cvii. 

Heboid the Imperial Mount! 

The Palatine is one mass of ruins, particularly on the 

side towards the Circus Maximus. The very soil is 

formed of crumbled brick-work. Nothing has been 

told, nothing can be told, to satisfy the belief of any but 

a Roman antiquary. — See Historical Illustrations, page 

206. 

Note 52. Stanza cviii. 

There is the moral of all human tales ; 
'T is but the same rehearsal of the past. 
First freedom, and then glory, etc. 

The author of the Life of Cicero, speaking of the 
opinion entertained of Britain by that orator and his 
cotetnporary Romans, has the following eloquent pas- 
sage : " From their railleries of this kind, on the bar- 
barity and misery of our island, one cannot help re- 
flecting on the surprising fate and revolutions of king- 
doms, how Rome, once the mistress of the world, the 
seat of arts, empire, and glory, now lies sunk in sloth, 
ignorance, and poverty, enslaved to the most cruel as 
well as to the most contemptible of tyrants, superstition, 
and religious imposture: while this remote country, 
anciently the jest and contempt of the polite Romans, 
is become the happy seat of liberty, plenty, anil letters; 
flourishing in all the arts and refinements of civil life ; 
yet running perhaps the same course which Rome it- 
self had run before it, from virtuous industry to wealth ; 
from wealth to luxury ; from luxury to an impatience 
of discipline, and corruption of morals : till, by a total 
degeneracy and loss of virtue, being grown ripe for 
destruction, it fall a prey at last to some hardy oppress- 
or, and, with the loss of liberty, losing every thing that 
is valuable, sinks gradually again into its original bar- 
barism." 11 



Note 53. Stanza ex. 

-and apostolic statue9 climb 



1 Acadern. 1. 13 

2 The History of the Life of M. Tullius Cicero, sect. vi. 
•ill. ii. pag. r02 The contrast has been reversed in a late 
«*traordinary instance. A gentleman was thrown into priuou 



To crush the imperial urn, whose ashes slept sublime. 
The column of Trajan is surmounted bv St. Peter, 
that of Aurelius by St. Paul. See Historical Illustrations 
of the IVth Canto, etc. 

Note 54. Stanza cxi. 
Still we Trajan's name adore. 
Trajan was proverbially the best of the Roman 
princes : ' and it would be easier to find a sovereign 
uniting exactly the opposite characteristics, than one 
possessed of all the happy qualities ascribed to this 
emperor. " When lie mounted the throne," savs the 
historian Dion, 2 " he was strong in body, he was vigor- 
ous in mind ; age had impaired none of his faculties; 
he was altogether free from envy and from detraction ; 
he honoured all the good and he advanced them ; and 
on this account they could not be the objects of his fear 
or of his hate ; he never listened to informers ; he gave 
not way to his anger; he abstained equally from unfair 
exactions and unjust punishments ; he had Father be 
loved as a man than honoured as a sovereign ; he was 
affable with his people, respectful to the senate, and 
universally beloved by both ; he inspired none with 
dread but the enemies of his country." 

Note 55. Stanza cxiv. 

Kienzi, last of Romans! 

The name and exploits of Rienzi must be familiar to 

the reader of Gibbon. Some details and inedited nian- 

tlScriptSj relative to this unhappy hero, will be seen in 

the Illustrations of the IVth Canto. 

Note 5fi. Stanza cxv. 
Egeria ! sweet creation of some heart 
Which round no mortal resting-place so fair 
As thine ideal breast. 

The respectable authority of Flaminius Vacca would 
incline us to believe in the claims of the Egcrian grotto. 3 
He assures us that he saw an inscription on the pave- 
ment, stating that the fountain was that of Egeria dedi- 



at Paris, efforts were made for his release. The French min- 
ister continued to detain him, under the pretext that he was 
not an Englishman, but only a ltomnn. See " Interesting facts 
relating lo Joachim Rlurat," Dag. I'-V.l 

1 "Hujus tantum memorial dehtnm est, ut, usque ad nos- 
trum aiaiem imn alitei in Senatil principibus acclamatiir, 
nisi, FELICIOR. AV6YSTO. 1UIXIOR. TKAJAXO." 
Entrop. Brer. Hist. Rom. lib. viii. cap. v. 

2 Tij rt yap aii/iaTt sppuro Kat rjj t/ftlVjj IJKpa^cv, 

di; p';0' i)770 y>)pw; ipSXivccOai Kai ovt' i606vii, 

ovrt Kad>)pzi Tivii, aWa Kal irdvv navras rovs ayuOois 
Irrpa Kai f/if)'i<XvW Kai <5ia tovto o'vrc i6o6ut6 Tiva 

sirnSVj ovtc iulaci iiaBoXals re qxiora tntjTivt, 

Ka't opyrj ^Kierta ISovXovro. t<Tu» tc xpyuaTuv tuih aXAui 

rpto)v taa Kai (j)6vuiv tGiv arlrVurv dirti^eTO ipiXoipc- 

v6i re ov v £ir' (lirroi; paXXor i; ripuSpzvos c^aipt Kai rji 
re Sijpip pcr y e-icintias OVVSylvero, Kal rfj yrjpovoia ocp- 
veitpvir&i S)jil\ci' dyavtirb; pev -aaaf ipoGtjioc l\i pr/^tvi, 
-y?iv - i.Nt/n'oii (ii/. Hist. Rom. lib. Ixviii. cap. ii. vii. torn, 
ii. p. 1123, 1124. edit. Hamb. 1"0. 

3 " Poco lontano rial detto luoqo si scendc ad tin casaletto, 
del quale ne sono Padroni Ii Cafarelli, che con qucsto nome 
e chiamato il lu.igo; vie una fonlana tottu una gran volte 
antica, che al presente si gode, e Ii Romani vi vanno l'estata 
a rierearsi ; nel pavimenlodi essa fonte si legge in mi cpitaffio 
essere quella la fonte di Egeria, dudicata site nint'e, e questa 
dice 1'ipitatlio, essere la medesima fonte in cui fn converlita." 
Memorio, etc. ap. Nurdini, pag. 13. Ho does not give tho 
desciiption. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



137 



caterl to the nymphs. The inscription is not there at 
this day; but Mo ntfaucon quotes two lines 1 of Ovid 
from a stone in the Villa Giustiniani, which he seems 
to think had been brought from the same grotto. 

This grotto and valley were formerly frequented in 
Btumner, and particularly the first Sunday in May, by 
the modern Romans, who attached a salubrious quality 
to the fountain which trickles from an orifice at the 
bottom of the vault, and, overflowing the little pools, 
creeps down the matted grass into the brook below. 
The brook is the Ovidian Almo, whose name and quali- 
ties are lost in the modern Aquataccio. The valley 
itself is called Valle di Caffarelli, from the dukes pf 
that name, who made over their fountain to the Palla- 
vicini, with sixtv rubbia of adjoining laud. 

There can be little doubt, that this long dell is the 
Egerian valley of Juvenal, and the pausing place of 
Unibricius, notwithstanding the generality of his com- 
mentators have supposed the descent of the satirist and 
his friend to have been into the Arician grove, where 
the nvmph met Hippolitus, and where she was more 
peculiarly worshipped. 

The step from the Porta Capena to the Alban hill, 
fifteen miles distant, would be too considerable, unless 
we were to believe in the wild conjecture of Yossius, 
who makes that eatc travel from its present station, 
where he pretends it was during the reign of the Kings, 
as far as the Arican grove, and then makes it recede 
to its old site with the shrinking city. 2 The tufo, or 
pumice, which the poet prefers to marble, is the sub- 
stance composing the bank in which the grotto is sunk. 

The modern topographers ' find in the erotto the 
statue of the nvmph and nine niches for the Muses, and 
a late traveller 4 has discovered that the cave is restored 
to that simplicity which the poet regretted had been 
exchanged for injudicious ornament. But the headless 
statue is palpably rather a male than a nymph, and has 
none of the attributes ascribed ■ it at present visible. 
The nine Muses could hardly ha\ >od in six niches ; 
and Juvenal certainly does not allude to any individual 
cave. i Nothing can be collected from the satirist but 
that somewhere near the Porta Capena was a spot in 
which it was supposed Numa held nightly consultations 
with his nymph, and where there was a grove and a 
6aored fountain, and fanes once consecrated to the 
Muses ; and that from this spot there was a descent into 



I "In villa Justininna fexrat iagena lapis quadratic solidus 
in quo sculpta lirce duo Ovirlii carmina sunt 

I est qua? prabet nqins dpi crata Camcenis. 
Il!;i Nuiice enninx nmsi liinnque tail. 
Qui lapis videtur ex eodem EgeriB fpnte, aut ejus vinnia 
iatlnii' ComportalllB." Diarium ltal'c. p. 153. 

J Da magnit. Vet. Rom. ftp. Gra?v. Ant. Rom. torn to: p. 
15(17. 

II E hinard. Descrizione di Roma e doll' aim Romano cor- 
retto dall' Abate Venuti in Romn, 1750. Tliey believe in the 
C rotto and nymph. "Simulacro di qucsto fonte, esaeodovi 
ICulpite le acqne a pie ili esao." 

4 Clanical Tour, chap. vi. p. 217. vol. ii. 

5 "Substitii ad voterea arcus. oradidamque Cetpenani) 

Hie utii noctumte Naraa eonstitueba t nmicip, 
IS'nnc saeri timiis nemug, * - i ttetubra loettotur 
Judaj'u quorum cophmuqn firnumquc siipollex. 
Omnis enim populo mercedem pendere .iussa est 
Arbor, et ej> tel ia CamcBnis. 

In vullein Kperia; de.tcendimus, Bl ipeloneu 
Diwimilea vcris ; quanto pnestantiot easel 
Numcn aqum. viTidi si marpine Claudl .'ret undas 
Herba noc ingenuum violarent inaraiora tophum." 

Sat. 1IL 



the valley of Egeria, where were several artificial caves. 
It is clear that the statues of the Muses made no pail 
of the decoration which the satirist thought misplaced 
in these caves ; for he expressly assigns other fanes 
(delubra) to these divinities above the valley, and more- 
over tells us, that they had been ejected to make room 
for the Jews. In fact, the little temple, now called that 
of Bacchus, was formerly thought to belong to the 
.Muses, and Nardini ' places them in a poplar grove, 
which was in his time above the valley. 

It is probable, from the inscription and position, that 
the cave now shown may be one of the " artificial cav- 
erns," of which, indeed, there is another a little way 
higher up the \ alley, under a tuft of alder bushes: but 
a single grotto of Egeria is a mere modern invention, 
grafted upon the application of the epithet Egerian to 
these nymphea in general, and which might send us 
to look for the haunts of Numa upon the banks of the 
Thames. 

Our English Juvenal was not seduced into mistrans- 
lation by his acquaintance with Pope : he carefully pre- 
serves the correct plural — 

" Thence slowly winding down the vale, wp view 
The 1'irciiaii grots ; oh, how unlike the true I" 

The valley abounds with springs, 2 and over these 
springs, which the Muses might haunt from their neigh- 
bouring groves, Egeria presided : hence she was said 
to supply them with water ; and she was the nymph of 
the grottos through which the fountains were taught to 
How. 

The whole of the monuments in the vicinity of the 
Egerian valley have received names at will, which have 
been changed at will. Venuti 3 owns he can see no 
traces of the temples of Jove, Saturn, Juno, Venus, 
and Diana, which Nardini found, or hoped to find. The 
mutatorium of Caracalla's circus, the temple of Honour 
and Virtue, the temple of Bacchus, and, above all, the 
temple of the god of Rcdiculus, are the antiquaries' 
despair. 

The circus of Caracalla depends on a medal of that 
emperor cited by Fulvius Ursinus, of which the reverse 
shows a circus, supposed, however, by some to repre- 
sent the Circus Maximus. It gives a very good idea of 
that place of exercise. The soil hxs been but little 
raised, if wc mav judge from the smail cellular structure 
at the end of the Spina, which was probably the chapel 
of the god Consus. This cell is hall berealh the soil, 
as it must have been in th circus itse'f, fir Dionysius 4 
could not be persuaded U. believe that this divinity was 
the Roman Neptune, because his altar was undct 
ground. 

Note 57. Stanza exxvii. 
Yet let us ponder boldly. 

"At all events," says the author of the Arademica. 
Questions, " I trust, whatever may be the fate of my 
own speculations, that philosophy will regain that esti- 
mation which it ought to possess. The free and phi- 
losophic spirit of our nation has been the theme of ad- 
miration to the world. This was the proud distinction 
of Englishmen, and the luminous source of all their 
glory. Shall we then forget the manly and dignified 



1 Lib. iii. cnp. iii. 

2 " Undiquee solo aquas scaturiunt." Nardini, lib. iii. cu 



3 F.chinard, etc. Pic. cit. pp. 097, 298. 

4 Auiiq. Rom. lib. ii. cap. xax! 



128 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



sentiments of our ancestors, to prate in the language of 
the mother or the nurse about our good old prejudices? 
This is not the way to defend the cause of truth. It 
was not thus that our fathers maintained it in the bril- 
liant periods of our history. Prejudice may be trusted 
to guard the outworks for a short space of time, while 
reason slumber* in the citadel: but if the latter Fink 
into a lethargy, the former will quickly erect a standard 
for herself. Philosophy, wisdom, and liberty, support 
each other ; he who will not reason, is a bigot ; he who 
cannot, is a fool; and he who dares not, is a slave." 
Preface, p. xiv. xv. vol. i. 1S05. 

Note 58. Stanza exxxii. 



-great Nemesis ! 



Here; « here the imei( nl paid due homage long. 

We read, in Suetonius, that Augustus, from a warn- 
rag received in a dream, ' counterfeited once a-yearthe 
oeggar, sitting before the gate of his palace, with his 
hand hollowed, and stretched out for charity. A statue 
formerly in the Villa Bbrghese, and which should be 
now at Paris, represents the emperor in that posture of 
supplication. The object of this self-degradation was 
the appeasement of Nemesis, the perpetual attendant 
on good fortune, of whose power the Roman conquerors 
were also reminded by certain symbols attached to their 
cars of triumph. The symbols were the whip and the 
cfotalo', which were discovered in the Nemesis of the 
Vatican. The attitude of beggary made the above 
statue pass for that of Belisarius ; and until the criti- 
cism of Whikelniann 2 bad rectified the mistake, one 
fiction was called in to support another. It was the same 
fear of the sudden termination of prosperity that made 
Amasis, king of Egypt, warn his friend Polycrates of 
Samos, that the gods loved those whose lives were 
chequered with good and evil fortunes. Nemesis was 
supposed to lie in wait particularly for the prudent: that 
is, for those whose caution rendered them accessible 
only to mere accidents ; and her first altar was raised 
on the banks of the Phrygian iEsepus by Adrastus, 
probably the prince of that name, who killed the son of 
Croesus by mistake. Hence the goddess was called 
Adrastea. 3 

The Roman Nemesis was sacred and august ; there 
was a temple to her in the Palatine, under the name of 
Rhamnusia: 4 so great indeed was the propensity of the 
ancients to trust to the revolution of events, and to be- 
lieve in the divinity of fortune, that in the same Pala- 
tine there was a temple to the fortune of the day. i 
This is-the last superstition which retains its hold over 
the human heart ; and from concentrating in one ob- 
ject the credulity so natural to man, has always appeared 
strongest in those unembarrassed by other articles of 



belief. The antiquaries have supposed this goddess to 
be synonymous with fortune and with fate: ' but it was 
in her vindictive quality that she was worshipped under 
the name of NeB 

Note 59. Stanza cxl. 

I sec before me the gladiator lie. 
Whether the wonderful statue which suggested this 
image, be a laquearian gladiator, which in spite of 
Winkelinatiirs criticism, has been stoutly maintained, 2 
or whether it be a Greek herald, as that great antiquary 
positively asserted, 3 or whether it is to be thought a 
Spartan or barbarian shield-bearer, according to the 
opinion of his Italian editor, 4 it must assuredly seem a 
copy of that masterpiece of Ctesilaus, which repre- 
sented " a wounded man dying, who perfectly expressed 
what there remained of life in him." b I\lontfuucon s 
and Malli-i' thought it the identical statue; but that 
statue was of bronze. The gladiator was once in the 
villa Ludovizi, and was bought by Clement XII. The 
right arm is an entire restoration of Michael Angelo. 8 
Note 60. Stanza cx'.i. 



-he, their sire, 



1 Sueton. in vit. Augnsti, cap. 01. Casaubon, in the. note, 
refers to Plutarch's Lives of Camillas and .Emiliiis Paulus, 
tinil also to his apophthegms, for the character of this deity. 
The hollowed band was reckoned the last degree of degra- 
dation: and when the dead body of the prcrfect Rtifinus was 
■iurne about in triumph by the people, the indignity was in- 
creased by putting his hand in that position. 

" Storia delle urti, etc., lib. xii. cap. iii. torn. ii. p. 422. 
Vistnnti calls the statue, however, n Cyhele, It is given in 
the Musco Pio Clement, torn. i. par. 40. The Abate Fea 
ttpiegaziode del Kami. Storia, etc., torn. iii. p. 513.) calls it 
a Chnsippui 

2 Diet, da Boyle, article Adrastea. 

4 It is enumerated by the regional? Victor. 

5 " ForUime hujuscc diei." Cicero mentions her, de legib. 
lb II. 



Butcher'd to make a Roman holiday. 
Gladiators were of two kinds, compelled and volun- 
tary; and were supplied from several conditions ; from 
slaves sold for that purpose : from culprits ; from bar- 
barian captives, either taken in war, and, after being 
led in triumph, set apart for the games, or those seized 
and condemned as rebels ; also from free citizens, some 
fighting for hire (avrtorati), others from a depraved 
ambition : at last even knights and senators were ex- 
hibited, a disgrace of which the first tyrant was naturally 
the first inventor. 9 In the end, dwarfs, and even wo- 
men, fought ; an enormity prohibited by Severus. Of 
these the most to be pitied, undoubtedly, were the bar- 
barian captives ; and to this species a Christian writer 10 
justly applies the epithet " innocent," to distinguish them 



1 DEAE NEMESI 
S1VE FORTVNAE 

PISTORIYS 

RVGIANVS 

V. C. LEG AT. 

LEG. XIII. G 

CORD. 

See Questiones Romanic, etc., Ap. Gra>v. Antiq. Roman 
torn. v. p. 942. See also Muratori. Nov. Thesaur. Inscript. 
Vet. torn. i. pp. 88, ■"!). where there are three Latin and one 
Greek inscription to Nemesis, and others to Fate. 

2 By the Abate Bracci, dissertazione sopra un clipeo-votivo, 
etc. Preface] pag. 7, who accounts for the cord round the 
neck, but not for the horn, which it does not appear the gla- 
diatcis themselves ever used. Note (A.) Storia delle arti, 
torn. ii. p. 805. 

3 Either Polifontes, herald of Laius. killed by CEdipus : or 
Cepreas, herald of Euriihens, killed by the Athenians when 
he endeavoured to drag the HeradidtB from the altar of 
mercy, and in whose honour they instituted annual games, 
continued to the time of Hadrian ; or Anthemncritus, the 
Athenian herald, killed by the Megarenses, who never recov- 
ered the impiety. Pee Storia delle arti, etc., loin. ii. pp. 20'!, 
904, 20:>, 906, 207. lib. ix. cap. ii. 

4 Storia. etc., torn. ii. p. 207. Not. (A.) 

5 " Vulneratum deficientem fecit in quo possit intelligl 
quantum restat animao." Plin. Nat. Hist, xxxiv. cap. 8. 

fi Antiq. torn. iii. par. 2. tab. 155. 

7 Race. atat. tab. 64. 

H Mus. Capitol, torn. iii. p. 154. edit. 1755. 

9 Julius Cesar, who rose by the fall of the aristocracy, 
brought Finius Leptinus and A. Cnlenus upon the arena. 

10 Tertullian ; " certo quidem et innocentes pladiatores in 
ludum veniunt, ut voluntatis publican hostiae riant " Just. 
Lips. Saturn. Sermon, lib. ii c ap. iii. 



CIIILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



129 



Ivom the professional gladiators. Aurelian and Claudius 
supplied great numbers of these unfortunate victims ; 
the one after his triumph, am! the othrr on the pretext 
of a rebellion. 1 No war, s;ivs Lipsiu::,- was ever so de- 
structive to the human race as these sports. In spite 
of the laws of Constantiue and Coiistans, gladiatorial 
shows survived the old established religion more than 
seventy years ; hut they owed their final extinction to 
the courage of a Christian. In the year 401, on the ka- 
lends of January, thev were exhibiting the shows in the 
Flavian amphitheatre before the usual immense con- 
course of people. Alinachius or Teleinacluis, an eastern 
monk, who hud travelled to Rome intent on his holy 
purpose, rushed into the midst of the area, and endea- 
voured to separate the combatants. The prator Alypius, 
a person incredibly attached to these games, 3 save instant 
orders to the gladiators to slay him ; and Telemachus 
gained the crown of martyrdom, and the title of saint, 
which surely has never, either before or since, been 
awarded for a more noble exploit. Honorius immedi- 
ately abolished the shows, which were never afterwards 
revived. The story is told by Theodoret* and Cassiodo- 
rus, b and seems worthy of credit, notwithstanding its 
place in the Roman martvrologv. Resides the torrents 
of blood which flowed at the funerals, in the amphi- 
theatres, the circus, the forums, and other public places, 
gladiators were introduced at feasts, and tore each other 
to pieces amidst the supper tables, to the great delight 
and applause of the guests. Yet Lipsius permits him- 
self to suppose the loss of courage, and the evident de- 
generacy of mankind, to be nearly connected with the 
abolition of these bloody spectacles. 7 

Note 61. Stanza cxlii. 

Here, where tlin Reman million's blame or praise 
\\ ;:s death or life, tlie playthings of a crowd. 

When one gladiator wounded another, he shouted 
" he has il" " hoc hahet," or " habet." The wounded 
combatant dropped his weapon, and, advancing to the 
edge of the arena, supplicated the spectators. If he had 
fought well, the people saved him ; if otherwise, or as 
they happened to be inclined, they turned down their 
thumbs, and be was slain. They were occasionally so 
savage, tnat they were impatient if a combat lasted 
longer than ordinary without wounds or death. The 
tor's presence generally saved the vanquished : and 
it is recorded as an instance of Caracalla's ferocity, that 
he sent those who supplicated him for life, in a spec- 
tacle at Nicomedia, to ask the people ; in other words, 
handed them over to be slain. A similar ceremony is 
observed at the Spanish bull-fights. The Magistrate pre- 



1 Vopiscns, in »it. Aureb an.l, in vit. Claud, ibid. 

2 "Credo, iroo scin, nullum helium tantam clatlem vastiti- 

••■II ti hurannp intuhase, qunm iios ad vomptaten 
ludos. Just. Lips. ibid. lih. i. cap. xii. 

:t (ueustinus, (lib. vi. confess, cup. viir.)"Alvpiom" strain 
m apectaeub inliiatu incredibiUtei abreptuin." scnlm. 
ibid. lib. i. cap. mi. 

4 lli-i Ecoles, cap. xxvi. lib. v. 

5 ' ..- -iml. Tripartita. I. x. r. xi. Pnturn. ih. lb. 

f! I'.rii.in.ii- ml ami. el in notisad Majtyrol. Rom. 1. Jan 
P ■ v, iransoni dalle rriemorie Sacra e profane dell' Amfiteatio 
Kluvio. p. 2">. edit. 174ti. 

7 " Hii.nl ! non Ul Lipsi momentum nliqimd hahuisse censes 
ad viiiiit.in ? Magnum. Tempore, nostra, nodule ipse* \idea- 
inns ( l ( ipidiim BCCe 11 rm in ah. nimvi- capture, direptum e-t 

tumuluu circa nos.non in nobis: .-i tamanconcid iset mr- 

bamnr. t'ln rnbar, ubi toi par annoa medttata sapioi 
dial uhi ille animus qui possil dicare, »i froctiu ULnbotur 
erhtsV etc. ihid., lib. ii. cap. xxv. The prototype of Air. 
Windham's panegyric on bull-baiune. 

P 22 



-ides; and, afier the horsemen and piccadores have 
fought the bull, the matadore steps forward and bows 
to him for permission to kill the animal. If the bull has 
done bis duty by killing two or three horses, or a man, 
which last is rare, the people interfere with shouts, the 
ladies wave their handkerchiefs, and the animal is saved. 
The wounds and death of the horses are accompanied 
with the loudest acclamations, and mr.ny gestures of 
delight, especially from the female portion of the audi- 
ence, including those of the gentlest blood/ I'-v' rv llnng 
depends on habit. The author of Chi We Harold, the 
writer of this note, and one or two other Englishmen, 
who have certainly in other days borne the sight of 3 
pitched battle, were, during the summer of 1809, in the 
governor's box at the great amphitheatre of Santa Ma- 
ria, opposite to Cadiz. The death of one or two horses 
completely satisfied their curiosity. A gentleman pre- 
sent, observing them shudder and look paie, noticed 
that unusual reception of so delightful a sport to some 
young ladies, who stared and smiled, and continued 
their applauses as another horse fell bleeding to the 
ground. One bull killed three horses off' his own horns. 
He was saved by acclamations, which were redoubled 
when it was known he belonged to a priest. 

An Englishman, who can be much pleased with see- 
ing two men beat themselves to pieces, cannot bear to 
look at a horse galloping round an arena with his 
bowels trailing on the ground, and turns from the spec 
tacle and spectators with horror and disgust. 
Note f>2. Stanza cxliv. 
Like laurels on the bald first Caesar's head. 

Suetonius informs us that Julius Caesar was particu- 
larly gratified by that decree of the senate, which en- 
abled him to wear a wreath of laurel on all occasions. 
He was anxious, not to show that he was the conqueror 
of the world, but to hide that he was bald. A stranger 
at Rome would hardly have guessed at the motive, nor 
should we without the help of the historian. 
Note 63. Stanza cxlv. 
"While stands the Coliseum, Home shall stand," etc. 

This is quoted in the Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire : and a notice on the Coliseum may be seen in 
the Historical Illustrations to the IVth Canto of Clulde 
Harold. 

Note C4. Stanza cxlvi. 
spared and blest by time. 

"Though plundered of all its brass, except the ring 
which was necessary to preserve the aperture above, 
though exposed to repeated fires, though sometimes 
Hooded by the river, and always open to the rain, no 
monument of equal antiquity is so well preserved as 
this rotunda. It passed with little alteration from the 
Pagan into the present worship ; and so convenient were 
its niches for the Christian altar, that Michael Angelo, 
ever studious of ancient beauty, introduced their de- 
sign as a model of the Catholic church." 

Forsyth's Remarks, etc., on Italy, p. 137. see. ediL 
Note H5. Stanza cxlvii. 

And they who feel for uenius may repose 
Theireyeson honour'd lories, whose bust* around them close 

The Pantheon has been made a receptacle for tho 

busts of modern great, or, at least, distinguished men. 

The flood of light which once fell through the large orn 

above on the whole circle of divinities, now slimes on 



130 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



a numerous assemblage of mortals, some one or two of 
whom have been almost deified by the veneration of 
their countrymen. 

Note 66. Stanza cxlviii. 
There is a dungeon, in whose dim drear light. 
This and the three next stanzas allude to the story of 
the Roman Daughter, which is recalled to the traveller, 
by the site or pretended site of that adventure now 
shown at the church of St. Nicholas in carcerc. The dif- 
ficulties attending the full belief of the tale, are stated 
in Historical Illustrations, etc. 

Note G7. Stanza clii. 
Turn to the mole which Hadrian reir'd on high. 
The castle of St. Angelo. See Historical Illustra- 
tions. 

Note G8. Stanza cliii. 
Butlo! the dome — the vast and wondrous dome. 
This and the six next stanzas have a reference to the 
church of St. Peter. For a measurement of the com- 
parative length of this basilica, and the other great 
churches of Europe, see the pavement of St. Peter's, 
and the Classical Tour through Italy, vol. ii. page 125, 
ct seep etiap. iv. 

Note C9. Stanza clxxi. 
-the strange fate 



Winch tambleE mightiest sovereigns, 
Mary died on the scaffold; Elizabeth of a broken 
heart ; Charles V. a hermit ; Louis XIV. a bankrupt in 
means and glory; Cromwell of anxiety ; and, — "the 
greatest is behind," — Napoleqnlives a prisoner. Tothese 
sovereigns a long but superfluous list might be added 
of names equally illustrious and unhappy. 
Note 70. Stanza clxxiii. 
Lo, Nemi ! navell'd in the woody hills. 
The village of Nemi was near the Arician retreat of 
Egeria, and, from the shades which embosomed the 
temple of Diana, has preserved to this day its distinctive 
appellation of The Grove. Nemi is but an evening's 
ride from the comfortable inn of Albano. 

Note 71. Stanza clxxiv. 



-and afar 



The Tiher winds, and the broad ocean laves 
The Latian coast, etc. etc. 

The whole declivity of the Alban hill is of unrivalled 
beauty, and from the convent on the highest point, 
which has succeeded to the temple of the Lariat) Jupiter, 
the prospect embraces all the objects alluded to in the 
cited stanza : the Mediterranean ; the whole scene of 
the latter half of the JEnoid ; and the coast from beyond 
the mouth of the Tiber to the headland of Circa;un) 
and the Cape of Terracina. 

The site of Cicero's villa may be supposed either at 
the Grotta Ferrata, or at the Tusculurn of Prince Lucien 
Buonaparte. 

The former was thought some years ago the actual 
site, as may be seen from Middleman's Life of Cicero. 
At present it has lost something of its credit, except for 
ale Domenichinos. Nine monks, of the Greek order, 
live there, and the adjoining villa is a cardinal's sum- 
mer-house. The other villa, called Rufinella, is on the 
summit of the hill above Frascati, and many rich re- 
mains of Tusculum have been found there, besides 
seventy-two statues of different merit and preservation, 
♦nd seven busts. 



From the same eminence are seen the Sabine hills, 
embosomed in which lies the long valley of Rustica. 
There are several circumstances which tend to establish 
the identity of this valley with the " Ustica" of Horace: 
and it seems possible that the mosaic pavement which 
the peasants uncover by throwing up the earth of a vine- 
yard, may belong to Ins villa. Rustica is pronounced 
short, not according to our stress upon — " Unlets 
eubantU. ,} — It is more rational to think that we are 
wrong, than that the inhabitants of this secluded val'ey 
have changed their tone in this word. The addition of 
the consonant prefixed is nothing : yet it is necessary to 
be aware that Rustica may be a modern name which 
the peasants may have caught from the antiquaries. 

The villa, or the mosaic, is in a vineyard on a knoll 
covered with chesnut trees. A stream runs down the 
valley, and although it is not true, as said in the guide- 
books, that this stream is called Licenza, yet there is a 
village on a rock at the head of the valley which is so 
denominated, and which may have taken its name from 
the Digentia. Licenza contains 700 inhabitants. On a 
peak a little way beyond is Civitella, containing 3f0. 
< >n the banks of the Anio, a little before you turn up 
into Valle Rustica, to the left, about an hour from the 
villa, is a town called Vico-varo, another favourable 
coincidence with the Varia of the poet. At the end 
of the valley, towards the Anio, there is a bare hill, 
crowned with a little town called Rardela. At the loot 
of this hill the rivulet of Licenza (lows, and is almost 
absorbed in a wide sandy bed before it reaches the Anio. 
Nothing can be more fortunate for the lines of the poet, 
whether in a metaphorical or direct sense : 

" Me qnotiens reficit gelidus Digentia rivus, 
Ciuom Mandela Mbit rugosus I'rigoir pages. 

The stream is clear high up the valley, but before it 
reaches the hill of Bardela looks green and yellow like 
a sulphur rivulet. 

Rocca Giovane, a ruined village in the hills, half an 
hour's walk from the vim yard where the pavement is 
shown, does seem to be the site of the fane of Vacuna, 
and an inscription found there tells that this temple of 
the Sabine victory was repaired by Vespasian.' With 
these helps, and a position corresponding exactly to 
every thing which the poet has told us of his retreat, 
we may feel tolerably secure of our site. 

The hill which should be Lucretilis is called Cam- 
panile, and by following up the rivulet to the pretended 
Ban lusia, vou come to the roots of the higher mountain 
Gennaro. Singularly enough, the only spot of ploughed 
land in the whole valley is on the knoll where this 
Bandusia rises, 

" To frigus amabile 

Testis venire' laiiris 

Pwcbes, el prrori vago." 

The peasants sine-., another spring nea* tV mosaic pave- 
ment, which they call "Oradina," ami which flows down 
the hills into a tank, or mill-dam, and thence trickles 
over into the Digentia. But we must not hope 

" To trace the Muses upwards to their spring," 
by exploring the windings of the romantic valley in 
search of the Bandusian fountain. It seems strange that 



] IMP. r.I'SAK VESPAS1 WVS 

PONTIPEX MAXIM VS. TRIB. 

POTEST. CENSOR. .TMU'.M 

VICTOKI/E. VF.TVST.VI T. Il.l. AI'SAM. 

SVA. IMl'ENSA. REST1TVIT. 



CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE. 



131 



any one should have thought Bandusia a fountain of the 
Digentia — Horace has not let drop a word of it ; and 
this immortal spring has, in fact, been discovered in pos- 
session of the holders of many good things in Italy, the 
monks. It was attached to the church of St. Gervais 
and Protais, near Venusia, where it was most likely to 
be found. 1 We shall not be so lucky as a late traveller 
in finding the occasional pine still pendant on the poetic 
villa. There is not a pine in the whole valley, but there 
are two cypresses, which he evidently took, or mistook, 
for the tree in the ode. 2 The truth is, that the pine is 
now, as it was in the days of Virgil, a garden tree, and 
it was not at all likely to be found in the craggy accliv- 
ities of the valley of Rustica: Horace pro&ably bad one 
of them in the orchard close above his farm, immediately 
overshadowing his villa, not on the rocky heights at some 
distance from his abode. The tourist may have easily 
supposed himself to have seen this pine figured in the 
above cypresses, for the orange and lemon-trees which 
throw such a bloom over his description of the royal 
gardens at Naples, unless they have been since displaced, 
were assuredly only acacias and other common garden 
shrubs. 3 The extreme disappointment experienced by 
choosing the Classical Tourist as a guide in Italy, must 
be allowed to find vent in a few observations, which, it 
is asserted without fear of contradiction, will be con- 
firmed by every one who has selected the same con- 
ductor through the same country. This author is, in (act, 
one of the most inaccurate, unsatisfactory writers that 
have in our times attained a temporary reputation, and is 
very seldom to be trusted even when he speaks of ob- 
jects which he must be presumed to have seen. His 
errors, from the simple exaggeration to the downright 
misstatement, are so frequent as to induce a suspicion 
that he had either never visited the spots described, or 
nad trusted to the fidelity of former writers. Indeed the 
Classical Tour has every characteristic of a mere com- 
pilation of former notices, strung together upon a very 
slender thread of personal observation, and swelled out 
by those decorations which are so easily supplied by a 
systematic adoption of all the commonplaces of praise, 
applied to everv thing, and therefore signifying nothing. 

The style which one person thinks cloggy and cum- 
brous, and unsuitable, may be to the taste of others, 
and such may experience some salutary excitement in 
ploughing through the periods of the Classical Tour. 
It must be said, however, that polish and weight are 
apt to beget an expectation of value. It is amongst the 
pains of the damned to toil up a climax with a huge 
round stune. 

The tourist had the choice of his words, but there 
was no such latitude allowed to that of his sentiments. 
The love of virtue and of liberty, which must have dis- 
tinguished the character, certainly adorns the pages of 
Mr. Eustace, and the gentlemanly spirit, so recom- 
mendatory either in an author or his productions, is very 
conspicuous throughout the Classical Tour. But these 
generous qualities are the foliage of such a performance, 
and may be spread about it so prominently and pro- 
fusely, as to embarrass those who wish to see and find 
the fruit at hand. The unction of the divine, and the 



1 P"e Historical Illustrations of the Fourth Canto, p. 43. 
1 Bee Classical Tour, etc. chap, vii. i>. 350. vol. ii. 
3 " Under inir windows, and bordering on tbe beach, is tlir 
royal (ardea, laid out in parterres, and walks shaded by rows 

of orajigu-uees." Classical Tour, etc., cliup. xi. vol. ii ocu 
365 



exhortations of the moralist, may have made this work 
something more and better than a book of travels, but 
they have not made it a book of travels; and this ob- 
servation applies more especially to that enticing method 
of instruction Conveyed by the perpetual introduction 
of the same Gallic Helot to reel and bluster before the 
rising generation, and terrify it into decency by the 
display of all (he excesses of the revolution. An ani 
mosity against atheists and regicides in general, and 
Frenchmen specifically, may be honourable, and may 
be useful, as a record ; but that antidote should either 
be administered in any work rather than a tour, or, at 
least, should be served up apart, and not so mixed with 
the whole mass of information and reflection, as 10 give 
a bitterness to every page: for who would choose to 
have the antipathies of any man, however just, for his 
travelling companions? A tourist, unless he aspires to 
the credit of prophecy, is nol answerable for the changes 
which may take place in the country w Inch he describes : 
but his reader mav very fairly esteem all his political 
portraits and deductions as so much waste paper, the 
moment they cease to assist, and more particularly if 
they obstruct, his actual survey. 

Neither encomium nor accusation of any government, 
or governors, is meant to be here offered ; but it is 
stated as an incontrovertible fact, that the change ope- 
rated, either by the address of the late imperial system, 
or bv the disappointment of every expectation by those 
who have succeeded to the Italian thrones, has been so 
considerable, and is so apparent, as not only to put Mr. 
Eustace's Antigalhcan philippics entirely out of date, 
but even to throw some suspicion upon the competency 
and candour of the author himself. A remarkable ex- 
ample may be found in the instance of Bologna, over 
whose papal attachments, and consequent desolation, 
the tourist pours forth such strains of condolence and 
revenge, made louder bv the borrowed trumpet of Mr. 
Burke. Now, Bologna is at this moment, and has 
been for some years, notorious amongst the states of 
Italy for its attachment to revolutionary principles, and 
was almost the only city which made any deinonstra 
tions in favour of the unfortunate Murat. This change 
mav, however, have been made since Mr. Eustace 
visited this country ; but the traveller whom he has 
thrilled with horror at the projected stripping of the 
copper from the cupola of St. Peter's, must be much 
relieved to find that sacrilege out of the power of the 
French, or any other plunderers, the cupola being cov- 
ered with lead. ' 

If the conspiring voice of otherwise rival critics had 
not given considerable currency to the Classical Tour, 
it would have been unnecessary to warn the reader, 
that, however it may adorn his library, it will De of little 
or no service to him in his carriage ; and if the judgment 
of those critics had hitherto been suspended, no attempt 
would have been made to anticipate their decision. As 
it is, those who stand in the relation of posterity to 
Mr. Eustace, may be permitted to appeal from cotcm- 
porary praises, and are perhaps more likely to bis just 



1 "Wlint, then, will bf> the astonishment, or rather tlw hor- 
ror of my render, when I inform hitn the Fiench 

Committee iun.nl its attention toSaim Peter's and employed 
a company of Jews to estimate and purchase the gold, stiver 
ami bronze, thai adorn the inside of the edifice, .is well aa 
ii... coppei 'Ii i' Cov< is i be vaults ami dome nn the outside." 
Chap. iv. p. 130. vol. ii. The story about the Jews is poni- 
tively denied ul Koiuo. 



132 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



in proportion as the causes of love and hatred are the] advice of returning travellers, induced to aoandon his 



farther removed. This appeal had, in some measure, 
been made before the above remarks were written ; for 
one of the most respectable of the Florentine publishers, 
who had been persuaded by the repeated inquiries of 
tnose on their journey southwards, to reprint a cheap 
edition of the Classical Tour, was, by the concurring 



lesign, although he had alrea ';. arranged bis types a*4 

paper, and bad struck off one or two of the first sheets. 
The writ' r of these notes would wish to pun (like 
Mr. Gibbon) on good terms with the Pope and the Car- 
dinals, but he does not think it oecessary to extend the 
same discreet silence to their humble partisans. 



®\it &iaour; 

A FRAGMENT OF A TURKISH TALE. 



One fatal remembrance — one sorrow that throws 
Its bleat shade alike o'er our joys and our woes — 
To which life nothing darker nor brighter, can bring, 
For which joy hath no balm, and affliction no sting. 

MOURE. 



TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ. 

AS A SLIGHT BUT MOST SINCERE TOKEN OF ADMIRATION OF HIS GENIUS 

RESrECT FOR HIS CHARACTER, AND GRATITUDE FOR HIS FRIENDSHIP; 

THIS PRODUCTION IS INSCRIBED, 

BY HIS OBLIGED AND AFFECTIONATE SERVANT, 

BYRON. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The Tale which these disjointed fragments present, is 
founded upon circumstances now less common in the 
East than formerly ; either because the ladies are 
more circumspect than in the " olden time ;" or be- 
cause the Christians have better fortune, or less en- 
terprise. The story, when entire, contained the 
adventures of a female slave, who was thrown, in the 
Mussulman manner, into the sea for infidelity, and 
avenged by a young Venetian, her lover, at the time 
the Seven Islands were possessed by the Republic of 
Venice, and soon after the Arnaouts were beaten back 
from the Morea, which they had ravaged for some 
time subsequent to the Russian invasion. The deser- 
tion of the Mainotes, on being refused the plunder of 
M sitra, led to the abandonment of that enterprise, 
and to the desolation of the Morea, during which the 
cruelty exercised on all sides was unparalleled even 
in the annals of the faithful. 



THE GIAOUR. 



No breath of air to break the wave 
That rolls below the Athenian's grave, 
That tomb ' which, gleaming o'er the cliff, 
First greets the homeward-veering skiff, 
High o'er the land he saved in vain : 
When shall such hero live again ? 



Fair clime ! where every season smiles 
Benignant o'er those blessed isles, 
Which, seen from far Colonna's height, 
Make glad the heart that hails the sight, 
And lend to loneliness delight. 
There, mildlv dimpling, Ocean's cheek 
Reflects the tints of many a peak 
Caught by the laughing tides that lave 
These Edens of the eastern wave ; 
And if, at times, a transient breeze 
Break the blue crystal of the seas, 
Or sweep one blossom from the trees, 
ITiw welcome is each gentle air 
That wakes and wafts the odours there ! 
For there — the rose o'er crag or vale, 
Sultana of the nightingale,? 

The maid for whom his melody, 
His thousand songs are heard on high, 
Blooms blushing to her lover's tale : 
His queen, the garden queen, his rose, 
Unbent by winds, unchill'd by snows, 
Far from the winters of the west, 
By every breeze and season blest, 
Returns the sweets by Nature given, 
In softest incense back to heaven ; 
And grateful yields that smiling sky 
Her fairest hue and fragrant sigh. 
And many a summer flower is there, 
And many a shade that love might share, 
And many a grotto, meant for rest, 
That holds the pirate for a guest ; 
Whose bark in sheltering cove below 
Lurks for the passing peaceful prow, 
Till the gay mariner's guitar 3 
Is heard, and seen the evening star; 





THE GIAOUR. 


133 


Then stealing with the muffled oar, 


Was freedom's home or glory's grave ! 






Far shaded by the rocky shore, 


Shrine of the mighty ! can it be, 






Hush the night-prowle« on the |>rey, 


Thai this is all n mains of thee? 






And turn to groans his roundelay. 


Approach, thou craven crouching slave: 






Strange — that where Nature loved to trace, 


Say, is not this Thermopylae? 






As if for gods, a dwelling-place,. 


These waters blue ihat round you lave, 






And cverv charm and grace hath mix'd 


Oh Servile offspring of the free — 






Within the paradise she fix'd, 


Pronounce what sea, what shore is this ' 






There man, enainourM of distress, 


The gulf, the rock of Sfelarrris ! 






Should mar it into wilderness, 


These seines, their story not unknown, 






And trample, brute-like, o'er each flower 


Arise, and make again your own ; 






That tasks not one laborious hour; 


Snatch from the ashes of your sires 






Nor claims the culture of his hand 


The embers of their former fires ; 






To bloom along the fairy laud, 


And he who iii the strife expires 






But springs as to preclude his care, 


VVill add to theirs a name of feai 






And sweetly woos him — but to spare! 


That tyranny shall quake to heai, 






Strange — that where all is peace beside 


And leave his sons a hope, a fame 






There passion riots in her pride, 


They too will rather die than shame : 






And lust and rapine wildly reign 


For freedom's battle once begun, 






To darken o'er the fair domain. 


Bequeath'd by bleeding sire to son, 






It is as though the fiends prevail'd 


Though baffled oft, is ever won. 






Against the seraphs they assail'd, 


Bear witness, Greece, thy living page, 






And, fix'd on heavenly thrones, should dwell 


Attest it many a deathless age ! 






The freed inheritors of hell ; 


While kings, in dusty darkness hid, 






So soft the scene, so form'd for joy, 


Have left a nameless pyramid, 






So curst the tyrants that destroy ! 


Thy heroes, though the general doom 
Hath swept the column from their tomb, 






He who hath bent him o'er the dead, 


A mightier monument command, 






Ere the first day of death is fled, 


The mountains of their native land! 






The first dark day of nothingness, 


There points thy muse to stranger's eye 






The last of danger and distress, 


The graves of those that cannot die ! 






(Befoce decay's effacing fingers 


'T were long to tell, and sad to trace, 






Have swept the lines where beauty lingers), 


Each step from splendour to disgrace ; 






And mark'd the mild angelic air, 


Enough — no foreign foe could quell 






The rapture of repose that's there, 


Thy soul, till from itself it fell ; 






The fix'd, yet tender traits that streak 


Yes ! self-abasement paved the way 






The languor of the placid cheek, 


To villain-bonds and despot-sway. 






An d — but for that sad shrouded eve, 








That fires not, wins not, weeps not, now, 


What can he tell who treads thy shore? 






And but for that chill, changeless brow, 


No legend of thine olden time, 






Where cold obstruction's apathy 4 


No theme on which the muse might soar, 






Appals the gazing mourner's heart, 


High as thine own in days of yore, 






As if to him it could impart 


When man was worthy of thy clime. 






The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon ; 


The hearts within thy valleys bred, 






Yes, but for these, and these alone, 


The fiery souls that might have led 






Some moments, ay, one treacherous hour, 


Thy sons to deeds sublime, 






He still might doubt the tyrant's power ; 


Now crawl from cradle to the grave, 






So fair, so oalm, so softly scal'd, 


Slaves — nay, the bondsmen of a slave, 






The first, last look by death reveal'd ! 5 


And callous, save to crime ; 






Such is the aspect of this shore ; 


Stain'd with each evil that pollutes 






'T is Greece, but living Greece no more !' 


Mankind, where least above the brutes. 






So coldly sweet, so deadly fair, 


Without even savage virtue blest, 






We start, for soul is wanting there. 


Without one free or valiant breast. 






Hers is the loveliness in death, 


Still to the neighbouring ports they waft 






That patts not quite with parting breath ; 


Proverbial wiles, and ancient craft; 






But beauty with that fearful bloom, 


In this the subtle Greek is found, 






That line which haunts it to the tomb, 


For this, and this alone, rcneww'd. 


** 




Expression's last receding rav, 


In vain might liberty invoke 






A gilded halo hovering round decay, 


The spirit to its bondage broke, 






The farewell beam of feeling past awav ! 


Or raise the neck that courts the yoke 






Spark of that flame, perchance of heavenly birth, 


No more her sorrows I bewail, 






Which gleams, but warms no nice its chcrish'd earth ! 


Yet this w ill he a mournful tale, 
And they who listen may believe, 






Clime of the urifornotten brave! 


Who heard it first had cause to grieve 






Whose land from plain to n:ountain-cave 
P2 


*****»» 





134 



BYRON S WORKS. 



Far, dark, along the blue-sea glancing, 
The shadows of the rocks advancing, 
Start on the fisher's eye like boat 
Of island- pirate or Mainotej 
And, fearful for his light caique, 
He shuns the near, but doubtful creek: 
Though worn and weary with his toil, 
And cumber'd with his scaly spoil, 
Slowly, yet strongly, plies the o:.r, 
Till Port Leone's safer shore 
Receives him by the lovely light 
That best becomes an eastern night. 

+ ***** + 

Who thundering comes on blackest steed, 
With slacken'd bit, and hoof of speed? 
Beneath the clattering iron's sound, 
The cavcrn'd echoes wake around 
In lash for lash, and bound for bound ; 
The foam that streaks the courser's side 
Seems gather'd from the ocean-tide ; 
Though weary waves are sunk to rest, 
There 's none within his rider's breast ; 
And though to-morrow's tempest lower, 
'Tis calmer than thy heart, young Giaour! 7 
I know thee not, I loathe thy race, 
But in thy lineaments I trace 
What time shall strengthen, not efface : 
Though young and pale, that sallow front 
Is scathed by fiery passion's brunt ; 
Though bent on earth thine evil eye, 
As meteor-like thou glidest by, 
Right well 1 view and deem thee one 
Whom Olhman's sons should slay or shun. 

On — on he hastened, and he drew 
My gaze of wonder as he (lew : 
Though like a demon of the night 
He pass'd and vanish'd from my sight, 
His aspect and his air impress'd 
A troublod memory on my breast, 
And long upon my startled ear 
Rung his dark courser's hoofs of fear. 
He spurs his steed ; he nears the steep, 
That, jutting, shadows o'er the deep ; 
He winds around ; he hurries by ; 
The rock relieves him from mine eye ; 
For well I ween unwelcome he 
Whose glance is fix'd on those that flee ; 
And not a star but shines too bright 
On him who takes such timeless flight. 
He wound along ; but, ere he pass'd, 
One glance he snatch'd, as if his last, 
A moment check'd his wheeling steed, 
A moment breathed him from his speed, 
A moment on his stirrup stood — 
Why looks hb o'er the olive-wood ? 
The crescent glimmers on the hill, 
The mosque's high lamps are quivering still : 
Though too remote for sound to wake 
In echoes of the far tophaike, 8 
Tl c flashes of each joyous peal 
Are seen to prove the Moslem's zeal. 
To- night, set Rhamazani's sun ; 
lo night the Bairam feast's begun ; 
To- night — but woo and what art thou, 
01 foreign garb and fearful brow ? 



And what are these to thine or t'.iec, 

Thu: th u shouldst either pauoe or flee 7 

He stood — some dread was on his face, 

Soon hatred settled in its pldCj: 

It rose not with the reddening flush 

Of transient anger's darkening Mush, 

But pale as marble o'er the tomb, 

Whose ghastly whiiene&s aids its gloom. 

His brow was bent, his eye was glazed, 

He raised his arm, and fiercely raise. I, 

And sternly shook his hand on high, 

As doubting to return or flv : 

Impatient of his flight dclay'd, 

Here loud his raven charger neigli'd — 

Down glanced that hand, and grasp'd his blade ■ 

That sound had burst his waking dream, 

As slumber starts at owlet's scream. 

The spur hath lanced his courser's sides ; 

Away, away, for life he rides; 

Swift as the hurl'd on high jerreed, ' 

Springs to the touch his startled steed ; 

The rock is doubled, and the shore 

Shakes with the clattering tramp no mora; 

The crag is won, no more is seen 

His Christian crest and haughty mien. 

'T was but an instant he rcstrain'd 

That fiery barb so sternly rein'd: 

'T was but a moment that he stood, 

Then sped as if by death pursued ; 

But in that instant o'er his soul 

Winters of memory seem'd to roll, 

And gather in that drop of time 

A life of pain, an age of crime. 

O'er him who loves, or hates, or fears, 

Such moment pours the grief of years: 

What felt he then, at once opprest 

By all that most distracts the breast ? 

That pause, which ponder'd o'er his fate, 

Oh, who its dreary length shall date ! 

Though in time's record nearly nought, 

It was eternity to thought ! 

For infinite as boundless space 

The thought that conscience must embrace, 

Which in itself can comprehend 

Woe without name, or hope, or end. 

The hour is past, the Giaour is gone ; 
And did he fly or fall alone ? 
Woe to that hour he came or went! 
The curse for Hassan's sin was sent, 
To turn a palace to a tomb : 
He came, he went, like the simoom, 10 
That harbinger of fate and gloom, 
Beneath whose widely-wasting breath 
The very cypress droops to death — 
Dark tree, still sad when others' grief is fled, 
The only constant mourner o'er the dead ! 

The steed is vanish'd from the stall ; 
No serf is seen in Hassan's hall ; 
The lonely spider's thin gray pall 
Waves slowly widening o'er the wall ; 
The ba* builds in his haram bower ; 
And in the fortress of his power 
The owl usurps the beacon-towci ; 
The wild-dog howls o'er the fountain's brim, 
With baffled thirst, and famine «rim ; 



-I 



THE GIAOUR. 



.35 



For the stream has shrunk from its marble bed, 

Where the weeds and the desolate dust are spread, 

'Twas sweet of yore to see it play 

And chase the sultriness of day, 

As, springing high, the silver dew 

In whirls fantastically llcw, 

And flung luxurious coolness round 

The air, and verdure o'er the ground. 

'Twas sweet, when cloudless stars were bright, 

To view the wave of watery light, 

And hear its melody by night, 

Ami oft had Hassan's childhood play'd 

Around the verge of that cascade; 

And oft upon his mother's breast 

That sound had harmonized his rest ; 

And oft had Hassan's youth along 

Its bank been soothed by beauty's song ; 

And softer seetn'd each melting tone 

Of music mingled with its own. 

Rut ne'er shall Hassan's age repose 

Along the brink at twilight's close : 

The stream that fill'd that font is fled — 

The blood that warm'd his heart is shed ! 

And here no more shall human voice 

Be heard to rage, regret, rejoice ; 

The last sad note that swell'd the gale 

Was woman's wildest funeral wail : 

That quenched in silence, all is still, 

Hut the lattice that flaps when the wind is shrill: 

Though raves the gust, and floods the rain, 

Nu hand shall close its clasp again. 

On desert sands 't were joy to scan 

The rudest steps of fellow man — 

So here the very voice of grief 

Might wake an echo like relief; 

At least 't would say, " all are not gone ; 

"There lingers life, though but in one — " 

For many a gilded chamber 's there, 

Which solitude might well forbear; 

Within that dome as jet decay 

Hath slowly work'd her cankering way — 

But gloom is gathered o'er the gate, 

Nor there the fakir's self will wait; 

Nor there will wandering dervise slay, 

For bounty cheers not his delav ; 

Nor there will weary stranger halt 

To bless the sacred " bread and salt." " 

Alike must wealth and poverty 

Pass heedless and unheeded by, 

For courtesy and pity died 

With Hassan on the mountain side. 

His roof, that refuge unto men, 

Is desolation's hungry den. 
""he guest flies the hall, and the vassals from labour, 
Since his turban was cleft by the infidel's sabre! " 



I hear the sound of coming feet, 
But not a voice mine ear to greet ; 
More near — each turban I can scan, 
And silver-sheathed ataghan ; 13 
The foremost of the band is seen, 
An emir bv his garb of green : '* 
" Ho! who art thou? — this low salam 14 
Replies of Moslem faith I am. 



The burthen ye so gently bear, 
Seems one that claims your utmost ruro, 
And, doubtless, nolds some precious freight, 
My humble bark would gladly wait." 

"Thou speakcst sooth, thy skiff unmoor, 
And waft us from the silent shore ; 
Nay, leave the sail still fnrl'd, and ply 
The nearest oar that's scattcr'd bv ; 
And midway to those rocks where sleep 
The channell'd waters dark and deep, 
Rest from your task — so — bravely done, 
Our course has been right swiftly run ; 
Yet 't is the longest voyage, I trow, 
That one of " 



Sullen it plunged, and slowly s:ink, 
The calm wave rippled to the bank ; 
I watch'd it as it sank, methought 
Some motion from the current caught 
Bestirr'd it more, — 't was but the beam 
That chequer'd o'er the living stream : 
I gazed, till vanishing from view, 
Like lessening pebble it withdrew ; 
Still less and less, a speck of white 
That gemm'd the tide, then mock'd the sigh' j 
And all its hidden secrets sleep, 
Known but to genii of the deep, 
Which, trembling in their coral caves 
They dare not whisper to the waves. 



As rising on its purple wing 
The insect-queen 16 of eastern spring, 
O'er emerald meadows of Kashmeer 
Invites the young pursuer near, 
And leads him on from flower to flower 
A weary chase and wasted hour, 
Then leaves him, as it soars on hign, 
With panting heart and tearful eye: 
So beauty lures the full-grown child, 
With hue as bright, and wing as wild , 
A chase of idle hopes and fears, 
Begun in folly, closed in tears. 
If won, to equal ills betray'd, 
Woe waits the insect and the maid ; 
A life of pain, the loss of peace, 
From infant's play, and man's caprice; 
The lovely toy so fiercely sought 
Hath lost its charm by being caught. 
For every touch that wooed its stay 
Hath brush'd its brightest hues away, 
Till, charm, and hue, and beauty gone, 
'T is left to fly or fall alone. 
With wounded wing, or bleeding bn-ast, 
Ah ! where shall either victim rest? 
C?n this with faded pinion soar 
From rose to tulip as before ? 
Or beauty, blighted in an hour, 
Find joy within her broken bower I 
No : gayer insects fluttering by 
Ne'er droop the wing o'er those that d.e, 
And lovelier things have mercy shown 
To every failing but their own, 



3G 



BYRON'S WORKS 



And every woe a tear can claim 
' it an erring sister's shame. 



The mind, that broods o'er guilty woes, 

Is like the scorpicn girt by fire, 
In circle narrowing as it glows, 
The flames around their captive close, 
Till, inly searchkl by thousand throes, 

And maddening in her ire, 
One sad and sole relief she knows, 
The sting she nourish'd for her foes, 
Whose venom never ye! was vain, 
Gives but one pang, and cures all pain, 
And darts into her despi rate brain: 
So do the dark in soul expire, 
Or live like scorpion girt by fire ; ,T 
So writhes the mind remorse hath riven, 
Unfit for earth, undooni'd fir heaven, 
Darkness above, despair beneath, 
Around it flame, within it death ! 

****** 

Black Hassan from the haram flics, 
Nor bends on woman's form his eyes ; 
The unwonted chase each hour employs, 
Yet shares he not the hunter's joys. 
Not thus was Hassan wont to fly 
When Leila dwelt in his Serai. 
Doth Leila there no longer dwell? 
Thai tale can only Hassan tell: 
Strange rumours in our city say 
Upon that eve she fled away, 
When Rhamuzan's lS last sun was set, 
And, flashing from each minaret, 
Millions of lamps procfaim'd the feast 
Of Bairam through the boundless east. 
*T was then she went as to the bath, 
Which Hassan vainly search'd in wrath ; 
For she was flown her master's rage, 
In likeness of a Georgian page, 
And far beyond the Moslem's power 
Had wrong'd him with the faithless Giaour. 
Sofnewhat of this had Hassan deem'd; 
But still so fond, so fair she seem'd, 
Too well he trusted to the slave 
Whose treachery deserved a grave: 
And on that eve bad gone to mosque, 
And thence to feast in his kiosk. 
Such is the tale his Nubians tell, 
Who did not watch their charge too well ; 
But others say, that on that night, 
By pale Phin^ari's IU trembling light, 
The Giaour upon his jet-black steed 
Was seen, but seen alone to speed 
With bloody spur along the shore, 
Nor muid nor page behind him bore. 

****** 

Her eve's dark charm 't were vain to tell, 
But gaze on that of the gazelle, 
I't will assist thy fancy well ; 
As f<jrge, as languishingly dark, 
Tut kouI beam'd forth in every spark 
That darted from beneath the lid, 
Bngiii as the jewel of G'amschid. 20 



Yea, soul, and should our prophet say 

That form was nought but breathing clay, 

By Alia! I would answer nay; 

Though on Al-Sirat's"' arch I stood, 

Which totters o'er the fiery flood, 

With paradise within my view, 

And all his houris beckoning through. 

Oh! who young Leila's glance could lead, 

And keep thai portion of his creed - J 

Which saith that woman is but dust, 

A soulless toy for tyrant's lust 7 

On her might muftis gaze, and own 

That through her eye the Immortal shone ; 

On her fair cheek's unfading hue 

The young pomegranate's 23 blossoms strew 

Their bloom in blushes ever new ; 

Her hair in hyacinthine 24 flow, 

When left to roll its folds below, 

As 'midst her handmaids in the hall 

She stood superior to them all, 

Hath swept the marble where her feet 

Gleam'd whiter than the mountain sleet, 

Ere from the cloud that gave it birth 

It fell, and caught one stain of earth. 

The cygnet nobly walks the wa4er; 

So moved on earth Circassia's daughter, 

The loveliest bird of Franguestan ! 2i 

As rears her crest the ruffled swan, 

And spurns ihe wave with wings of pride, 
When pass the steps of stranger man 

Along the banks that bound her tide ; 
Thus rose fair Leila's whiter neck : — 
Thus arm'il with beauty would she check 
Intrusion's glance, till folly's gaze 
Shrunk from the charms it meant to praise. 
Thus high and graceful was her gait; 
Her heart as tender to her mate ; 
Her mate — stern Hassan, who was he? 
Alas! that name was not for thee ! 

****** 

Stern Hassan hath a journey ta'en, 
With twenty vassals in his train, 
Each arm'd, as best becomes a man, 
With arquebuss and ataghan ; 
The chief before, as deek'd for war, 
Bears in h:s belt the scimitar 
Stain'd with the best of Arnaut blood, 
When in the pass the rebels stood, 
And few return'd to tell the tale 
Of what befell in Fame's vale. 
The pistols which his girdle bore 
Were those that once a pacha wore, 
Which still, though gemm'd and boss'd with golii. 
Even robbers tremble to behold. 
'Tis said he goes to woo a bride 
More true than her who left his side ; 
The faithless slave that broke her bower, 
And, worse than faithless, for a Giaour ! 
****** 

The sun's last rays are on the hill, 
And sparkle in the fountain rill, 
Whose welcome waters, cool and clear, 
Draw blessings from the mountaineer: 
Here may the loitering merchant Greek 
Find that repose 'twere vain to seek 



THE GIAOUR. 



137 



In cities lodged too near his lord, 
And trembling for his secret hoard — 
Here may he rest where none can see, 
In crowds a slave, in deserts free ; 
And with forbidden wine may slain 
The bowl a Moslem must not drain. 



The foremost Tartar 's in the gap, 
Conspicuous by his yellow cap ; 
The rest in lengthening line the while 
Wind slowly through the long defile : 
Above, the mountain rears a peak, 
Where vultures whet the thirsty beak, 
And theirs may be a feast to-night, 
Shall tempt them down ere morrow's light ; 
Beneath, a river's wintry stream 
Has shrunk before the summer beam, 
And .eft a channel bleak and bare, 
Save shrubs that spring to perish there : 
Each side the midway path there lay 
Small broken crags of granite gray, 
By time, or mountain lightning, riven 
From summits clad in mists of heaven ; 
For where is he that hath beheld 
The peak of Liakura unveil'd ? 



They reach the grove of pine at last: 
" Bismillah ! - s now the peril 's past ; 
For yonder view the opening plain, 
And there we '11 prick our steeds amain:" 
The Chiaus spake, and as he said, 
A bullet whistled o'er his head ; 
The foremost Tartar bites the ground ! 

Scarce had they time to check the rein, 
Swift from their steeds the riders bound ; 

But three shall never mount again: 
[Jnseen the foes that gave the wound, 

The dying ask revenge in vain. 
With steel unsheathed, and carbine bent, 
Some o'er their coursers' harness leant, 

Half shelter'd by the steed ; 
Some fly behind the nearest rock, 
And there await the coming shock, 

Nor tamely stand to bleed 
Beneath the shaft of foes unseen, 
Who dare not quit their craggy screen. 
Stern Hassan only from his horse 
Disdains to light, and keeps his course, 
Till fiery flashes in the van 
Proclaim too sure the robber-elan 
Have well secured the only way 
Could now avail the promised prey; 
Then curl'd his very beard -' with ire, 
And glared his eye with fiercer tire : 
" Though far and near the bullets hiss, 
I 've soaped a bloodier hour than this." 
And now the foe their covert quit, 
Arid call his vassals to submit ; 
But Hassan's frown and furious word 
Are dreaded more than hostile sword, 
Nor of his little band a man 
Resign'd carbine or aughan, 
Nor raised the craven cry, Amaiin I " 
'13 



In fuller sight, inure near and near, 
The lute |y auibush'd foes appear, 
And, issuing from the grove, advance 
Some who on battle-charger prance. 
Who leads them on with foreign brand. 
Far Hashing in hi.; red right hand? 
" 'T is he ! 't is he ! I know him now ; 
I know him by his pallid brow ; 
I know him bv the evil eve 28 
That aids Ins envious treachery ; 

I know him by his jet-black b:irl> : 
Though now array'd in Arnaut garb, 
Apostate from his own vile faith, 

II shall not save him from the death : 
'T is he! well met in any hour ! 
Lost Leila's love, accursed Giaour!" 

As rolls the river into ocean, 
In sable torrent wildly streaming ; 

As the sea-tide's opposing motion, 
In azure column proudly gleaming, 
Beats back the current many a rood. 
In curling foam and mingling flood, 
While eddying whirl, and breaking wave, 
Roused bv the blast of winter, rave ; 
Through sparkling spray, in thundering clasn, 
The lightnings of the waters flash 
In awful whiteness o'er the shore, 
That shines and shakes beneath the roar ; 
Thus — as the stream and ocean greet, 
With waves that madden as they meet — 
Thus join the bands, whom mutual wrong, 
And fate, and fury, drive along. 
The bickering sabres' shivering jar, 

And pealing wide or ringing near 

Its echoes on the throbbing ear, 
The death-shot hissing from afar, 
The shock, the shout, the groan of war 

Reverberate along that vale, 

More suited to the shepherd's tale : 
Though few the numbers — theirs the strife, 
That neither spares nor speaks for life ! 
Ah ! fondly youthful hearts ran press, 
To seize and share the dear caress; 
But love itself could never pant 
For all that be&Uty sighs to grant 
With half the fervour hate bestows 
Upon the last embrace of foes, 
When grappling in the fight they fold 
Those arms that ne'er shall loose their In Id 
Friends meet to part ; love laughs at faith. 
True foes, once met, are join'd till death ! 
******* 

With sabre shiver'd to the hilt, 
Yet dripping with the blood he spil* ; 
Yet strain'd within the sever'd hand 
Which quivers round, that faithless brand; 
His turban far behind him roll'd, 
And cleft in twain its firmest fold ; 
His flowing robe by falchion torn, 
And crimson as those clouds of morn 
That, streak'd with dusky red, portend 
The day shall have a stormy end; 
A stain on every bush that bore 
A fragment of his nalampore, 50 



133 



BYRON'S WORKS 



His breast with wounds unnumbcr'd riven, 
His buck to earth, his face to heaven, 
Fallen Hassan lies — iiis unclosed eye 
Yet lowering on his enemy, 
As if the hour that seal'd his fate 
Surviving left h'u quenchless hate ; 
And o'er him bends that foe wilh brow 
As dark as his that bled below. — 



" Yes, Leila sleeps beneath the wave, 
But his shall be a redder grave ; 
Her spirit pointed well the steel 
Which taught that felon heart to feel. 
He call'd the Prophet, but his power 
Was vain against the vengeful Giaour 
He call'd on Alia — but the word 
Arose unheeded or unheard. 
Thou Paynim fool ! could Leila's prayer 
Be pass'd, and thine accorded there ? 
I watch'd my time, I leagued with these, 
The traitor in his turn to seize ; 
My wrath is wreak'd, the deed is done, 
And now I go— but go alone." 



The browzing camels' bells are tinkling : 
His mother look'd from her lattice high — 

She saw the dews of eve besprinkling 
The pasture green beneath her eye, 

She saw the planets faintly twinkling: 
" 'T is twilight — sure his train is nigh." 
She could not rest in the garden-bower, 
But gazed through the grate of his steepest tower 
' Why comes he not? his steeds are fleet, 
Nor shrink they from the summer heat ; 
Wiry sends not the bridegroom his promised gift? 
Is his heart more cold, or his barb less swift ? 
Oh, false reproach ! yon Tartar now 
Has gain'd our nearest mountain's brow, 
And warily the steep descends, 
And now within the valley bends ; 
And he bears the gift at his saddle-bow — 
How could I deem his courser slow? 
Right well my largess shall repay 
His welcome speed, and weary way." 
The Tartar lighted at the gate, 
But scarce upheld his fainting weight: 
His swarthy visage spake distress, 
But this might be from weariness ; 
His garb with sanguine spots was dyed, 
But these might be from his courser's side ; 
He drew the token from his vest — 
Angel of Death ! 't is Hassan's cloven crest ! 
His calpac 31 rent — his caftan red — 
" Lady, a fearful bride thyieon hath wed : 
Me, not front mercy, did they spare, 
But this empurpled pledge to bear. 
Peace to the brave ! whose blood is spilt : 
Woe to the Giaour! for his the guilt." 



A turban 32 carved in coarsest stone, 
A pillar with rank weeds o'ergrown, 



Whereon can now be scarcely read 

The Koran verse that mounts the dead. 

Point out the spot where Hassan fell 

A victim in that lonely detL 

There sleeps as true an Osmanli 

As e'er at Mecca bent the knee ; 

As ever scorn'd forbidden v. ine, 

Or pray'd with face towards the shrine, 

In orisons resumed anew 

At solemn sound of "Alia Hu ! " 33 

Yet died he by a stranger's hand, 

And stranger in his native land ; 

Yet died he as in arms he stood, 

And unavenged, at least in blood. 

But him the maids of paradise 

Impatient to their halls invite, 
And the dark heaven of Houri's eves 

On him shall glance for ever bright ; 
They come — their kerchiefs green they wave, 
And welcome with a kiss the brave ! 
Who falls in battle 'gainst a Giaour 
Is worthiest an immortal bower. 



But thou, false infidel ! shall writhe 
Beneath avenging Monkir's 35 scythe; 
And from its torment 'scape alone 
To wander round lost Eblis' •"> throne ; 
And fire unquench'd, unquenchable, 
Around, within, thy heart shall dwell ; 
Nor ear can hear nor tongue can tell 
The tortures of that inward hell ! 
But first, on earth as vampire 3T sent, 
Thy corse shall from its tomb be rent : 
Then ghastly haunt thy native place, 
And suck the blood of all thy race ; 
There from thy daughter, sister, wife, 
At midnight drain the stream of life ; 
Yet loathe the banquet which perforce 
Must feed thy livid living corse : 
Thy victims ere they yet expire 
Shall know the demon for their sire, 
As cursing thee, thou cursing them, 
Thy Mowers are wither'd on the stem. 
But one that for thy crime must fall, 
The youngest, most beloved of all, 
Shall bless thee with a father's name — 
That word shall wrap thy heart in name ! 
Yet must thou end thy task, and mark 
Her cheek's last tinge, her eye's last spark, 
And the last glassy glance must vifcw 
Which freezes o'er its lifeless blue ; 
Then with unhallow'd hand shalt tear 
The tresses of her yellow hair, 
Of which in life a lock, when shorn, 
Affection's fondest pledge was worn ; 
But now is borne away by thee, 
Memorial of thine agony ! 
Wet with thine own best blood shall urip '• 
Thy gnashing tooth and haggard lip ; 
Then, stalking to thy sullen grave, 
Go — and with Gouls and Afrits rave ; 
Till these in horror shrink away 
From spectre more accursed than they ! 



THE GIAOUR. 



139 



" How name ye yon lone Caloyer? 

His features I have scann'd before 
In mine own land : 't is many a year, 

Since, dashing by the lonely shore, 
I saw him urge as fleet a steed 
As ever served a horseman's need. 
But once I saw that face, yet then 
It was so mark'd with inward pain, 
I could not pass it by again ; 
It breathes the same dark spirit now, 
As death were stamp'd upon his brow." 

" 'T is twice three years at summer-tide 
Since first among our freres he came ; 
And here it soothes him to abide 

For some dark deed he will not name. 
But never at our vesper prayer, 
Nor e'er before confession chair 
Kneels he, nor recks he when arise 
Incense or anthem to the skies, 
But broods within his cell alone, 
nis faith and race alike unknown. 
The sea from Paynim land he crost, 
And here ascended from the coast ; 
Yet seems he not of Othman raoe, 
But only Christian in his face : 
I 'd judge him some stray renegade. 
Repentant of the change he made, 
Save that he shuns our holy shrine, 
Nor tastes the sacred bread and wine. 
Great largess to these walls he brought, 
And thus our abbot's favour bought : 
But, were I prior, not a day 
Should brook such stranger's further stay, 
Or, pent within our penance cell, 
Should doom him there for aye to dwell. 
Much in his visions mutters he 
Of maiden whelm'd beneath the sea ; 
Of sabres clashing, foemen flying, 
Wrongs avenged, and Moslem dying. 
On cliff he hath been known to stand, 
And rave as to some bloody hand 
Fresh sever'd from its parent limb, 
Invisible to all but him, 
Which beckons onward to his grave, 
And lures to leap into the wave." 



Dark and unearthly is the scowl 

That glares beneath his dusky cowl: 

The flash of that dilating eye 

Reveals too much of times gone by ; 

Though varying, indistinct its hue, 

Oft will his glante the gazer rue, 

For in it lurks that nameless spell 

Which speaks, itself unspeakable, 

A spirit yet unquell'd and high, 

That claims and keeps ascendancy; 

And like the bird whose pinions quake, 

But cannot fly the gazing snake, 

Will others quail beneath his look, 

Nor 'scape the glance they scarce can brook. 

From him the half-affrighted friar 

When met alone would fain retire, 

As if that eye and bitter smile 

Trunsferr'd to others fear and guile : 



Not oft to smile descendeth he, 

And when he doth 't is sad to see 

That he but mocks at misery. 

How that pale lip will curl and quiver ! 

Then fix once more as if for ever ; ' . 

As if his sorrow or disdain 

Forbade him e'er to smile again. 

Well were it so — such ghastly mirth 

From joyaunce ne'er derived its birth. 

But sadder still it were to trace 

What once were feelings in that face : 

Time hath not yet the features fix'd, 

But brighter traits with evil mix'd ; 

And there are hues not alwavs faded, 

Which speak a mind not all degraded, 

Even by the crimes through which it waded : 

The common crowd but see the gloom 

Of wayward deeds, and fitting doom ; 

The close observer can espy 

A noble soul, and lineage high : 

Alas ! though both bestow'd in vain, 

Which grief could change, and guilt could stain, 

It was no vulgar tenement 

To which such lofty gifts were lent, 

And still with little less than dread 

On such the sight is riveted. 

The roofless cot, decay'd and rent, 
Will scarce delay the passer-by ; 

The tower by war or tempest bent, 

While yet may frown one battlement, 
Demands and daunts the stranger's eye ; 

Each ivied arch, and pillar lone, 

Pleads haughtily for glories gone ! 

" His floating robe around him folding, 
Slow sweeps he through the column'd aisle 

With dread beheld, with gloom beholding 
The rites that sanctify the pile. 

But when the anthem shakes the choir, 
And kneel the monks, his steps retire ; 

By yonder lone and wavering torch 
His aspect glares within the porch ; 
There will he pause till all is done — 
And hear the prayer, but utter none. 

See — by the half-illumined wall 

His hood fly back, his dark hair fall, 

That pale brow wildly wreathing round, 

As if the Gorgon there had bound 

The sablest of the serpent-braid 

That o'er her fearful forehead stray'd : 

For he declines the convent oath, 

And leaves those locks' unhallow'd growth, 

But wears our garb in all beside ; 

And, not from piety but pride, 

Gives wealth to walls that never heard 

Of his one holy vow nor word. 

Lo! — mark ye, as the harmony 

Peals louder praises to the sky. 

That livid cheek, that stony air 

Of mix'd defiance and despair! 

Saint Francis, keep him from the shrine ' 

Else may wc dread the wrath divine 

Made manifest by awful sign. 

If ever evil angel bore 

The form of mortal, such he woit: 

By all my hope of sins forgiven, 

Such looks are not of earth nor "heaven !" 



i40 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



To love the softest hearts are prone, 


Of passions fierce and uncontrolrd, 


But such can ne'er be all his own ; 


Such as thy penitents unfold, 


Too timid in his woes to share, 


Whose secret sins and sorrows rest 


Too meek to meet, or brave despair ; 


Within thy pure and pitying lireast. 


And sterner hearts alone may feel 


My days, though few, have pass'd below 


The wound that time can never heal. 


In much of joy, but more of woe ; 


The rugged metal of the mine 


Yet still in hours of love or strife, 


Must burn before its surface shine, 


I 've 'scaped the weariness ol life : 


But plunged within the furnace-flame, 


Now leagued with friends, now girt by foes, 


It bends and melts — though still the same ; 


I loathed the languor of repose. 


Then temper'd to thy want, or will, 


Now nothing left to love or hate, 


'T will serve thee to defend or kill ; 


No more with hope or pride elato, 


A breastplate for thine hour of need, 


I 'd rather be the thing that crawls 


Or blade to bid thy foeman bleed ; 


Most noxious o'er a dungeon's walls, 


But if a dagger's form it bear, 


Than pass my dull, unvarying days, 


Let those who shape its edge beware ! 


Condemn'd to meditate and gaze. 


Thus passion's fire, and woman's art, 


Yet, lurks a wish within my breast 


Can turn and tame the sterner heart ; 


For rest — but not to feel 't is rest. 


From these its form and tone are ta'cn, 


Soon shall my fate that wish fulfil ; 


And what they make it, must remain, 


And I shall sleep without the dream 


But break — before it bend again. 


Of what I was, and would be still, 


****** 


Dark as to thee my deeds may seem : 


****** 


My memory now is but the tomb 


If solitude succeed to grief, 


Of joys long dead ; my hope, their doom : 


Release from pain is slight relief; 


Though better to have died with those 


The vacant bosom's wilderness 


Than bear a life of lingering woes. 


Might thank the pang that made it less. 


My spirits shrunk not to sustain 


We loathe what none are left to share : 


The searching throes of ceaseless pain ; 


Even bliss — 'twere woe alone to bear; 


Nor sought the self-accorded grave 


The heart once left thus desolate 


Of ancient fool and modern knave : 


Must fly at last for ease — to hate. 


Yet death I have not fear'd to meet ; 


It is as if the dead could feel 


And in the field it had been sweet. 


The icy worm around them steal, 


Had danger woo'd me on to move 


And shudder, as the reptiles creep 


The slave of glory, not of love. 


To revel o'er their rotting sleep, 


I 've braved it — not for honour's boast ; 


Without the power to scare away 


I smile at laurela won or lost ; 


The cold consumers of their clay ! 


To such let others carve their way, 


It is as if the desert-bird, 39 


For high renown, or hireling pay : 


Whose beak unlocks her bosom's stream 


But place again before my eyes 


To still her famish'd nestlings' scream, 


Aught that I deem a worthy prize ; 


Nor mourns a life to them transferr'd, 


The maid I love, the man I hate, 


Should rend her rash devoted breast, 


And I will hunt the steps of fate, 


And find them flown her empty nest. 


To save or slay, as these require, 


The keenest pangs the wretched find 


Through rending steel, and rolling fire : 


Are rapture to the dreary void, 


Nor need'st thou doubt this speech from one 


The leafless desert of the mind, 


Who would but do — what he hath done. 


The waste of feelings unemploy'd. 


Death is but what the haughty brave, 


Who would be doom'd to gaze upon 


The weak must bear, the wretch must crave ; 


A sky without a cloud or sun ? 


Then let life go to him who gave : 


I/ess hideous far the tempest's roar 


I have not quail'd to danger's brow 


Than ne'er to brave the billows more — 


When high and happy — need I now ? 


Thrown, when the war of winds is o'er, 


****** 


A lonely wreck on fortune's shore, 


"I loved her, friar! nay, adored — 


'Mid sullen calm, and silent bay, 


But these are words that all can use — 


Unseen to drop by dull decay : — 


I proved it more in deed than word ; 


Better to sink beneath the shock, 


There's blood upon that din'.ed sword, 


Than moulder piecemeal on the rock ! 


A stain its steel can never lose: 


****** 


'T was shed for her, who died for me, 


" Father ! thy days have pass'd in peace, 


It warm'd the heart of one abhorr'd : 


'Mid counted beads, and countless prayer 


Nay, start not — no — nor bend thy knee, 


To bid the sins of others cease, 


Nor midst my sins such act record : 


Thyself without a crime or care, 


Thou wilt absolve me from the deed, 


Save transient ills that all must bear, 


For he was hostile to thy creed ! 


Has oeen thy lot from youth to age ; 


The very name of Nazarene 


And thou wiit bless thee from the rage 


Was wormwood to his Paynim spleen. 



- 



THE GIAOUR. 



141 



Ungrateful fool ! since but for brands 

Well wielded in some hard}' hands, 

And wounds by Galileans given, 

The surest pass to Turkish heaven, 

For him his Houris still might wait 

Impatient at the prophet's gate. 

( loved her — love will find its way 

Through paths where wolves would fear to prey, 

A.nd if it dares enough, 't were hard 

»f passion met not some reward — 

No matter how, or where, or why, 

I did not vainly seek, nor sigh : 

Yet sometimes, with remorse, in vain 

I wish she had not loved again. 

She died — I dare not tell thee how ; 

But look — 't is written on my brow ! 

There read of Cain the curse and crime 

In characters unworn by time : 

Still, ere thou dost condemn me, pause ; 

Not mine the act, though I the cause. 

Vet did he but what I had done 

Had she been false to more than one. 

Faithless to him, he gave the blow ; 

But true to me, I laid him low : 

Howe'er deserved her doom might be, 

Her treachery was truth to me ; 

To me she gave her heart, that all 

Which tyranny can ne'er enthral ; 

And I, alas ! too late to save ! 

Yet all I then could give, I gave, 

'T was some relief, our foe a grave. 

His death sits lightly ; but her fate 

Ha? made me — what thou well may'st hate. 

His doom was seal'd — he knew it well, 
'/V'arn'd by the voice of stern Taheer, 
Deep in whose darkly-boding ear 40 
The death-shot peal'd of murder near, 

As filed the troop to where they fell ! 
He died too in the battle broil, 
A time that heeds nor pain nor toil ; 
One cry to Mahomet for aid, 
One prayer to Alia all he made : 
He knew and cross'd me in the fray — 
I gazed upon him where he lay, 
And watch'd his spirit ebb away : 
Though pierced like pard by hunters' steel, 
He felt not half that now I feel. 
I search'd, but vainly scarch'd, to find 
The workings of a wounded mind ; 
Each feature of that sullen corse 
Bctray'd his rage, but no remorse. 
Oh, what had vengeance given to trace 
Despair upon his dying face ! 
The late repentance of that hour, 
When penitence hath lost her power 
To tear one terror from the grave, 
And will not soothe, and cannot save. 

****** 
" The cold in clime are cold m blood, 

Their love can scarce deserve the name ; 
But mine was like the lava flood 

That boils in ^Etna's breast of flame. 
I cannot prate in puling strain 
Of ladye-love, and beauty's chain : 
If changinj^heek, and scorching vein, 



Lips taught to writhe, but not complain, 
If bursting heart, and madd'ning brain, 
And daring deed, and vengeful steel, 
And all that I have felt, and feel, 
Betoken love — that love was mine, 
And shown by many a bitter sign. 
'T is true I could not whine nor sigh, 
I knew but to obtain or die. 
I die — but first I have possess'd, 
And, come what may, I have hren blest. 
Shall I the doom I sought upbraid ? 
No — reft of all, yet undismay'd 
But for the thought of Leila slain, 
Give me the pleasure with the pain, 
So would I live and love again. 
I grieve, but not, my holy guide ! 
For him who dies, but her who died: 
She sleeps beneath the wandering wave- 
Ah ! had she but an earthlv grave, 
This breaking heart and throbbing head 
Should seek and share her narrow bed. 
She was a form of life and light, 
That, seen, became a part of sight ; 
And rose where'er I turn'd mine eye, 
The morning-star of memory ! 



" Yes, love indeed is light from heaven ; 

A spark of that immortal fire 
With angels shared, by Alia given, 

To lift from earth our low desire. 
Devotion wafts the mind above, 
But heaven itself descends in love ; 
A feeling from the Godhead caught, 
To wean from self each sordid thought ; 
A ray of him who form'd the whole ; 
A glory circling round the soul ! 
I grant my love imperfect, all 
That mortals by the name miscall ; 
Then deem it evil, what thou wilt ; 
But say, oh sav, hers was not guilt' 
She was my life's unerring light ; 
That quench'd, what beam shall break my nijht T 
Oh ! would it shone to lead me still, 
Although to death or deadliest ill ! 
Why marvel ye, if they who lose 

This present joy, this future hope, 

No more with sorrow meekly cope ; 
In phrensy then their fate accuse : 
In madness do those fearful deeds 

That seem to add but guilt to woe ? 
Alas ! the breast that inly bleeds 

Hath nought to dread from outward blow , 
Who falls from all he knrws of bliss, 
Cares little into what abyss. 
Fierce as the gloomy vulture's now 

To thee, old man, my deeds appear: 
I read abhorrence on thy brow, 

And this too was I born to bear ! 
'T is true, that, like that bird of prey, 
With havoc have I mark'd my way. 
But this was taught me by the dove, 
To die — and know no second love. 
This lesson yet hath man to learn, 
Taught by the thing he dares to snurti • 



142 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The bird that sings within the brake, 
The swan that swims upon the lake, 
One mate, and one alone, will take. 
And let the fool still prone to range, 
And sneer on all who cannot change, 
Partake his jest with boasting boys ; 

I envy not his varied joys, 

But deem such feeble, heartless man, 
Less than yon solitary swan ; 
Far, far beneath the shallow maid 
He left believing and betray'd. 
Such shame at least was never mine— 
Leila ! each thought was only thine ! 
My good, my guilt, my weal, my woe, 
My hope on high — my all below. 
Earth holds no other like to thee, 
Or if it doth, in vain for me : 
For worlds I dare not view the dame 
Resembling thee, yet not the same. 
The very crimes that mar my youth, 
This bed of death — attest my truth ! 
'T is all too late — thou wert, thou art 
The cherish'd madness of my heart ! 
" And she was lost — and yet I breathed, 

But not the breath of human life : 
A serpent round my heart was wreathed, 

And stung my every thought to strife. 
Alike all time, abhorr'd all place, 
Shuddering I shrunk from nature's face, 
Where every hue that charm'd before 
The blackness of my bosom wore. 
The rest thou dost already know, 
And all my sins, and half my woe. 
But talk no more of penitence ; 
Thou see'st I soon shall part from hence : 
And if thy holy tale were true, 
The deed that's done can'st thou undo! 
Think me not thankless — but this grief 
Looks not to priesthood for relief. 41 
My soul's estate in secret guess : 
But wouldst thou pity more, say less. 
When thou canst bid my Leila live, 
Then will I sue thee to forgive ; 
Then plead my cause in that high place 
Where purchased masses proffer grace. 
Go, when the hunter's hand hath wrung 
From forest-cave her shrieking young, 
And calm the lonely lioness : 
But soothe not — mock not my distress ! 

II In earlier days, and calmer hours, 
When heart with heart delights to blend, 

Where bloom my native valley's bowers 

I had — ah ! have I now ?— a friend ! 
To him this pledge I charge thee send, 

Memorial of a youthful vow ; 
I w^ould remind him of my end : 

Though souls absorb'd like mine allow 
Brief thought to distant friendship's claim, 
Yet dear to him my blighted name. 
'T is strange — he prophesied my doom, 

And I have smiled — I then could smile — 
When prudence would his voice assume, 

And warn — I reck'd not what — the while : 
But now remembrance whispers o'er 
Those ncconts scarcely mark'd before. 



Say — that his bodings came to pass, 
And he will start to hear their truth, 
And wish his words had not been sooth : 
Tell him, unheeding as 1 was, 

Through many a busy bitter scene 
Of all our golden youth had been, 
In pain, my faltering tongue had tried 
To bless his memory ere I died ; 
But Heaven in wrath would turn away, 
If guilt should for the guiltless pray. 
I do not ask him not to blame, 
Too gentle he to wound my name ; 
And what have I to do with fame ? 
I do not ask him not to mourn, 
Such cold request might sound like sc.^rn ; 
And what than friendship's manly tear 
May better grace a brother's bier ? 
But bear this ring, his own of old, 
And tell him — what thou dost behold ! 
The wither'd frame, the ruin'd mind, 
The wreck by passion left behind, 
A shrivell'd scroll, a scatter'd leaf, 
Sear'd by the autumn blast of grief! 
****** 

" Tell me no more of fancy's gleam, 
No, father, no, 'twas not a dream ; 
Alas ! the dreamer first must sleep, 
I only watch'd, and wish'd to weep, 
But could not, for my burning brow 
Throbb'd to the very brain as now : 
I wish'd but for a single tear, 
As something welcome, new, and dear : 
I wish'd it then, I wish it still — 
Despair is stronger than my will. 
Waste not thine orison, despair 
Is mightier than thy pious prayer : 
I would not, if I might, be blest ; 
I want no paradise, but rest. 
'T was then, I tell thee, father ! then 
I saw her ; yes, she lived again ; 
And shining in her white symar, 42 
As through yon pale gray cloud the star 
Which now I gaze on, as on her, 
Who look'd and looks far lovelier ; 
Dimly I view its trembling spark : 
To-morrow's night shall be more dark ; 
And I, before its rays appear, 
That lifeless thing the living fear. 
I wonder, father ! for my soul 
Is fleeting towards the final goal. 
I saw her, friar ! and I rose 
Forgetful of our former woes ; 
And rushing from my couch, I dart, 
And clasp her to my desperate heart* 
I clasp — what is it that I clasp ? 
No breathing form within my grasp, 
No heart that beats reply to mine. 
Yet, Leila ! yet the form is thine ! 
And art thou, dearest, changed so much, 
As meet my eye, yet mock my touch? 
Ah ! were thy beauties e'er so cold, 
I care not ; so my arms enfold 
The all they ever wish'd to hold. 
Alas ! around a shadow prest, 
They shrink upon my lonely breast ; 



THE GIAOUR. 



143 



Yet still 't is there ! in silence stands, 
And beckons with beseeching hands! 
With braided hair, and bright-black eye- 
I knew 't was false — she could not die ! 
But he is dead ! within the dell 
I saw him buried where he fell ; 
He comes not, for he cannot break 
From earth ; why then art thou awake? 
They told me nil. I waves roll'd above 
The face I view, the form I love ; 
They fold me — 't was a hideous tale ! 
I 'd tell it, but my tongue would fail : 
If true, and from thine ocean-cave 
Thou com'st to claim a calmer grave, 
Oh ! pass thy dewy fingers o'er 
This brow that then will burn no more ; 
Or place them on my hopeless heart: 
But, shape or shade ! whate'er thou art, 
In mercy ne'er again depart! 
Or farther with thee bear my soul, 
Than winds can waft, "r Vaters roll ! 



" Such is my name, and such my tale. 

Confessor ! to thy secret ear 
I breathe the sorrows I bewail, 

And thank thee for the generous tear 
This glazing eye could never shed. 
Then lay me with the humblest dead, 
And, save the cross above mv head, 
Be neither name nor emblem spread, 
By prying stranger to be read, 
Or stay the passing pilgrim's tread." 
He pass'd — nor of his name and race 
Hath left a token or a trace, 
Save what the father must not say 
Who shrived him on his dying day : 
This broken tale was all we knew 
Of her he loved, or him he slew. 4 > 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 132, line 3. 
That tomb which, gleaming o'er the clitT. 
A tomb above the rocks on the promontory, by some 
supposed the sepulchre of Themistocles. 
Note 2. Page 132, line 22. 
Sultana of the nightingale. 
The attachment of the nightingale to the rose is a 
well-known Persian fable. If I mistake not, the " Bul- 
bul of a thousand tales" is one of his appellations. 
Note 3. Page 132, line 40. 
Till the gay mariner's guitar. 
The guitar is the constant amusement of the Greek 
sailor by night: with a steady fair wind, and during a 
calm, it is accompanied always by the voice, and often 
by dancing. 

Note 4. Page 133, line 40. 
Where cold obstruction's opnthy. 
" Ay. but to die and go we know not where, 
To lie in cold obstruction." 

Measure far Measure, Act III. 130. Sc. 2. 



Note 5. Page 133, line 48. 
The first, last look by death reveal il. 
I trust that few of my readers have ever had an op 
portunity of witnessing what is here attempted in de- 
scription, but those who have, will probably retain a 
painful remembrance of that singular beauty which 
pervades, with few exceptions, the features of the dead, 
a few hours, and but for a few hours, after " the spirit 
is not there." It is to be remarked, in cases of violent 
death by gun-shot wounds, the expression is always 
that of languor, whatever the natural energy of the 
sufferer's character ; but in death from a stab the coun- 
tenance preserves its traits of feeling or ferocity, and 
the mind its bias to the last. 

Note 6. Page 133, line 110. 
Slaves — nay, the bondsmen of a slave. 
Athens is the property of the Kislar Aga (the slave 
of the seraglio, and guardian of the women), who ap- 
points the Waywode. A pander and eunuch — these 
are not polite, yet true appellations — now governs the 
governor of Athens ! 

Note 7. Page 134, line 23. 
'T is calmer than thy heart, young Giaour. 
Infidel. 

Note 8. Page 134, line 58. 

In echoes of the far tophaike. 

" Tophaike," musket. — The Bairam is announced 

by the cannon at sunset ; the illumination of the Mosques, 

arid the firing of all kinds of smali arms, loaded with 

ball, proclaim it during the night. 

Note 9. Page 134, line 84. 
Swift as the hurl'd on high jerreed. 
Jerreed, or Djerrid, a blunted Turkish javelin, which 
is darted from horseback with great force and precision. 
It is a favourite exercise of the Mussulmans ; but I 
know not if it can be called a manly one, since the most 
expert in the art are the Black Eunuchs of Constanti- 
nople — I think, next to these, a Mamlouk at Smyrna was 
the most skilful that came within my observation. 

Note 10. Page 134, line 115. 
He came, he went, like the simoom. 
The blast of the desert, fatal to every thing living, 
and often alluded to in eastern poetry. 

Note 11. Page 135, line 47. 
To bless the sacred " bread and salt." 
To partake of food, to break bread and salt with 
your host, insures the safety of the guest ; even though 
an enemy, his person from that moment is sacred. 

Note 12. Page 135, line 55. 
Since his turban was cleft by the infidel's sabre. 
I need hardly observe, that Charity and Hospitality 
are the first duties enjoined by Mahomet ; and, to say 
truth, very generally practised by his disciples. The 
first praise that can be bestowed on a chief is a pane- 
gyric on his bounty ; the next on his valour. 

Note 13. Page 135, line 59. 
And silver-sheathed atagnan. 
The ataghan, a long dagger worn with pistols in me 
belt, in a metal scabbard, generally of silver ; ana. 
among the wealthier, gilt or of gold. 



144 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Note 14. Page 135, line 61. 
An emir by his garb of green. 
Green is the privileged colour of the prophet's nu- 
merous pretended descendants ; with them, as here, 
faith (the family inheritance) is supposed to supersede 
the necessity of good works : they are the worst of a 
very indifferent hrood. 

Note 15. Page 13.", line 62. 
"Ho ! who art thou? — this low islam," etc. 
Salam aleikoum ! aleikoum salam ! peace he with you ; 
be with you peace — the salutation reserved for the 
faithful : — to a Christian, " Urlarula," a good journey ; 
or sahan hircsem, sahan serula ; good morn, good even ; 
and sometimes, " may your end be happy ;" are the 
usual salutes. 

Note 16. Page 135, line 93. 
The insect-queen of eastern spring. 
The blue-winged butterfly of Kashmeer, the most 
rare and beautiful of the species. 

Note 17. Page 136, line 15. 
Or live like scorpion girt by fire. 
Alluding to the dubious suicide of the scorpion, so 
placed for experiment by gentle philosophers. Some 
maintain that the position of the sting, when turned 
towards the head, is merely a convulsive movement : 
but others have actually brought in the verdict, "Felo 
de se." The scorpions are surely interested in a speedy 
decision of the question ; as, if once fairly established 
as insect Catos, thev will probably be allowed to live 
as long as they think proper, without being martyred 
for the sake of a hypothesis. 

Note 18. Page 136, line 30. 
When Rhamazan's last sun was set 
The cannon at sunset close the Rhamazan. See 
note 8. 

Note 19. Page 136, line 49. 
By pale Phingari's trembling light. 
Phingari, the moon. 

Note 20. Page 136, line 60. 
B'u/ht as the jewel of Giamschid. 
The celebrated fabulous ruby of Sultan Giamschid, 
the embellisher of Istakhar ; from its splendour, named 
Schebgerr^, " the torch of night ;" also, " the cup of 
the sun," etc. — In the first editions, " Giamschid " was 
Written as a word of three syllables, so D'Herbelot 
has it ; but I am told Richardson reduces it to a dis- 
syllable, and writes "Jamshid." I have left in the 
text the orthography of the one with the pronunciation 
of the other. 

Note 21. Page 136, line 64. 
Though on Al-Sirnt's arch I stood. 
Al-Sirat, the bridge, of breadth less than the thread 
of a famished spider, over which the Mussulmans must 
skate into paradise, to which it is the only entrance ; 
but this is not the worst, the river beneath being hell 
itself, into which, as may be expected, the unskilful 
and tender of foot contrive to tumble with a "facilis 
discen.ius Averni," not very pleasing in prospect to the 
lieu passenger. There is a shorter cut downwards for 
me Jews and Christians. 

Note 22. Page 136, line 69. 
And keep that portion of his creed. 
A vulgar error : the Koran allots at least a third of 



paradise to well-behaved women : but by far me greater 
number of Mussulmans interpret the text their own 
way, and cxlude their moieties from heaven. Being 
enemies to Platonics, they cannot discern "any fitness 
of things" in the souls of the other sex, conceiving 
them to be superseded by the Houris. 

Note 23. Page 136, line 75. 
The young pomegranate's blossoms strew. 
An oriental simile, which may, perhaps, though fairly 
stolen, be deemed "plus Arabc qu'en Arabic." 

Note 24. Page 136, line 77. 
Her hair in hyacinthine How. 
Hvacinthine, in Arabic, " Sunbul ;" as common a 
thought in the eastern poets, as it was among the 
Greeks. 

Note 25. Page 136, line 87. 
The loveliest bird of Franguestan. 
"Franguestan," Circassia. 

Note 26. Page 137, line 26. 
" Bismillah I now the peril \s past," etc. 
Bismillah — "In the name of God;" the commence- 
ment of all the chapters of the Koran but one, and of 
prayer and thanksgiving. 

Note 27. Page 137, line 51. 
Then curl'd his very beard with ire. 
A phenomenon not uncommon with an angry Mussul- 
man. In 1509, the Capitan Pacha's whiskers at a 
diplomatic audience, were not less lively with indigna- 
tion than a tiger cat's, to the horror of all the drago- 
mans ; the portentous mustachios twisted, they stood 
erect of their own accord, and were expected every 
moment to change their colour, hut at last condescended 
to subside, which probably saved more heads than they 
contained hairs. 

Note 28. Page 137, line 61. 
Nor raised the craven cry, Amaun! 
" Aniaun," quarter, pardon. 

Note 29. Page 137, line 70. 
1 know him by the evil eye. 
The " evil eye," a common superstition in the Le- 
vant, and of which the imaginary effects are yet very 
singular, on those who conceive themselves affected. 

Note 30. Page 137, line 124. 
A fragment of his palanipore. 
The flowered shawls, generally worn by persons of 
rank. 

Note 31. Page 138, line 51. 
His calpac rent — his cafian red. 
The " Calpac" is the solid cap or centre part of the 
head-dress ; the shawl is wound round it, and forms 
the turban. 

Note 32. Page 138, line 57. 
A turban carved in coarsest stone. 
The turban, pihar, and insciptive verse, decorate 
the tombs of the Osmanlies, whether in the cemetery 
or the wilderness. In the mojntains you frequently 
pass similar mementos ; and, on inquiry, you are in- 
formed, that they record some victim of rebellion, 
plunder, or revenge. 

Note 33. Page 138, line 68. 
At solemn sound of "Allu Hu !" 
"Alia Hu !" the concluding words of the Muezzin's 



THE GIAOUR. 



145 



call to prayer from the highest gallery on the exterior 
ol the minaret. On a still evening, when the Muezzin 
has a fine voice, which is frequently the case, the ef- 
fect is solemn and beautiful heyond all the bells in 
Christendom. 

Note 34. Page 138, line 77. 

They come — their kerchiefs green they wave. 

The following is part of a battle-song of the Turks : 

— " I see — I see a dark-eyed girl of paradise, and she 

waves a handkerchief, a kerchief of green ; and cries 

aloud, Come, kiss me, for I love thee," etc. 

Note 35. Page 133, line 82. 
Deneotli avenging Monkir's scythe. 
Monkir and Nekir are the inquisitors of the dead, 
before whom the corpse undergoes a slight noviciate 
and preparatory training for damnation. If the an- 
swers are none of the clearest, he is hauled up with a 
scythe and thumped down with a red-hot mace till prop- 
erly seasoned, with a variety of subsidiary probations. 
The office of these angels is no sinecure ; there are but 
two, and the number of orthodox deceased being in a 
small proportion to the remainder, their hands are al- 
ways full. 

Note 36. Page 138, line 84. 
To wander round lost Eblis' throne. 
Eblis, the Oriental Prince of Darkness. 

Note 37. Page 138, line 89. 
But first, on earth, as vampire sent. 

The Vampire superstition is still general in the Le- 
rant. Honest Toumefort tells a long story, which Mr. 
Southey, in the notes on Thalaba, quotes about these 
"Vroucolochas," as he calls them. The Romaic tennis 
" Vardoulacha." I recollect a whole family being terri- 
fied by the scream of a child, which they imagined 
must proceed from such a visitation. The Greeks 
never mention the word without horror. I find that 
" Broucolokas" is an old legitimate Hellenic appellation 
—at least is so applied to Arscnius, who, according to 
the Greeks, was after his death animated by the Devil. 
The moderns, however, use the word I mention. 
Note 38. Page 138, line 115. 
Wet with thine own best blood shall drip. 

The freshness of the face, and the wetness of the lip 
with blood, are the never-failing signs of a Vampire. 
The stories told in Hungary and Greece of these foul 
feeders are singular, and some of them most incredibly 
attested. 

Note 39. Page 140, line 36. 
It is as if the desert-bird. 
1 he pelican is, I believe, the bird so libelled, by the 
imputation of feeding her chickens with her blood. 

Note 40. Page 141, line 36. 

Deep in whose darkly-boding ear. 

This superstition of a second-hearing (for I never met 

nth downright second-sight in the east) fell once under 

my own ooservation — On my third journey to Cape 

Colonna early in 1811, as we passed through the defile 

that leads from the hamlet between Ker atia and Colonna, 

I observed Dervish Tahiri riding rather out of the path, 

and leaning his head upon his hand, as if in pain. I rode 

op and inquired. " We are in peril," he answered. 

"What peril? we are not now in Albania, nor in the 

d.2 24 



passes to Ephesus, Messalunghi, or Lepanto ; there are 
plenty of us, well armed, and the Choriates have not 
courage to be thieves." — " True, Arfendi ; but never 
theless the shot is ringing in my ears." — " The shot !— 
not a tophaikc has been fired this morning." — "1 hear it 
notwithstanding — Bom — Bom — as plainly as I hear your 
voice." — "Psha." — "As you please, Affendi ; if it is 
written, so will it be." — I left this quick-eared predesti- 
riarian, and rode up to Basili,his Christian compatriot, 
whose ears, though not at all prophetic, by no means 
relished the intelligence. We all arrived at Colonna, re- 
mained a few hours, and returned leisurely, saying a va- 
riety of brilliant things, in more languages than spoiled 
the building of Babel, upon the mistaken seer; Romaic, 
Arnaout, Turkish, Italian, and English were all exercised, 
in various conceits, upon the unlbrtunate Mussulman. 
While we were contemplating the beautiful prospect, 
Dervish was occupied about the columns. I thought he 
was deranged into an antiquarian, and asked him if he 
had become a " Pulnocaxtro'" man. "No," said he, 
" but these pillars will be useful in making a stand ;" 
and added other remarks, which at least evinced his own 
belief in his troublesome faculty of fore-hearing. On our 
return to Athens, we heard from Leone (a prisoner set 
ashore some days after) of the intended attack of the 
Mainotes, mentioned, with the cause of its not taking 
place, in the notes to Childe Harold, Canto 2d. I was 
at some pains to question the man, and he described the 
dresses, arms, and marks of the horses of our party so 
accurately, that, with other circumstances, we could not 
doubt of his having been in " villanous company," and 
ourselves in a bad neighbourhood. Dervish became a 
soothsayer for life, and I dare say is now hearing more 
musketry than ever will be fired, to the great refresh- 
ment of the Arnaouts of Berat, and his native moun- 
tains. — I shall mention one trait more of this singular 
race. In March 1811, a remarkably stout and active 
Arnaout came (I believe the 50th on the same errand) 
to offer himself as an attendant, which was declined: 
"Well, AfTendi," quoth he, "may you live! — von 
would have found me useful. I shall leave the town for 
the hills to-morrow ; in the winter I return, perhaps you 
will then receive me." — Dervish, who was present, 
remarked, as a thing of course, and of no consequence, 
"in the mean time he will join the Elephtes" (rob- 
bers), which was true to the letter If not cut off", they 

came down in the winter, and pass it unmolested in 
some town, where they are often as well known as their 
exploits. 

Note 41. Page 142, line 36. 
LookB not to priesthood for relief. 
The monk's sermon is omitted. It seems to have had 
so little effect upon the patient, that it could have no 
hopes from the reader. It may be sufficient to say, that 
it was of a customary length (as may be perceived from 
the interruptions and uneasiness of the penitent), and 
was delivered in the nasal tone of all orthodox preachers 

Note 42. Page 142, line 102. 
And shining in her white symar. 
" Symar" — shroud. 

Note 43. Page 143, line 37 
The circumstance to which the above story relate* 
was not very uncommon in Turkey. A few years a»o 
the wife of Muchtar Pacha complained to his father c( 



146 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



his son's supposed infidelity ; he asked with whom, and 
she had the barbarity to give in a list of the twelve 
handsomest women in Yanina. They were seized, fast- 
ened up in sacks, and drowned in the lake the same 
night ! One of the guards who was present informed 
me, that not one of the victims uttered a cry, or showed 
a svmptom of terror at so sudden a " wrench from all 
we know, from all we love." The fate of Phrosine, the 
{barest of this sacrifice, is the subject of many a Romaic 
and Arnaout ditty. The story in the text is one told of 
a young Venetian many years ago, and now nearly for- 
gotten. I heard it by accident recited by one of the 
coffee-house story-tellers who abound in the Levant, 
and sing or recite their narratives. The additions and 
interpolations by the translator will be easily distin- 
guished from the rest by die want of Eastern imagery ; 



and I regret that my memory has retained so few frag- 
ments of the original. 

For the contents of some of the notes I am indebted 
partly to D'Herbelot, and pari y to that most eastern, 
and, as Mr. Weber justly entitles it, "sublime tale," the 
"Caliph Vathek." I do not know from what source 
the author of that singular volume may have drawn his 
male-rials ; some of his incidents are to be found in the 
" BibliouVque Orientate ;" but for correctness of cos- 
tume, beauty of description, and power of imagination, 
it far surpasses all European imitations ; and bears such 
marks of originality, that those who have visited the East 
will find some difficulty in believing it to be more than 
a translation. As an Eastern tale, even Rasselas must 
bow before it ; his " Happy Valley " will not bear a 
comparison with ihe "Hall of Eblis." 



8Ttie ifrttre o€ ^tjitfros; 

A TURKISH TALE. 



Hail we never loved so kindly. 
Bad we never loved so Mindly, 
Never met or never pnrted, 
We had ne'er been broken-hcartsd. 

BURNS. 



TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE LORD HOLLAND, 
THIS TALE IS INSCRIBED, 

WITH EVERY SENTIMENT OF REGARD AND RESPECT, BV HIS GRATEFULLY OBLIGED 
AND SINCERE FRIEND, 

BYRON. 



CANTO I. 



i. 



Rnow ye the land where the cypress and myrtle 

Are emblems of deeds that are done in their clime ? 
Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the turtle, 

Now melt into sorrow, now madden to crime ! 
Know ye the land of the cedar and vine, 
Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever shine; 
Where the light wings of Zephyr,oppress'd with perfume, 
Wax faint o'er the gardens of Gull ' in her bloom ; 
Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit, 
And the voice of the nightingale never is mute ; 
Where the tints of the earth, and the hues of the sky, 
In colour though varied, in beauty may vie, 
And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye ; 
Where the virgins ave soft as the roses they twine, 
And all, save the spirit of man, is divine ? 
'T is the clime of the east ; 't is the land of the sun — 
Can he smile on such deeds as his children have done? 2 
Oh ! wild as the accents of lovers' farewell 
Arc the hearts which they bear, and the tales which they 
tell. 



II. 

Begirt with many a gallant slave, 

Apparell'd as becomes the brave, 

Awaiting each his lord's behest, 

To guide hi* steps, or guard his rest, 

Old Giaftir sate in his Divan: 
Deep thought was in his aged eye ; 

And though the face of Mussulman 
Not oft betrays to standers by 

The mind within, well skill'd to hide 

All but unconquerable pride, 

His pensive cheek and pondering brow 

Did more than he was wont avow. 
III. 
"Let the chamber be clcar'd." — The train disappear'd- 

"Now call me the chief of the Haram guard." 
With Giaffir is none but his only son, 

And the Nubian awaiting the sire's award 

" Haroun — when all the crowd that wait 

Are pass'd beyond the outer gate, 

(Woe to the head whose eye beheld 

My child Zuleika's face unveil'd!) 

Hence, lead my daughter from her tower; 

Her fate is fix'd this very hour : 



THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 



117 



Yet not to her repeat my thought ; 
Byrne alone be duty taught!" 

" Pacha ! to hear is to obey." 
No more must slave to despot say- 
Then to the tower had ta'cn his way, 
But here young Selim silence brake, 

First lowly rendering reverence meet : 
And downcast look'd, and gently spake, 

Sli 1 standing at the Pacha's feet : 
For son of Moslem must expire, 
Ere dare to sit before his sire ! 

" Father ! for fear that thou shouldst chide 
My sister, or her sable guide, 
Know — for the fault, if fault there be, 
Was mine ; then fall thy frowns on me— 
So lovelily the morning shone, 

That — let the old and weary sleep— 
I could not ; and to view alone 

The fairest scenes of land and deep, 
With none to listen and reply 
To thoughts with which my heart beat high, 
Were irksome — for, whate'er my mood, 
In sooth I love not solitude ; 
I on Zuleika's slumber broke, 

And, as thou knowest that for me 

Soon turns the Haram's grating key, 
Before the guardian slaves awoke, 
We to the cypress groves had flown, 
And made earth, main, and heaven our own! 
There linger'd we, beguiled too long 
With Mejnoun's tale, or Sadi's song;' 
Till I, who heard the deep tambour 4 
Beat thy Divan's approaching hour, 
To thee and to my duty true, 
Warn'd by the sound, to greet thee flew : 
But there Zuleika wanders yet — 
Nay, father, rage not — nor forget 
That none can pierce that secret bower 
But those who watch the women's tower." 

IV. 
"Son of a slave!" — the Pacha said — 
" From unbelieving mother bred, 
Vain were a father's hope to see 
Aught that beseems a man in thee. 
Thou, when thine arm should bend the bow, 
And hurl the dart, and curb the steed, 
Thou, Greek in soul if not in creed, 
Must pore where babbling waters flow, 
And watch unfolding roses blow. 
Would that yon orb, whose matin glow 
Thy listless eyes so much admire, 
Would lend thee something of his fire ! 
Thou, who wouldst see this battlement 
By Christian cannon piecemeal rent; 
Nay, tamely view old Stambol's wall 
Before the dogs of Moscow fall, 
Nor strike one stroke for life and death 
Against the curs of Nazareth! 
Go — let thy less than woman's hand 
Assume the distaff— not the brand. 
But, Haroun! — to my daughter speed: 
And hark — of thine own head take heed — 
If thus Zuleika oft takes wing — 
Thou see'bt yon bow — it hath a string!" 



No sound from Selim's lip was neard, 

At least that met old Giaffir's ear, 
But every frown and every won! 
Pierced keener than a Christian's sword. 

" Son of a slave ! — reproach' d with fear! 

Those gibes had cost another dear. 
Son of a slave ! — and who my sue /" 

Thus held his thoughts their dark career 
And glances even of more than ire 

Flash forth, then faintly disappear. 
Old GialF.r gazed upon his son 

And started; for within his eye 
He read how much his wrath had done ; 
He saw rebellion there begun : 

" Come hither, boy — what, no reply? 
I mark thee — and I knew thee too ; 
But there be deeds thou darcst not do: 
But if thy beard had manlier length, 
And if thy hand had skill and strength, 
I 'd joy to see thee break a lance, 
Albeit against my own perchance." 
As sneeringly these accents fell, 
On Selim's eyes he fiercely gazed : 

That eye returned him glance for glance, 
That proudly to his sire's was raised, 

Till GialhYs quaiPd and shrunk askance—. 
And why — he felt, but durst not tell. 
" Much I misdoubt this wayward boy 
Will one day work me more annoy ; 
I never loved him from his birth, 
And — but his arm is little worth, 
And scarcely in the chase could cope 
With timid fawn or antelope, 
Far less would venture into strife 
Where man contends for fame and life — 
I would not trust that look or tone : 
No — nor the biood so near my own. 
That blood — he hath not heard — no more — 
I 'H watch him closer than before. 
He is an Arab s to my sight, 
Or Christian crouching in the fight- 
But hark! — I hear Zuleika's voice; 

Like Houris' hymn it meets mine ear : 
She is the offspring of my choice ; 

Oh ! more than even her mother dear, 
With all to hope, and nought to fear — 
My Peri ! ever welcome here ! 
Sweet, as the desert-fountain's wave 
To lips just cool'd in time to save — 

Such to my longing sight art thou ; 
Nor can they waft to Mecca's shrine 
More thanks for life, than I for thine, 

Who blest thy birth, and bless thee now. 
VI. 
Fair, as the first that fell of womankind, 

When on that dread yet lovely serpent smiling. 
Whose image tiien was stamp'd upon her mind— 

Butonce beguiled — and ever more beguilini; 
Dazzling, as that, oh ! too transcendent vision 
To sorrow's phantom-peopled slumber given. 
When heart meets heart again in dreams Elysiau* 
And paints the lost on earth revived in hew U , 
Soft, as the memory of buried love ; 
Pure, as the prayer which childhood waits aUivw - 



.48 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Was she — the daughter of that rude old chief, 
Who met the maid with tears — but not of grief. 

Who hath not proved how feebly words essay 
To fix one spark of beauty's heavenly ray ? 
Who doth not feel, until his failing sight 
Faints into dimness with its own delight, 
His changing cheek, his sinking heart confess 
The might — the majesty of loveliness ? 
Such was Zuleika — such around her shone 
The nameless charms urmiark'd by her alone : 
The light of love, the purity of grace, 
The mind, the music breathing from her face,' 
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole — 
And, oh ! that eye was in itself a soul ! 

Her graceful arms in meekness bending 
Across her gently-budding breast; 

At one kind word, those arms extending, 
To clasp the neck of him who blest 
His child caressing and carest, 
Zuleika came — and Giaffir felt 
His purpose half within him melt : 
Not that against her fancied weal 
His heart, though stern, could ever feel; 
Affection chain'd her to that heart; 
Ambition tore the links apart. 

VII. 

" Zuleika ! child of gentleness ! 

How dear this very day must tell, 
When I forget my own distress, 

ki losing what I love so well, 

To bid thee with another dwell : 

Another ! and a braver man 

Was never seen in battle's van. 
We Moslem reck not much of blood ; 

But yet the line of Carasman' 
Unchanged, unchangeable hath stood 
First of the bold Timariot bands 
That won and well can keep their lands. 
Enough that he who comes to woo 
Is kinsman of the Bey Oglou : 
His years need scarce a thought employ: 
I would not have thee wed a boy. 
And thou shalt have a noble dower: 
And his and my united power 
Will laugh to scorn the death-firman, 
Which others tremble but to scan, 
And teach the messenger 8 what fate 
The bearer of such boon may wait. 
And now thou know'st thy father's will : 

All that thy sex hath tieed to know : 
*T was mine to teach obedience still — 

The way to love thy lord may show." 

VIII. 
hi silence bo\v"d the virgin's head; 

And if hei eye was fill'd with tears, 
That stifled feeling dare not shed, 
And changed her cheek from pale to red, 

And red to pale, as through her ears 
Those winged words like arrows sped, 

What could such be but maiden fears? 
So bright the tear in beauty's eye, 
Love half regrets to kiss it dry ; 



So sweet the blush of bashfulness, 

Even pity scarce can wish it less! 

Whate'er it was the sire forgot ; 

Or, if remember'd, mark'd it not ; 

Thrice clapp'd his hands, and call'd his steeo, 

Resign'd his «em-adorn'd Chibouke, 10 
And mounting fratly for the mead, 

With Maugrabee" and Mamaluke, 

His way amid his Delis took, 12 
To witness many an active deed 
With sabre keen, or blunt jerreed. 
The Kislar only and his Moors 
Watch'd well the Haram's massy doors. 

IX. 

His head was leant upon his hand, 

His eye look'd o'er the dark-blue water 
That swiftly glides and gently swells 
Between the winding Dardanelles ; 
But yet he saw nor sea nor strand 
Nor even his Pacha's turban'd band 

Mix in the game of mimic slaughter, 
Careering cleave the folded felt 13 
With sabre stroke, right sharply dealt ; 
Nor mark'd the javelin-darting crowd, 
Nor heard their Ollahs 14 wild and loud — 
He thought but of old GiaftVs daugnter ! 
X. 
No word from Selim's bosom broke ; 
One sigh Zuleika's thought bespoke: 
Still gazed he through the lattice grate, 
Pale, mute, and mournfully sedate. 
To him Zuleika's eye was turn'd, 
But little from his aspect learn'd : 
Equal her grief, yet not the same ; 
Her heart confess'd a gentler flame : 
But yet that heart alarm'd or weak, 
She knew not why, forbade to speak, 
Yet speak she must — but when essay 7 
" How strange he thus should turn away ! 
Not thus we e'er before have met ; 
Not thus shall be our parting yet." 
Thrice paced she slowly through the room 
And watch'd his eye — it still was fix'd : 
She snatch'd the urn wherein was mix'd 
The Persian Atar-gul's 1S perfume, 
And sprinkled all its odours o'er 
The pictured roof 16 and marble floor: 
The drops, that through his glittering vest 
The playful girl's appeal addrest, 
Unheeded o'er his bosom flew, 
As if that breast were marble too. 
"What, sullen yet? it must not be — 
Oh ! gentle Selim, this from thee !" 
She saw in curious order set 

The fairest flowers of Eastern land — 
" He loved them once ; may touch them yet 

If offer'd by Zuleika's hand." 
The childish thought was hardly breath'd 
Before the rose was pluck'd and wreathed ; 
The next fond moment saw her seat 
Her fairy form at Selim's feet : 
" This rose to calm my brother's cares 
A message from the Bulbul ■' bears ; 
It says to-night he will prolong 
For Selim's car his sweetest song ; 



• 

THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS. *40 


And though his note is somewhat sad, 


I would not wrong the slenderest hair 


He 'II try for once a strain more glad, 


That clusters round thy forehead fair, 


With some faint hope his alter'd lay 


For all the treasures buried lar 


May sing these gloomy thoughts away. 


Within the caves of Istakar." 


XI. 


This morning clouds upon me lower'd, 


" What ! not receive my foolish flower ? 


Reproaches on my head were shower'd, 


Nay then I am indeed unhlest : 


And Giaffir almost called me coward ! 


On me can thus thy forehead lower? 


Now I have motive to be brave ; 


And know'st thou not who loves thee best? 


The son of his neglected slave — 


Oh, Selim dear! oh, more than dearest! 


Nay, start not, 't was the term he gave— 


Sav, is it me thou hat'st or fearest ? 


May show, though little apt to vaunt, 


Come, lay thy head upon my breast, 


A heart his words nor deeds can daunt. 


And I will kiss thee into rest, 


His son, indeed ! — yet thanks to thee, 


Since words of mine, and songs must fail 


Perchance I am, at least shall be ; 


Even from my fabled nightingale. 


But let our plighted secret vow 


I knew our sire at times was stern, 


Be only known to us as now. 


But this from thee had yet to Icam : 


I know the wretch who dares demand 


Too well I know he loves thee not ; 


From Giaffir thy reluctant hand ; 


But is Zuleika's love forgot '! 


More ill-got wealth, a meaner soul, 


Ah ! deem I right ? the Pacha's plan— 


Holds not a Musselim's 20 control : 


This kinsman Bey of Carasman 


Was he not bred in Egripo? 21 


Perhaps may prove some foe of thine. 


A viler race let Israel show ! 


If so, I swear by Mecca's shrine, 


But let that pass — to none be told 


If shrines that ne'er approach allow 


Our oath ; the rest shall time unfold 


To woman's step admit her vow, 


To me and mine leave Osman Bey ; 


Without thy free consent, command, 


I 've partisans for peril's day : 


The Sultan should not have my hand ! 


Think not I am what I appear ; 


Think'st thou that I could bear to part 


I've arms, and friends, and vengeance near 


With thee, and learn to halve my heart? 


XIII. 


Ah ! were I sever'd from thy side, 


Where were thy friend — and who my guide ? 


" Think not thou art what thou appearcst ! 


Years have not seen, time shall not see, 


My Selim, thou art sadly changed : 


The hour that tears my soul from thee: 


This morn I saw thee gentlest, dearest ; 


Even Azrael, 18 from his deadly quiver 


But now thou 'it from thyself estranged. 


When flies that shaft, and fly it must, 


My love thou surely knew'st before, 


That parts all else, shall doom for ever 


It ne'er was less, nor can be more. 


Our hearts to undivided dust !" 


To see thee, hear thee, near thee stay s 


XII. 


And hate the night I know not why, 


He lived — he breathed — he moved — he felt ; 


Save that we meet not but by day ; 


He raised the maid from where she knelt: 


With thee to live, with thee to die, 


His trance was gone — his keen eye shone 


I dare not to my hope deny : 


Wi'h thoughts that long in darkness dwelt ; 


Thy cheek, thine eyes, thy lips to kiss, 


With thoughts that burn — in rays that melt. 


Like this — and this — no more than this; 


As the stream late conceal'd 


For, Alia ! sure thy lips are flame : 


By the fringe of its willows ; 


What fever in thy veins is flushing ? 


When it rushes reveal'd 


My own have nearly caught the same, 


In the light of its billows ; 


At least I feet my cheek too blushing. 


As the bolt bursts on high 


To soothe thy sickness, watch thy health, 


From the black cloud that bound it, 


Partake, but never waste, thy wealth, 


Flash'd the soul of that eye 


Or stand with smiles unmurmuring by, 


Through the long lashes round it. 


And lighten half thy poverty ; 


A war-horse at the trumpet's sound, 


Do all but close thy dying eye, 


A lion roused by heedless hound, 


For that I could not live to try ; 


A tyrant waked to sudden strife 


To these alone my thoughts aspire: 


By graze of ill-directed knife, 


More can I do, or thou require ? 


Starts not to more convulsive life 


But, Selim, thou must answer why 


Than he, who heard that vow, display'd, 


We need so much of mystery ? 


And all, before repress' d, betray'd : 


The cause I cannot dream nor tell, 


" Now thou art mine, for ever mine, 


But be it, since thou say'st 'tis well ; 


Witn life to keep, and scarce with life resign ; 


Yet what thou mean'st by ' arms ' and ' fncivu 


Now thou art mine, that sacred oath, 


Beyond my weaker sense extends. 


Though sworn by o - ie, hath bound us both. 


I meant that Giarfir should have heard 


Yes, fondly, wisely hast thou done; 


The very vow I plighted thee ; 


That vow hath saved more heads than i-*ie : 


His wrath would not revoke my word ; 


But blench not thou — thy simplest tress 


But s-irely he wouta leave me free. 


Claims more I'om me than tenderness j 


Can this fond wish seem strange in me, 







150 



BYRON'S WORKS 



To be what I have ever been ? 
What other hath Zuleika seen 
From simple childhood's earliest hour ? 

What other can she seek to see 
Than thee, companion of her bower, 

The partner of her infancy ? 
These cherish'd thoughts with life begun, 

Si'.y, why must I no more avow ? 
What change is wrought to make me shun 
The truth ; my pride, and thine till now? 
To meet the gaze of stranger's eyes 
Our law, our creed, our God denies ; 
Nor shall one wandering thought of mine 
At such, our Prophet's will, repine : 
No ! happier made by that decree ! 
He left tne all in leaving thee. 
Deep were my anguish, thus compell'd 
To wed with one I ne'er beheld : 
This wherefore should I not reveal ? 
Why wilt thou urge me to conceal ? 
I know the Pacha's haughty mood 
To thee hath never boded good ; 
And he so often storms at nought, 
Allah ! forbid that e'er he ought ! 
And why I know not, but within 
My heart concealment weighs like sin. 
If then such secrecy be crime, 

And such it feels while lurking here ; 
Oh, Selim ! tell me yet in time, 

Nor leave me thus to thoughts of fear. 
Ah ! yonder see the Tchocadar, 22 
My father leaves the mimic war ; 
I tremble now to meet his eye — 
Say, Selim, canst thou tell me why ?" 
XIV. 

" Zuleika ! to thy tower's retreat 

Betake thee — Giaffir I can greet ; 

And now with him I fain must prate 

Of firmans, imposts, levies, state. 

There 's fearful news from Danube's banks ; 

Our Vizier nobly thini; his ranks, 

For whic'n the Giaour may give him thanks! 

Our Sultan hath a shorter way 

Such costly triumph to repay. 

But, mark me, when the twilight drum 
Hath warn'd the troops to food and sleep, 

Unto thy cell will Selim come : 
Then softly from the Haram creep 
Where we may wander by the deep : 
Our garden-battlements are steep ; 

Nor these will rash intruder climb 

To list en - words, or stint our time, 

And . ue doth, I want not steel 

Which some have felt, and more may feel. 

Then shalt thou learn of Selim more 

Than thou hast heard or thought before ; 

Trust me, Zuleika — fear not me ! 

Thou know'st I hold a Haram key. ' 

M Fear thee, my Selim ! ne'er till now 

Did word like this " 

"Delay not thcu; 

I ktep the key — and Haroun's guard 

Have some, and hope of more reward. 

To-pigM, Zuleika, thou shalt hear 

My tele, my purpose, and my fear: 

I ara not, love ! what I appear." 



CANTO II. 



i. 

The winds are high on Helle's wave, 

As on that night of stormy water 
When Love, who sent, forgot to save 
The young, the beautiful, the brave, 

The lonely hope of Sestos' daughter. 
Oh ! when alone along the sky 
Her turret-torch was blazing high, 
Though rising gale, and breaking foam, 
And shrieking sea-birds warn'd him home ; 
And clouds aloft and tides below, 
With signs and sounds, forbade to go ; 
He could not see, he would not hear 
Or sound or sign foreboding fear ; 
His eve but saw that light of love, 
The only star it hail'd above ; 
His ear but rang with Hero's song, 
" Ye waves, divide not lovers long !" 
That tale is old, but love anew 
May nerve young hearts to prove as true. 

II. 

The winds are high, and Helle's tide 

Rolls darkly heaving to the mam ; 
And night's descending shadows hide 

That field with blood bedew'd in vain, 
The desert of old Priam's pride ; 
The tombs, sole relics of his reign, 
All — save immortal dreams that could beguile 
The blind old man of Scio's rocky isle ! 

III. 

Oh ! yet — for there my steps have been ; 

These feet have press'd the sacred shore, 
These limbs that buoyant wave hath borne — 
Minstrel! with thee to muse, to mourn, 

To trace again those fields of yore, 
Believing every hillock green 

Contains no fabled hero's ashes, 
And that around the undoubted scene 

Thine own "broad Hellespont" 53 still dashes, 
Be long my lot ! and cold were he 
Who there could gaze denying thee ! 

IV. 

The night hath closed on Helle's stream, 

Nor yet hath risen on Ida's hill 
That moon, which shone on his high theme ; 
No warrior chides her peaceful beam, 

But conscious shepherds bless it still. 
Their flocks are grazing on the mound 

Of him who felt the Dardan's arrow . 
That mighty heap of gather'd ground 
Which Amnion's 2 * son ran proudly round, 
By nations raised, by monarchs crown'd, 

Is now a lone and nameless barrow I 

Within— thy dwelling-place how narrow . 
Without — can only strangers breathe 
The name of him that was beneath • 
Dust long outlasts the storied stone, 
But thou — thy very dust is gone 1 



THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 



151 



Late, late to-night will Dian cheer 

The swain, and chase the boatman's fear; 

Till then — no beacon on the cliff 

May shape the course of struggling skiff; 

The scatter'd lights that skirt the bay, 

All, one by one, have died away ; 

The only lamp of this lone hour 

Is glimmering in Zuleika's tower. 

Yes ! there is light in that lone chamber, 

And o'er her silken ottoman 
Are thrown the fragrant beads of amber, 

O'er which her fairy fingers ran ; 2S 
Near these, with emerald rays beset, 
(How could she thus that gem forget?) 
Her mother's sainted amulet, 26 
Whereon engraved the Koorsee text, 
Could smooth this life, and win the next; 
And by her Comboloio 27 lies 
A Koran of illumined dyes ; 
And many a bright emblazon'd rhyme 
By Persian scribes redeem'd from time ; 
And o'er those scrolls, not oft so mute, 
Reclines her now neglected lute ; 
And round her lamp of fretted gold 
Bloom flowers in urns of China's mould; 
The richest work of Iran's loom, 
And Sheeraz' tribute of perfume ; 
All that can eye or sense delight 

Are gather'd in that gorgeous room : 

But yet it hath an air of gloom. 
She, of this Peri cell the sprite, 
What doth she hence, and on so rude a night? 

VI. 

Wrapt in the darkest sable vest, 

Which none save noblest Moslem wear, 
To guard from winds of heaven the breast 

As heaven itself to Selim dear, 
With cautious steps the thicket threading, 

And starting oft, as through the glade 

The gust its hollow moanings made, 
Till on the smoother pathway treading, 
More free her timid bosom beat, 

The maid pursued her silent guide ; 
And though her terror urged retreat, 

How could she quit her Selim's side? 

How teach her tender lips to chide ? 

VII. 

They rcach'd at length a grotto, hewn 

By Nature, but enlarged by art, 
Where oft her lute she wont to tune, 

And oft her Koran conn'd apart ; 
And ofl in youthful reverie 
She dream'd what Paradise might be : 
Where woman's parted soul shall go 
Her prophet had disdain' d to show ; 
But Selim's mansion was secure, 
Nor deem'd she, could he long endure 
His bower in other worlds of bliss, 
Without her, most beloved in this ! 
Oh ! who so dear with him could dwell? 
What Houri soothe him half so well ? 



VIII. 

Since last she visited the spot 

Some change seem'd wrought within the grot 

It might be only that the night 

Disguised things seen by better light: 

That brazen lamp but dimly threw 

A ray of no celestial hue ; 

But in a nook within the cell 

Her eye on stranger objects fell. 

There arms were piled, not such as wield 

The turban'd Delis in the field ; 

But brands of foreign blade and hilt, 

And one was red — perchance with guilt ! 

Ah ! how without can blood be spilt? 

A cup too on the board was set 

That did not seem to hold sherbet. 

What may this mean ? she turn'd to see 

Her Selim—" Oh ! can this be he ?" 

IX. 

His robe of pride was thrown aside, 

His brow no high-crown'd turban bore, 
But in its stead a shawl of red, 

Wreathed lightly round, his temples wore ; 
That dagger, on whose hilt the gem 
Were worthy of a diadem, 
No longer glitter'd at his wais f , 
AVhere pistols unadorn'd were braced ; 
And from his belt a sabre swung, 
And from his shoulder loosely hung 
The cloak of white, the thin capote 
That decks the wandering Candiote . 
Beneath — his golden-plated vest 
Clung like a cuirass to his breast ; 
The greaves below his knee that wound 
With silvery scales were sheathed and bound 
But were it not that high command 
Spake in his eye, and tone, and hand, 
All that a careless eye could see 
In him was some young Galiongee. 28 

X. 

" I said I was not what I seem'd ; 

And now thou seest my words were true 
I have a tale thou hast not dream'd, 

If sooth — its truth must others rue. 
My story now 't were vain to hide ; 
I must not see thee Osman's bride : 
But had not thine own lips declared 
How much of that young heart I shared, 
I could not, must not, yet have shown 
The darker secret of my own. 
In this I speak not now of love ; 
That, let time, truth, and peril prove : 
But first — Oh ! never wed another — 
Zuleika ! I am not thy brother ! " 

XI. 

" Oh ! not my brother ! — yet unsay — 

God ! am I left alone on earth 
To mourn — I dare not curse — the day 

That saw my solitary birth ? 
Oh ! thou wilt love me now no more ! 

My sinking heart foreboded ill ; 
But know me all I was before, 

Thy sister — friend — Zuleika stilL 



152 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Thou lcil'st me here perchance to kill ; 

If thou hast cause for vengeance, see. 
My breast is otfer'd — take thy fill ! 
Fir hotter with the dead to be 
Than live thus nothing now to thee : 
Perhaps far worse, for now I know 
Why Giaffir always seem'd thy foe; 
And I, alas ! am Giatiir's child, 
For whom thou wert contcmn'd, reviled. 
If not thy sister — wouldst thou save 
My life, Oh ! bid me be thy slave !" 

XII. 
"My slave, Zuleika ! — nay, I'm thine: 

But, gentle love, this transport calm. 
Thy lot shall yet be link'd with mine ; 
I swear it by our Prophet's shrine, 

And be that thought thy sorrow's balm. 
So may the Koran 29 verse display'd 
Upon its steel direct my blade, 
In danger's hour to guard us both, 
As I preserve that awful oath ! 
The name in which thy heart hath prided 

Must change ; but, my Zuleika, know, 
That tie is widen'd, not divided, 

Although thy sire 's my deadliest foe. 
My father was to Giaflir all 

That Sclim late was deem'd to thee ; 
That brother wrought a brother's fall, 

But spared, at least, my infancy ; 
And lulPd me with a vain deceit 
That yet a like return may meet. 
He rear'd me, not with tender help, 

But like the nephew of a Cain ; 30 
He watch' d me like a lion's whelp, 

That gnaws and yet may break his chain. 

My father's blood in every vein 
Is boiling ; but for thy dear sake 
No present vengeance will I take ; 

Though here I must no more remain. 
But first, beloved Zuleika! hear 
How Gaffir wrought this deed of fear. 

XIII. 

" How first their strife to rancour grew, 

If love or envy made them ibes, 
It matters little if I knew ; 
In fiery spirits, slights, though few 

And thoughtless, will disturb repose. 
In war Abdallah's arm was strong, 
Reinember'd yet in Bosniac song, 
And Paswan's 31 rebel hordes attest 
How little love they bore such guest: 
His death is all I need relate, 
The stern effect of Giaffir's hate • 
And how my birth disclosed to me, 
What'er beside it makes, hath made me free. 

XIV. 
" When Paswan, after years of strife, 
At last for power, but first for life, 
In Widin's walls too proudly sate, 
Our Pachas rallied round the state ; 
Nor last nor least in high command 
Each brother led a separate band ; 



They gave their horsetails 32 to the wind, 

And, mustering in Sophia's plain, 
Their tents were pitch'd, their post assign'd ; 

To one, alas ! assign'd in rain ! 
What need of words ! the deadly bowl, 

By Giaffir's order drugg'd and given, 
With venom, subtle as his soul, 

Dismiss'd Abdallah's hence to heaven. 
Reclined and feverish in the bath, 

He, when the hunter's sport was up, 
But little deem'd a brother's wrath 

To quench his thirst had such a cup : 
The bowl a bribed attendant bore ; 
He drank one draught,- 13 nor needed more! 
If thou my tale, Zuleika, doubt, 
Call Haroun — he can tell it out. 

XV. 

"The deed once done, and Paswan's feud 

In part suppress'd, though ne'er subdued, 

Abdallah's pachalick was gain'd : 

Thou know'st not what in our Divan 

Can wealth procure for worse than man — 

Abdallah's honours were obtain'd 

By him a brother's murder stain'd ; 

'T is true, the purchase nearly drain'd 

His ill-got treasure, soon replaced. 

Would'st question whence ? Survey the waste, 

And ask the squalid peasant how 

His gains repay his broiling brow 1 

Why me the stern usurper spared, 

Why thus with me his palace shared, 

I know not. Shame, regret, remorse, 

And little fear from infant's force ; 

Besides, adoption as a son 

By him whom Heaven accorded none, 

Or some unknown cabal, caprice, 

Preserved me thus ; — but not in peace : 

He cannot curb his haughty mood, 

Nor I forgive a father's blood. 

XVI. 

"Within thy father's house are foes ; 

Not all who break his bread are true : 
To these should I my birth disclose, 

His days, his very hours were few. 
They only want a heart to lead, 
A hand to point them to the deed. 
But Haroun only knows, or knew 

This tale, whose close is almost nigh : 
He in Abdallah's palace grew, 

And held that post in his Serai 

Which holds he here — he saw him die: 
But what could single slavery do ? 
Avenge his lord ! alas ! too late ; 
Or save his son from such a fate ? 
He chose the last, and when elate 

WiUl foes subdued, or friends bctray'd, 
Proud Giaflir in high triumph sate, 
He led me helpless to his gate, 

And not in vain it seems essay'd 

To save the life for which he pray'd. 
The knowledge of my birth secured 

From all and each, but most from me ; 
Thus Giaffir's safety was ensured, 
ltemoved he too from Roumebe 



THE ERDE OF ABYDOS. 



153 



To this our Asiatic side, 

Far troni our seats by Danube's tide, 

Willi none but Haroun, who retains 
Such knowledge — and the Nubian feels 

A tyrant's secrets are but chains 
From which the captive gladly steals, 
And this and more to me reveals : 
Such still to guilt just Alia sends — 
Slaves, tools, accomplices — no frienda! 

XVII. 

" All this, Zuleika, harshly sounds ; 

But harsher still my talc must be : 
Howc'er my tongue thy softness wounds, 

Yet I must prove all truth to thee. 

I saw thee start this garb to see, 
Yet is it one I oft have worn, 

And long must wear: this Galiongee, 
To whom thy plighted vow is sworn, 

Is leader of those pirate hordes, 
Whose laws and lives are on their swords ; 
To hear whose desolating tale 
Would make thy waning cheek more pale : 
Those arms thou see'st my band have brought, 
The hands that wield are not remote ; 
This cup too for the rugged knaves 

Is fill'd — once quaff 'd, they ne'er repine : 
Our Prophet might forgive the slaves ; 

They 're only infidels in wine. 

XVIII. 

" What could I be ? Proscribed at home, 

And taunted to a wish to roam ; 

\nd listless left — for Giaffir's fear 

Denied the courser and the spear — 

Though oft — Oh, Mahomet ! how oft ! — 

In full Divan the despot scoff'd, 

As if my weak unwilling hand 

Refused the bridle or the brand: 

He ever went to war alone, 

And pent me here untried, unknown ; 

To Haroun's care with women left, 

By hope unblest, of fame bereft. 

While thou — whose softness long endcar'd, 

Though it unmann'd me, still had cheer'd — 

To Brusa's walls for safety sent, 

Awaited'st there the field's event. 

Haroun, who saw my spirit pining 

Beneath inaction's sluggish yoke, 
His captive, though with dread resigning, 

My thraldom for a season broke, 
On promise to return before 
The day when Giaffir's charge was o'er. 
'Tis vain — my tongue cannot impart 
My almost drunkenness of heart, 
When first this liberated eve 
Survey'd earth, ocean, sun, and sky, 
As if my spirit pierce I them through, 
And all their inmost wonders knew ! 

i I alone can paint to thee 
That more than feeling — I was free! 
E'en for thy presence ceased to pine ; 
The world — nay — heaven itself was mine! 

XIX. 
"The shallop of a trusty Moor 
Convcy'd me from this idle shore; 
P 25 



I long'd to sec the isles that gem 

Old Ocean's purple diadem: 

I sought by turns, and saw them all ; 34 

But when and where I join'd the crew, 
With whom I 'm pledged to rise or fali, 

XV hen all that we design to do 
Is done, 't will then be time more meet 
To tell thee when the tale's complete. 

XX. 

" 'T is tnie, they are a lawless brood, 
But lough in form, nor mild in mood.: 
And every creed, and every race, 
With them hath found — may find a place: 
But open speech, and ready hand, 
Obedience to their chief's command ; 
A soul for every enterprise, 
That never sees with terror's eyes ; 
Friendship for each, and faith to all, 
And vengeance vow'd for those who fall, 
Have m<.de them fitting instruments 
For more than even my own intents. 
And some — and I have studied all 

Distinguish'd from the vulgar rank, 
But chietiy to my council call 

The wisdom of the cautious Frank — 
And some to higher thoughts aspire, 
The last of Lambro's 3b patriots there 
Anticipated freedom share ; 
And oft around the cavern fire 
On visionary schemes debate, 
To snatch the Rayahs 36 from their fate. 
So let them ease their hearts with [irate 
Of equal rights, which man ne'er knew; 
I have a love for freedom too. 
Ay ! let me like the ocean-patriarch 37 roam, 
Or only know on land the Tartar's home ! 3S 
My tent on shore, my galley on the sea, 
Are more than cities and serais to me : 
Borne by my steed, or wafted by mv sail, 
Across the desert, or before the gale, 
Bound where thou wilt, my barb ! or glide, mv prow 
But be the star that guides the wanderer, thou ! 
Thou, n;y Zuleika, share and bless my bark ; 
The dove of peace and promise to mine ark ! 
Or, since that hope denied in worlds of strife, 
Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life ! 
The evening beam that smiles the clouds away, 
And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray ! 
Blest — as the Muezzin's strain from Mecca's wall 
To pilgrims pure and prostrate at his call: 
Soft — as the melody of youthful days, 
That steals the trembling tear of speechless praise; 
Dear — as his native song to exile's ears, 
Shall sound each tone thv long-loved voice endears 
For thee in those bright isles is built a bower 
Blooming as Aden 39 in its earliest hour. 
A thousand swords, with Sclim's heart and nnr«l, 
Wait — wave — defend — destroy — at thy command I 
Girt by mv baud, Zuleika at my side, 
The spoil of nations shall bedeck my bride. 
The haram's languid years of listtass case 
Are well resign'd for cares — for joys like tnese : 
Not blind to fate, I see, where'er I rove, 
Umiurnber'd perils — but one only love ' 



154 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Vet well my toils shall that fond breast repay, 

Though fortune frown, or falser friends betray. 

How dear the dream in darkest hours of ill, 

Should all be changed, to find thee faithful still ! 

He but thy soul, like Selim's, firmly shown ; 

To thee be Selim's tender as thine own ; 

To soothe each sorrow, share in each delight, 

Blend every thought, do all — but disunite! 

Once free, 't is mine our horde again to guide ; 

Friends to each other, foes to aught beside : 

Yet there wc follow but the bent assign'd 

Bv fatal nature to man's warring kind : 

Mark ! where his carnage and his conquests cease ! 

He makes a solitude, and calls it — peace ! 

I, like the rest, must use my skill or strength, 

But ask no land beyond my sabre's length : 

Power sways but by division — her resource 

The blest alternative of fraud or force ! 

Ours be the last : in time deceit may come, 

When cities cage us in a social home : 

There even thy sou! might err — how oil the heart 

Corruption shakes which peril could not part ! 

And woman, more than man, when death or woe 

Or even disgrace would lay her lover low, 

Sunk in the lap of luxury "ill shame — 

Away suspicion! — not Zultika's name! 

But life is hazard at the best ; and here 

No more remains to win, and much to fear: 

Yes, fear ! — the doubt, the dread of losing thee, 

By Osman's power and GialTir's stern decree. 

That dread shall vanish with the favouring gale, 

Which love to-right hath promised to my sail : 

No danger daunts the pair his smile hath blest, 

Their steps still roving, but their hearts at rest. 

With thee all toils are sweet, each clime hath charms ; 

Earth — sea alike — our world within our arms ! 

Ay — let the loud winds whistle o'er the deck, 

So that those arms cling closer round my neck: 

The deepest murmur of this lip shall be 

No sigh lor safety, but a prayer for thee ! 

The wars of elements no fears impart 

To love, whose deadliest bane is human art : 

IViere lie the only rocks our course can check ; 

Here moments menace — tliere are years of wreck ! 

But hence ye thoughts that rise in horror's shape ! 

This hour bestows, or ever bars escape. 

Few words remain of mine my tale to close ; 

Of thine but one to waft us from our foes ; 

Yeu — foes — to me will Giaflir's hate decline ? 

And is not Osman, who would part us, thine ? 

XXI. 

'■ 1 lis head and faith from doubt and death 
Return'd in time my guard to save ; 
Few heard, none told, that o'er the wave 
From isle to isle I roved the while: 
And since, though parted from ray band, 
Too seldom now I leave the land, 
No deed they 've done, nor deed shall do, 
Ere I have heard and doom'd it too : 
I form the plan, decree the spoil, 
'T is fit I oilener share the toil. 
But now too long I 've held thine car ; 
Time presses, floats my bark, and here 
We. leave behind but hate and fear. 



To-morrow Osman with his train 
Arrives — to-night must break thy chain: 
And wouldst thou save that haughty Bey, 

Perchance his life who gave thee thine, 
With me this hour away — away ! 

But yet, though thou art plighted mine, 
Wouldst thou recall thy willing vow, 
AppaU'd by truths imparted now, 
Here rest I — not to see thee wed : 
But be that peril on my head !" 

XXH. 

Zuleika, mute and motionless, 

Stood like that statue of distress, 

When, her last hope for ever gone, 

The mother harden'd into stone ; 

All in the maid that ey^Wuld s^e 

Was but a younger N i oneVSaJ' 

Hut ere her lip, or even her eye, 

Essay'd to speak, or look replv, 

Beneath the garden's wicket porch 

Far llash'd on high a blazing torch ! 

Another — and another — and another— 

"Oh ! flv — no more — yet now my more than brc the* ' 

Far, wide, through every thicket spread, 

The fearful lights are gleaming red ; 

Nor these alone — for each right hand 

Is ready with a sheathless brand. 

They part, pursue, return, and wheel 

W r ith searching flambeau, shining steel ; 

And last of all, his sabre waving, 

Stern Giaflir in his fury raving : 

And now almost they touch the cave — 

Oh ! must that grot be Selim's grave? 

XXIII. 

Dauntless he stood — " 'tis come — soon past- 
One kiss, Zuleika — 't is my last : 

But yet my band not far from shore 
May hear this signal, see the flash j 
Yet now too few — the attempt were rash : 

No matter — yet one effort more." 
Forth to the cavern mouth he stept ; 

His pistol's echo rang on high. 
Zuleika started not, nor wept, 

Despair benurnb'd her breast and eye ! — 
" They hear mc not, or if they ply 
Their oars, 't is but to see me die ; 
That sound hath drawn my foes more nigh. 
Then forth my father's scimitar, 
Thou ne'er hast seen less equal war ! 

Farewell, Zuleika! — Sweet! retire: 
Yet stay within — here linger safe, 
At thee his rage will only chafe. 
Stir not — lest even to thee perchance 
Some erring blade or ball should glance. 

Fear'st thou for him ? — may I expire 

If in this strife I seek thy sire ! 
No — though by him that poison pour'd ; 
No — though again he call me coward ! 
But tamely shall I meet their steel / 
No — as each crest save his may feel !" 

XXIV. 

One bound he made, and gain'd the sand : 
Already at his feet hath sunk 



THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 



15.") 



The foremost of the prying band, 

A gasping head, a quivering trunk: 
Anotner falls — but round him close 
A swarming circle of his foes ; 
From right to left his path he cleft, 

And almost met the meeting wave : 
His boat appears — not five oars' length — 
His comrades strain with desperate strength- 

Oh ! are they yet in time to save ? 

His feet the foremost breakers lave ; 
His band are plunging in the bay, 
Their sabres glitter through the spray ; 
Wet — wild — unwearied to the strand 
They struggle — now they touch the land ! 
They come — 't is but to add to slaughter— 
His heart's best blood is on the water ! 

XXV. 

Escaped from shot, unharm'd by steel, 

Or scarcely grazed its force to feel, 

Had Selim won, betray'd, beset, 

To where the strand and billows met : 

There as his last step left the land, 

And the last death-blow dealt his hand— 

Ah ! wherefore did he turn to look 

For her his eye but sought in vain ? 
That pause, that fatal gaze he took, 

Hath doom'd his death, or fi.v'd his chain. 
Sad proof, in peril and in pain, 
How late will lover's hope remain ! 
His back was to the dashing spray; 
Behind, but close, his comrades lay, 
When, at the instant, hiss'd the ball— 
M So may the foes of Giaffir fall !" 
Whose voice is heard ? whose carbine rang ? 
Whose bullet through the night-air sang, 
Too nearly, deadly aim'd to err ? 
'T is thine — Abdallah's murderer ! 
The father slowly rued thy hate, 
The son hath found a quicker fate : 
Fast from his breast the blood is bubbling, 
The whiteness of the sea-foam troubling— 
If aught his lips essay'd .o groan, 
The rushing billows choak'd the tone ! 

XXVI. 

Morn slowly rolls the clouds away ; 

Few trophies of the fight are there : 
The shouts that shook the midnight bay 
Are silent ; but some signs of fray 

That strand of strife may bear, 
And fragments of each shiver'd brand : 
Steps stamp'd ; and dash'd into the sand 
The print of many a struggling hand 

May there be mark'd ; nor far remote 

A broken torch, an oarless boat ; 
And tangled on the weeds that heap 
The beach where shelving to the deep 

There lies a white capote ! 
'Tis rent in twain — one dark-red stain 
The wave vet ripples o'er in vain : 
But where is he who wore ? 
Ye ! who would o'er his relics weep 
Go, seek them where the surges sweep 
Their burthen round Sigipum's steep, 
And cast on Lemnos' shore : 



The sea-birds shriek above the prey, 
O'er which their hungry beaks delay, 
As shaken on his restless pillow, 
His head heaves with the heaving billow ; 
That hand, whose motion is not life, 
Yet feebly seems to menace strife, 
Flung by the tossing tide on high, 
Then levell'd with the wave — 
What recks it, though that corse shaL lie 

Within a living grave ? 
The bird that tears that prostrate form 
Hath only robb'd the meaner worm ; 
The only heart, the only eye 
Had bled or wept to see him die, 
Had seen those scatter'd limbs composed, 
And mourn'd above his turban-stone, *° 
That heart hath • urst — that eye was closed — 
Yea — closed before his own ! 
XXVII. 
By Helle's stream there is a voice of wail ! 
And woman's eye is wet — man's cheek is pale : 
Zuleika ! last of GiafEr's race, 

Thy destined lord is come too late ; 
He sees not — ne'er shall see thy face ! 

Can he not hear 
The loud Wul-wulleh 41 warn his distant ear? 
Thy handmaids weeping at the gate, 
The Koran-chaunters of the hymn of fate, 
The silent slaves with folded arms that wait, 
Sighs in the hall, and shrieks upon the gale, 

Tell him thy tale ! 
Thou didst not view thy Selim fall ! 

That fearful moment when he left the cave 
Thy heart grew chill : 
He was thy hope — thy joy — thy love — thine all — 
And that last thought on him thou couldst not save 
Sufficed to kill ; 
Burst forth in one wild cry — and all was still. 

Peace to thy broken heart, and virgin grave ! 
Ah ! happy ! but of life to lose the worst ! 
That grief — though deep — though fatal — was thy first 
Thrice happy ! ne'er to feel nor fear the force 
Of absence, shame, pride, hate, revenge, remorse ! 
And," oh ! that pang where more than madness lies 
The worm that will not sleep — and never dies ; 
Thought of the gloomy day and ghastly night, 
That dreads the darkness, and yet loathes the light, 
That winds around, and tears the quivering heart! 
Ah ! wherefore not consume it — and depart! 
Woe to thee, rash and unrelenting chief! 
Vainly thou heap'st the dust upon thy head, 
Vainly the sackcloth o'er thy limbs doth spread : 
By that same hand Abdallah — Selim bled. 
Now let it tear thy beard in idle grief: 
Thy pride of heart, thv bride for Osman's bed, 
She, whom thy sultan had but seen to wed, 
Thy daughter 's dead ! 
Hope of thine age, thy twilight's lonely beam, 
The star hath set that shone on Helle's stream. 
What quench'd its ray ? — the blood that thou hast slit u ! 
Hark ! to the hurried question of despair : 
"Where is my child ?" an echo answers — " Whera I"* 
XXVIII. 
Within the place of thousand tombs 
That shine beneath, while dark abrve 



156 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The sad but living cypress glooms 
And withers not, though brunch and leaf 
Are stamp'd with an eternal grief, 

Like early unrequited love, 
One spot exists, which ever blooms 

Even in that deadly grove — 
A single rose is shedding there 

Its lonely lustre, meek and pale : 
It looks as planted by despair — 

So white — so faint — the slightest gale 
Might whirl the loaves on high ; 

And yet, though storms and blight assail, 
And hands more rude than wintry sky 

May wring it from the stem — in vain — 

To-morrow sees it bloom again ! 
The stalk some spirit gently rears, 
And waters with celestial tears ; 

For well may maids of Hello deem 
That this can be no earthly (lower, 
Which mocks the tempest's withering hour, 
And buds unshelter'd by a bower ; 
Nor droops, though spring refuse her shower, 

Nor woos the summer beam : 
To it the livelong night there sings 

A bird unseen — but not remote : 
Invisible his airy wings, 
But soft as harp that Houri strings 

His long entrancing note ! 
It were the bulbul ; but his throat, 

Though mournful, pours not such a strain : 
For they who listen cannot leave 
The spot, but linger there and grieve 

As if they loved in vain ! 
And yet so sweet the tears they shed, 
'Tis sorrow so unmix' d with dread, 
They scarce can bear the morn to break 

That melancholv spell, 
And longer yet would weep and wake, 

He sings so wild and well ! 
Put when the day-blush bursts frotn high, 
Expires that magic melody. 
And some have been who could believe 
(So fondly youthful dreams deceive, 

Yet harsh be they that blame) 
That note so piercing and profound 
Will snape and syllable its sound 

Into Zuleika's name. 43 
'T is from her cypress' summit heard, 
That melts in air the liquid word : 
'T is from her lowly virgin earth 
That white rose takes its tender birth. 
There late wae laid a marble stone ; 
Eve saw it placed — the morrow gone ! 
It was no mortal arm that bore 
That deep-fix'd pillar to the shore ; 
For there, as Helle's legends tell, 
Next morn 't was found where Selim fell ; 
Lash'd by the tumbling tide, whose wave 
Denied his bones a holier grave : 
And there, by night, reclined, 't is said. 
Is seen a ghastlv turban'd head: 
And hence extended by the billow, 
T is named the " Pirate-phantom's pillow !" 
Where first it lay that mourning flower 
Elath flourish'?! ; flounsheth this hour, 
Alone and dewy, coldly pure and pale; 
\" weening beauty's chcuk at sorrow's talc! 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 146, line 8. 
Wax faint o'er tlie gardens of Gul in her bloom 
"Gul," the rose. 

Note 2. Page 146, line 17. 
Can he smile on such deeds as his children have done 7 

" Souls made of fire, and children of the sun. 
With whom revenge is virtue." 

Young's Revenge. 

Note 3. Page 147, line 31. 
With Mcjnoun's tale, or Sadi's song. 
Mejnoun and Leila, the Romeo and Juliet of tli6 
East. Sadi, the moral poet of Persia. 

Note 4. Page 147, line 3"2. 
Till I, who heard the deep tamhour. 
Tambour, Turkish drum, which sounds at sunrise, 
noon, and twilight. 

Note 5. Page 147, line 103. 
He is an Arab to my sight. 
The Turks abhor the Arabs (who return the compli- 
ment a hundred fold), even more than they hate the 
Christians. 

Note G. Page 143, line 12. 
The mind, the music breathing from her face. 
This expression has met with objections. I will not 
refer to "him who hath not Music in his soul," but 
merely request the reader to recollect, for ten seconds, 
the features of the woman whom he believes to be tho 
most beautiful ; and if he then does not comprehend 
fully what is feebly expressed in the above line, I shall 
be sorry for us both. For an eloquent passage in the 
latest work of the first female writer of this, perhaps 
of any age, on the analogy (and the immediate com- 
parison excited by that analogy), between "painting 
and music," see vol. iii. cap. 10. De L'Ali.emagne. 
And is not this connexion still stronger with the original 
than the copy 1 — with the colouring of nature than of 
art? After all, this is rather to be felt tnan described ; 
still I think there are some who will understand it, at 
least they would have done, had they beheld the coun- 
tenance whose speaking harmony suggested the idea ; 
for this passage is not drawn from imagination, but 
memory, that mirror which affliction dashes to the 
earth, and looking down upon the fragments, only be- 
holds the reflection multiplied ! 

Note 7. Page 14/, line 34. 
Hut yet the line of Carasman. 
Carasman Oglou, or Kara Osman Oglou, is the 
principal landholder in Turkey : he governs Magnesia: 
those who, by a kind of feudal tenure, possess land on 
condition of service, are called Timariots: they serve 
as Spahis, according to the extent of territory, and 
bring a certain number into the field, generally ca\ airy. 

Note 8. Page 148, line 46. 
And teach the messenger what fate. 
When a Pacha is sufficiently strong to resist, the 
single messenger, who is always the first bearer of the 
order for his death, is strangled instead, and some- 
times five or six, one after the other, on the sr.mo 
errand, by command of the refractory patient ; if, on 
the contrary., he \r weak or loval, he bows, kisses the 



THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS. 



157 



Sultan's respectable signature, and is bowstrung with 
great complacency. In 1810, several of these presents 
were exhibited in the niche of the Seraglio gate ; 
among others, the head of the Pacha of Uagdat, a 
orave young man, cut off by treachery, after a despe- 
rate resistance. 

Note 9. Page 148, line 65. 
Thrice clapp'd his hands, and call'd his steed. 
Clapping of hands calls the servants. The Turks 
hate a superfluous expenditure of voice, and they have 
no bells. 

Note 10. Page 148, line 66. 

Resign'd his gem-adoru'd chibouque. 

Chibouque, the Turkish pipe, of which the amber 

mouth-piece, and sometimes the ball which contains the 

leaf, is adorned with precious stones, if in possession 

of the wealthier orders. 

Note 11. Page 148, line 68. 
With Maugrabee and Mamaluke. 
Maugrabce, Moorish mercenaries. 

Note 12. Page 148, line 69. 
His way amid his Delis took. 
Deli, bravo? who form the forlorn hope of the cavalry, 
and always begin the action. 

Note 13. Page 148, line 81. 
Careering cleave the folded felt. 
A twisted fold of felt is used for scimitar practice by 
he Turks, and few but Mussulman arms can cut through 
\t at a single stroke : sometimes a tough turban is used 
for die same purpose. The jerreed is a game of blunt 
javelins, animated and graceful. 

Note 14. Page 148, line 84. 
Nor heard their Ollahs wild nnd loud — 
" Ollahs," Alia il Allah, the " Leilies," as the Spanish 
poets call them, the sound is Ollah ; a cry of which the 
Turks, for a silent people, are somewhat profuse, par- 
ticularly during the jerreed, or in the chase, but mostly 
in battle. Their animation in the field, and gravity in 
the chamber, with their pipes and comboloios, form an 
amusing contrast. 

Note 15. Page 148, line 103. 
The Persian Atar-gul's perfume. 
"Atar-gul," ottar of roses. The Persian is the 
finest. 

Note 16. Page 148, line 105. 
The pictured roof and marble Hour. 
The ceiling and wainscots, or rather walls, of the 
Mussulman apartments are generally painted, in great 
houses, with one eternal and highly coloured view of 
Constantinople, wherein the principal feature is a noble 
contempt of perspective ; below, arms, scimitars, etc., 
arc in general fancifully and not inelegantly disposed. 

Note 17. Page 148, line 121. 
A message from tha Bulbul bears. 
It has been much doubted whether the notes of this 
" Lover of the rose," are sad or merry ; and Mr. Fox's 
remarks on the subject have provoked some learned 
controversy as to the opinions of the ancients on the 
subject. I dare not venture a conjecture on the point, 
though a little inclined to the "errare mallem " etc. 
if Mr. Fox was mistaken. 
H 2 



Note 18. Page 149, line 34. 
Even Azrael, from his deadly quiver. 
"Azrael" — the angel of death. 

Note 19. Page 149, line 67. 
Within the caves of Istakar. 
The treasures of the Prcadamite Sultans. See D'Heti 
belot, article Istukar. 

Note 20. Page 149, line 83. 
Holds Dot a Musselim's control. 
Musselim, a governor, the next in rank after a Pacha; 
a Waywode is the third ; and then come the Agas. 

Note 21. Page 149, line 84. 

Was he not bred in Egripo 1 

Egripo — the Negropont. According to the proverb, 

the Turks of Egripo, the Jews of Salonica, and tho 

Greeks of Athens, are the worst of their respective 

races. 

Note 22. Page 130, line 31. 
Ah ! yonder see the Tchocadar. 
" Tchocadar" — one of the attendants who precedes 
a man of authority. 

Note 23. Page 150, line 101. 
Thine own "broad Hellespont" still dashes. 
The wrangling about this epithet, " the broad Hel- 
lespont" or the "boundless Hellespont," whether it 
means one or the other, or what it means at all, has 
been beyond all possibility of detail. I have even heard 
it disputed on the spot ; and, not foreseeing a speedy 
conclusion to the controversy, amused myself with 
swimming across it in the mean time, and probably 
may again, before the point is settled. Indeed, the 
question as to the truth of " the tale of Troy divine " 
still continues, much of it resting upon the talismanic 
word "a-£(fioj :" probably Homer had the same notion 
of distance that a coquette has of time, and when ha 
talks of boundless, means half a mile ; as the latter, by 
a like figure, when she says eternal attachment, simply 
specifies three weeks. 

Note 24. Page 150, line 112. 
Which Amnion's son ran proudly round. 
Before his Persian invasion, and crowned the altar 
with laurel, etc. He was afterwards imitated by Cara- 
calla in his race. It is believed that the last also 
poisoned a friend, named Festus, for the sake of new 
Patroclan games. I have seen the sheep feeding on 
the tombs of iEsietes and Antilochus ; the first is in 
the centre of the plain. 

Note 25. Page 151, line 12. 
O'er which her fairy fingers ran. 
When rubbed, the amber is susceptible of a perfume, 

which is slight, but not disagreeable. 

Note 26. Page 151, line 15. 
Her mother's sainted amulet. 
The belief in amulets engraved on gems, or inclosed 
in gold boxes, containing scraps from the Koran, worn 
round the neck, wrist, or arm, is still universal in the 
East. The Koorsee (throne) verse in the second chap. 
of the Koran describes the attributes of the most High, 
and is engraved in this manner, and worn by tne piouu, 
as the most esteemed and sublime of aU sentences. 



158 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Note 27. Page 151, line 18. 
And by her Comboloio lies. 
"Comboloio"— a Turkish rosary. The MSS., par- 
ticularly those of the Persians, are richly adorned and 
illuminated. The Greek females are kept in utter igno- 
rance ; but many of the Turkish girls are highly ac- 
complished, though not actually qualified for a Chris- 
tian coterie ; perhaps some of our own "blues" might 
not be the worse for bleaching. 

Note 28. Page 151, line 96. 
In liim was some young Galiongee. 
Galiongee " — or Galiongi, a sailor, that is, a Turh- 
is/i sailor; the Greeks navigate, the Turks work the 
guns. Their dress is picturesque ; and I have seen the 
Captain Pacha more than once wearing it as a kind of 
incog. Their legs, however, are generally naked. The 
buskins described in the text as sheathed behind with 
silver, are those of an Arnaout robber, who was my 
host (he had quitted the profession), at his Pyrgo, near 
Gastouni in the Morea ; they were plated in scales one 
over the other, like the back of an armadillo. 

Note 29. Page 152, line 13. 
So may the Koran verse display'd. 
The characters on all Turkish scimitars contain some- 
times the name of the place of their manufacture, but 
more generally a text from the Koran, in letters of gold. 
Amongst those in my possession is one with a blade of 
singular construction ; it is very broad, and the edge 
notched into serpentine curves like the ripple of water, 
or the wavering of flame. I asked the Armenian who 
sold it, what possible use such a figure could add : he 
said, in Italian, that he did not know ; but the Mussul- 
mans had an idea that those of this form gave a severer 
wound ; and liked it because it was " plu feroce." I 
did not much admire the reason, but bought it for its 
peculiarity. 

Note V). Page 152, line 33. 

But like the nephew of a Cain. 
It is to be observed, that every allusion to any thing 
or personage in the Old Testament, such as the Ark, or 
Cain, is equally the privilege of Mussulman and Jew; 
indeed the former profess to be much better acquainted 
with the lives, true and fabulous, of the patriarchs, than 
is warranted by our own Sacred writ, and not content 
with Adam, they have a biography of Pre- Adamites. 
Solomon is the monarch of all necromancy, and Moses a 
irophet inferior only to Christ and Mahomet. Zuleika 
w the Persian name of Pntiphar's wife, and her amour 
with Joseph constitutes one of the finest poems in their 
an<ma<>e. It is therefore no violation of costume to put 
.he names of Cain, or Noah, into the mouth of a Moslem. 

Note 31. Page 152, line 49. 
And Paswan's rebel hordes attest. 
Pas wan Oglou, the rebel of Widin, who for the last 
vears of his life, set the whole power of the Porte at 
ieliance. 

Note 32. Page 152, line 61. 
They gave their horsetails to the wind. 
Horsetail, the standard of a Pacha. 

Note 33. Page 152, line 74. 
He drank one draught, nor needed more ! 
♦iiafnr, Pacha of Argyro Castro, or Scutari, I am not 



sure which, was actually taken off" by the Albanian Ali, 
in the manner described in the text. Ali Pacha, while 
I was in the country, married the daughter of his victim, 
some years after the event had taken place at a bath in 
Sophia, or Adrianople. The poison was mixed in the 
cup of coffee, which is presented before the sherbet by 
the bath-keeper, after dressing. 

Note 34. Page 153, line 64. 
I sought by turns, and saw them all. 
The Turkish notions of almost all islands are confined 
to the Archipelago, the sea alluded to. 

Note 35. Page 153, line 87. 
The last of Lambro's patriots there. 
Lambro Canzani, a Greek, famous for his efforts in 
1789-90 for the independence of his country: aban- 
doned by the Russians, he became a pirate, and the 
Archipelago was the scene of his enterprises. He is said 
to be still alive at Petersburgh. He and Riga are the two 
most celebrated of the Greek revolutionists. 

Note 36. Page 153, line 91. 
To snatch the Rayahs from their fate. 
" Ravahs," all who pay the capitation tax, called tho 
" Haratch." 

Note 37. Page 153, line 95. 
Ay! let rno like the ocean- patriarch roam. 
This first of voyages is one of the few with which the 
Mussulmans profess much acquaintance. 

Note 38. Page 153, line 96. 
Or only know on land the Tartar's home. 
The wandering life of the Arabs, Tartars, and Turko- 
mans, will be found well detailed in any book of Eastern 
travels. That it possesses a charm peculiar to itself can- 
not be denied. A young French rencgado confessed to 
Chateaubriand, that he never found himself alone, gal- 
loping in the desert, without a sensation approaching to 
rapture, which was indescribable. 

Note 39. Page 153, line 116. 
Blooming as Aden in its earliest hour. 
" Jannat al Aden," the perpetual abode, the Mussul- 
man Paradise. 

Note 40. Page 155, line 78. 
And mourn'd above his turban-stone. 
A turban is carved in stone above the graves of men 
only. 

Note 41. Page 155, line 87. 
The loud Wul-wulleli warn his distant ear. 
The death-song of the Turkish women. The "silent 
slaves " are the men whose notions of decorum forbid 
complaint in public. 

Note 42. Page 155, line 123. 
" Where is my child ? " — an echo answers — " Where V 
"I came to the place of my birth and cried, 'the 
friends of my youth, where are they ? ' and an Echo 
answered, ' where are they ? ' " 

From an Arabic MS. 

The above quotation (from which the idea in the text 
is taken) must be already familiar to every reader — it is 
given in the first annotation, page 67, of "the Pleasures 
of Memory ;" a poem so well known as to render a 
reference almost superfluous ; but to whose pages il' 
will be delishted to recur. 



THE CORSAIR. 



159 



Note 43. Page 156, line 47. 

Into Zukika's name. 

"And airy tongues that syllalde men's names." 

WILTON. 

For a belief that the souls of the dead inhabit the form 
of birds, we need not travel to the cast. Lord Lyttlcton's 
ghost story ; the belief of the Duchess of Kendal, that 
George I. flew into her window in the shape of a raven 



(see Orford's Reminiscences), and many other instan- 
ces, bring this superstition nearer home. The most singu- 
lar was the whim of a Worcester lady, who, believing 
her daughter to exist in the shape of a singing-bird, lit- 
erally furnished her pew in the Cathedral with cages-full 
of the kind ; and as she was rich, and a benefactress in 
beautifying the church, no objection was made to her 
harmless folly. — For this anecdote, see Orford's Letters. 



£ftc <£orsatr; 

A TALE. 



I suoi pension in lui dormir non ponno. 

TASSO, Canto dtcimo, Gerusalemme Libcrata. 



THOMAS 1VICOHE, ESQ. 

MY DEAR MOORE, 

I dedicate to you the last production with which I 
shall trespass on public patience, and your indulgence, 
for some years; and I own that I feel anxious to avail 
myself of this latest and only opportunity of adorning 
mvpa^es with a name, consecrated by unshaken public 
principle, and the most undoubted and various talents. 
While Ireland ranks you among the firmest of her pa- 
triots : while vou stand alone the first of her bards in her 
estimation, and Britain repeats and ratifies the decree, 
permit one, whose only regret, since our first acquaint- 
ance, has been the years he had lost before it commenced, 
to add the humble but sincere suffrage of friendship, to 
the voice of more than one nation. It will at least prove 
to you, that I have neither forgotten the gratification 
derived from your society, nor abandoned the prospect 
of its renewal, whenever your leisure or inclination allows 
you to atone to your friends for too long an absence. It 
is said among those friends, I trust truly, that you are 
engaged in the composition of a poem whose scene will 
be laid in the East : none can do those scenes so much 
justice. The wrongs of your own country, the magnifi- 
cent and fiery spirit of her sons, the beauty and feeling of 
her daughters, may there be found ; and Collins, when 
he denominated his Oriental his Irish Eclogues, was not 
aware how true, at least, was a part of his parallel. Your 
imagination will create a warmer sun, and less clouded 
sky ; but wildness, tenderness, and originality, are part 
of your national claim of oriental descent, to which you 
have already thus far proved your title more clearly than 
the most zealous of your country's antiquarians. 

May I add a few words on a subject on which all men 
are supposed to be fluent, and none agreeable? — Self. 
I have written much, and published more than enough 
to demand a longer silence than I now meditate ; but for 
some years to come it is my intention to tempt no 
further the award of " gods, men, nor columns." In 
(he present composition I have attempted not the most 
difficult, but, perhaps, the best-adapted measure to our 
language, the good old and now neglected heroic couplet. 
The stan/a of Spenser is perhaps too slow and dignified 
for narrative ; though I confess, it is the measure moat 



after my own heart : Scott alone, of the present gene- 
ration, has hitherto completely triumphed over the fatal 
facility of the octo-svliabic verse ; and this is not the least 
victory of his fertile and mightv genius: in blank verse, 
Milton, Thomson, and our dramatists, are the beacons 
that shine along the deep, but warn us from the rough 
and barren rock on which the)' are kindled. The heroic 
couplet is not the most popular measure certainly ; but 
as I did not deviate into the other from a wish to flatter 
what is called public opinion, I shall quit it without 
further apology, and take my chance once more with 
that versification, in which I have hitherto published 
nothing but compositions whose former circulation is 
part of my present and will be of my futmo regret. 

With regard to my story, and stories in general, I 
should have been glad to have rendered my personages 
more perfect and amiable, if possible, inasmuch as I 
have been sometimes criticised, and considered no less 
responsible for their deeds and qualities than if all had 
been personal. Be it so — if I have deviated into the 
gloomy vanity of " drawing from self," the pictures are 
probably like, since they are unfavourable ; and if not, 
those who know me are undeceived, and those who do 
not, I have little interest in undeceiving. I have no 
particular desire that any but my acquaintance should 
think the author better than the beings of his imagining ; 
but I cannot help a little suprisc, and perhaps amuse- 
ment, at some odd critical exceptions in the present 
instance, when I see several bards (far more deserving, 
I allow), in very reputable plight, and quite exempted 
from all participation in the faults of those heroes, who, 
nevertheless, might be found with little more morality 
than " The Giaour," and perhaps — but no— I must admit 
Childc Harold to be a very repulsive personage ; and as 
to his identity, those who like it must give him whatever 
"alias" they please. 

If, however, it were worth while to remove the im- 
pression, it might be of some service to me, that the man 
who is alike the delight of his readers and his friends, 
the poet of all circles, and the idol of his own, permits 
me here and elsewhere to subscribe myself, 

most truly, and affectionately, 
las obedient servant, 

BYRON. 
January 2, 1814. 



1G0 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO I. 



-nessun maggior < 



ilnrc. 



('he ricorilarai del tempo felice 

Mulla iniseria 1 — 

DANTE. 



I. 

'O'er the glad waters of the dark-blue sea, 
Our thoughts as boundless, and our souls as free, 
Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam, 
Survev our empire and behold our home ! 

These are our realms, no limits to their sway — 

Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey. 

Ours the wild life in tumult still to range 

From toil to rest, and joy in every change. 

Oh, who can tell ? not thou, luxurious slave ! 

Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave ; 

Not thou, vain lord of wantonness and ease ! 

Whom slumber soothes not — pleasure cannot plea.se- 

Oh, who can tell, save he whose heart hath tried, 

And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide, 

The exulting sense — the pulse's maddening play, 

That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way? 

That for itself can woo the approaching tight, 

And turn what some deem danger to delight ; 

That seeks what cravens shun with more than zeal, 

And where the feebler faint — can only feel — 

Feel — to the rising bosom's inmost core, 

Its hope awaken and its spirit soar? 

No dread of death — if with us die our foes — 

Save that it seems even duller than repose : 

Come when it will — we snatch the life of life ; 

When lost — what recks it — by disease or strife ? 

Lei him who crawls enamour'd of decay, 

Cling to his couch, and sicken years away; 

Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied head ; 

Ours — the fresh turf, and not the feverish bed. 

While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul, 

Ours with one Jiang — one bound — escapes control. 

His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave, 

And they who loathed his life may gild his grave : 

Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed, 

When ocean shrouds and sepulchres our dead. 

For us, even banquets fond regret supply 

In the red cup that crowns our memory ; 

And the brief epitaph in danger's day, 

When those who win at length divide the prey, 

And cry remembrance saddening o'er each brow, 

How hud tnc brave who fell exulted now .'" 

II. 

Sujh were the notes that from the pirate's isle, 

Around the kindling watch-fire rang fie while ; 

Such were the sounds that thrill'd the rocks along, 

And unto cars as rugged scem'd a song ! 

In scatter'd groups upon the golden Band, 

They game — carouse — converse — or whet the brand ; 

Select the arms — to each his blade assign, 

And careless eye the blood that dims its shine : 

Repair me boat, replace the helm or oar, 

While others straggling muse along the shore; 

For the wild b;rd the busy springes set, 

')> spread beneath the sun the dripping net; 



Gaze where some distant sail a speck supplies, 

With all the thirsting eve of enterprise ; 

Tell o'er the tales of many a night of toil, 

And marvel where they next shall seize a spoil : 

No matter where — their chief's allotment this, 

Theirs to believe no prey nor plan amiss. 

Hut who that Chief 1— His name on every slio** 

Is famed and fear'd — they ask and know no more. 

With these he mingles not but to command : 

Few arc his words, but keen his eye and hand. 

Ne'er reasons he with mirth their jovial mess, 

But they forgive his silence for success. 

Ne'er for his lip the purpling rup they fill, 

That goblet passes him untasted still — 

And for his fare — the rudest of his crew 

Would that, in turn, have pass'd untasted too ; 

Earth's coarsest bread, the garden's homeliest roots 

And scarce the summer luxury of fruits, 

His short repast in humbleness supply 

With all a hermit's board would scarce deny. 

But while he shuns the grosser joys of sense, 

His mind seems nourish'd by that abstinence. 

" Steer to that shore!" — they sail. "Do this! " — 't is done* 

"Now form and follow me !" — the spoil is won. 

Thus prompt his accents and his actions still, 

And all obey and few inquire his will; 

To such brief answer and contemptuous eye 

Convey reproof, nor further deign reply. 

HI. 

"A sail! — a sail !" — a promised prize to hope • 

Her nation — flag — how speaks the telescope? 

No prize, alas ! — but yet a welcome sail : 

The blood-red signal glitters in the gale. 

Yes — she is ours — a home-returning bark — 

Blow fair, thou breeze ! — she anchors ere the dark. 

Already doubled is the cape — our bay 

Receives that prow which proudly spurns the spray. 

How gloriously her gallant course she goes ! 

Her white wings flying — never from her foes — 

She walks the waters like a thing of life, 

And seems to dare the elements to strife. 

Who would not brave the battle-fire — the wreck — 

To move the monarch of her peopled deck? 

IV. 
Hoarse o'er her side the rustling cable rings ; 
The sails are furl'il ; and anchoring round she swings : 
And gathering loiterers on the land discern 
Her boat descending from the latticed stern. 
'T is mann'd — the oars keep concert to the strand, 
Till grates her keel upon the shallow sand. 
Hail to the welcome shout! — the friendly speech! 
Wlien hand grasps hand uniting on the beach ; 
The smile, the question, and the quick reply, 
And the heart's promise of festivity ! 

V. 

The tidings spread, and gathering grows the crowd : 
The hum of voices, and the laughter loud, 
And woman's gentler anxious tone is heard — 
Friends' — husbands' — lovers' names in each dear w^d: 
"Oh ! are they safe? we ask not of success — 
But shall we see them' ! will their accents bless? 
From where the bathe roars — the billows chafe — 
They doubtless boldly died — but who are safe ? 



Here let them haste to gladden and surprise, 
And kiss the doubt from these delighted eyes!" — 

VI. 

"Where is our chief? for him we bear report — 

And doubt that joy — which hails our coming — short ; 

Yet thus sincere — 'tis cheering, (hough so brief; 

Dut, Juan ! instant guide us to our chief: 

Out greeting paid, we'll feast on our return, 

And all shall hear what each may wish to learn." 

Ascending slowly by the rock-hewn way, 

To where his watch-tower beetles o'er the bay, 

By bushy brake, and wild-dowers blossoming, 

And freshness breathing from each silver spring, 

Whose scalter'd streams from granite basins burst, 

Leap into life, and sparkling woo your thirst ; 

From crag to cliff* they mount — Near yonder cave, 

What lonely straggler looks along the wave / 

In pensive posture leaning on the brand, 

Not oft a resting-staff to that red hand. 

"'Tis he — 'tis Conrad — here — as wont — alone; 

On — Juan! on — and make our purpose known. 

The bark he views — and tell him we would greet 

His ear with tidings he must quickly meet : 

We dare not vet approach — thou know'st his mood, 

When strange or uninvited steps intrude." 

VII. 
Him Juan sought, and told of their intent — 
He spake not — but a sign express'd assent. 
These Juan calls — they come — to their salute 
He bends him slightly, but his lips are mute. 
"These letters, Chief, are from the Greek — the spy, 
Who still proclaims our spoil or peril nigh : 
Whate'er his tidings, we can well report, 
M r;h that" — " Peace, peace !" — He cuts their prating 

short. 
Wondering they turn, abash'd, while each to each 
Conjecture whispers in his muttering speech : 
They watch his glance with many a stealing look, 
To gather how that eve the tidings took ; 
But, this as if he guess'd, with head aside, 
Perchance from some emotion, doubt, or pride, 
He read the scroll — " My tablets, Juan, hark — 
Where is Gonsalvo ?" 

" In the anehor'd bark." 
" There let him stay — to him this order bear. 
Back to your duty — for my course prepare: 
Myself this enterprise to-night will share." 
"To-night, Lord Conrad?" 

" Ay ! at set of sun : 
The breeze will freshen when the day is done. 
My corslet — cloak — one hour — and we arc gone. 
Sling on thy bugle — see that, free from nist, 
My carbine-lock springs worthy of my trust ; 
Be the edge sharpen'd of my boarding-brand, 
And give its guard more room to fit my hand. 
This let the armourer with speed dispose ; • 
Last time, it more fatigued my arm than foes : 
Mark that the signal-gun be duly fired 
To tell us when the hour of stay's expired." 

VIII. 
They make obeisance, and retire in haste, 
•»Too soon to seek again the watery waste: 
Vet they repine not — so that Conrad guides ; 
A n d who dare question aught that he decides? 
26 



That man of loneliness and mystery, 
Scarce seen to smile, and seldom heard to sigh ; 
Whose name appals the fiercest of his crew, 
And tints each swarthy cheek with sallower line; 
Still sways their souls with that commanding art 
That dazzles, '.cads, yet chills the vulgar heart. 
What is thai spell, that thus his lawless train 
Confess and envy, y< t oppose in vain? 
What should it be, that thus their faith can bind? 
The pcp'.ver of Though! — the magic of tin.' .Mini ! 
Link' J w'th success, assumed ami k< pt with skill, 
That moulds another's weakness to its will; 
Wields with their hands, but, still to these unknown, 
Makes even their mightiest deeds appear his own. 
Such hath it been — shall be — beneath the sun 
The many still must labour for the one ! 
'Tis Nature's doom — but let the wretch who toils 
Accuse not, hate not him who wears the spoils. 
Oh! if he knew the weight of splendid chains, 
How light the balance of his humbler pains! 

IX. 

Unlike the heroes of each ancient race, 

Demons in act, but gods at least in \'m-c, 

In Conrad's form seems little to admire, 

Though bis dark eyebrow shades a glance of fire 

Robust, but not Herculean — to the sight 

No giant frame sets forth his common height ; 

Vet, in the whole, who paused to look again, 

Saw more than marks the crowd of vulgar men ; 

They gaze and marvel how — and still confess 

That thus it is, but why they cannot guess. 

Sun-burnt his cheek, his forehead high and pale 

The sable curls in wild profusion veil ; 

And oft perforce his rising lip reveals 

The haughtier thought it curbs, but scarce conceals 

Though smooth his voice, and calm his general mien 

Still seems there something he would not have seln: 

His features' deepening lines and varying hue, 

At times attracted, yet perplex'd the view, 

As if within that murkiness of mind, 

Work'd feelings fearful, and yet undefined , 

Such might it be — that none could truly tell — 

Too close inquiry his stern glance would quell. 

There breathe but few whose aspect might defy 

The full encounter of his searching eye ; 

He had the skill, when Cunning's gaze would seek 

To probe his heart and watch his changing cheek, 

At once the observer's purpose to espy, 

And on himself roll back his scrutiny, 

Lest he to Conrad rather should betray 

Some secret thought loan drag that chief's to-day. 

There was a laughing devil m his sneer, 

That raised emotions both of rage and fejir, 

And where his frown of hatred darkly fell, 

Hope withering fled — and Mercy sigh'd farewell' 

X. 

Slight are the outward signs of evil thought, 

Within — within — 'twas there the spirit wrought! 

Love shows all changes — Hate, ambition, guile 

Betray no further than the bitter smile; 

The lip's least curl, the lightest paleness thrown 

Along the govcrn'd aspect, speak alone 

Of deeper passions ; and to judge their mien, 

Ho, who would sec, must b< inrus^l unseen 



162 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Then — with the hurried tread, the upward eye, 
The clenched h;ind, the pause of agony, 
That listens, starting, lest the step too near 
Approach intrusive on that mood of fear: 
Then — with cacti feature working from the heart, 
With feelings loosed to strengthen — not depart: 
That rise — convulse — contend — that freeze, or glow, 
Flush in the cheek, or damp upon the brow; 
Then — stranger ! if thou canst, and tremblest not, 
Behold his soul — the rest that soothed his lot ! 
Mark — how that lone and blighted bosom scars 
The scathing thought of execrated years ! 
Behold — but who hath seen, or e'er shall see, 
Man as himself — the secret spirit free? 

XI. 

Yet was not Conrad thus by nature sent 

To lead the guilty — guilt's worst instrument ; — 

His soul was changed, before his deeds had driven 

Him forth to war with man and forfeit heaven. 

Warp'd by the world in Disappointment's school, 

In words too wise, in conduct lliere a fool ; 

Too firm to yield, and far too proud to stoop, 

Pootn'd by his very virtues for a dupe, 

He cursed those virtues as the cause of ill, 

And not the traitors who betray'd him still ; 

Nor deem'd that gifts bestow'd on better men 

Had left him joy, and means to give again. 

Fear'd — shunn'd — belied — ere youth had lost her force, 

He hated man too much to feel remorse, 

And thought the voice of wrath a sacred call, 

To pay the injuries of some on all. 

He knew himself a villain — but he deem'd 

The rest no better than the thing he seem'd ; 

And scorn'd the best as hypocrites who hid 

Those deeds the bolder spirit plainly did. 

He knew himself detested, but he knew 

1 he hearts that loathed him crouch'd and dreaded too. 

Lone, wild, and strange, he stood alike exempt 

From all affection and from all contempt : 

His name could sadden, and his acts surprise ; 

But they that fear'd him dared not to despise : 

Man spurns the worm, but pauses ere he wake 

The slumbering venom of the folded snake : 

The first may turn — but not avenge the blow ; 

The last expires — but leaves no living foe ; 

Fast to the doom'd offender's form it clings, 

And he may crush — not conquer — still it stings ! 

XII. 

None are all evil — quickening round his heart, 

On6 softer feeling would not yet depart ; 

Oft could he sneer at others as beguiled 

By passions worthy of a fool or child ; 

Yet 'gainst that passion vainly still he strove, 

And even in him it asks the name of love ! 

Yes, it was love — unchangeable — unchanged, 

Felt but for one from whom he never ranged ; 

Though fairest captives daily met his eye, 

He shunn'd, nor sought, but coldly pass'd them by ; 

Thougn n.any a beauty croop'd in prison'd bower, 

None ever soothed his most unguarded hour. 

Yes — it Was love — if thoughts of tenderness, 

Tried in temptation, strengthen'd by distress, 

Unmoved by absence, firm in every clime, 

And yet — Oh more than all ! — untired by time ; 



Which nor defeated hope, nor baffled wile 

Could render sullen were she near to smile. 

Nor rage could fire, nor sickness fret to vent 

On her one murmur of his discontent ; 

Which still would meet with joy, with calmness part, 

Leal that his look of grief should reach her heart ; 

Which nought removed, nor menaced to remove — 

If there be love in mortals — this was love ! 

He was a villain — ay — reproaches shower 

On him — but not the passion, nor its power, 

Which only proved, all other virtues gone, 

Not guilt itself could quench this loveliest one! 

XIII. 

He paused a moment — till his hastening men 

Pass'd the first winding downward to the olen. 

"Strange tidings! — many a peril have I past, 

Nor know I why this next appears the last ! 

Yet so my heart forebodes, but must not fear, 

Nor shall my followers find me falter here. 

'T is rash to meet, but surer death to wait 

Till here they hunt us to undoubted fate ; 

And, if my plan but hold, and fortune smile, 

We '11 furnish mourners for our funeral-pile. 

Ay — let them slumber — peaceful be their dreams ! 

Morn ne'er awoke them with such brilliant beam- 

As kindle high to-night (but blow, thou breeze!) 

To warm these slow avengers of the seas. 

Now to Medora — Oh ! my sinking heart, 

Long may her own be lighter than thou art ! 

Yet was I brave — mean boast where all are brave ! 

Even insects sting for aught thev seek to save. 

This common courage which with brutes we share, 

That owes its deadliest efforts to despair, 

Small merit claims — but 't was mv nobler hope 

To teach mv few with numbers still to cope ; 

Long have I led them — not to vainly bleed ; 

No medium now — we perish or succeed ! 

So let it be — it irks not me to die ; 

But thus to urge them whence they cannot fly. 

My lot hath long had little of my care, 

But chafes my pride thus baffled in the snare ; 

Is this my skill ? my craft ? to set at last 

Hope, power, and life upon a single cast? 

Oh, fate ! — accuse thy folly, not thy fate — 

She may redeem thec still — nor yet too late." 

XIV. 

Thus with himself communion held he, till 
He reach'd the summit of his tower-crow n'd hit 
There at the portal paused — for wild and soft 
He heard those accents never heard too oft ; 
Through the high lattice far yet sweet they run" 
And these the notes his bird of beauty sung : 

1. 

" Deep in mv soul that tender secret dwells, 

Lonely and lost to light for evermore. 
Save when to thine my heart responsive swells 

Then trembles into silence as before. 



" There, in its centre, a sepulchral lamp 
Burns the slow rlame, eternal — but unseen ; 

Which not the darkness of despair can damp, 
Though vain its ray as it had never been. 



THE CORSAIR. 



1G3 



*' Remember me — Oh ! pass not thou my grave 
Without one thought whose n lies there recline: 

The only pang mv bosom dare not. brave 
Must be to tind forgetfulncss in thine. 



"My fondest — faintest — latest — accents hear: 
Grief for the dead not virtue can reprove ; 

Then give me all I ever asked — a tear, 

The first — last — sole reward of so much love !" 

He pass'd the portal — cross'd the corridore, 
And reach'd the chamber as the strain gave o'er: 
'My own Medora! sure thy song is sad — " 

'In Conrad's absence wouldst thou have K glad? 
Without thine ear to listen to my lay, 
Still must my song my thoughts; my soul betray : 
Still must each accent to my bosom suit, 
My heart unhush'd — although my lips were mute! 
Oh ! many a night on this lone couch reclined, 
My dreaming fear with storms hath wing'd the wind, 
And deem'd the breath that faintlv fann'd thy sail 
The murmuring prelude of the ruder gale ; 
Though soft, it seem'd the low prophetic dirge, 
That mourn'd thee floating on the savage surge : 
Still would I rise to rouse the beacon- fire, 
Lest spies less true should let the blaze expire ; 
And many a restless hour outwatch'd each star, 
And morning came — and still thou wert afar. 
Oh ! how the chill blast on my bosom blew, 
And day broke dreary on lay troubled view, 
And still I gazed and gazed — and not a prow 
Was granted to my tears — mv truth — mv vow! 
At length — 'twas noon — I hail'd and blest the mast 
That met my sight — it near'd — Alas ! it past ! 
Another came — Oh God ! 'twas thine at last! 
Would that those days were over ! wilt thou ne'er, 
My Conrad ! learn the joys of peace to share ? 
Sure thou hast more than wealth ; and many a home 
As bright as this invites us not to roam ; 
Thou know'st it is not peril that I fear, 
I only tremble when thou art not here : 
Then not for mine, but that far dearer life, 
Which flies from love and languishes for strife- 
How strange that heart, to me so tender still, 
Should war with nature and its better will !" 

"Yes, strange indeed, that heart hath long been changed; 

Worm-like 'twas trampled — adder-like avenged, 

Without one hope on earth beyond thy love, 

And scarce a glimpse of mercy from above. 

Yet the same feeling which thou dost condemn, 

My very love to thee is hate to them, 

So closely mingling here, that, disentwined, 

I cease to love thee when I love mankind. 

Yet dread not this — the proof of all the past 

Assures the future that my love will last ; 

But — Oh, Medora ! nerve thy gentler heart, 

This hour again — but not for long — we part." 

" This hour we part ! — my heart foreboded this : 
Thus ever fade my fairy dreams of bliss. 
This hour — it cannot be — this hour away ! 
Yon bark hath hardly anchored in the bay : 



Her consort still is absent, and her crew 

Have need of rest before they toil anew ; 

My love! thou mock'st my weakness ; and wouldst steci 

Mv lire;;si before the lime when it must feel; 

But trifle now no more With my distress, 

Such mirth hath less of play than bitterness. 

Be silent, Conrad ! — dearest ! come and share 

The feast these hands delighted to prepare; 

Light toil ! to cull and dress thy frugal fare ! 

See, I have pluck'd the fruit thai promised best, 

And where not sure, perplex'd, but pleas'd, I guess'd 

At such as seem'd the fairest : thrice the hill 

My steps have wound to try the coolest rill ; 

Yes ! thy sherbet to-night will sweetly flow, 

See how it sparkles in its vase of snow ! 

The grape's gav juice thy bosom never cheers; 

Thou more than Moslem when the cup appears! 

Think not I mean to chide — for I rejoice 

What others deem a penance is thy choice. 

But conic, the board is spread ; our silver lamp 

Is trimm'd, and heeds not the Sirocco's damp : 

Then shall my handmaids while, the time along, 

And join with me the dance, or wake the song; 

Or my guitar, which still thou lov'st to hear, 

Shall soothe or lull — or, should it vex thine car, 

We 'II turn the tale, by Ariosto told, 

Of fair Olympia loved and left of old. 1 

Why — thou wert worse than he who broke his vow 

To that lost damsel, shouldst thou leave me now; 

Or even that traitor chief — I've seen thee smile, 

When the clear sky show'd Ariadne's Isle, 

Which I have pointed from these cliffs the while: 

And thus, half sportive, half in fear, I said, 

Lest time should raise that doubt to more than dread, 

Thus Conrad, too, will quit me for the main : 

And he deceived me — for — he came again !" 

"Again — again — and oft again — my love ! 

If there be life below, and hope above, 

He will return — but now, the moments bring 

The time of parting with redoubled Wing : 

The why — the where — what boots it now to tell? 

Since all must end in that wild word — farewell ! 

Yet would I fain — did time allow — disclose — 

Fear not — these are no formidable foes ; 

And here shall watch a more than wonted guard, 

For sudden siege and long defence prepared : 

Nor be thou lonely — though thy lord's away, 

Our matrons and thy handmaids with thee stay ; 

And this thy comfort — that, when next we meet, 

Security shall make repose more sweet: 

List ! — 'tis the bugle — Juan shrilly blew — 

One kiss— one more — another — Oh ! Adieu !" 

She rose — she sprung — she clung to his embrace. 
Till his heart heaved beneath her hidden face. 
He dared not raise to his that deep-blue eye, 
Which downcast droop'd in tearless Agony. 
Her long fair hair lay floating o'er his arms, 
In all the wildness of dishevell'd charms ; 
Scarce beat that bosom where his image uwelt 
So full — that feehng seem'd r.lmost unfelt ! 
Hark — peals the thunder of the signal-gun! 
It told 't was sunset — and he cursed that sun. 
Again — again — that form he madly press'd ; 
Which mutely clasp'd, imploringly caress'd ' 



164 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And, tottering to the couch, his bride he bore, 
One moment gazed— as if to gaze no more ; 
Felt — that for him earth held but her alone, 
Kiss'd her cold forehead — turn'd — is Conrad gone? 

XV. 

"And is he gone?" — on sudden solitude 

How oR that fearful question will intrude! 

u 'T was but an instant past — and here he stood ! 

And now" — without the portal's porch she rush'd, 

And then at length her tears in freedom gush'd ; 

Big — bright — and fast, unknown to her they fell ; 

But still her lips refused to send — "farewell!" 

For in that word — that fatal word — howe'er 

We promise — hope — believe — there breathes despair. 

O'er every feature of that still pale face, 

Had sorrow fix'd what time can ne'er erase ; 

The tender blue of that large loving eye 

Grew frozen with its gaze on vacancy, 

Till — Oh, how far ! — it caught a glimpse of him, 

And then it flow'd — and phrensied seem'd to swim 

Through these long, dark, and glistening lashes, dew'd 

With drops of sadness oft to be renew'd. 

"He 's gone !" — against her heart that hand is driven, 

Convulsed and quick — then gently raised to heaven; 

She look'd and saw the heaving of the main ; 

The white sail set — she dared not look again ; 

But turn'd with sickening soul within the gate— 

" It is no dream — and I am desolate !" 

XVI. 

Fi-om crag to crag descending — swiftly sped 

Siern Conrad down, nor once he turn'd his head ; 

But shrunk whene'er the windings of his way 

Forced on his eye what he would not survey, 

His lone, but lovely dwelling on the steep, 

That hail'd him first when homeward from the deep : 

And she — the dim and melancholy star, 

Whose ray of beauty reach'd him from afar, 

On her he must not gaze, he must not think, 

There he might rest, but on destruction's brink : 

Yet once almost he stopp'd — and nearly gave 

His fate to chance, his projects to the wave ; 

But nn — it must not be — a worthy chief 

May melt, but not betray to woman's grief. 

He sees his bark, he notes how fair the wind, 

And sternly gathers all his might of mind: 

Again he hurries on — and as he hears 

The clang of tumult vibrate on his ears, 

The busy sounds, the bustle of the shore, 

The shout, the signal, and the dashing oar; 

As marks his eye the sea-boy on the mask 

The anchor's rise, the sails unfurling fast, 

The waving kerchiefs of the crowd that urge 

That mute adieu to those who stem the surge ; 

And, more than all, his blood-red flag aloft, 

He marvell'd how his heart could seem so soft. 

Fire in his glance, and wildness in his breast, 

He feels of all his former self possest ; 

He bounds — he flies — until his footsteps reach 

The verge where ends the cliff, begins the beach, 

There checks his speed ; but pauses less to breathe 

The breezy freshness of the deep beneath, 

Tli an there his wonted statelier step renew; 

Not rush, d-isturb'd by haste, to vulgar view : 



For well had Conrad learn'd to curb .he crowd, 
By arts that veil, and oft preserve, the proud ; 
His was the lofty port, the distant inirn, 
That seems to shun the sight — and awes if seen. 
The solemn aspect, and'the high-born eye, 
That checks low mirth, but lacks not courtesy ; 
All these he wielded to command assent : 
Hut where he wish'd to win, so well unbent, 
That kindness cancell'd fear in those who heard, 
Ar.d others' gifts show'd mean beside his word, 
When echoed to the heart as from his own 
His deep yet tender melody of tone : 
But such was foreign to his wonted mood, 
He cared not what he soften'd, but subdued ; 
The evil passions of his youth had made 
Him value less who loved — than what obey'd. 

XVII. 

Around him mustering ranged his ready guard ; 
Before him Juan stands — "Are all prepared?" 
" They are — nay more — embark'd : the latest boat 

Waits but my chief " 

"My swori and my capote." 
So firmly girded on, and lightly slung, 
His belt and cloak were o'er his shoulders flung. 
"Call Pedro here!" — He comes — and Conrad bends, 
With all the courtesy he deign'd his friends ; 
"Receive these tablets, and peruse with care, 
Words of high trust and truth are graven there ; 
Double the guard, and when Anselmo's bark 
Arrives, let him alike these orders mark : 
In three days (serve the breeze) the sun shall shine 
On our return — till then all peace be thine !" 
This said, his brother Pirate's hand he wrung, 
Then to his boat with haughty gesture sprung. 
Flash'd the dipt oars, and sparkling with the stroke, 
Around the waves, phosphoric 2 brightness broke; 
They gain the vessel — on the deck he stands ; 
Shrieks the shrill whistle — ply the busy hands — 
He marks how well the ship her helm obeys, 
How gallant all her crew — and deigns to praise. 
His eyes of pride to young Gonsalvo turn — 
Why doth he start, and inly seem 10 mourn? 
Alas ! those eyes beheld his rocky tower, 
And live a moment o'er the parting hour ; 
She — his Medora — did she mark the prow ! 
Ah ! never loved he half so much as now ! 
But much must yet be done ere dawn of day — 
Again he mans himself and turns away ; 
Down to the cabin with Gonsalvo bends, 
And there unfolds his plan — his means — and ends ; 
Before them burns the lamp, and spreads the chart. 
And all that speaks and aids the naval art ; 
They to the midnight watch protract debate ; 
To anxious eyes what hour is ever late ? 
Meantime, the steady Dreeze serenely blew, 
And fast and falcon-like the vessel flew ; 
Pass'il the high headlands of each clustering isle, 
To gain their port — long — long ere morning smile 
And soon the night-glass through the narrow bay 
Discovers where the Pacha's galleys lay. 
Count they each sail — and mark how there supine 
The lights in vain o'er heedless Moslem shine. 
Secure, unnoted, Conrad's prow pass'd by, 
And anchor'd where his ambush meant to lie ; 



THE CORSAIR. 



165 



Screen'd from espial by the jutting cape, 
That rears on high its rmle fantastic shape. 
Then rose his hand to duty — not from sleep — 
Equipp'd for deeds alike on land or deep ; 
While lean'd their leader o'er the fretting flood, 
And calm.y talk'd — and yet he talk'd of blood ! 



CANTO II. 



Conosccsle i dubiogj desiri 7 

DANTE. 



I. 

In Coron's bav floats many a galley light, 
Through Coron's lattices the lamps are bright, 
For Seyd, the Pacha, makes a feast to-night: 
A feast for promised triumph vet to come, 
When he shall drag the fetter'd Rovers home ; 
This hath he sworn bv Alia and his sword, 
And faithful to his firman and his word, 
His summon'd prows collect along the coast, 
And great the gatnering crews, and loud the boast 
Already shared the captives and the prize, 
Though far the distant foe they thus despise; 
'T is but to sail — no doubt to-morrow's sun 
Will see the Pirates bound — their haven won ! 
Meantime the watch may slumber, if they will, 
Nor only wake to war, but dreaming kill ; 
Though all, who can, disperse on shore and seek 
To flesh their glowing valour on the Greek ; 
How well such deed becomes the turban'd brave — 
To bare the sabre's edge hefore a slave ! 
Infest his dwelling — but forbear to slay — 
Their arms are strong, yet merciful to-day, 
And do not deign to smite because they may ! 
Unless some gay caprice suggests the blow, 
To keep in practice for the coming foe. 
Revel and rout the evening hours beguile, 
And they who wish to wear a head, must smile ; 
For Moslem mouths produce their choicest cheer, 
And hoard their curses, till the coast is clear. 

II. 

High in his hall reclines the turban'd Seyd ; 
Around — the bearded chiefs he came to lead. 
Removed the banquet, and the last pilaff — 
Forbidden draughts, 'tis said, he dared to qua/F, 
Though to the rest the sober berry's juice, 3 
The slaves bear round Gbr rigid Moslem's use ; 
The long Chibouque's 4 dissolving cloud supply. 
Willie dance the Almas i to wild minstrelsy. 
The rising morn will view the chiefs embark ; 
But waves are somewhat treacherous in the dark : 
And revellers may more securely sleep 
On silken couch, than o'er the rugged deep ; 
Feast there who can — nor combat till they must, 
And less to conquest than to Koran* trust ; 
And vet the numbers crowded in his host 
Might warrant more than even the Pacha's boast. 

III. 
With cautious reverence from the outer gate, 
Slow stalks the slave, whose office there to wait, 
Bows his bent head — his hand salutes the floor, 
Lrc vet his tongue the trusted tidings bore: 
S 



"A ca| live Dervise, from the pirate's nest 
Escaped is here — himself would toll the rest." 
He took tie- si^n from Seyd's assenting eye, 
And led the holy man in silence nigh. 
His anus were folded on his dark-grei n v< st, 
His step was feeble, and his look deprest ; 
Yet worn he seem'd of hardship more than years, 
And pale his cheek with penance, not from fears. 
Vow'd to his God — his sable locks he wore. 
And these his lofty cap rose proudly o'er : 
Around his form his loose long robe was thrown, 
And wrapt a breast bestow'd on heaven alone ; 
Submissive, yet with self-possession niann'd. 
He calmly met the curious eves that scann'd ; 
And question of his coming fain would set k, 
Before the Pacha's will allow'd to speak. 

IV. 

" Whence com'st thou, Dervise ?" 

" From the outlaw's den, 
A fugitive — " 

"Thy capture where and when?'' 
" From Scalanova's port to Scio's isle, 
The Saick was bound ; but Alia did not smile 
Upon our course — the Moslem merchant's gains 
The Rovers won : our limbs have worn their chains. 
I had no death to fear, nor wealth to boast, 
Beyond the wandering freedom which I lost ; 
At length a fisher's humble boat by night 
Afforded hope, and offer'd chance of flight : 
I seized the hour, and find my safety here — 
With thee — most mighty Pacha! who can fear?" 

" How speed the outlaws ? stand they well prepared, 
Their plunder'd wealth, and robber's rock, to guard ? 
Dream they of this our preparation, doom'd 
To view with fire their scorpion nest consumed?" 

" Pacha ! the fetter'd captive's mourning eye 

That weeps for flight, but ill can play the spy ; 

I only heard, the reckless waters roar, 

Those waves that would not bear me from the shore ; 

I only mark'd the glorious sun and sky, 

Too bright — too blue — for my captivity ; 

And felt — that all which Freedom's bosom cheers, 

Must break my chain before it dried my tears. 

This may'st thou judge, at least, from my escape, 

They little deem cf aught in peril'* shape ; 

Else vainly had I pray'd or sought the chance 

That leads me here — if eyed with vigilance: 

The careless guard that did not see me fly, 

May watch as idly when thy power is nigh : 

Pacha! — my limbs are faint — and nature craves 

Food for my hunger, rest from tossing \\„ves ; 

Permit my absence — peace be with thee ! Pen'-; 

With all around! — now grant repose — release." 

" Stay, Dervise ! I have more to question — stay, 
I do command thee — sit — dost hear? — obey! 
More I must ask, and food the slaves shall bring , 
Thou shalt not pine where all are banqueting : 
Tin' supper done — prepare thee to reply, 
Clearly and full — I love not mystery." 

'T were vain to guess what shook the pious maji. 
Who look'd not lovingly on that Divan j 



16G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Nor show'd high relish for the banquet prest, 
And less respect for every fe. low-guest. 
'T was but a moment's peevish liectic past 
Along his cheek, and tranquillized as fast: 
He sate him down in silence, and his look 
Resumed the calmness which before forsook : 
The feast was usher'd in — but sumptuous fare 
He shunn'd, as if some poison mingled there. 
For one so long condemn'd to toil and fast, 
Mcthinks he strangely spares the rich repast. 
" What ails thee, Dervise ? eat — dost thou suppose 
This feast a Christian's? or my friends thy foes? 
Why dost thou shun the salt ? that sacred pledge 
Which, once partaken, blunts the sabre's edge, 
Makes even contending tribes in peace unite, 
And hated hosts seem brethren to the sight!" 

" Salt seasons dainties — and my food is still 
The humblest root, my drink the simplest rill ; 
And my stern vow and order's laws oppose 
To break or mingle bread with friends or foes ; 
It may seem strange — if there be aught to dread, 
That peril rests upon my single head ; 
But for thy sway — nay more — thy Sultan's throne, 
I taste nor bread, nor banquet — save alone ; 
Infringed our order's rule, the Prophet's rage 
To Mecca's dome might bar my pilgrimage." 

"Well — as thou wilt — ascetic as thou art — 

One question answer ; then in peace depart. 

How many? — Ha! it cannot sure be day! 

What star — what sun is bursting on the bay? 

It shines a lake of fire ! — away — away ! 

Ho! treachery! my guards ! my scimitar! 

The galleys feed the flames — and I afar ! 

A'xursed Dervise ! — these thy tidings — thou 

Some villain spy — seize — cleave him — slay him now !" 

Up rose the Dervise with that burst of light, 
Nor less his change of form appall'd the sight: 
Up rose that Dervise — not in saintly garb, 
But like a warrior bounding on his barb, 
Dash'd his high cap, and tore his robe away — 
Shone his mail'd breast, and flash'd his sabre's ray ! 
His close but glittering casque, and sable plume, 
More glittering eye, and black brow's sabler gloom, 
Glared on the Moslems' eyes some Afrit sprite, 
Whose demon death-blow left no hope for fight. 
The wild confusion, and the swarthy glow 
Of flames on high, and torches from below ; 
The shriek of terror, and the mingling yell — 
For swords began to clash, and shouts to swell, 
Flung o'er that spot of earth the air of hell ! 
Distracted, to and fro, the flying slaves 
Behold but bloody shore and fiery waves ; 
Nought heeded they the Pacha's angry cry, 
They seize that Dervise ! seize on Zatanai ! T 
He saw their terror— -check'd the first despair 
That urged him but to stand and perish there, 
Since far too early and too well obey'd, 
The ilame was kindled ere the signal made ; 
He saw their terror — from his baldric drew 
His nugle — brief the blast — but snrilly blew ; 
'T is answer'd — " Well ye speed, my gallant crew ! 
Why did I doubt their quickness of career? 
And itcf-m design had left me single here?" 



Sweeps his long arm — thr 4 sabre's whirling sway 

Sheds fast atonement for its first delay ; 

Completes his fury, what their fear began, 

And makes the many basely quail to one. 

The cloven turbans o'er the chamber spread, 

And scarce an arm dare rise to guard its head : 

Even Seyd, convulsed, o'erwhelni'd with rage, surprise 

Retreats before him, though he still defies. 

No craven he — and yet he dreads the blow, 

So much Confusion magnifies his foe! 

His blazing galleys still distract his sij;ht, 

He tore his beard, and foaming fled the fight ;* 

For now the pirates pass'd the Haram gate, 

And burst within — and it were death to wait; 

Where wild amazement shrieking — kneeling — throws 

The sword aside — in vain — the blood o'erflows ! 

The Corsairs pouring, haste to where within 

Invited Conrad's bugle, and the din 

Of groaning victims, and wild cries for life, 

Proclaim'd how well he did the work of strife. 

They shout to find him grim and lonely there, 

A glutted tiger mangling in his lair ! 

But short their greeting — shorter his reply — 

" 'T is well — but Seyd escapes — and he must die. 

Much hath been done — but more remains to do— 

Their galleys blaze — why not their city too?" 

V. 

Quick at the word — they seize him each a torch, 

And fire the dome from minaret to porch. 

A stern delight was fix'd in Conrad's eye, 

But sudden sunk — for on his ear the cry 

Of women struck, and like a deadly knell 

Knock'd at that heart unmoved by battle's yell. 

"Oh ! burst the Haram — wrong not on your lives 

One female form — remember — we have wives. 

On them such outrage vengeance will repay ; 

Man is our foe, and such 't is ours to slay : 

But still we spared — must spare the weaker prey. 

Oh ! I forgot — but Heaven will not forgive 

If at my word the helpless cease to live ; 

Follow who will — I go — we yet have time 

Our souls to lighten of at least a crime." 

He climbs the crackling stair — he bursts tlie door, 

Nor feels his feet glow scorching with the floor ; 

His breath choak'd gasping with the volumed smoke, 

But still from room to room his way he broke. 

They search — they find — they save : with lusty arma 

Each bears a prize of unregarded charms ; 

Calm their loud fears ; sustain their sinking frame* 

With all the care defenceless beauty claims: 

So well could Conrad tame their fiercest mood, 

And check the very hands with gore imbrued. 

But who is she ? whom Conrad's arms convey 

From reeking pile and combat's wreck — away — 

Who but the love of him he dooms to bleed ! 

The Haram queen — but still the slave of Seyd ! 

VI. 

Brief time had Conrad now to greet Gulnare, 3 

Few words to reassure the trembling fair ; 

For in that pause compassion snatch'd from war, 

The foe, before retiring fast and far, 

With wonder saw their footsteps unpursued, 

First slowlier fled— then rallied — then withstood. 



THE CORSAIR. 



This Seyd perceives, then first perceives how few, 

Comuared with his, the Corsair's roving crew, 

And hlusncs o'er his error, as he eyes 

The ruin wrought by panic and surprise. 

Alia il Alia! Vengeance swells the cry — 

Shame mounts to rage that must atone or die ! 

And Bam for flame and blood for blood must tell, 

The tide of triumph ebbs that fiow'd too well — 

When wrath returns to renovated strife, 

And those who fought for conquest strike for life. 

Conrad beheld the danger — he beheld 

His followers faint by freshening foes rcpellM : 

" One effort — one — to break the circling host !" 

They form — unite — charge — waver — all is lost ! 

Within a narrower ring compress'd, beset, 

Hopeless not heartless, strive and struggle yet — 

Ah ! now they fight in firmest tile no more — 

Hemm'd in — cut off — cleft down — and trampled o'er ; 

But each strikes singly, silently, and home, 

And sinks outwearied rather than o'ercome, 

His last faint quittance rendering with his breath, 

Till the blade glimmers in the grasp of death ! 

VII. 

But first ere came the rallying host to blows, 
And rank to rank and hand to hand oppose, 
Gulnare and all her Haram handmaids freed, 
Safe in the dome of one who held their creed, 
By Conrad's mandate safely were hestow'd, 
And dried those tears for life and flame that fiow'd : 
And when that dark-eyed lady, young Gulnare, 
Recall'd those thoughts late wandering in despair, 
Much did she marvel o'er the courtesy 
That smooth'd his accents ; soften'd in his eye : 
'T was strange — that robber thus with gore bedew'd, 
Seem'd gentler then than Seyd in fondest mood. 
The Pacha woo'd as if he deem'd the slave 
Must seem delighted with the heart he gave ; 
The Corsair vow'd protection, soothed affright, 
As if his homage were a woman's righti 
"The wish is wrong — nay, worse for female, vain: 
Yet much I long to view that chief again ; 
If but to thank for, what my fear forgot, 
The life — my loving lord remember'd not!" 

VIII. 

And him she saw, where thickest carnage spread, 

But gather'd breathing from the happier dead ; 

Far from his band, and battling with a host 

That deem right dearly won the field he lost, 

Fell'd — bleeding — baffled of the death he sought, 

And snatch'd to expiate all the ills he wrought ; 

Preserved to linger and to live in vain ; 

While Vengeance ponder'd o'er new plans of pain, 

And staunch'd the blood she saves to shed again — 

But drop by drop, for Seyd's unglutted eye 

Would doom him ever dying — ne'er to die! 

Can this be he? triumphant late she saw, 

When his red hand's wild gesture waved, a law ! 

'T is he indued — disarm'd but undeprest, 

His sole regret the life he still possest ; 

Eis wounds too slight, though taken with that will, 

Which would have kiss'd the hand that then could kill. 

Oh ! were there none, of all the many given, 

To send has soul — he scarcely ask'd to heav'n ? 



Must he alone of all retain his breath, 

Who more than all had striven and struck for death? 

He deeply felt — what mortal hearts must feel, 

When thus reversed on faithless fortune's wheel, 

For crimes committed, and the victor's threat 

Of lingering tortures to repay the debt — 

He deeply, darkly felt ; but evil pride 

That led to perpetrate — now serves to hide. 

Still in his stern and self-collected mien 

A conqueuor's more than captive's air is seen : 

Though faint with wasting toil and stiffening wound, 

But few that saw — so calmly gazed around : 

Though the far shouting of the distant crowd, 

Their tremors o'er, rose insolently loud, 

The better warriors who beheld him near, 

Insulted not the foe who taught them fear ; 

And the grim guards that to his durance led, 

In silence eyed him with a secret dread. 

IX. 

The leech was sent — but not in mercy — there 

To note how much the life yet left could bear ; 

He found enough to load with heaviest chain, 

And promise feeling for the wrench of pain : 

To-morrow — yea — to-morrow's evening sun 

Will sinking see impalement's pangs begun. 

And rising with the wonted blush of morn 

Behold how well or ill those pangs are borne. 

Of torments this the longest and the worst, 

Which adds all other agony to thirst, 

That day by day death still forbears to slake, 

While famish'd vultures flit around the stake. 

" Oh ! water — water !" — smiling hate denies 

The victim's prayer — for if he drinks — he dies. 

This was his doom: — the leech, the guard were gone, 

And left proud Conrad fetter'd and alone. 

X. 

'T were vain to paint to what his feelings grew — 
It even were doubtful if their victim knew. 
There is a war, a chaos of the mind, 
When all its elements convulsed — combined-- 
Lie dark and jarring with perturbed force, 
And gnashing with impenitent remorse ; 
That juggling fiend — who never spake before- 
But cries, " I warn'd thee !" when the deed is o ei. 
Vain voice ! the spirit burning but unbent, 
May writhe — rebel — the weak alone repent! 
Even in that lonely hour when most it feels, 
And, to itself, all — all that self reveals, 
No single passion, and no ruling thought 
That leaves the rest as once unseen, unsought ; 
But the wild prospect, when the soul reviews- 
All rushing through their thousand avenues — 
Ambition's dreams expiring, love's regret, 
Bndanger'd glory, life itself beset ; 
The joy untasted, the contempt or hate 
'Gainst those who fain would triumph in our fate, 
The hopeless past ; the hasting future driven 
Too quickly on to guess if hell or heaven ; 
Deeds, thoughts, and words, perhaps remember'd me 
So keenly till that hour, but ne'er forgot ; 
Things light or lovely in their acted time, 
But now to stern reflection each a crime ; 



rfcft 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The withering sense of evil unrevcal'd, 

Not cankering less because (lie more conceal'd — 

All, in a word, from winch all eves must start, 

That opening sepulchre — the naked heart 

B;in-s with us buried woes, till pride awake, 

'l\i match the mirror from the soul — and break. 

Ay-— pride can veil, and courage brave it all, 

All — all — before— beyond — the deadliest fall. 

Each hath some fear, and he who least betrays, 

The only hypocrite deserving praise : 

Not the loud recreant wretch who boasts and flies ; 

But he who looks on death — and silent dies. 

So steel'd by pondering o'er his far career, 

He half-way meets him should he menace near ! 

XI. 

In the high chamber of his highest tower, 

Sate Oonrad, fetter'J in the Pacha's power. 

His palace perish'd in the tlame — this fort 

Contain'd at once his captive and his court. 

Not much could Conrad of his sentence blame, 

His foe, if vanquished, had but shared the same: — 

Alone he sate — in so itude had scann'd 

His guilty bosom, but that breast he mann'd : 

One thought alone he could not — dared not meet. 

"Oh ! how these tidings will Medora greet!" 

Then — only then — his clanking hands he raised, 

And strain'd with rage the chain on which he gazed ; 

But soon he f mud — or feign'd — or drcam'd relief, 

And smiled in self-derision of his grief: 

" And now come torture when it will — or may, 

More need of rest to nerve me for the day!" 

This said, with languor to his mat he crept, 

And, whatsoe'er his visions, quickly slept. 

' I' was hardly midnight when that fray begun, 
For Conrad's plans matured, at once were done ; 
And Havoc loathes so much the waste of time, 
She scarce had left an in. committed crime. 
One hour beheld him since the tide he stemm'd — ■ 
Disguised, discovered, conquering, ta'en, condemn'd — 
A chief on land— an outlaw on the deep — 
Destroying — saving — prison'd — and asleep ! 

XII. 

He slept in calmest seeming — for his breath 

Was hush'd so deep — Ah ! happy if in death ! 

He slept — Who o'er his placid slumber bends ? 

His foes are gone — and here he hath no friends ; 

Is it some seraph sent to grant him grace '! 

No, 'tis an earthly form with heavenly face ! 

Its white arm raised a lamp — yet gently hid, 

Lcsl the ray flash abruptly on the lid 

Of that closed eye, which opens but to pain, 

And once unclosed — but once may close again. 

That form, with eye so dark, and check so fair, 

And auburn waves of gemm'd and braided hair ; 

W ith shape of fairy lightness — naked foot, 

1 uat shines like snow, and falls on earth as mute — 

Through guards and duiuiest night how came it there ? 

Ah ! rather ask what will not woman dare, 

Whom youth and pity lead like thee, Gulnare? 

She cjuld not sleep — and while the Pacha's rest 

In muttering dreams yet saw his pirate-guest, 

Sue icft his side — his signet-ring she bore, 

VVlurh oft in snort idorn'd her hand before — 



And with it, scarceW questioned, won her way 
Through drowsy guards thai must that sign obey. 
Worn "Ut with toil, and tired with changing blows, 
Their eyes had envied Conrad his repose ; 
And chill and nodding at the turret door, 
They stretch their listless limbs, and watch no more, 
Just raised their heads to hail the signet-ring, 
Nor ask or what or who the sign may bring. 

XIII. 

She gazed in wonder, " Can he calmly sleep, 
While other eyes his fall or ravage weep ? 
And mine in restlessness are wandering here — 
What sudden spell hath made this man so dear? 
True — 't is to him my life, and more I owe, 
And me and mine he spared from worse than woe: 
'T is late to think — but soft — his slumber breaks — 
How heavily he sighs! — he starts — awakes!" 
He raised his head — and, dazzled with the light, 
His eye seem'd dubious if it saw aright : 
He moved his hand — the grating of his chain 
Too harshly told him that he lived again. 
" What is that form 1 if not a shape of air, 
Mcthinks my jailor's face shows wondrous fair'" 

" Pirate ! thou know'st me not — but I am one 
Grateful for deeds thou hast too rarely done; 
Look on me — and remember her, thy hand 
Snatch'd from the flames, and thy more fearful banrj 
I come through darkness — and I scarce know why- 
Yet not to hurt — I would not see thee die." 

" If so, kind lady ! thine the only eye . 

That would not here in that gay hope delight : 

Theirs is the chance — and let them use their right. 

But still I thank their courtesy or thine, 

That would confess me at so fair a shrine." 

Strange though it seem — yet with extremest grief 

Is huk'd a mirth — it doth not bring relief — 

That playfulness of sorrow ne'er beguiles, 

And smiles in bitterness — but still it smiles-, 

And sometimes with the wisest and the best, 

Till even the scaflbld l0 echoes with their jest! 

Yet not the joy to which it seems akin — 

It may deceive all hearts, save that within. 

Whate'er it was that flash'd on Conrad, now 

A laughing wildness half unbent his brow : 

And these his accents had a sound of mirth, 

As if the last he could enjoy on earth ; 

Yet 'gainst his nature — for through that short life, 

Few thoughts had he to spare from gloom and strife, 

XIV. 

" Corsair ! thy doom is named — but I have power 

To soothe the Pacha in his weaker hour. 

Thee would I spare — nay more — would save thee now 

But this — time — hope — nor even thy strength allow; 

But all I can, I will : at least, delay 

The sentence that remits thee scarce a day. 

More now were ruin — even thyself were loth 

The vain attempt should bring but doom to both." 

"Yes! — loth indeed : — my soul is nerved to all 
Or fall'n too low to fear another fall : 
Tempt not thyself with peril ; me with hope, 
Of flight from foes with whom I could not cope- 



THE CORSAIR. 



160 



Unfit to vanquish — shall I meanly fly, 

The one of all my band thai would not die? 

Vet there is one — to whom mv memory clings, 

Till to these eyes her own wild softness springs. 

My sole resources in the path I trod 

Were these — my bark — my sword — my love — my God ! 

The last I left in youth — he leaves me now — 

And man hut works his will to lay me low. 

I have no thought to mock his throne with prayer 

Wriini; from the coward crouching of despair; 

[t is enough — I breathe — and I can bear. 

My sword is shaken from the worthless hand 

That might have better kept so true a brand ; 

My bark is sunk or captive — but my love — 

For her in sooth my voice would mount above : 

Oh ! she is all that still to earth can bind — 

And this will break a heart so more than kind, 

And blight a form — till thine appear'd, Gulnare! 

Mine eye ne'er ask'd if others were as fair." 

" Thou lovest another then ? — but what to me 
Is this — 'tis nothing — nothing e'er can be : 
But yet — thou lovest — and — Oh ! I envy those 
Whose hearts on hearts as faithful can repose, 
Who never feel the void — the wandering thought 
That sighs o'er visions — such as mine hath wrought." 

" Lady — methought thy love was his, for whom 
This arm redeem'd thee from a fiery tomb." 

"My love stern Seyel's! Oh — no — no — not my love — 
i r et much this heart, that strives no more, once strove 
To meet his passion — but it would not be. 
I felt — I feel — love dwells with — with the Iree. 
I am a slave, a favour'd slave at best, 
To share his splendour, and seem very blest ! 
Oft must my soul the question undergo, 
Of — ' Dost thou love V and burn to answer ' No !' 
Oh ! hard it is that fondness to sustain, 
And struggle not to feel averse in vain ; 
But harder still the heart's recoil to bear, 
And hide from one — perhaps another there. 
He takes the hand I give not — nor withhold — 
Its pulse nor check' d — nor quicken'd — calmly cold : 
And, when resign'd, it drops a lifeless weight 
From one I never loved enough to hate. 
No warmth these lips return by his imprest, 
And chill'd remembrance shudders o'er the rest. 
Yes — had I ever proved that passion's zeal, 
The change to hatred were at least to feel: 
But still — he goes unmourn'd — returns unsought — 
And oft when present — absent from mv thought. 
Or when reflection comes — and come it must — 
I fear that henceforth 'twill but Itring disgust; 
I am his slave — but, in di spite of pride, 
'T were Worse than bondage to become his bride. 
Oh ! that this dotage of his breast would cease ! 
Or seek another and give mine release, 
But yesterday — I could have said, to peace! 
Ves — if unwonted fondness now 1 feign, 
Remember — captive! 't is to break thy chain; 
Repay the life that to thy hand I owe ; 
To give thee back to ali endear' d below, 
Who share such love as I can never know. 
Farewell — morn breaks — and I must now away : 
•T will cost me dear — but dread no death to day !" 
s 2 27 



XV. 

She press'd his fetter'd fingers to her heart, 

And bow'd her head, and turn'd her to depart, 

And noiseless as a lovely dream is gone. 

And was she here ? and is he now alone ? 

vVhal gem hath dropp'd and sparkles o'er his chain? 

The tear most sacred, shed for other's [rain, 

That starts at once — bright — pure — from pity's mine, 

Already polish'd by the hand divine ! 

Oh ! too convincing — dangerously dear — 

In woman's eye the unanswerable tear ! 

What weapon of her weakness she can wield, 

To save, subdue — at once her spear and shield : 

Avoid it — virtue ebbs and wisdom errs, 

Too fondly gazing on that grief of hers ! 

What lost a world, and hade a hero fly 1 

The timid tear in Cleopatra's eye. 

Yet be the soft triumvir's fault forgiven, 

By this — how many lose not earth — but heaven ! 

Consign their souls to man's eternal foe, 

And seal their own to spare some wanton's woe ! 

XVI. 

'T is morn — and o'er his alter'd features play 
The beams — without the hope of yesterday. 
What shall he be ere night? perchance a thing 
O'er which the raven flaps her funeral wing : 
By his closed eye unheeded and unfelt, 
While sets that sun, and dews of evening melt, 
Chill — wet — and misty round each stiffened limb, 
Refreshing earth — reviving all but him ! — 



CANTO III. 



Come vedi — ancor non m' abbandona. 

DANTfc. 



I. 

Slow sinks, more lovely ere his race be run, 

Along Morea's hills, the setting sun ; 

Not, as in northern climes, obscurely bright, 

But one unclouded blaze of living light! 

O'er the hush'd deep the yellow beam he throw-,, 

Gilds the green wave, that trembles as it glows. 

On old jEgina's rock, and Lira's isle, 

The god of gladness sheds his parting smile ; 

O'er his own regions lingering, loves to shine, 

Though there his altars arc no more divine. 

Descending fast the mountain shadows kiss 

Thy glorious gulf, uneonquer'd Salamis ! 

Their azure arches through the long expanse 

More deeply purpled meet his mellowing glance, 

And tenderest tints, along their summits driven, 

Mark his gay course and own the hues of heaven, 

Till, darkly shaded from the land and deep, 

Behind Ins Delphian chtfhe sinks to sieep. 

On such an eve, his palest beam he cast, 
When, Athens! here thy wisest look'd his last. 
How wateh'd *hv better sons his farewell ra>', 
That closed their murder'd sage's ' ' latest day ' 
Not yet — not yet — Sol pauses on the hill — 
The precious hour of parting lingers still ; 



70 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



But sad his light to agonizing eyes, 
Ami dark the mountain's once delightful dyes: 
Gloom o'er the lovely land he seem'd to pour, 
The land, where Phoebus never frown'd before ; 
But, ere he sunk below Cithseron's head, 
The cup of woe was quafl'd — the spirit fled ; 
The soul of hirn who scorn'd to fear or fly — 
Who lived and died, as none can live or die ! 

But lo ! from high Hymettus to the plain, 

The queen of night asserts her silent reign. 11 

No murky vapour, herald of the slonn, 

Hides her fair face, nor girds her glowing form ; 

Willi cornice glimmering as the moon-beams play, 

There the white column greets her grateful ray, 

And, bright around with quivering beams beset, 

Her emblem sparkles o'er the minaret : 

The groves of olive scatter'd dark and wide 

Where meek Cephisus pours his scanty tide, 

The cypress saddening by the sacred mosque, 

The gleaming turret of the gay Kiosk, 13 

And, dun and sombre 'mid the holy calm, 

Near Theseus' fane yon solitary palm, 

All tinged with varied hues, arrest the eye — 

And dull were his that pass'd them heedless by. 

Again the iEgean, heard no more afar, 

Lulls his chafed breast from elemental war ; 

Again his waves in milder tints unfold 

Their long array of sapphire and of gold, 

Mixt with the shades of many a distant isle, 

That frown — where gentler ocean seems to smile.'* 

II. 

Not now my theme — why turn my thoughts to thee? 

Oh ! who can look along thy native sea, 

Nor dwell upon thy name, whate'er the tale, 

So much its magic must o'er al! prevail ? 

Who that beheld that sun upon thee set, 

Fair Athens ! could thine evening face forget ? 

Not iie — whose heart nor time nor distance frees, 

Spe'l- bound within the clustering Cyclades! 

Nor seems this homage foreign to his strain, 

His Corsair's isle was once thine own domain — 

Would that with freedom it were thine again ! 

III. 

The sun hath sunk — and, darker than the night, 
Sinks with its beam upon the beacon height 
Medora's heart — the third day 's come and gone — 
With it he comes not — sends not — faithless one ! 
The wind was fair though light; and storms were none. 
Last eve Anselmo's bark return'd, and yet 
His only tidings that they had not met ! 
Though wild, as now, far different were the tale 
Had Conrad waited for that single sail. 

The night-breeze freshens — she that day had past 
In watching all that hope proclaim'd a mast ; 
Sadly she sate — on high— Impatience bore 
At last her footsteps to the midnight shore, 
And there she wan-ierM heedless of the spray 
That dash'd her garments oft, and warn'd away : 
She saw not — felt not this — nor dared depart, 
Nor deem'd it cold — her chill was at her heart ; 
Till grew such certainty from that suspense — 
His vcy sight had shock'd from life or sense ! 



It came at last — a sad and shatter'd boat, 
Whose inmates first beheld whom first they sought, 
Some bleeding — all most wretched — these the few- 
Scarce knew they how escaped — this all they knew. 
In silence, darkling, each appeat'd to wait 
His fellow's mournful guess at Conrad's fate : 
Something they would have said ; but seem'd to fear 
To trust their accents to Medora's ear. 
She saw at once, yet sunk not — trembled not — 
Beneath that grief, that loneliness of lot, 
Within that meek fair form were feelings high, 
That deem'd not till they found their energy. 
While yet was Hope — they soflen'd — Hutter'd — wept— 
All lost — that softness died not — but it slept ; 
And o'er its slumber rose that strength which said, 
" With nothing left to love — there's nought to dread." 
'Tis more than nature's; like the burning might 
Delirium gathers from the lever's height. 

" Silent you stand — nor would I hear you tell 

What — speak not — breathe not — for I know it well — 

Yet would I ask — almost my lip denies 

The — quick your answer — tell me where he lies." 

" Lady ! we know not — scarce with life we fled ; 

But here is one denies that he is dead : 

He saw him bound, and bleeding — hut alive." 

She heard no further — 't was in vain to strive — 

So throbb'd each vein — each thought — till then with 

stood ; 
Her own dark soul — these words at once subdued: 
She totters — falls — and senseless had the wave 
Perchance but snatch'd her from another grave ; 
But that with hands though rude, yet weeping eyes, 
They yield such aid as Pity's haste supplies : 
Dash o'er her deathlike cheek the ocean dew, 
Raise — fan — sustain till life returns anew ; 
Awake her handmaids, with the matrons leave 
That fainting form o'er which they gaze and grieve ; 
Then seek Anselmo's cavern, to report 
The tale too tedious — when the triumph short. 

IV. 

In that wild council words wax'd warm and strange, 
With thoughts of ransom, rescue, and revenge; 
All, save repose or flight : still lingering there 
Breathed Conrad's spirit, and forbade despair ; 
Whate'er his fate — the breasts he form'd and led 
Will save him living, or appease him dead. 
Woe to his foes ! there yet survive a few, 
Whose deeds are daring, as their hearts are true 

V. 

Within the Haram's secret chamber sate 

Stern Seyd, still pondering o'er his captive's fate ; 

His thoughts on love and hate alternate dwell, 

Now with Gulnare, and now in Conrad's cell ; 

Here at his feet the lovely slave reclined 

Surveys his brow — would soothe his gloom of riind, 

While many an anxious glance her large dark eye 

Sends in its idle search for sympathy, 

His only bends in seeming o'er his beads, 15 

But inly views his victim as he bleeds. 

" Pacha ! the day is thine ; and on thy cres' 
Sits triumph — Conrad taken — fall'n the rest ! 



His doom is fix'd — he dies : and well his fate 
Was earn'd — yet much too worthless for thy hate : 
Methinks, a short release, for ransom told 
With all his treasure, not unwisely sold ; 
Report speaks largely of his pirate-hoard — 
Would that of this my Pacha were the lord ! 
While baffled, weaken'd by this fatal fray — 
Watch'd — follow'd — he were then an easier prey ; 
But once cut off — the remnant of his band 
Embark their wealth, and seek a safer strand." 

" Gulnare ! — If for each drop of blood a gem 

Were offer'd rich as Stamboul's diadem ; 

If for each hair of his a massy mine 

Of virgin ore should supplicating shine ; 

If all our Arab tales divulge or dream 

Of wealth were here — that gold should not redeem! 

It had not now redeem'd a single hour, 

But that I know him fetter'd, in my power ; 

And, thirsting for revenge, I ponder still 

On pangs that longest rack and latest kill." 

" Nay, — Seyd ! — I seek not to restrain thy rage, 
Too justly moved for mercy to assuage ; 
My thoughts were only to secure for thee 
His riches — thus released, he were not free: 
Disabled, shorn of half his might and band, 
His capture could but wait thy first command." 

" His capture could ! — and shall I then resign 
One day to him — the wretch already mine? 
Release my foe ! — at whose remonstrance? — thine! 
Fair suitor ! — to thy virtuous gratitude, 
That thus repays this Giaour's relenting mood, 
Which thee and thine alone of all coukl spare, 
No doubt — regardless if the prize were fair, 
My thanks and praise alike are due — now hear! 
I have a counsel for thy gentler ear : 
I do mistrust thee, woman ! and each word 
Of thine stamps truth on all suspicion heard. 
Borne in his arms through fire from yon Serai- 
Say, wert thou lingering there with him to fly ? 
Thou need'st not answer — thy confession speaks, 
Already reddening on thy guilty cheeks ; 
Then, lovely dame, bethink thee ! and beware : 
'T is not his life alone may claim such care ! 
Another word and — nay — I need no more. 
Accursed was the moment when he bore 
Thee from the flames, which better far — but — no — 
I then had moum'd thee with a lover's woe — 
Now 't is thy lord that warns — deceitful thing ! 
Know'st thou that I can clip thy wanton wing? 
In words alone I am not wont to chafe : 
Look to thyself— nor deem thy falsehood safe !" 

He rose — and slowly, sternly thence withdrew, 
Rage in his eye, and threats in his adieu : 
Ah ! little reck'd that chief of womanhood— 
Which frowns ne'er quell'd, nor menaces subdued ; 
And little deem'd he what thy heart, Gulnare! 
When soft could feel, and when incensed could dare. 
His doubts appcar'd to wrong — nor yet she knew 
How deep the root from whence compassion grew— 
She was a slave — from such may captives claim 
A fellow-feeling, differing but in name ; 
Still half-unconscious — heedless of his wrath, 
Again she ventured on the dangerous path. 



Again his rage repell'd — until arose 

That strife of thought, the source of woman's woes ! 

VI. 

Meanwhile — long anxious — weary — still — the same 

Roll'd day and night — his soul could terror tame — 

This fearful interval of doubt and dread, 

When every hour might doom him worse than dead. 

When every step that echo'd by the gate, 

Might entering lead where axe and stake await : 

When every voice that grated on his ear 

Might be the last that he could ever hear ; 

Could terror tame — that spirit stern and high 

Had proved unwilling as unfit to die ; 

'T was worn — perhaps decay' d — yet silent bore 

That conflict deadlier far than all before : 

The heat of fight, the hurry of the gale, 

Leave scarce one thought inert enough to quail ; 

But bound and fix'd in fetter'd solitude, 

To pine, the prey of every changing mood ; 

To gaze on thine own heart, and meditate 

Irrevocable faults, and coming fate — 

Too late the last to shun — the first to mend — 

To count the hours that struggle to thine end, 

With not a friend to animate, and tell 

To other ears that death became thee well ; 

Around thee foes to forge the ready lie, 

And blot life's latest scene with calumny ; 

Before the tortures, which the soul can dare, 

Yet doubts how well the shrinking flesh may bear ; 

But deeply feels a single cry would shame, 

To valour's praise thy last and dearest claim ; 

The life thou leavest below, denied above 

By kind monopolists of heavenly love ; 

And more than doubtful paradise — thy heaven 

Of earthly hope — thy loved one from thee riven. 

Such were the thoughts that outlaw must sustain, 

And govern pangs surpassing mortal pain : 

And those sustain'd he — boots it well or ill? 

Since not to sink beneath is something still ! 

VII. 

The first day pass'd — he saw not her — Gulnare — 

The second — third — and still she came not there ; 

But what her words avouch'd, her charms had done. 

Or else he had not seen another sun. 

The fourth day roll'd along, and with the night 

Came storm and darkness in their mingling might ; 

Oh ! how he listen'd to the rushing deep, 

That ne'er till now so broke upon his sleep ; 

And his wild spirit wilder wishes sent, 

Roused by the roar of his own element ! 

Oft had he ridden on that winged wave, 

And loved its roughness for the speed it gave , 

And now its dashing echo'd on his ear, 

A long-known voice — alas ! too vainly near'. 

Loud sung the wind above ; and, doublv Ioiki, 

Shook o'er his turret cell the thunder-cloud ; 

And flash'd the lightning by the latticed bar, 

To him mere genial than the midnight star ; 

Close to the glimmering grate he dra^g'd his chain. 

And hoped that peril might not prove in vain. 

He raised his iron hand to Heaven, and prav'd 

One pitying flash to mar the form it made : 

His slcel and impious prayer attract alike — 

The storm roll'd onward, end disdain'd to strike , 



172 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



[is peal wax'd fainter — ceased — he felt alone, 
As if some faithless friend had spurn'd his groan ! 

VIII. 

The midnight pass'd — and to the massy door, 
A light step came — it paused — it moved once more : 
Slow turns the grating bolt and sullen key: 
'T is as his heart forboded — that fair she ! 
Whatu'cr her sins, to him a guardian saint, 
And beauteous still as hermit's hope can paint ; 
Yet changed since last within that crll she came, 
More pale her cheek, more tremulous her frame : 
On him she cast her dark and hurried eye, 
Which spoke before her accents — " thou must die! 
Yes, thou must die — there is but one resource, 
The last — the worst — if torture were not worse." 

" Lady ! I look to none — my lips proclaim 
What last proclaim'd they — Conrad still the same 
Why shouldst thou seek an outlaw's life to spare, 
And change the sentence I deserve to bear 7 
Well have I carn'd — nor here alone — the meed 
Of Seyd's revenge, by many a lawless deed." 

"Why should I seek? because — Oh! didst thou not 
Redeem my life from worse than slavery's lot 7 
Why should I seek? — hath misery made thee blind 
To the fond workings of a woman's mind 7 
And must I say? albeit my heart rebel 
With all that woman feels, but should not tell — 
Because — despite thy crimes — that heart is moved: 
It fear'd thee — thank'd thee — pitied — madden'd — loved. 
Reply not, tell not now thy tale again, 
Thou lov'st another — and I love in vain ; 
Though fond as mine her bosom, form more fair, 
I rush through peril which she would not dare. 
If that thy heart to hers were truly dear, 
Were I thine own — thou wert not lonely here : 
An outlaw's spouse — and leave her lord to roam ! 
What hath such gentle dame to do with home ? 
But speak not now — o'er thine and o'er my head 
Hangs the keen sabre by a single thread ; 
If thou hast courage still, and wouldst be free, 
Ri ceive this poniard — rise and follow me !" 

" Ay — in my chains ! my steps will gently tread, 
With these adornments, o'er each slumbering head! 
Thou hast forgot — is this a garb for flight 7 
Or is that instrument more fit for fight?" 

" Misdoubting Corsair! I have gain'd the guard, 

Ripe for revolt, and greedy for reward. 

A single word of mine removes that chain : 

Without some aid, how here could I remain? 

Well, since we met, hath sped my busy time, 

If in aught evil, for thy sake the crime: 

The crime — 't is none to punish those of Seyd. 

That hated tyrant, Conrad — he must bleed! 

I see thee shudder — but my soul is changed — 

Wrong'd — spurn'd — reviled — and it shall be avenged — 

An used of what till now my heart disdain'd— 

Toe faithful, though to bitter bondage chain'd. 

Yes, smile ! but he had little cause to sneer, 

I- wxs not treacherous then — nor thou too dear: 

But lie has said it — and the jealous well, 

Those tyrants, teasing, tempting to rebel, 

Desert the fate their fretting lips foretell. 



I never loved — he bought me — somewhat high— 

Since with me came a he-art he could not buy. 

I was a slave unmurmuring ; he hath said, 

But for his rescue I with thee had fled. 

'T was false thou know'st — but let such augurs nift, 

Their words are omens insult renders true. 

Nor « :is thy respite granted to my prayer j 

This fleeting grace was only to prepare 

New torments for thy life, and my despair. 

Mine too he threatens ; but his dotage still 

Would fain reserve me for his lordly will: 

When wearier of these fleeting charms and me, 

There yawns the sack — and yonder rolls the sea! 

What, am 1 then a toy for dotard's play, 

To wear but till the gilding frets away 7 

I saw thee — loved thee — owe thee all — would save, 

If but to show how grateful is a slave. 

But had he not thus menaced fame and life 

(And well he keeps his oaths pronounced in strife), 

I stdl had saved thee — but the Pacha spared. 

Now I am all thine own — for all prepared : 

Thou lov'st me not — nor know'st — or but the worst, 

Alas ! this love — that haired are the first — 

Oh ! couldst thou prove my truth, thou wouldst wot 

start, 
Nor fear the fire that lights an eastern heart ; 
'T is now the beacon of thy safety — now 
It points within the port a Maitiote prow : 
But in one chamber, where our path must lead, 
There sleeps — he must not wake — the oppressor Seyd (i " 

" Gulnare — Gulnarc — I never felt till now 

My abject fortune, wither'd fame so low: 

Seyd is mine enemy : had swept my band 

From earth with ruthless but with open hand, 

And therefore came I, in my hark of war, 

To smite the smiter with the scimitar ; 

Such is my weapon — not the secret knife — 

Who spares a woman's seeks not slumber's life. 

Thine saved I gladly, lady, not for this — 

Let me not deem that mercy shown amiss. 

Now fare thee well — more peace be with thy breast! 

Night wears apace — my last of earthly rest !" 

"Rest! rest! by sunrise must thy sinews shake. 

And thy limbs writhe around the ready stake. 

I heard the order — saw — I will not see — 

If thou wilt perish, I will fall with thee. 

My life — my love — my hatred — all below 

Are on this cast — Corsair ! 't is but a blow ! 

Without it flight were idle — how evade 

His sure pursuit ? my wrongs too unrepaid, 

My youth disgraced — the long, long wasted years, 

One blow shall cancel with our future fears ; 

But since the dagger suits thee less than brand, 

I '11 try tne firmness of a female hand. 

The guards are gain'd — one moment all were o'er— 

Corsair ! we meet in safety or no more ; 

If errs my feeble hand, the morning cloud 

Will hover o'er thy scaffold, and my shroud." 

IX. 

She turn'd, and vanish'u ere he could reply, 
But his glance follow'd far with eager eye ; 
And gathering, as he could, the links that bound 
Ilis form, to curl their length, and curb their sound, 



THE CORSAIR. 



173 



Since bar and bolt no more his steps preclude, 

He, fast as fetter'd limbs allow, pursued. 

'T was dark and winding, and he knew not where 

That passage led ; nor lamp nor guard were there: 

He sees a dusky glimmering— shall he seek 

Or shun that ray so indistinct and weak ? 

Chance guides his steps — a freshness seems to bear 

Full on his brow, as if from morning air — 

He reach'd an open gallery — on his eye 

Gleam'd the last star of night, the clearing sky: 

Yet scarcely heeded these — another light 

From a lone chamber struck upon his sight. 

Towards it he moved, a scarcely closing door 

Reveal'd the ray within, but nothing more. 

With hasty step a figure outward past, 

Then paused — and turn'd — and paused — 'tis she at last! 

No poniard in that hand — nor sign of ill — 

"Thanks to that softening heart — she could not kill!" 

Again he iook'd, the wildness of her eye 

Starts from the day abrupt and fearfully. 

She stopp'd — threw back her dark far-floating hair, 

That nearly veil'd her face and bosom fair : 

As if she late had bent her leaning head 

Above some object of her doubt or dread. 

They meet — upon her brow — unknown — forgot— 

Her hurrying hand had left — 't was but a spot — 

Its hue was all he saw, and scarce withstood — 

Oh ! slight but certain pledge of crime — 't is blood ! 



He had seen battle — he had brooded lone 

O'er promised pangs to sentenced guilt foreshown ; 

He had been tempted — chasten' d — and the chain 

Yet on his arms might ever there remain: 

But ne'er from strife — captivity — remorse — 

From all his feelings in their inmost force — 

So thrill'd — so shudder'd every creeping vein, 

As now they froze before that purple stain. 

That spot of blood, that light but guil'y streak 

Had banish'd all the beauty from her cheek ! 

Blood he had view'd — could view unmoved — but then 

It flow'd in combat, or was shed by men ! 

XI. 

"'T is done — he nearly waked — but it is done. 
Corsair ! he perish'd — thou art dearly won. 
All words would now be vain — away — away ! 
Our bark is tossing — 't is already day. 
The few gain'd over, now are wholly mine, 
And these thy yet surviving band shall join : 
Anon my voice shall vindicate my hand, 
When once our sail forsakes this hated strand." 

XII. 

She clapp'd her hands — and through the gallery pour, 
Equipped for flight, her vassals — Greek and Moor; 
Silent but quick they stoop, his chains unbind ; 
Once more his limbs are free as mountain-wind ! 
But on his heavy heart such sadness sate, 
As if they there transferr'd that iron weight. 
No words are utter' d — at her sign, a door 
Reveals the secret passage to the shore ; 
The city lies behind — they speed, they reach 
The glad waves dancing on the yellow beach : 
And Conrad following, at her beck, obey'd, 
Nor cared he now if rescued or betray'd j 



Resistance were as useless as if Seyd 
Yet lived to view the doom his ire decreed. 

XIII. 

Embark'd, the sail unftirl'd, the light breeze blew — 
How much had Conrad's memory to review ! 
Sunk he in contemplation, till tho cape 
Where last he anchor'd rear'd its giant shape. 
Ah ! — since that fatal night, though brief the time, 
Had swept an age of terror, grief, and crime. 
As its far shadow frowri'd above the mast, 
He veil'd his face, and sorrow'd as he past ; 
He thought of all — Gonsalvo and his band, 
His fleeting triumph and his failing hand, 
He thought on her afar, his lonely bride : 
He turn'd and saw — Gulnare, the homicide ! 

XIV. 

She watch'd his features till she could not bear 
Their freezing aspect and averted air, 
And that strange fierceness, foreign to her eye, 
Fell quench'd in tears, too late to shed or dry. 
She knelt beside him, and his hand she prest — 
"Thou may'st forgive, though Alla's self detest, 
But for that deed of darkness, what wcrt thou ? 
Reproach me — but not yet — Oh ! spare me now ! 
I am not what I seem- -this fearful night 
My brain bewildcr'd — do not madden quite ! 
If I had never loved — though less my guilt, 
Thou hadst not lived to — hate me — if thou wilt." 

XV. 

She wrongs his thoughts, they more himself upbraid 

Than her, though undesign'd, the wretch he made ; 

But speechless all, deep, dark, and unexprest, 

They bleed within that silent cell — nis breast. 

Still onward, fair the breeze, nor rough the surge, 

The blue waves sport around the stern they urge; 

Far on the horizon's verge appears a speck, 

A spot — a mast — a sail — an armed deck ! 

Their little bark her men of watch descry, 

And ampler canvas woos the wind from high ; 

She bears her down majestically near, 

Speed on her prow, and terror in her tier ; 

A flash is seen — the ball beyond their bow 

Booms harmless, hissing to the deep below. 

Up rose keen Conrad from his silent trance, 

A long, long absent gladness in his glance ; 

" 'T is mine — my blood-red Aug ! again — again- 

I am not all deserted on the main !" 

They own the signal, answer to the hail, 

Hoist out the boat at once, and slacken sail. 

'"Tis Conrad! Conrad!" shouting horn the deck. 

Command nor duty could their transport check ! 

With light alacrity and gaze of pride, 

They view him mount once men Ins vessel's side, 

A smile relaxing in each rugged face, 

Their arms can scarce forbear a rough emurace. 

He, half-forgetting danger and defeat, 

Returns their greeting as a chief may greet. 

Wrings with a cordial grasp Ausi-lmo's hand. 

And feels he yet can conquer and command' 

XVI. 
These greetings o'er, the feelings that o'crflow, 
Yet grieve to win him back without a blow; 



174 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



They sail'il prepared for vengeance — had they known 
A woman's hand secured that deed her own, 
She were their queen — less scrupulous are they 
Than haughty Conrad how they win their way. 
With many an asking smile, and wondering stare, 
Thev whisper round, and gaze upon Gulnare; 
And her, at once above — beneath her sex, 
Whom blood appall'd not, their regards perplex. 
To Conrad turns her faint imploring eye, 
She drops her veil, and stands in silence by ; 
Her arms are meekly folded on that breast, 
Which — Conrad safe — to fate resign'd the rest. 
Though worse than phrensy could that bosom fill, 
Extreme in love or hate, in good or ill, 
The worst of crimes had left her woman still ! 

XVII. 
This Conrad mark'd, and felt — ah! could he less? 
Hate of that deed — but grief for her distress ; 
What she has done no tears can wash away, 
And heaven must punish on its angry day : 
But — it was done: he knew, whate'er her guilt, 
For him that pomard smote, that blood was spill ; 
And he was free ! — and she for him had given 
Her all on earth, and more than all in heaven ! 
And now he turn'd him to that dark-eyed slave, 
Whose brow was bow'd beneath the glance he gave, 
Who now seem'd changed and humbled: — faint and 

meek, 
But varying oft the colour of her cheek 
Tc deeper shades of paleness — all its red 
Tnat fearful spot which stain'd it from the dead ! 
He took that hand — it trembled — now too late — 
So soft in love — so wildly nerved in hate ; 
He clasp'd that hand — it trembled — and his own 
Had lost its firmness, ana nis voice its tone. 
"Gulnare!" — but she replied not — "dear Gulnare!" 
She raised her eye — her only answer there — 
At once she sought and sunk in his embrace : 
If he had driven her from that resting-place, 
His had been more or less than mortal heart, 
But — good or ill — it bade her not depart. 
Perchance, but for the bodings of his breast, 
His latest virtue then had join'd the rest. 
Yet even Medora might forgive the kiss 
That ask'd from form so fair no more than this, 
The first, the last that frailty stole from faith — 
To lips where love had lavish'd all his breath, 
To lips — whose broken sighs such fragrance fling, 
As he had fann'd them freshly with his wing ! 

XVIII. 
Tney gain by twilight's hour their lonely isle : 
T'.i them the very rocks appear to smile ; 
The haven hums with many a cheering sound, 
The beacons blaze their wonted stations round, 
The boats are darting o'er the curly bay, 
And sportive dolphins bend them through the spray ; 
Even the hoarse sea-bird's shrill discordant shriek 
Greets like the welcome of his tuneless beak ! 
Beneath each lamp that through its lattice gleams, 
Their fancy paints the friends that trim the beams. 
Oh ! what can sanctify the joys of home, 
Like hope's gay glance from ocean's troubleo. foam? 

XIX. 

The lights are high on beacon and from bower, 
And 'midst them Conrad seeks Medora's tower: 



He looks in vain — 'tis strange — and all remark, 

Amid so many, hers alone is da/k. 

'T is strange — of yore its welcome never fail'd, 

Nor now, perchance, extinguisb'd, only ^eil'd. 

With the first boat descends he for the shore, 

And looks impatient on the lingering oar. 

Oh ! ibr a wing beyond the falcon's flight, 

To bear him like an arrow to that height ! 

With the first pause the resting rowers gay**. 

He waits not — looks not — leaps into the wav«- 

Strives through the surge, bestrides the beach, ao<l high 

Ascends the path familiar to his eye. 

He reach'd his turret door — he paused — no sound 
Broke from within ; and all was night around. 
He knock'd, and loudly — footstep nor reply 
Announced that any heard or deem'd him nigh ; 
He knock'd — but faintly — for his trembling hand 
Refused to aid his heavy heart's demand. 
The portal opens — 't is a well-known face — 
But not the form he panted to embrace ; 
Its lips are silent — twice his own essay'd, 
And fail'd to frame the question they delay'd ; 
He snatch'd the lamp — its light will answer all — 
It quits his grasp, expiring in the fall. 
He would not wait for that reviving ray — 
As soon could he have linger'd there for day ; 
But, glimmering through the dusky corridore, 
Another chequers o'er the shadow'd floor ; 
His steps the chamber gain — his eyes behold 
All that his heart believed not — yet foretold ! 

XX. 
He turn'd not — spoke not — sunk not — fix'd his .nok, 
And set the aaxious frame that lately shook : 
He gazed — how long we gaze despite of pain, 
And know, but dare not own, we gaze in vain! 
In life itself she was so still and fair, 
That death with gentler aspect wither'd there ; 
And the cold flowers l6 her colder hand contain'd, 
In that last grasp as tenderly were strain'd 
As if she scarcely felt, but feign'd a sleep, 
And made it almost mockery yet to weep : 
The long dark lashes fringed he.- lids of snow, 
And veil'd — thought shrinks from all that lurk'd below- 
Oh ! o'er the eye death most exerts his might, 
And hurls the spirit from her throne of light ! 
Sinks those blue orbs in that long last eclipse, 
But spares, as yet, the charm around her lips — 
Yet, yet, they seem as they forbore to smile, 
And wish'd repose — but only for a while ; 
But the white shroud, and each extended tress, 
Long — fair — but spread in utter lifelessness, 
Which, late the sport of every summer wind, 
Escaped the baffled wreath that strove to bind ; 
These — and the pale pure check, became the bier — 
But she is nothing — wherefore is he here? 

XXI. 
He ask'd no question — all were answer'd now 
By the first glanre on that still — marble brow. 
It was enough — she died — what reek'd it how? 
The love of youth, the hope of better years, 
The source of softest wishes, tendcrcst fears, . 
The only living thing he could not hate, 
Was reft at once — and he deserved his fate, 
But did not feel it less ; — the good explore, 
For peace, those realms where guilt can never soar. 



THE CORSAIR. 



176 



The proud — the wayward — who have fix'd below 
Their joy — Bad find this earth enough for woe, 
Lost; in that one their all — perchance a mite — 
But who in patience parts with all delight? 
Full many a Btoic eve and aspect stern 
Mask hearts when; grief hath little left to learn ; 
And many a withering thought lies hid, nut lost 
In smiles thai least belli who wear them most. 

XXII. 
Bv those, (hat dn^oest feel, is .ill exprest 

The mdistmclirs. f the suiiering breast ; 
Where thousand th. ghts begin to end in one, 
Which seeks from al. .ne refilge found in none; 
No words Suffice the secret soul to show, 
For Truth denies all eloquence to Woe. 
On Conrad's stricken soul exhaustion prest, 
And stupor almost hill'd it into rest ; 
So feeble now — his mother's softness crept 
To th ise wild e\es, which like an infant's wept: 
It was the very weakness of his bram, 
Which thus confessed without relieving pain. 
None saw his trickling tears — perchance, if seen, 
Thai useless Qood of grief had never been : 
Nor kuuj thev ll'iw'd — he dried them to depart, 
iii helpless — hopeless — brokenness of heart: 
The sun goes forth — but Conrad's day is dim ; 
And the night cometh — ne'er to pass from him. 
There is no darkness like the cloud of mind, 
Oh gril t"s vain eve — the blindest of the blind ! 
Which may not — dare not see — but turns aside 
To blackest shade — nor will endure a guide ! 

XXIII. 
His heart was form'd for softness — warp'd to wrong ; 
Betrnv'd too early, and beguiled too long; 
Each feeling pure — as falls the dropping dew 
Within the grot — like that had harden'd too ; 
Less clear, perchance, its earthlv trials pass'd, 
B it sunk, and chili'd, and petrified at last. 
Vet tempests wear, and lightning cleaves the rock; 
If such his heart, so shatter'd it the shock. 
There grew one flower beneath its rugged brow, 
Though dark the shade — it shelter'd, — saved till now. 
The thunder came — that bolt hath blasted both, 
The granite's firmness, and the lily's growth : 
The gentle plant hath left no leaf to tell 
Its tale, but shrunk and wither'd where it fell, 
And of its cold protector, blacken round 
But shiver'd fragments on the barren ground ! 

XXIV. 

T is morn — to venture on his lonely hour 

Few dare ; though now Anaejmo sought his tower. 

He was not there — nor seen along the shore; 

Ere nig'i', a! .inn'd, their isle is traversed o'er: 

Another mom— another bids them seek, 

And shout Ins name till echo waxetli weak ; 

Mount -grotta — cavern — valley eearch'd in vain, 

They find on shore a sea-boat's broken chain : 

Their hope revives — they follow o'er the main. 

'T is idle all — noonj roll on moons away, 

Anil Conrad COSOeS not — ■caine not sincr; that day ; 

Nor trace nor tidings of his doom declare 

Where lives his grief) <>r perish'd his despair! 

Long mourn'd Ins hand whom none could mourn beside 

And fair the monument they yave his bride : 



For bun they raise not the recording stone — 
His death yet dubious, deeds too widely known ; 
He left a Corsair's name to other times, 
Link'd with one virtue, and a thousand crimes. 1 '' 



NOTES. 



The time in this poem may seem too short for the 
occurrences ; but the whole of the JEge&n isles are 
within a few hours' sail of the continent, and the readei 
must be kind enough to take the wind as 1 have often 
found it. 

Note 1. Page 163, line 86. 
Of fair Olympia loved and left of old. 
Orlando, Canto 10. 

Note 2. Page 164, line 96. 

Around the waves phosphoric brightness broke. 

By night, particularly in a warm latitude, every 

stroke of the oar, every motion of the boat or ship, is 

followed by a slight flash like sheet lightning from the 

water. 

Note 3. Page 165, line 39. 
Though to the rest the 6oher berry's juice. 
Coffee. 

Note 4. Page lf.5, line 41. 
The long Chibouuue's dissolving cloud supply. 
Pipe. 

Note 5. Page 185, line 42. 
While dunce the Almas to wild minstrelsy 
Dancing-girls. 

Note to Canto II. Page 165, line 55. 

It has been objected that Conrad's entering disguised 
as a spy, is out of nature. — Perhaps so. — I find som> 
thing not unlike it in history. 

" Anxious to explore with his own eyes the state of 
the Vandals, Majorian ventured, after disguising the 
colour of his hair, 'o visit Carthage in the character of 
his own ambassador ; and Genseric was afterwards 
mortified by the discovery, that he had entertained and 
dismissed the Emperor of the Romans. Such an anec- 
dote may be rejected as an improbable fiction ; but it is 
a fiction which would not have been imagined unless in 
the life of a hero." Gibbon, D. and F. Vol. VI p. 180. 

That Conrad is a character not altogether out of na- 
ture, I shall attempt to prove by some historical coin- 
cidences which I have met with since writing "The 
Corsair." 

" Eccelin prisonnier," dit Rolandini, "s'enfermoit 
dans un silence menacant ; il fixoit sur la tcrre son visago 
feroce, et ne donnoit point d'essor a sa profonde in- 
dignation. — De toutcs parts cependant les soldats et lea 
peuples accouroient, ils vouloient voir cet homrae, Jadis 
si puissant, et la joic universclle eclatoit de toutes parts. 
******** 

" Eocelin etoit d'une petite taillc ; mais tout l'aspect 
de sa personnc, tons sos mouvements indiquoicnl un 
soldat. — Son langagc etoit amer, son deportemcr.t su 
perbo — et par son scul regard il faisoit trembler les 
plus hardis." Sismondi, tome ni. pp. 219, 220. 

" Gizericus (Genseric, king of the Vandals, the con 
qucror of both Carthaje and Rome), statura mediocrui 



17G 



BYRON'S WORKS; 



et ccjui casu claudicans, aninio profundus, sermone ra- 
rus, luxurix contemptor, ira turbidire, hahendi cupidus, 
ad Bollicitandas gentes providentissimus," etc., etc. 
Jornandes de Reims Geticis, c. 33. 

I beg leave to quote these gloomy realities, to keep in 
countenance my Giaour and Corsair. 

Note 6. Page 166, line 19. 
Ami my stern vow and order's laws oppose. 
The Dervises are in colleges, and of dilferent orders, 
as the Monks. 

Note 7. Page 166, line 54. 
Tliey seize that Dernse ! — seize on Zatanai ! 
Satan. 

Note 8. Page 16n, line 75. 
He tore his beard, and foaming fled the fisht. 
A common and not very novel effect of Mussulman 
anger. See Prince Eugene's Memoirs, page 2-1. "The 
Seraskier received a wound in the thigh ; he plucked 
up his beard by the roots, because he was obliged to 
quit the field." 

Note 9. Page 166, line 119. 
Rrief time had Conrad now to greet Gulnare. 
Gulnare, a female name; it means, literally, the 
flower of the pomegranate. 

Note 10. Page 168, line 100. 
Till even the scaffold echoes with their jest! 
In Sir Thomas More, for instance, on the scaffold, 
and Anne Bolcyn in the Tower, when grasping her neck, 
she remarked, that " il was too slender to trouble the 
headsman much." Duiing one part of the French Rev- 
olution, it became a fashion to leave some " mot " as a 
legacy ; and the quantity of facetious last words spoken 
during that period, would form a melancholy jest-book 
of a considerable size. 

Note 11. Page 1G9, line 113. 
That closed their murder'd sage's latest day ! 
Socrates drank the hemlock a short time before sun- 
set (the hour of execution), notwithstanding the en- 
treaties of his disciples to wait till the sun went down. 

Note 12. Page 170, L e 10. 
The queen of night asserts her silent reign. 
The twilight in Greece is much shorter than in our 
own country ; the days in winter are longer, but in 
summer of shorter duration. 

Note 13. Page 170, line 20. 
The gleaming turret of the gay Kiosk. 
The kiosk is a Turkish summer-house ; the palm is 
without the present walls of Athens, not far from the 
temple of Theseus, between which and the tree the wall 
intervenes. — Cephisus' stream is indeed scanty, and 
Ihssus has no stream at all. 

Note 14. Page 170, line 30. 
That frown — where gentler ocean seems to smile. 
The opening lines as far as Section II. have, perhaps, 
little business here, and were annexed to an unpub- 
lished, (though printed) poem; but they were written 
on the spot in the spring of 1811, and — I scarce know 
why — the reader must excuse their appearance here if 
he can. 

Note 15. Page 170, line 116. 
His only bends in seeming o'er his beads. 
The coinboloio, or Mahometan rosarv ; the beads are 
is number ninety-nine- 



Note lfi. Page 174, line 98. 
And the cold flowers her solder hand contain'd. 
In the Levant it is the custom to strew flowers on the 
bodies of the dead, and in the hands of young persons 
to place a nosegay. 

Note 17. Page 175, line 65. 
LinkM with one virtue, and a thousand crimes. 

That the point of honour which is represented in one 
instance of Conrad's character has not been carried 
beyond the bounds of probability, n.ay perhaps be in 
some degree confirmed by the foil'" ng anecdote of a 
brother buccaneer in the present ' ar, 1814. 

Our readers have all seen tht account of the enter- 
prise against the pirates of Barrataria ; but few, we be- 
lieve, were informed of the situation, history, or nature 
of that establishment. For the information of such as 
were unacquainted with it, we have procured from a 
friend the following interesting narrative of the main 
facts, of which he has personal knowledge, and which 
cannot fail to interest some of our readers. 

Barrataria is a bay, or a narrow arm of the gulf of 
Mexico ; it runs through a rich but very flat country, 
until it reaches within a mile of the Mississippi river, 
fifteen miles below the city of New-Orleans. The bay 
has branches almost innumerable, in which persons 
can lie concealed from the severest scrutiny. It com- 
municates with three lakes which lie on the south-west 
side, and these, with the lake of the same name, and 
which lies contiguous to the sea, where there is an island 
formed by the two arms of this lake and the sea. The 
east and west points of this island were fortified in the 
year 1811, by a band of pirates, under the command of 
one Monsieur La Fitte. A large majority of these out- 
laws are of that class of the population of the state of 
Louisiana who fled from the island of St. Domingo 
during the troubles there, and took refuge in the island 
of Cuba: and when the last war between France and 
Spain commenced, they were compelled to leave diat 
island with the short notice of a few days. Without 
ceremony, they entered the United States, the most of 
them the State of Louisiana, with all the negroes they 
had possessed in Cuba. They were notified by the Gov- 
ernor of that State of the clause in the constitution 
which forbad the importation of slaves ; but, at the 
same time, received the assurance of the Governor that 
he would obtain, if possible, the approbation of the gen- 
eral Government for their retaining this pioperty. 

The island of Barrataria is situated about lat. 29. dcg. 
15 rnin. Ion. 92. 30. and is as remarkable for its health as 
for the superior scale and shell-fish with which its waters 
abound. The chief of this horde, like Charles de Moor, 
had mixed with his many vices some virtues. In the year 
1813, this party had, from its turpitude and boldness, 
claimed the attention of the Governor of Louisiana; and 
to break up the establishment, he thought proper to 
strike at the head. He therefore offered a reward of 500 
dollars for the head of Monsieur La Fitte, who was well 
known to the inhabitants of the city of New-Orleans, 
from his immediate connexion, and his once having been 
a fencing-master in that city of great reputation, which 
art he learnt in Buonaparte's army, where he was a 
Captain. The reward which was offered by the Governor 
for the head of La Fitte was answered m'the offer ot a 
reward from the latter of 15,000 for the head of the 
Governor. The Governor oruered out a company to 



LARA. 



177 



march from '.lie city to La Fine's island, anil to burn and 
destroy all the property, and to bring to the city of New- 
Orleans all his banditti. This company, under the com- 
mand of a man who had been the intimate associate of 
this bold Captain, approached very near 'o the fortified 
island, before he saw a man, or heard a sound, until he 
heard a whistle, not unlike a boatswain's call. Then it 
was he found himself surrounded by armed men, who 
had emerged from the secret avenues which led into 
Bayou. Here it was that the modern Charles de Moor 
developed his few noble traits , for to this man, who had 
come to destroy his life, and all that was dear to him, he 
not only spared Ins life, but offered him that which would 
have made the honest soldier easy for the remainder of 
his days, which was indignantly refused. lie then, with 
the approbation of his captor, returned to the city. This 
circumstance, and some concomitant events, proved that 
this band of pirates was not to be taken by land. Our 
naval force having alwavs been small in that quarter, 
exertions for the destruction of this illicit establishment 
could not be expected from them until augmented ; for 
an officer of the navy, with most of the gun-boats on 
that station, had to retreat from an overwhelming force 
of La Fate's. So soon as the augmentation of the 
navy authorized an attack, one was made; the over- 
throw of this banditti has been the result; and now this 
almost invulnerable point and key to New-Orleans is 
clear of an enemy, it is to be hoped the government 
will hold it by a strong military force. — From an Ameri- 
can Newspaper. 

In Noble's continuation of Granger's Biographical 
Dictionary, there is a singular passage in his account of 
archbishop Blackbourne, and as in some measure con- 
nected with the profession of the hero of the foregoing 
poem, I cannot resist the temptation of extracting it : 

"There is something mysterious in the history and 
character of Dr. Blackbourne. The former is but im- 
perfectly known ; and report has even asserted he was 
a buccaneer; and that one of his brethren in that pro- 
fession having asked, on his arrival in England, what 
had become of his n'' 1 '■hum, Blackbourne, was an- 



swered, he is Archbishop of York. We are informed, 
that Blackbourne was installed sub-dean of Exeter in 
1694, which office he resigned in 1702: but after his 
successor, Lewis Barnet's death, in 1704, he regained 
it. In the following year he became dean ; and, in 1714, 
held with it the archdeanery of Cornwall. He was con- 
secrated bishop of Exeter, February 24, 1716; and 
translated to York, November 28, 1724, as a reward, 
according to court scandal, for uniting George I. to the 
Duchess of Minister. This, however, appears to have 
been an unfounded calumny. As archbishop, lie behaved 
with great prudence, and was equally respectable as the 
guardian of the revenues of the see. Rumour whis- 
pered he retained the vices of his youth, and that a 
passion for the fair sex formed an item in the list of his 
weaknesses ; but so far from being convicted by seventy 
witnesses, he does not appear to have been directly 
criminated by one. In short, I look upon these asper- 
sions as the effects of mere malice. How is it possible a 
buccaneer should have been so good a scholar as Black- 
bourne certainly was? he who had so perfect a know- 
ledge of the classics (particularly of the Greek trage- 
dians), as to be able to read them with the same ease 
as he could Shakspeare, must have taken great pains 
to acquire the learned languages; and have had both 
leisure and good masters. But he was undoubtedly 
educated at Christ-church College, Oxford. He is al- 
lowed to have been a pleasant man : this, however, was 
turned against him, by its being said, ' he gained more 
hearts than souls.' " 

" The only voice that could soothe the passions of the 
savage (Alphonso 3d) was that of an amiable and vir 
tuous wife, the sole object of his love ; the voice of 
Donna Isabella, the daughter of the Duke of Savoy, 
and the grand-daughter of Philip II. King of Spain. — 
Her dying words sunk deep into his memory ; his fierce 
spirit melted into tears; and, after the last embrace, 
Alphonso retired into his chamber to bewail his irre- 
parable loss, and to meditate on the vanity of human 
life." — Miscellaneous IVorks of Gibbon, new edition, 
8i-o. vol. 3. page 473. 



A TALE. 



CANTO I. 



i. 

The sorts are gtad through Lara's wide domain, 
And slavery half forgets her feudal chain ; 
He, their unhoped, but unforgotten lord, 
The long self-exiled chieftain is restored : 
There be bright faces in the busy hall, 
Bowls on the board, and banners on the wall ; 
Far checkering o'er the pictured window, plays 
The unwonted faggots' hospitable blaze; 
And gay retainers gather round the hearth, 
With tongues all loudness, and with eyes all mirth. 
T 28 



II. 

The chief of Lara is return'd again : 
And why had Lara cross'd the bounding main? 
Left by his sire, too young such loss to know, 
Lord tf himself; — that heritage of woe — 
That tearful empire which the human breast 
Hut holds to rob the heart within of rest ! — 
With none to check, and few to point in timo 
The thousand paths that slope the way to crime; 
Then, when he most required commandment, 'hen 
Had Eara's daring boyhood govern'd men. 
It skills not, boots not, step by step to trace 
His youth through all the mazes of ; ts race ; 
Short was the course his restlessness bad run, 
But long enough to leave him half undone. 



178 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



in. 

And Lara left in youth his father-land ; 
But from the hour he waved his parting hand 
Each trace waz'd fainter of his course, till all 
Had nearly censed his memory to recall. 
His sire was dust, his vassals could declare, 
'T was all they knew, that Lara was not there ; 
Nor sent, nor came he, till conjecture grew 
Cold in the many, anxious in the few. 
His hall scarce echoes with his wonted name, 
His portrait darkens in its fading frame, 
Another chief consoled his destined hride, 
The young forgot him, and the old had died : 
" Yet doth he live ?" exclaims the impatient heir, 
And sighs for sahles which he must not wear. 
A hundred 'scutcheons deck with gloomy grace 
The Laras' last and longest dwelling-place; 
But one is ahsent from the mouldering file, 
That now were welcome in that Gothic pile. 

IV. 

He comes at last in sudden loneliness, 

And whence they know not, why they need not guess ; 

They more might marvel, when the greeting's o'er, 

Not that he came, but came not long before: 

No train in his beyond a single page, 

Of foreign aspect, and of lender age. 

Years had roll'd on, and fast they speed away, 

To those that wander as to those that stay : 

But lack of tidings from another clime, 

Had lent a flagging wing to weary time. 

They see, they recognise, yet almost deem 

The present dubious, or the past a dream. 

He lives, nor yet is pass'd his manhood's prime, 
Though sear'd by toil, and something touch'd by time 
His faults, whate'er they were, if scarce forgot, 
Might be untaught him by his varied lot ; 
Nor good nor ill of late we'e known, his name 
Might yet uphold his patrimonial fame : 
His soul in youth was haughty, but his sins 
No more than pleasure from the stripling wins ; 
And such, if not yet harden'd in their course, 
Might be redeem'd, nor ask a long remorse. 



And they indeed were changed — 't is quickly seen 
Whate'er he be, 'twas not what he had been: 
That brow in furrow'd lines had fix'd at last, 
And spake of passions, but of passion past : 
The pride, but not the fire, of early days, 
Coldness of mien, and carelessness of praise; 
A high demeanour, and a glance that took 
Their thoughts from others by a single look ; 
And that sarcastic levity of tongue, 
The stinging of a heart the world hath stung, 
That darts in seeming playfulness around, 
And makes those feel that will not own the wound ; 
All these seem'd his, and something more beneath, 
Than glance could well reveal, or accent breathe. 
Ambition, glory, love, the common aim, 
Thai some can conquer, and that all would claim, 
Within his breast appear'd no more to strive, 
Yet seem'd as lately they had been alive ; 
\nd some deep feeling it were vain to trace 
At moments li«hten'd o'er hw livid face. 



VI. 

Not much he loved long question of the past, 
Nor told of wondrous wilds, and deserts vast, 
In those far lands where he had wander' d lone, 
And — as himself would have it seem — unknown 
Yet these in vain his eve could seafcely scan, 
Nor glean experience from hk fellow -man ; 
But what he had beheld he shunn'd to show, 
As hardly worth a stranger's care to know ; 
If still more prying such inquiry grew, 
His brow fell darker, and his words more few. 

VII. 
Not unrejoiced to sec him once again, 
Warm was his welcome to the haunts of men : 
Born of high lineage, link'd in high command, 
He mingled with the' magnates of his land ; 
Join'd the carousals of the great and gay, 
And saw them smile or sigh their hours away: 
But still he only saw, and did not share 
The common pleasure or the general care ; 
He did not follow what they all pursued 
With hope still baffled, still to be renew'd ; 
Nor shadowy honour, nor substantial gain, 
Nor beauty's preference, and the rival's pain : 
Around him some mysterious circle thrown 
Repell'd approach, and show'd him still alone; 
Upon his eye sat something of reproof, 
That kept at least frivolity aloof; 
Anil things more timid that beheld him near, 
In silence gazed, or whisper'd mutual fear : 
And they the wiser, friendlier few confest 
They dcem'd him better than his air exprest. 

VIII. 

'T was strange — in youth all action and all life, 
Burning for pleasure, not averse from strife ; 
Woman — the field — the ocean — all that gave 
Promise of gladness, peril of a grave, 
In turn he tried — he ransack'd all below, 
And found his recompense in joy or woe, 
No tame, trite medium ; for his feelings sought 
In that intenseness an escape from thought : 
The tempest of his heart in scorn had gazed 
On that the feebler elements hath raised ; 
The rapture of his heart had look'd on high, 
And ask'd if greater dwelt beyond the sky: 
Chain'd to excess, the slave of each extreme, 
How woke he from the wildness of that dream? 
Alas ! he told not — but he del awake 
To curse the wither'd heart that would not break. 

IX. 

Books, for his volume heretofore was Man, 
With eye more curious he appear'd to scan, 
And oft, in sudden mood, for many a day 
From all communion he would start away : 
And then, his rarely-call'd attendants said, 
Through night's long hours would sound his hurried 

tread 
O'er the dark gallery, where his fathers frown'd 
In rude but antique portraiture around: 
They heard, but whisper'd, " tltat must not be know n- 
The sound of words less earthly than his own. 
Yes, they wiio chose might smile, but some had seen 
They scarce knew what, but more than should hav« 

been. 



Why gazed he so upon the ghastly head 

Which hands profane had gsther'd from the dead, 

That still beside his opcn'd volume lay, 

As if to startle all save hint away ? 

Why slept he not when others were at rest? 

Why heard no music, and received no guest ? 

All was not well they decin'd — but where the wrong? 

Some knew perchance — but 't were a tale too long ; 

And such besides were loo discreetly wise, 

To more than hint their knowledge in surmise : 

But if they would — they could" — around the board, 

Thus Lara's vassals prattled of their lord. 

X. 

It was the night — and Lara's glassy stream 

The stars are studding, each with imaged beam: 

So calm, the waters scarcely seem to stray, 

And yet they glide like happiness away ; 

Reflecting far and fairy-like from high 

The immortal lights that live along the sky: 

Its banks are fringed with many a goodly tree, 

And flowers the fairest that may feast the bee ; 

Such in her chaplet infant Dian wove, 

And Innocence would otfer to her love, 

These deck the shore ; the waves their channel make 

In windings bright and mazy like the snake. 

All was so still, so soft in earth and air, 

You scarce would start to meet a spirit there • 

Secure that nought of evil could delight 

To walk in such a scene, on such a night! 

It was a moment only for the good : 

So Lara deem'd, nor longer there he stood, 

But turn'd in silence to his castle-gate ; 

Such scene his soul no more could contemplate : 

Such scene reminded him of other days, 

Of skies more cloudless, moons of purer blaze, 

Of nights more soft and frequent, hearts that now — 

No — no — the storm may beat upon his brow, 

Unfelt — unsparing — but a night like this, 

A night of beauty, mock'd such breast as his. 

XI. 

He turn'd within his solitary hall, 
And his high shadow shot along the wall ; 
There were the painted forms of other times, 
'T was all they left of virtues or of crimes, 
Save vague tradition ; and the gloomy vaults 
That hid their dust, their foibles, and their faults; 
And half a column of the pompous page, 
That speeds the specious tale from age to age ; 
Where history's pen its praise or blame supplies, 
And lies like truth, and still most truly lies. 
He wandering mused, and as the moonbeam shone 
Through the dim lattice o'er the floor of stone, 
And the high fretted roof, and saints, that there 
O'er Gothic windows knelt in pictured prayer, 
Reflected in fantastic figures grew, 
Like life, but not like mortal life, to view ; 
His bristling locks of sable, brow of gloom, 
And the wide waving of his shaken plume, 
Glanced like a spectre's attributes, and gave 
His aspect all that terror gives the grave. 

XII. 

'T was midnight — all was slumber ; the lone light 
Dimni'd in the lamp, as loth to break the night. 



Hark! there lie murmurs heard in Lara's hall — 
A sound — a voice — a shrii k — a fearful call ! 
A long, bud shriek — and silence — did they hear 
That frantic echo burst the sleeping ear? 
They heard and rose, and, tremulously brave, 
Hush where (he sound invoked their aid to save; 
They (some will) halt-lit tapers in their hands, 
And snatch'd in Startled haste unbelted brands. 

XIII. 

Cold as the marble where his length was laid, 

Pale as the beam that o'er his features play'd, 

Was Lara stretched ; his half-drawn sabre near, 

Drupp'd it should seem in more than nature's feat ; 

Vet he was linn, or had been linn till now, 

And still defiance knit his galher'd brow ; 

Though roix'd with terror, senseless as lie lay, 

There lived upon his lip the wish to slay ; 

Some half-fii-ni'd threat in utterance there had die.!, 

Some imprecation of despairing pride ; 

His eye was almost seal'd, but not forsook, 

Even in its trance, the gladiator's look, 

That oft awake his aspect could disclose, 

And now was fix'd in horrible repose. 

They raise him — bear him; hush ! he breathes, he speaks 

The swarthy blush rCColours in his cheeks, 

His lip resumes its red, his eve, though dim, 

Rolls wide and wild, each slowly-quivering limb 

Recalls its function, but Ins words are strung 
In terms that seem not of his native tongue; 
Distinct, but strange, enough they mi Wstaad 
To deem them accents of another lai d; 
And such they were, and meant to meet an ear 
That hears him not — alas ! that cannot hear ! 

XIV. 

His page approach'd, and he alone appear'd 
To know the import of the words they heard ; 
And, by the changes of his cheek and brow, 
They were not such as Lara should avow, 
Nor he interpret, yet with less surprise 
Than those around their chieftain's state he eyes; 
But Lara's prostrate form he bent beside, 
And in that tongue which seem'd his own replied ; 
And Lara heeds those tones that gently seem 
To soothe away the horrors of his dream, 
If dream it were, that thus could overthrow 
A breast that heeded not ideal woe. 

XV. 

Whnte'er his phrensv dream'd or eye behelu, 
If yet remember'd ne'er to be reveaPd, 
Rests at his heart. — The 'eustom'd merfflrig came, 
And breathed new vigour in his shaken frame ; 
And solace sought he none from priest nor leech, 
And, soon the same in movement and in speech, 
As heretofore he SUM the passing hours, 
Nor less he smiles, nor more his forehead lours, 
Than these were wont ; and if the coming night 
Appear'd less welcome now to Lara's sight, 
He to his marvelling vassals show'd it not, 
Whose shuddering proved Jieir fear was less forget. 
In trembling pairs (alone tin y dare not ) craw! 
The astonish'd slaves, and shun the fated hall; 
The waving banner, and the clapping door, 
The rustling tapestry, and the echoing floor 5 



The long dim shadows of surrounding trees, 
The Happing bat, the night-song of the breeze; 
Aught they behold or hear their thought appals, 
As evening saddens o'er the dark gray walls. 

XVI. 

Vain thought ! that hour of ne'er unravell'd gloom 

Came not again, or Lara could assume 

A seeming of forgctfulness, that made 

His vassals more amazed nor less afraid — 

Had memory vanish'd then with sense restor'd ? 

Since word, nor look, nor gesture of their lord 

Betray'd a feeling that recall'd to these 

That fever'd moment of his mind's disease. 

Was it a dream? was his the voice that spoke 

Those strange wild accents ? his the cry that broke 

Their slumber? his the oppress'd o'er-labour'd heart 

That ceased to beat, the look that made them start? 

Could he who thus had suffcr'd so forget, 

When such as saw that suffering shudder yet ? 

Or did that silence prove his memory fix'd 

Too decj) for words, indelible, unmix'd 

In that corroding secrecy which gnaws 

The heart to show the effect, but ur? the cause ? 

Not so in him ; his breast had buried both, 

Nor common gazers could discern the growth 

Of thoughts that mortal lips must leave half-told ; 

They choke the feeble words that would unfold. 

XVII. 

In him inexplicab y mix'd appear'd 

Much to be loved and hated, sought and fear'd ; 

Opinion varying o'er his hidden lot, 

In praise or railing ne'er his name forgot ; 

His silence form'd a theme for others' prate — 

They guess'd — they gazed — they fain would know his fate. 

What had he been ? what was he, thus unknown, 

Who walk'd their world, his lineage only known? 

A hater of his kind ? yet some would say, 

With them he could seem gay amidst the gay ; 

But own'd, that smile, if oft observed and near, 

Waned in its mirth, and wither'd to a sneer ; 

That smile might reach his lip, but pass'd not by, 

None e'er could trace its laughter to his eye: 

Yet there was softness too in his regard, 

At times, a heart as not by nature hard, 

But once perceived, his spirit seem'd to chide 

Such weakness, as unworthy of its pride, 

And steel'd itself, as scorning to redeem 

One doubt from others' half-withheld esteem ; 

In self-inflicted penance of a breast 

Which tenderness might once have wrung from rest ; 

In vigilance of grief that would compel 

That soul to hate for having loved too well. 

XVIII. 

Thue was in him a vital scorn of all : 
As if the worst had fall'n which could befall, 
He stood a stranger in this breathing world, 
An erring spirit from another hurl'd ; 
A thing of dark imaginings, that shaped 
By r.hoice the perils he by chance escaped ; 
But 'scaped in vain, for in their memory yet 
His mind would half exult and half regret : 
With more capacity for love than earth 
Bestows op most of mortal mould and birth, 



His early dreams of good outstripp'd the truth, 
And troubled manhood foUWd baffled youth ; 

With thought of years in phantom chase mispeot, 

And wasted powers lor better purpose lent ; 

And fiery passions that had pour'd their wrath 

In hurried desolation o'er his path, 

And left the better feelings all at strife 

In wild reflection o'er his stormy life; 

But haughty still, and loth himself to blame, 

He call'd on Nature's self to share the shame, 

And charged all faults upon the fleshly form 

She gave to clog the soul, and feast the worm; 

Till he at last confounded good and ill, 

And half mistook for fate the acts of will : 

Too high for common selfishness, he could 

At times resign his own for others' good, 

But not in pity, not because he ought, 

But in some strange perversity of thought, 

That sway'd him onward with a secret pride 

To do what few or none would do beside ; 

And this same impulse would, in tempting time, 

Mislead his spirit equally to crime ; 

So much he soar'd beyond, or sunk beneath 

The men with whom he felt condemn'd to breathe, 

And long'd by good or ill to separate 

Himself from all who shared his mortal state ; 

His mind abhorring this had fix'd her throne 

Far from the world, in regions of her own : 

Thus coldly passing all that pass'd below, 

His blood in temperate seeming now would flow : 

Ah ! happier if it ne'er with guilt had glow 'd, 

But ever in that icy smoothness flow'd ! 

'T is true, with other men their path he walk'd, 

And like the rest in seeming did and talk'd, 

Nor outraged reason's rules by flaw nor start, 

His madness was not of the head, but heart ; 

And rarely wander'd in his speech, or drew 

His thoughts so forth as to offend the view. 

XIX. 

With all that chilling mystery of mien, 
And seeming gladness to remain unseen, 
He had (if 'twere not nature's boon) an art 
Of fixing memory on another's heart : 
It was not love perchance — nor hate — nor aught 
That words can image to express the thought ; 
But they who saw him did not see in vain, 
And once beheld, would ask of him again : 
And those to whom he spake remember'd well, 
And on the words, however light, would dwell : 
None knew, nor how, nor why, but he entwined 
Himself perforce around the hearer's mind ; 
There he was stamp'd in liking, or in hate, 
If greeted once ; however brief the date 
That friendship, pity, or aversion knew, 
Still there within the inmost thought he grew. 
You could not penetrate his soul, but found, 
Despite your wonder, to your own he wound ; 
His presence haunted still ; and from the breast 
He forced an all-unwilling interest : 
Vain was the struggle in that mental net, 
His spirit seem'd to dare you to forget ! 

XX. 

There is a festival, where knights and dames, 
And aught that wealth or lofty lineage claims 



LARA. 



181 



Appear — a high-born and a welcome guest, 
To Otho's hall came Lara with the rest. 
The long carousal shakes the illumined hall, 
Well speeds alike the banquet and the ball ; 
And the gay dance of bounding beauty's train 
Links grace and harmony in happiest chain : 
Blest are the early hearts and gentle hands 
That mingle there in well-according bands ; 
L is a sight the careful brow might smooth, 
And make age smile, and dream itself to youth, 
And youth forget such hour was r ass'd on earth, 
So springs the exulting bosom to that mirth ! 

XXI. 

And Lara gazed en these, sedately glad, 

His brow be'ied him if his soul was sad ; 

And his glance follow'd fast each Muttering fair, 

Whose steps of lightness woke no echo there: 

He lean'd against the lofty pillar nigh, 

Willi foiled arms and long attentive eve, 

Nor mark'd a glance so sternly fix'd on his— 

111 brook'd high Lara scrutiny like this: 

At length he caught it, 't is a face unknown, 

But seems as searching his, and his alone ; 

Prying and dark, a stranger's ^y his mien, 

Who still till now had gazed on him unseen ; 

At length encountering meets the mutual gaze 

Of keen inquiry, and of mute amaze ; 

On Lara's glance emotion gathering grew, 

As if distrusting that the stranger threw ; 

Along the stranger's aspect fix'd and stern, 

Flash'd more than thence the vulgar eye could learn. 

XXII. 
"'Tis he!" the stranger cried, and those that heard 
Re-echoed fast and far the whisper'd word. 
" 'T is he !" — " 'T is who ?" they question far and near, 
Till louder accents rung on Lara's ear ; 
So widely spread, few bosoms well cc-uld brook 
The general marvel, or that single look : 
But Lara stirr'd not, changed not, the surprise 
That sprung at first to his arrested eyes, 
Seem'd now subsided, neither sunk nor raised, 
Glanced his eye round, though still the stranger gazed ; 
And drawing nigh, exclaim'd, with haughty sneer, 
" 'T is he! — how came he thence ? — what doth he here?" 

XXIII. 

It were too much for Lara to pass by 

Such question, so repeated fierce and high ; 

With look collected, but with accent, cold, 

More mildly firm than petulantly bold, 

He turn'd, and met the inquisitorial tone — 

" My name is Lara ! — when thine own is known, 

Doubt not my fitting answer to requite 

The unlook'd-for courtesy of such a knight. 

'T is Lara ! — further wouldst thou mark or ask, 

I shun no question, and I wear no mask." 

" Thou sluin'st no question ! Ponder — is there none 
Thy heart wust answer, though thine ear would shun? 
And deem's^faou me unknown too? Gaze again! 
At least thy memory was not given in vain. 
Oh ! never canst thou cancel half her debt, • 
Eternity forbids thee to forget." 
With slow and searching glance upon his face 
Grew Lara's eyes, but nothing there could trace 
T 2 



They knew, or chose to know — with dubious look 
He deigu'd no answer, hul his head he shook, 
And half-contemptuous turn'd to pass away ; 
But the stern stranger motion'd him to stay. 
" A word ! — I charge thee stay, and answer here 
To one who, wcrl thou noble, were tin- peer, 
But as thou wast and art — nay, frown not, lord, 
If false, 't is easy to disprove the word — 
But, as thou wast and art, on thee looks down, 
Distrusts thy smiles, but shakes not at thy frown. 

Art thou not he ? whose deeds " 

" Whate'er I be, 
Words wild as these, accusers like to thee 
I list no further; those with whom liny weigh 
May hear the rest, nor venture to g 
The wond'rous tale no doubt thy tongue can tell, 
Which thus begins so courteously and well. 
Let Otho cherish here his polish' d guest, 
To him my thanks and thoughts shall be exprest." 
And here their wondering host hath interposed — 
"Whate'er there be between you undisclosed, 
This is no time nor fitting place to mar 
The mirthful meeting with a wordy war. 
If thou, Sir Ezzelin, hast aught to show 
Which it befits Count Lara's ear to know, 
To-morrow, here, or elsewhere, as may best 
Beseem your mutual judgment, speak the rest; 
I pledge myself for thee, as not unknown, 
Though like Count Lara now return'd alone 
From other lands, almost a stranger grown ; 
And if from Lara's blood and gentle birth 
I augur right of courage and of worth, 
He will not that untainted 'ine belie, 
Nor aught that knighthood may accord deny." 
"To-morrow be it," Ezzelin replied, 
" And here our several worth and truth be tried ; 
I gage my life, my falchion to attest 
My words, so may I mingle with the blest !" 
What answers Lara? to its centre shrunk 
His soul, in deep abstraction sudden sunk ; 
The words of many, and the eyes of all 
That there were gather'd, seem'd on him to fall ; 
But his were silent, his appear'd to stray 
In far forgetfulness away — away — 
Alas ! that heedlessness of all around 
Bespoke remembrance only too profound. 

XXIV. 

"To-morrow! — ay, to-morrow!" further word 

Than those repeated none from Lara heard ; 

Upon his brow no outward passion spoke, 

From his large eye no flashing anger broke ; 

Yet there was something fix'd in that low tone, 

Which show'd resolve, determined, though unknown. 

He seized his cloak — his head he slightly bow'd, 

Ami, passing Ezzelin, he lefl the crowd ; 

And, as he paris'd him, smiling ftiel the Jrnwn 

With which that chieftain's brow would bear him down 

It was nor Smile of nur'.h, nor struggling pride, 

That curbs to scorn the wrath it cannot hide ; 

But that of one in his own heart secure 

Of all that lie would do, or could endure. 

Could this mean peace? the calmness of (he good* 

Or guilt grown old in desperate hardihood ? 

Alas ! too like in confidence arc each, 

For man to trust to mortal look or speech . 



I»2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



From deeds, and deeds alone, may be discern 
Truths which it wrings the unpractised heart to learn. 

XXV. 

A nd Lara call'd his page, and went his way — 
Will could that stripling word or sign obey: 
His only follower from those climes afar, 
Where the soul glows beneath a brighter star ; 
For Lara left the shore from whence he sprung, 
In duty patient, and sedate though young ; 
Silent as him he served, his faith appears 
Above his station, and beyond his years. 
Though not unknown the tongue of Lara's land, 
In such from him he rarely heard command ; 
But fleet his step, and clear his tones would come, 
When Lara's lip breathed forth the words of home : 
Those accents, as his native mountains dear, 
Awake their absent echoes in his ear, 
Friends', kindreds', parents', wonted voice recall, 
Now lost, abjured, for one — his friend, his all : 
For him earth now disclosed no other guide ; 
What marvel then he rarely left his side ? 

XXVI. 

Light was his form, and darkly delicate 

That brow whereon his native sun had sate, 

But had not marr'd, though in his beams he grew, 

The cheek where oft the unbidden blush shone through; 

Yet not such blush as mounts when health would show 

All the heart's hue in that delighted glow ; 

But 't was a hectic tint of secret care 

That for a burning moment fever'd there ; 

And the wild sparkle of his eye seem'd caught 

From high, and lighten'd with electric thought, 

Though its black orb those long low lashes fringe, 

Had temper'd with a melancholy tinge; 

Yet less of sorrow than of pride was there, 

Or if 't were grief, a grief that none should share : 

And pleased not him the sports that please his age, 

Tin- tricks of youth, the frolics of the page : 

For hours on Lara he would fix his glance, 

As all-forgotten in that watchful trance ; 

And from his chief withdrawn, he wander'd lone, 

Brief were his answers, and his questions none ; 

His walk the wood, his sport some foreign book ; 

His resting-place the bank that curbs the brook : 

He seem'd, like him he served, to live apart 

From all that lures the eye, and fills the heart ; 

To know no brotherhood, and take from earth 

No gift beyond that bitter boon — our birth. 

XXVII. 

If aught he loved, 't was Lara ; but was shown 

His faith in reverence and in deeds alone ; 

In mute attention ; and his care, which guess'd 

Each wish, fullill'd it ere the tongue exprcss'd. 

Hull there was haughtiness in all he did, 

A r.pint deep that brook'd not to be chid ; 

His zcai, though more than that of servile hands, 

.n act ah.nc obeys, his air commands ; 

As if 't was Lara's less than his desire 

That thus he served, but surely not for hire. 

SVgh' were the tasks enjoin' d him by his lord, 

To hold the stirrup, or to bear the sword ; 

1 o tune his lute, or if he will'd it more, 

Qi> tunics of oilier tim&s and tongues to pore; 



But ne : cr to mingle with the menial train, 

To whom he show'd nor deference nor disdain, 

But that well-worn reserve, which proved he knew 

No sympathy with that familiar crew ; 

His soul, whate'er his station or his stem, 

Could bow to Lara, not descend to them. 

Of higher birth be suem'd, and better days, 

Nor mark of vulgar toil that hand betrays, 

So femininely white it might bespeak 

Another sex, when match'd with that smooth cher^, 

But for his garb, and something in his gaze, 

More wild and high than woman's eye betrays ; 

A latent fierceness that far more became 

His fiery climate than his tender frame : 

True, in his words it broke not from his breast, 

But, from his aspect, might, be more than guess'a 

Kaled his name, though rumour said he bore 

Another, ere he left his mountain-shore ; 

For sometimes he would hear, however nigh, 

That name repeated loud without reply, 

As unfamiliar, or, if roused again, 

Start to the sound, as but remember'd then ; 

Unless 't was Lara's wonted voice that spake, 

For then, ear, eyes, and heart would .all awake. 

XXVIII. 

He had look'd down upon the festive hall, 

And mark'd that sudden strife so mark'd of all ; 

And when the crowd around and near him told 

Their wonder at the calmness of the bold ; 

Their marvel how the high-born Lara bore 

Such insult from a stranger, doubly sore, 

The colour of young Kaled went and came, 

The lip of ashes, and the cheek of flame ; 

And o'er his brow the danip'ning heart-drops 'hrcw 

The sickening iciness of that cold dew, 

That rises as the busy bosom sinks 

With heavy thoughts from which reflection shrinks. 

Yes — there be things that we must dream and dare, 

And execu.'e ere thought be half aware: 

Whate'er might Kaled's be, it was enow 

To seal his lip, but agonize his brow. 

He gazed on Ezzelin till Lara cast 

That sidelong smile upon the knight he past ; 

When Kaled saw that smile, his visage fell, 

As if on something recognised right well ; 

His memory read in such a meaning, more 

Than Lara's aspect unto others wore : 

Forward he sprung — a moment, both were gone, 

And all within that hall seem'd left alone ; 

Each had so fix'd his eye on Lara's mien, 

All had so mix'd their feelings with that scene, 

That when his long dark shadow through the porch 

No more relieves the glare of yon high torch, 

Each pulse beats quicker, and all bosoms seem 

To bound, as doubting from too black a dream, 

Such as we know is false, yet dread in sooth, 

Because the worst is ever nearest truth. 

And they are gone — but Ezzelin is there, 

With thoughtful visage and imperious air : 

But long remain'd not ; ere an hour expired, 

He waved his hand to Otho, and retired. 

XXIX. 

The crowd are gone, the revellers at rest ; 
The courteous host, and all-approving gues* 



LARA. 



183 



Again to that accustom'd couch must creep 

Where joy subsides, and sorrow sighs to sleep, 

And man, o'er-labour'd with his being's strife, 

Shrinks to that sweet forgetfulness of life: 

There lie love's feverish hope and cunning's guile, 

Hate's working brain, and lull'd ambition's wile : 

O'er each vain eye oblivion's pinions wave, 

And quunch'd existence crouches in a grave. 

What better name may slumber's bud become ? 

Night's sepulchre, the universal home, 

Where weakness, strength, vice, virtue, sunk supine, 

Alike in naked helplessness recline; 

Glad for a while to heave unconscious breath, 

Vet wake to wrestle with the dread of death, 

And shun, though day but dawn on ills increast, 

That sleep, the loveliest, since it dreams the least. 



CANTO II. 



r. 

Night wanes — tne vapours round the mountains curl' 

Melt into morn, and light awakes the world. 

Man has another day to swell the past, 

And lead him near to little, but his last ; 

But mighty Nature bounds as from her birth, 

The sun is in the heavens, and life on earth ; 

Flowers in the valley, splendour in the beam, 

Health on the gale, and freshness in the stream. 

Immortal man ! behold her glories shine, 

And cry, exulting inly, " they are thine !" 

Gaze on, while yet thy gladden'd eye mav see ; 

A morrow comes when they are not for thee : 

And grieve what may above thy senseless bier, 

Nor earth nor sky will yield a single tear ; 

Nor cloud shall gather more, nor leaf shall fall, 

Nor gale breathe Orth one sigh for thee, for all ; 

But creeping things shall revel in their spoil, 

And fit thy clay to fertilize the soil. 

II. 
'Tis morn — 'tis noon — assembled in the hall, 
The gather'd chieftains come to Otho's call ; 
'T is now the promised hour, that must proclaim 
The me or death of Lara's future fame ; 
When Ezzelin his charge may here unfold, 
And whatsoe'er the talc, it must be told. 
His faith was pledged, and Lara's promise given, 
To meet it in the eye of man and heaven. 
Why comes he not? Such truths to be divulged, 
Methinks the accuser's rest is long indulged. 

III. 
The hour is past, and Lara too is there, 
With self-confiding, coldly patient air ; 
Why comes not Ezzelin ? The hour is past, 
And murmurs rise, and Otho's brow's o'ercast. 
" I know my friend ! his faith I cannot fear, 
If yet he be on earth, expect him here ; 
The roof that held him in the valley stands 
Between my own and noble Lara's lands ; 
My halls from such a guest had honour gain'd, 
Nor had Sir Ezzelin his host disdain'd, 
Hut that some previous proof forbade him stay, 
And urged him to prepare against to day ; 



The word I pledged for his I pledge again, 

Or will myself redeem his knighthood's stain." 

He ceased — and Lara answer'd, " I am here 

To lend at thy demand a listening ear 

To tales of evil from a stranger's tongue, 

Whose words already might my heart have wrung, 

But that I deem'd him scarcely less than mad, 

Or, at the worst, a foe ignobly bad. 

I know him not — but me it seems he knew 

In lands where — but I must not trifle too : 

Produce this babbler — or redeem the pledge ; 

Here in thy hold, and with thy falchion's edge." 

Proud Otho, on the instant, reddening, threw 

His glove on earth, and forth his sabre flew. 

" The last alternative befits me best, 

And thus I answer for mine absent guest." 

With cheek unchanging from its sallow gloom, 

However near his own or other's tomb ; 

With hand, whose almost careless coolness spoke 

Its grasp well used to deal the sabre-stroke ; 

With eye, though calm, determined not to spare, 

Did Lara too his willing weapon bare. 

In vain the circling chieftains round them closed ; 

For Otho's phrensy would not be opposed ; 

And from his lip those words of insult fell — 

" His sword is good who can maintain them well." 

IV. 

Short was the conflict ; furious, blindly rash, 

Vain Otho gave his bosom to the gash : 

He bled, and fell, but not with deadly wound, 

Stretch'd by a dexterous sleight along the ground. 

" Demand thy life :" He answer'd not : and then 

From that red floor he ne'er had risen again, 

For Lara's brow upon the moment grew 

Almost to blackness in its demon hue ; 

And fiercer shook his angry falchion now 

Than when his foe's was levell'd at his brow , 

Then all was stern collectedness and art, 

Now rose the unleaven'd hatred of his heart ; 

So little sparing to the foe he fell'd, 

That when the approaching crowd his arm withbeio 

He almost turn'd the thirsty point on those 

Who thus for mercy dared to interpose ; 

But to a moment's thought that purpose bent: 

Vet look'd he on him still with eye intent, 

As if he loathed the ineffectual strife 

That left a foe, howe'er o'erthrown, with life : 

As if to search how far the wound he gave 

Had sent its victim onward to his grave. 

V. 

They raised the bleedins Otho, and the leech 
Forbade all present question, sign, and speech , 
The others met within a neighbouring hall, 
And he, incensed and heedless of them all, 
The cause and conqueror in this sudden fray, 
In haughty silence slowly strode aw;iy ; 
He back'd his steed, his homeward path he took, 
Nor cast on Otho's towers a single look. 

VI. 

Rut where was lie? that meteor of a night, 
Who menaced but to disappear with light ? 
Where was this Ezzelin? who cf.nc and went. 
To leave no other trace of his intent. 



181 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



He left the dome of Otho long ere morn, 
In darkness, yet so well the path was worn 
He could not miss it: near his dwelling lay ; 
But there he was not, and with coming day 
Came fast inquiry, which unfolded nought 
Except the absence of the chief it sought. 
A chamber tcnantless, a steed at rest, 
His host alarm'd, his murmuring squires distrcst. 
Their search extends along, around the path, 
In dread to meet the marks of prowlers' wrath : 
But none are there, and not a brake hath borne 
Nor gout of blood, nor shred of mantle torn ; 
Nor fall nor struggle hath defaced the grass, 
Which still retains a mark where murder was ; 
Not dabbling fingers left to tell the tale, 
The bitter print of each convulsive nail, 
When agonized hands, that cease to guard, 
Wound m that pang the smoothness of the sward, 
Some such had been, if here a life was reft, 
But these were not ; and doubting hope is left ; 
And strange suspicion Whispering Lara's name, 
Now daily mutters o'er his blacken'd fame ; 
Then sudden silent when his form appear'd, 
Awaits the absence of the thing it fear'd 
Again its wonted wondering to renew, 
And dye conjecture with a darker hue. 

VII. 
Days roll along, and Otho's wounds are heal'd, 
But not his pride ; and hate no more conceal'd: 
fie was a man of power, and Lara's foe, 
The friend of all who sought to work him woe, 
And from his country's justice now demands 
Account of Ezzelin at Lara's hands. 
Who else than Lara could have cause to fear 
His presence? who had made him disappear, 
If not the man on whom his menaced charge 
Had sate too deeply were he left at large? 
The general rumour ignorantly loud, 
The mystery dearest to the curious crowd ; 
The seeming friendlessness of him who strove 
To \vn no confidence, and wake no love ; 
The sweeping fierceness which his soul betray'd, 
The skill with which he wielded his keen blade; 
When: had his arm unwarlike caught that art? 
Where had that fierceness grown upon his heart? 
For it was not the blind capricious rage 
A word can kindle and a word assuage ; 
But the deep working of a soul unmix'd 
With aught of pity where its wrath had fix'd ; 
Such as long power and overgorged success 
Concentrates into all that 's merciless : 
These, link'd with that desire which ever sways 
Mankind, the rather to condemn than praise, 
'Gainst Lara gatheiing raised at length a storm, 
Such as himself might fear, and foes would form, 
And he must answer for the absent head 
Of one that haunts him still, alive or dead. 

VIII. 
Within that land was many a malcontent, 
Who cursed the tyranny to which he bent , 
That soil full many a wringing despot saw, 
Who work'-! bis wantonness in form of law; 
Long war tvithou. and frequent broil within 
Had made a path for blood and giant sin, 
That wai'ed but a signal to begin 



New havoc, such as civil discord blends, 

Which knows no neuter, owns but toes or friends; 

Fix'd in bis feudal fortress each was lord, 

In word and deed obey'd, in soul abhorr'd. 

Thus Lara had inherited his lands, 

And with them pining hearts and sluggish hands; 

But that long absence from his native chine 

Had left him stainless of oppression's crime, 

And now diverted by his milder suav, 

All dread by slow degrees had worn away ; 

The menials felt their usual awe alone, 

But more for him than them that fear was grown , 

They dcem'd him now unhappy, though at first 

Their evil judgment augur'd of the worst, 

And each long restless night, and silent mo^/d, 

Was traced to sickness, fed by solitude : 

And though his lonely habits threw of late 

Gloom o'er his chamber, cheerful was bis gate ; 

From thence the wretched ne'er unsoothed withdrew, 

For them, at least, his soul compassion knew. 

Cold to the great, contemptuous to the high, 

The humble pass'd not his unheeding eye ; 

Much he would speak not, but beneath his roof 

They found asylum oft, and ne'er reproof. 

And they who watched might mark that day by day, 

Some new retainers gather'd to his sway ; 

But most of late, since Ezzelin was lost, 

He play'd the courteous lord and bounteous host: 

Perchance his strife with Otho made him dread 

Some snare prepared for his obnoxious head. 

Whate'cr his view, his favour more obtains 

With these, the people, than his fellow thanes. 

If this were policy, so far 'twas sound, 

The million judged but of him as they found ; 

From him, by sterner chiefs to exile driven, 

They but required a shelter, and 't was given. 

By him no peasant mourn'd his rifled cot, 

Arid scarce the serf could murmur t. •» bis lot ; 

With him old Avarice found Us hoar.! secure, 

With him contempt forbore to mock the poor ; 

Youth, present cheer, and promised recompense 

Detained, till all too late to part from thence : 

To hate he orfer'd, with the coming change, 

The deep reversion of delay'd revenge ; 

To love, long baffled by the unequal match, 

The well-won charms success was sure to snatch. 

All now was ripe, he waits but to proclaim 

That slavery nothing which was stul a name. 

The moment came, the hour when Otho thought 

Secure at last the vengeance which he sought : 

His summons found the destined criminal 

Begirt by thousands in his swarming hall, 

Fresh from their feudal fetters newly riven, 

Defying earth, and confident of heaven. 

That morning he had freed the soil-bound slaves, 

Who dig no land for tyrants but their graves ! 

Such is their cry — some watch-word for the fight 

Must vindicate the wrong, and warp the right : 

Religion — freedom — vengeance — what you will, 

A word 's enough to raise mankind to kill: 

Some factious phrase by cunning caught and spread, 

That guilt may reign, and wolves and worms be fed ! 

IX. 

Throughout that clime the feudal chiefs had gain'd 
Such sway, their infant monarch hardly reign'd; 



j, aha. 



105 



Now was the hour for faction's rebel growth, 
The serfs contemn' d the one, and hated both: 
They waited but a leader, and they found 
One to their cause inseparably bound ; 
By circumstance compcll'd to plunge again, 
In sell-defence, amidst the strife of men. 
Cut off by some mysterious fate from those 
Whom birth and nature meant not for his foes, 
Had Lara from that night, to him accurst, 
Prepared to meet, but not alone, the worst: 
Some reason urged, whate'er it was, to shun 
Inquiry into deeds at distance done ; 
By mingling with his own the cause of all, 
E'en if he fail'd, he still delay'd his fall. 
The sullen calm that long his bosom kept, 
The storm that once had spent itself and slept, 
Roused by events that seeni'd foredoom'd to urge 
His gloomy fortunes to their utmost verge, 
Burst forth, and made him all he once had been, 
And is again ; he only changed the scene. 
Light care had he lor life, and less for fame, 
But not less fitted for the desperate game : 
He deem'd himself mark'd out for others' hate, 
And mock'd at ruin so they shared his fate. 
What cared he for the freedom of the crowd ? 
He raised the humble but to bend the proud. 
He had hoped quiet in his sullen lair, 
But man and destiny beset him there ; 
Inured to hunters, he was found at bay, 
Ani* 'hey must kill, they cannot snare the prey, 
aiern, unambitious, silent, he had been 
Henceforth a calm spectator of life's scene ; 
But, dragged again upon the arena, stood, 
A. leader not unequal to the feud ; 
In voice — mien — gesture — savage nature spoke, 
And from his eye the gladiator broke. 

X. 

What boots the oft-repeated tale of strife, 

The feast of vultures, and the waste of life? 

The varying fortune of each separate field, 

The fierce that vanquish and the faint that yield ? 

The smoking ruin, and the crumbled wall? 

In this the struggle was the same with all ; 

Save that distemper'd passions lent their force 

In bitterness that banish'd all remorse. 

None sued, for Mercy knew her cry was vain, 

The captive died upon the battle-plain : 

In either cause, one rage alone possest 

The empire of the alternate victor's breast ; 

And they tnat smote for freedom or for sway, 

Deem'd few were slain, while more remain'd to slay. 

It was too late to check the wasting brand, 

And desolation reap'd the famish'd land ; 

The torch was lighted, and the flame was spread, 

And carnage smiled upon her daily dead. 

XI. 

Fresh with the n€ rve the new-born impulse strun", 
The first success to Lara's numbers clung : 
But that vain victory hath ruin'd all, 
They form no longer to their leader's call; 
In blind confusion on the foe they press, 
And think to snatch is to secure success. 
The lust of booty, and the thirst of hate. 
Lure on the broken brigands to their fate ; 
29 



In vain he doth whate'er a chief may do, 
To check the h< adlong fury of that erew; 

In vain their stubborn ardour he would tame, — 
The hand that kindles cannst quench the flame ; 
The wary foe alone hath turn'd their mood, 
And shown their rashness to their erring brood: 
The feign'd retreat, the nightly ambuscade, 
Tli.' daily harass, and the fight delay'd, 
The long privation ol the hoped supply, 
'I'll, tentless rest beneath the humid sky, 
The stubborn wall that mocks the leaguer's art, 
And palls the patience of his battled heart, 
Of these they had not deem'd : the battle-day 
They could encounter as a veteran may 
But more preferr'd the fury of the u'rife. 
And present death to hourly suffering life 
And famine wrings, and fever sweeps away 
His numbers melting fast from their array ; 
Intemperate triumph fades to discontent, 
And Lara's soul alone seems still unbent : 
But few remain to aid his voice and hand, 
And thousands dwindled to a scanty band : 
Desperate, though few, the last and best remain'd 
To mourn the discipline they late disdain'd. 
One hope survives, the frontier is not far, 
And thence they may escape from native war; 
And bear within thein to the neighbouring state 
An exile's sorrows, or an outlaw's hate : 
Hard is the task their father-land to quit, 
But harder still to perish or submit. 

XII 

It is resolved — they march — consenting Night 
Guides with her star their dim and torehless flight 
Already they perceive its tranquil beam 
Sleep on the surface of the barrier stream ; 
Already tliey uescry — Is yon the bank? 
Away! 'I is lined with many a hostile rank. 
Return or fly ! — What glitters in the rear? 
'Tis Otho's banner — the pursuer's spear! 
Are those the shepherds' fires upon the height? 
Alas ! they blaze too widely for the flight : 
Cut off from hope, and conipass'd in the toil, 
Less blood perchance hath bought a richer spoil 

xm. 

A moment's pause, 't is but to breathe their band, 
Or shall they onward press, or here withstand ? 
It matters little — if they charge the foes 
Who by the border-stream their march oppose, 
Some few, perchance, may break and pass the lin« 
However link'd to bailie such design. 
" The charge he ours ! to wait for their assaun 
Were fate well worthy of a coward's hMt." 
Forth flies each sabre, rein'd is every steed, 
And the next word -hall scarce outstrip the deed - 
In the next tone of Lara's gathering breath 
How many shall but hear the voice of death ! 

XIV 

His blade is bared, in him there is nn air 
As deep, but far too tranquil for despaii , 
A something of indifference more than then 
Becomes the bravest, if they feel for men — 
He turn'd his eye on Kaled, ever near, 
And still too faithful to betray one fear ; 



IG6 



UYRONS WORKS. 



Perchance 't was but the moon's dim twilight threw 

Along his aspect an unwonted hue 

Of mournful paleness, whose deep tint exprest 

The truth, and not the terror of his breast. 

This Lara mark'd, and laid his hand on his : 

It trembled not in such an hour as this ; 

His lip was silent, scarcely beat his heart, 

His eye alone proclaini'd, "We will not part! 

Thy band may perish, or thy friends may flee, 

Farewell to life, but not adieu to thee !" 

The word hath pass'd his lips, and onward driven, 

Pours the link'd band through ranks asunder riven ; 

Well has each steed obey'd the armed heel, 

And flash the scimitars, and rings the steel : 

Outnumber'd, not outbraved, they still oppose 

Despair to daring, and a front to foes ; 

And blood is mingled with the dashing stream, 

Which runs all redly till the morning beam. 

XV. 

Commanding, aiding, animating all, 
Where foe appear'd to press, or friend to fall, 
Cheers Lara's vo.ee, and waves or strikes his steel, 
Inspiring hope, himself had ceased to feel. 
None fled, for well they knew that flight were vain; 
But those that waver turn to smite again, 
While yet they find the firmest of the foe 
Recoil before their leader's look and blow : 
Now girt with numbers, now almost alone, 
He foils their ranks, or reunites his own ; 
Himself he spared not — once they seem'd to fly- 
Now was the time, he waved his hand on high, 
And shook — why sudden droops that plumed crest? 
The shaft is sped — the arrow's in his breast! 
That fatal gesture left the unguarded side, 
And Death hath stricken down yon arm of pride. 
The word of triumph fainted from his tongue ; 
That hand, so raised, how droopingly it hung! 
But yet the sword instinctively retains, 
Though from its fellow shrink the falling reins : 
These Kaled snatches: dizzy with the blow, 
And senseless bending o'er his saddle-bow, 
Perceives not Lara that his anxious page 
Beguiles his charger from the combat's rage : 
Meantime his followers charge, and charge again ; 
Too mix'd the slayers now to heed the slain ! 

XVI. 

Day glimmers on the dying and the dead, 
The cloven cuirass, and the helmless head ; 
Tho war-horse masterless is on the earth, 
And that last gasp hath burst his bloody girth ; 
And near, yet quivering with what life remain'd, 
The heel that urged him and the hand that rein'd ; 
And some too near that rolling torrent lie, 
Whose waters mock the lip of those that die ; 
That panting thirst which scorches in the breath 
Of those that die the soldier's fiery death, 
»n vain impels the burning mouth to crave 
One drop — the last — to cool it for the grave ; 
With feeble and convulsive efTort swept, 
Their limbs along the crimson'd turf have crept ; 
The faint remains of life such struggles waste, 
But yet they reach the stream, and bend to taste: 
They feel its freshness, and almost partake — 
Why tiaus«>7 No further thirst have they to slake — 



It is unquench'd, and yet they feel it not ; 
It was ar. agony — but now forgot ! 

XVII. 

Beneath a lime, remoter from the scene, 

Where but for him that strife bad never been, 

A breathing but devoted warrior lay : 

'T was Lara, bleeding fist from life away. 

His follower once, and now his only guide, 

Kneels Kaled, watchful o'er his welling side, 

And with his scarf would staunch the tides that rush. 

With each convulsion, in a blacker gush ; 

And then, as his faint breathing waxes low, 

In feebler, not less fatal tricklings flow: 

He scarce can speak, but motions him 't is vain, 

And merely adds another throb to pain. 

He clasps t!ie hand that pang which would assuage, 

And sadly smiles his thanks to that dark page, 

VJ ho nothing fears, nor feels, nor heeds, nor sees, 

Save that damp brow which rests upon bis knees; 

Save that pale aspect, where the eye, though dun, 

Held all the light that shone on earth for him. 

XVIII. 

The foe arrives, who long had search'd the field, 
Their triumph nought till Lara too should yield ; 
They would remove him, but they see 't were vain, 
And he. regards them with a calm disdain, 
That rose to reconcile him with his fate, 
And that escape to death from living bate : 
And Otho comes, and, leaping from his steed, 
Looks on the Weeding foe that made him bleed, 
And questions of his state ; he answers not, 
Scarce glances on him as on one forgot, 
And turns to Kaled: — each remaining word, 
They understood not, if distinctly heard ; 
His dying tones .are in that other tongue, 
To which some strange remembrance wildly clung. 
Thev spake of other scenes, but what — is known 
To Kaled. whom their meaning reach'd alone ; 
And he replied, though faintly, to their sound, 
While gazed the rest in dumb amazement round : 
They seem'd even then — that twain — unto the last 
To half forget the present in the past ; 
To share between themselves some separate fate, 
Whose darkness none b':side should penetrate. 

XIX. 

Their words, though faint, were many — from the tone 

Their import those who heard could judge alone ; 

From this, you might have deem'd young Kaled's deatn 

More near than Lara's by his voice and breath, 

So sad, so deep and hesitating, broke 

The accents his scarce-moving pale lips spoke ; 

But Lara's voice though low, at first was clear 

And calm, till murmuring death gasp'd hoarsely near, 

But from his visage little could we guess, 

So unrepentant, dark, and passionless, 

Save that, when struggling nearer to his last, 

Upon that page his eye was kindly cast ; 

And once as Kaled's answering accents ceast, 

Rose Lara's h md, and pointed to the East: 

Whether (as then the breaking sun from high 

Roli'd back the clouds) the morrow caught his eye, 

Or that 't was chance, or some remember'd scene 

That raised his arm to point where such had b«en. 



Scarce Kaled seem'd to know, but turn'd away 

As if his heart abhorr'd that coming day. 

And shrunk his glance before that morning light, 

To look on Lara's brow — where all grew night. 

Yet sense seern'd left, though better were its loss ; 

For when one near display'd the absolving cross, 

And proffer'd to his touch the holy bead, 

Of which his parting soul might own the need, 

He look'd upon it with an eye profane, 

And smiled — Heaven pardon! if 'twere with disdain : 

And Kaled, though he spoke not, nor withdrew 

From Lara's face his fix'd despairing view, 

With brow repulsive, and with gesture swift, 

Flung back the hand which held the sacred gift, 

As if such but disturb'd the expiring man, 

Nor seem'd to know his life but then began, 

That life of immortality, secure 

To none, save them whose faith in Christ is sure. 

XX. 

But gasping heaved the breath that Lara drew, 
And dull the film along his dim eye grew ; 
His limbs stretch'd fluttering, and his head droop'd o'er 
The weak, yet still untiring knee that bore ; 
He press'd the hand he held upon his heart — 
It beats no more, but Kaled will not part 
With the cold grasp, but feels, and feels in vain 
For that faint throb which answers not again. 
" It beats !" Away, thou dreamer ! — he is gone- 
It once was Lara which thou look'st upon. 

XXI. 

He gazed, as if not yet had pass'd away 

The haughty spirit of that humble clay ; 

And those around have roused him from his trance, 

But cannot tear from thence his fixed glance ; 

And when, in raising him from where he bore 

Within his arms the form that felt no more, 

He saw the head his breast would still sustain, 

Roll down like earth to earth upon the plain ; 

He did not dash himself thereby, nor tear 

The glossy tendrils of his raven hair, 

But strove to stand and gaze, but reel'd and fell, 

Scarce breathing more than that he loved so well. 

Than that he loved ! Oh ! never yet beneath 

The breast of man such trusty love may breathe ! 

That trying moment hath at once reveal'd 

The secret long and yet but half conceal'd ; 

In baring to revive that lifeless breast, 

Its grief seem'd ended, but the sex confess'd ; 

And life return'd, and Kaled felt no shame — 

What now to her was Womanhood or Fame ! 

XXII. 

And Lara sleeps not where his fathers sleep ; 

But where he died his grave was dug as deep, 

Nor is his mortal slumber less profound, 

Though priest nor bless'd, nor marble deck'd the mound; 

And he was mourn'd by one whose quiet grief, 

Less loud, outlasts a people's for their chief. 

Vain was all question ask'd her of the past, 

And vain even menace — silont to the last, 

She told nor whence, nor why she left behind 

Her all for one who seem'd but little kind. 

Wny did she love him ? Curious fool ! — be still — 

Is numan love the growth ol human will 1 



To her he might be gentleness ; the stern 
Have deeper thoughts than your dull eyes discern, 
And when they love, your smilers guess not how 
Beats the strong heart, though less the lips avow. 
They were not common links, that forni'd the chaii 
That bound to Lara Kaled's heart and brain , 
But that wild tale she brook'd not to unfold, 
And seal'd is now each lip that could have told. 

XXIII. 
They laid him in the earth, and on his breast, 
Besides the wound that sent his soul to rest, 
They found the scatter'd dints of many a scar, 
Which were not planted there in recent war ; 
Where'er had pass'd his summer years of life, 
It seems they vanish'd in a land of strife ; 
But all unknown his glory or his guilt, 
These only told that somewhere blood was spilt, 
And Ezzelin, who might have spoke the past, 
Return'd no more — that night appcar'd his last. 

XXIV. 

Upon that night (a peasant's is the tale), 

A serf that cross'd the intervening vale, 

When Cynthia's light almost gave way to morn, 

And nearly veil'd in mist her waning horn ; 

A serf, that rose betimes to thread the wood, 

And hew the bough that bought his children's food, 

Pass'd by the river that divides the plain 

Of Otho's lands and Lara's broad domain : 

He heard a tramp — a horse and horseman broke 

From out the wood — before him was a cloak 

Wrapt round some burthen at his saddle-bow, 

Bent was his head, and hidden was his brow. 

Roused by the sudden sight at such a time, 

And some foreboding that it might be crime, 

Himself unheeded watch'd the stranger's course, 

Who reach'd the river, bounded from his horse, 

And, lifting thence the burthen which he bore, 

Heaved up the bank, and dash'd it from the shore, 

Then paused, and look'd, and turn'd, and seem'd u 

watch, 
And still another hurried glance would snatch, 
And follow with his step the stream that flow'd, 
As if even yet too much its surface show'd : 
At once he started, stoop'd, around him strown 
The winter floods had scatter'd heaps of stone ; 
Of these the heaviest thence he gather'd there, 
And slung them with a more than common care. 
Meantime the serf had crept to where unseen 
Himself might safely mark what this might mean , 
He caught a glimpse, as of a floating breast, 
And something grttter'd star-like on the vest, 
But ere he well could mark the buoyant trunk, 
A massy fragment .smote it, and it sunk : 
It rose again but indistinct to view, 
And left the waters of a purple hue, 
Then deeply disappear'd : .he horseman gazed 
Till ebb'd the latest eddy it had raised ; 
Then turning, vaulted on his pawing stead, 
And insUint spurr'd him into panting speed. 
His face was mask'd — the features of the dead, 
If dead it were, escaped the observer's dread \ 
But if in sooth a star its bosom bore, 
Such is the badge that knighthood ever wore, 
And such 't is known Sir Ezzelin had worn 
Upon the night that led to such c morn. 



183 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



If thus lie periah'd, Heaven receive his soul ! 
IIis undjscover'd limbs to ocean roll: 
And charity upon the hope would dwell 
It was not Lara's hand by which he fell. 

XXV. 
And Kalcd — Lara — Ezzeiin, are gone, 
Alike without their monumental stone! 
The first, all efforts vainly strove to wean 
From lingering where her chieftain's blood had been ; 
Grief had so tamed a spirit once too proud, 
Her tears were few, her wailing never loud ; 
12 ut furious would you tear her from the spot 
Where yet she scarce believed that he was not, 
Her eye shot forth with all the living fire 
That haunts the tigress in her whelpless ire : 
ISut, left to waste her weary moments there, 
She talk'd all idly unto shapes of air, 
Such as the busy brain of sorrow paints, 
And woos to listen to her fond complaints : 
And she would sit beneath the very tree 
Where lay his drooping head upon her knee ; 
And in that posture where she saw him fall, 
His words, his looks, his dying grasp recall; 
And she had shorn, but saved her raven hair, 
And oft would snatch it from her bosom there, 
And fold, and press it gently to the ground, 
As if she staunch'd anew some phantom's wound. 
Herself would question, and for him reply ; 
Then rising, start, and beckon hitn to ffy 
From some imagined spectre in pursuit ; 
Then seat her down upon some linden's root, 
And hide her visage with her meagre hand, 
Or trace strange characters along the sand — 
This could not last — she lies by him she loved ; 
Her tale untold — her truth too dearly proved. 



NOTE. 



The event in section 24, Canto II, was suggested by 
*he description of the death, or rather burial, of the 
Duke of Gandia. 

The most interesting and particular account of this 
mysterious event, is given by Burchard ; and is in sub- 
stance as follows : " On the eighth day of June, the 
cardinal of Valenza, and the Duke of Gandia, sons of 
the Pope, supped with their mother, Vanozza, near the 
church of «S. Pietro ad vinculo.; several other persons 
being present at the entertainment. A late hour ap- 
proaching, and the cardinal having reminded his brother, 
that it was time to return to the apostolic palace, thej- 
mounted their horses or mules, with only a few attend- 
ants, and proceeded together as far as the palace of 
cardinal Ascanio Sforza, when the duke informed the 
cardinal, that before he returned home, he had to pay 
a visit of pleasure. Dismissing, therefore, all his at- 
tendants, excepting his slqffir.ro, or footman, and a 
nerson in a mask, who had paid him a visit whilst at 
supper, and who, during the space of a month, or there- 
abouts, previous to this time, had called upon him 
almost daily, at the apostolic palace ; he took this per- 
son behind him on his mule, and proceeded to the 
street of the Jews, where he quitted his servant, direct- 
ing hni to remain there until a certain hour ; when, 
» be did not return, lie might repair to the palace. 



The duke then Beated the person in the mask behind 
him, and rode, I know not whither ; but in that night 
he was assassinated, and thrown into the river. Tho 
servant, after having been dismissed, was also assaulted 
and mortally wounded ; and although he was attended 
With great care, yet such was his situation, that he 
could give no intelligible account of what had befallen 
his master. In the morning, the duke not having r<- 
turned lo the palace, his servants began to be alarmed ; 
and one of them informed the pontilf of the evening 
excursion of his sons, and that the duke had not yi i 
made his appearance. This gave the l'ope no small 
anxiety; but he conjectured that 'he duke had been 
attracted by some courtesan to pass the night with 
hrr, and, not choosing to quit the house in open day, 
had waited till the following evening to return home. 
When, however, the evening arrived, and he found 
himself disappointed in his expectations, he became 
deeply afflicted, and began to make inquiries from 
different persons, whom he ordered to attend him for 
that purpose. Amongst these was a man named Gior- 
gio Schiavoni, who, having discharged some timber 
from a bark in the river, had remained on board the 
vessel, to watch it, and being interrogated whether be 
had seen any one thrown into the river, on the night 
preceding, he replied, that lie saw two men on foot, 
who came down the street, and looked diligently about, 
to observe whether any person was passing. That see- 
ing no one, they returned, and a short time afterwards 
two others came, and looked around in the same 
manner as the former ; no person still appearing, they 
gave a sign to their companions, when a man came, 
mounted on a white horse, having behind him a dead 
body, the head and arms of which hung on one side, 
and the feet on the other side of the horse ; the two 
persons on foot supporting the body, to prevent its 
falling. They thus proceeded towards that part, where 
the filth of the city is usually discharged into the river, 
and, turning the horse with his tail towards the water, 
the two persons took the dead body by the arms and 
feet, and with all their strength flung it into the river. 
The person on horseback then asked if they had thrown 
it in, to which they replied, Signor, si, (yes, Sir). He 
then looked towards the river, and seeing a mantle 
floating on the stream, he inquired what it was that 
appeared black ; to which they answered, it was a 
mantle; and one of them threw stones upon it, in 
consequence of which it sunk. The attendants of the 
pontiff' then inquired from Giorgio, why he had not 
revealed this to the governor of the city; to which he 
replied, that he had seen in his time a hundred dead 
bodies thrown into the river at the same place, without 
any inquiry being made respecting them, and that he 
had not, therefore, considered it as a matter of any 
importance'. The fishermen and seamen were then 
collected, and ordered to search the river ; where, on 
the following evening, they found the body of the 
duke, with his habit entire, and thirty ducats in his 
purse. He was pierced with nine wounds, one of 
which was in his throat, the others in his head, body, 
and limbs. No sooner was the pontiff informed of 
the death of his son, and that he had been thrown, 
like filth, into the river, than, giving way to his gnei, 
he shut himself up in a chamber, and wept bitterly. 
The cardinal of Segovia, and other attendants on the 



THE CURSE OF MLXERYA. 



189 



Pope went to the door, and after many hours spent in 
persuasions and exhortations, prevailed upon him to 
admit them. From the evening of Wednesday, till the 
follow ing Saturday, the Pope took no food ; nor did he 
sleep from Thursday morning till the same hour on the 



ensuing day. At length, however, giving way to the 
entreaties of his attendants, he began to restrain his 
sorrow, and to consider the injury which his own 
health might sustain, by the further indulgence of his 
grief." — Roscoe's Leo Tenth, vol. i. page 265. 



2Tlic Qxixnt ot 3fg£tucrtoi. 

A POEM. 



Pallas te hoc vulnere, Piillaa 

Immolat, et p<pnam sculerato ex sanguine suinit. 



Slow sinks, more lovely ere his race be run, 

Along Morea's hills the setting sun ; 

Not, as in northern climes, obscurely bright, 

But one unclouded blaze of living light ! 

O'er the hush'd deep the yellow beam he throws, 

Gilds the green wave, that trembles as it glows. 

On old JEgina's rock, and Idra's isle, 

The god of gladness sheds his parting smile ; 

O'er his own regions lingering loves to shine, 

Though there his altars are no more divine. 

Descending fast the mountain shadows kiss 

Thy glorious gulf, unconquer'd Salamis ! 

Their azure arches through the long expanse, 

More deeply purpled, met his mellowing glance, 

And tenderest tints, along their summits driven, 

Mark his gay course and own the hues of heaven; 

Till, darkly shaded from the land and deep, 

Behind his Delphian cliff he sinks to sleep. 

On such an eve, his palest beam he cast, 
When, Athens ! here thy wisest look'd his last. 
How watch'd thy better sons his farewell rav, 
That closed their murder'd sage's latest day! 1 
Not yet — not yet — Sol pauses on the hill — 
The precious hour of parting lingers still ; 
But sad his light to agonizing eyes, 
And dark the mountain's once delightful dyes ; 
Gloom o'er the lovely land he seem'd to pour, 
The land where Phoebus never frown'd before ; 
But ere he sunk below Cithieron's head, 
Thf cup of woe was quaff'd — the spirit fled ; 
The so il of him that scorn'd to fear or fly — 
Who hved and died as none can live or die ! 

But, lo! from high Hymettus to the plain, 
The queen of night asserts her silent reign. 2 
No murky vapour, herald of the storm, 
Hides her fair face, nor girds her glowing form ; 
With cornice glimmsring as the moon-beams play, 
There the white column greets her grateful ray, 
And bright around, with quivering beams beset, 
Her emblem sparkles o'er the minaret : 
The groves of olive seatter'd dark ar.d wide 
Where meek Ccphisus sheds his scanty tide, 
The cypress saddening by the sacred mosque, 
The gleaming turret of the gay Kiosk, 3 
And, dun and sombre 'mid the hol\ calm, 
Near Theseus' fane yon solitary palm, 
All tinged with varied hues, arrest the eye — 
And dull were his that pass'd them heedless bv. 

u 



Again the ^2gean, heard no more afar, 
Lulls his chafed breast from elemental war ; 
Again his waves in milder tints unfold 
Their long array of sapphire and of gold, 
Mix'd with the shades of many a distant isle, 
That frown — where gentler ocean seems to smile. 

As thus within the walls of Pallas' fane 
I mark'd the beauties of the land and main, 
Alone and friendless, on the magic shore 
Whose arts and arms but live in poet's lore, 
Oft as the matchless dome I turn'd to scan, 
Sacred to gods, but not secure from man, 
The past return'd, the present seem'd to cease, 
And glory knew no clime beyond her Greece. 
Hours roll'd along, and Dian's orb on high 
Had gain'd the centre of her softest sky, 
And yet unwearied still my footsteps trod 
O'er the vain shrine of many a vanish'd god ; 
But chicflv, Pallas! thine, when Hecate's glare, 
Chcck'd by thy columns, fell more sadly fair 
O'er the chill marble, where the startling tread 
Thrills the lone heart like echoes from the dead. 
Long had I mused, and measured every trace ■ 
The wreck of Greece recorded of her race, 
When, lo! a giant form before me strode, 
And Pallas hail'd me in her own abode. 
Yes, 'twas Minerva's self, but, ah! how changed 
Since o'er the Dardan field in anus she ranged ' 
Not such as erst, by her divine command, 
Her form appcar'd from Phidias' plaslic hand; 
Gone were the terrors of her awful brow, 
Her idle -tfigis bore no gorgon now ; 
Her helm was deep indented, and her lance 
Seem'd weak and shaftlesd, e'en to mortal glance; 
The olive branch, which still she deign'd to clasp. 
Shrunk from her touch and wither'd in her grasp: 
And, ah ! though still the brightest of the sky, 
Celestial tears bedimm'd her large blue eye : 
Round the rent casque her owlet circled slow, 
And mourn'il his mistress with a shriek of woe 
" Mortal! ('twas thus she spake) that blush of shain* 
Proclaims thee Briton — once a noble name — 
First of the mighty, foremost of the free, 
Now hononr'd /(•«.< by all — and least by me : 
Chief of thy foes shall Pallas still be found : — 
Seek'st thou the cause? O mortal, look arounu! 
Lo ! here, despite of war and wasting fiie, 
I saw successive tyrannies expire; 



190 



BYRON'S WORRS. 



'Scaped from the ravage of the Turk and Goth, 

Thy country sends a spoiler worse than boti. ! 

Survey this vacant violated fane : 

Recount the relics torn that yet remain ; 

Tiiese Cecrops placed — this Pericles adorn'd 4 — 

'That Hadrian rear'd when drooping science mourn'd: 

What more I owe let gratitude attest — 

Know, Alaric and Elgin did the rest. 

That all may learn from whence the plunder came, 

The insulted wall sustains his hated name.' 

For Elgin's fame thus grateful Pallas pleads : 

Below, his name — above, behold his deeds ! 

Be ever hail'd with equal honour here 

The Gothic monarch and the Pictish peer. 

Arms gave the first his right — the last had none, 

But basely stole what less barbarians won ! 

So when the lion quits his fell repast, 

Next prowls the wolf — the filthy jackal last: 

Flesh, limbs, and blood, the former make their own ; 

The last base brute securely gnaws the bone. 

Yet still the gods are just, and crimes are crost— 

See here what Elgin won, and what he lost ! 

Another name with his pollutes my shrine, 

Behold where Dian's beams disdain to shine! 

Some retribution still might Pallas claim, 

When Venus half avenged Minerva's shame." 6 

She ceased awhile, and thus I dared reply, 
To soothe the vengeance kindling in her eye : — 
" Daughter of Jove ! in Britain's injured name, 
A true-born Briton may the deed disclaim! 
Frown not on England — England owns him not — 
Athena, no ! the plunderer was a Scot !' 
Ask thou the difference '/ From fair Phyle's towers 
Survey Bceotia — Caledonia's ours. 
And well I know within that bastard land 8 
Hath wisdom's goddess never held command: 
A barren soil, where nature's germs, confined, 
To stern sterility can stint the mind ; 
VVhose thistle well betravs the niggard earth, 
Emblem of all to whom the land gives birth. 
Each genial influence nurtured to resist, 
A land of meanness, sophistry, and mist : 
Each breeze from foggy mount and marshy plain 
Dilutes with drivel every drizzling brain, 
Till, burst at length, each watery head o'erflows, 
Foul as their soil, and frigid as their snows : 
Ten thousand schemes of petulance and pride 
Despatch her scheming children far and wide ; 
Some east, some west, some every where but north! 
In quest of lawless gain they issue forth ; 
And thus, accursed be the day and year, 
She sent a Pict to play the felon here. 
Yet, Caledonia claims some native worth, 
As dull Bceotia gave a Pindar birth — 
So may her few, the letter'd and the brave, 
Bound to no clime, and victors o'er the grave, 
Shake off the sordid dust of such a land, 
And shine like children of a happier strand: 
As once of yore, in some obnoxious place, 
Ten names (if found) had saved a wretched race!" 

" Mortal," the blue-eyed maid resumed, " once more, 
Bopr back my mandate to thy native shore ; 
Though fallen, alas ! this vengeance still is mine, 
To turn my councils <ar from lands like thine. 



Hear then in silence Pallas' stern behest ; 

Hear and believe, for time shall tell the rest. 

First on the head of him who did the deed 

My curse shall light,— on him and all his seed : 

Without one spark of intellectual fire, 

Be all the sons as senseless as the sire : 

If one with wit the parent brood disgrace, 

Believe him bastard of a brighter race ; 

Still with his hireling artists let him prate, 

And folly's praise repay for wisdom's hate ! 

Long of their patron's gusto let them tell, 

Whose noblest native gusto — is to sell : 

To sell, and make (may shame record the day !) 

The state receiver of his pilfer'd prey ! 

Meantime, the flattering feeble dotard, West, 

Europe's worst dauber, and poor Britain's best, 

With palsied hand shall turn each model o'er. 

And own himself an infant of fourscore : 9 

Be all the bruisers call'd from all St. Giles, 

That art and nature may compare their styles ; 

While brawny brutes in stupid wonder stare, 

And marvel at his lordship's stone-shop there. 10 

Bound the throng'd gate shall sauntering coxcombs creep, 

To lounge and lucubrate, to prate and peep, 

While many a languid maid, with longing sigh, 

On giant statues casts the curious eye ; 

The room with transient glance appears to skim, 

YeMnarks the mighty back and length of limb, 

Mourns o'er the difference of now and then ; 

Exclaims, ' these Greeks indeed were proper men ;' 

Draws slight comparisons of these with those, 

And envies Lais all her Attic beaux : 

When shall a modern maid have swains like these' 

Alas ! Sir Harry is no Hercules ! 

And, last of all, amidst the gaping crew, 

Some calm spectator, as he takes his view," 

In silent indignation, mix'd with grief, 

Admires the plunder, but abhors the thief. 

Loathed throughout life — scarce pardon'd in the dust, 

May hate pursue his sacrilegious lust! 

Link'd with the fool who fired the Ephesian dome, 

Shall vengeance follow far beyond the tomb j 

Erostratus and Elgin e'er shall shine 

In many a branding page and burning line! 

Alike condemn'd for aye to stand accursed— 

Perchance the second viler than the first : 

So let him stand through ages yet unborn, 

Fix'd statue on the pedestal of scorn ! 

Though not for him alone revenge shall wait, 

But fits thy country for her corning fate: 

Hers were the deeds that taught her lawless son 

To do what oft Britannia's self had done. 

Look to the Baltic blazing from afar — 

Your old ally yet mourns perfidious war : 

Not to such deeds did Pallas lend her aid, 

Or break the compact which herself had made ; 

Far from such councils, from the faithless field, 

She fled — but left behind her gorgon shield ; 

A fatal gift, that turn'd your friends to stone, 

And left lost Albion hated and alone. 

Look to the east, where Ganges' swarthy race 

Shall shake your usurpation to its base ; 

Lo ! there Rebellion rears her ghastly head, 

And glares the Nemesis of native dead, 

Till Indus rolls a deep purpureal flood, 

And claims his long arrear of oorthern blood, 



THE CURSE OF MINERVA. 



191 



So may ye perish ! Pallas, when she gave 
Your free-born rights, forbade ye to enslave. 
Look on your Spain, she clasps the hand she hates, 
But coldly clasps, and thrusts you from her gates. 
Bear witness, bright Barrossa, thou canst tell 
Whose were the sons that bravely fought and fell. 
While Liisitaiiia, kind and dear ally, 
Can spare a few to light and sometimes fly. 
Oh glorious field ! by famine fiercely won ; 
The Gaul retires for once, and all is done! 
But when did Pallas teach that one retreat 
Retrieved three long olympiads of defeat? 
Look last at home — ve love not to look there, 
On the grim smile of comfortless despair ; 
Your city saddens, loud though revel howls, 
Hen: l:i:nine faints, and yonder rapine prowls: 
See :ill alike of more or less bereft — 
No misers tremble when there's nothing left. 
' Blest paper credit' 12 who shall dare to sing? 
It clogs like lead corruption's weary wing: 
Yet Pallas plucked each Premier by the ear, 
Who g'ids and men alike disdain'd to hear; 
But one, repentant o'er a bankrupt state, 
On Pailas calls, but calls, alas! too late! 
Then raves for + ** ; l3 'o that Mentor bends, 
Though he r.nd Pallas never yet were friends : 
Him senates hear whom never yet they heard, 
Contemptuous once, and now no less absurd : 
So once of vore each reasonable frog 
Swore faith and fealty to his sovereign log ; 
Thus hail'd your rulers their patrician clod, 
As Egypt chose an onion for a god. 

" Now fare ye well, enjoy your little hour ; 

Go, grasp the shadow of your vanish'd power ; 

Gloss o'er the failure of each fondest scheme, 

Your strength a name, your bloated wealth a dream. 

Gone is that gold, the marvel of mankind, 

And pirates barter all that 's left behind ; 14 

No more the hirelings, purchased near and far, 

Crowd to the ranks of mercenary war; 

The idle merchant on the useless quay 

Droops o'er the bales no bark may bear away, 

Or, back returning, sees rejected stores 

Rot piecemeal on his own encumber'd shores ; 

The starved mechanic breaks his rustic loom, 

And, desperate, mans him 'gainst the common doom. 

Then in the senate of your sinking state, 

Show me the man whose counsels may have weight. 

Vain is each voice whose tone3 could once command ; 

Even factions cease to charm a factious land ; 

While jarring sects convulse a sister isle, 

And light with maddening hands the mutual pile. 

" 'T is done, 'tis past, since Pallas warns in vain, 
The Furies seize her abdicated reign ; 
Wide o'er the realm they wave their kindling brands, 
And wring her vitals with their fiery hands. 
But one convulsive struggle still remains, 
And Gaul shall weep ere Albion wear her chains, 
The banner'd pomp of war, the glittering files, 
O'er whose gay trappings stern Bellona smiles ; 
The brazen trump, the spirit-stirring drum, 
That bid the foe defiance »''"■ thev come ; 
The hero bounding at his country's call, 
The glorious death that decorates his latl, 



Swell the young heart with visionary charms, 
And bid it antedate the joys of arms. 
But know, a lesson you may yet be taught — 
With death alone are laurels cheaply bought: 
Not in the conflict havoc seeks delight — 
His day of mercy is the day of fight; 
But when the field is fought, the battle won, 
Though drench'd with gore, his woes are but begun. 
His deeper deeds ye yet know but by name, — 
The slaughtered peasant and the ravish'd dame, 
The rilled mansion and the foe-reap'd field, 
III suit with souls at home untaught to yield. 
Say with what eye, along the distant down, 
Would flying burghers mark the blazing town? 
How view the column of ascending flames 
Shake his red shadow o'er the startled Thames ? 
Nay, frown not, Albion ! for the torch was thine 
That lit such pyres from Tagus to the Rhine : 
Now should they burst on thy devoted coast, 
Go, ask thy bosom, who deserves them most? 
The law of heaven and earth is life for life ; 
And she who raised in vain regrets the strife." 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 189, line 22. 

How watch 'd thy better sons his farewell ray, 

That closed their murder'd sage's latest day! 

Socrates drank the hemlock a short time before sua 

set (the hour of execution), notwithstanding the en 

treaties of his disciples to wait till the sun went down. 

Note 2. Page 189, line 34. 
The queen of night asserts her silent reign. 
The twilight in Greece is much shorter than in our 
country ; the days in winter are longer, but in summei 
of less duration. 

Note 3. Page 189, line 44. 
The gleaming turret of the gay Kiosk. 
The Kiosk is a Turkish summer-house ; the palm is 
without the present walls of Athens, not far from the 
temple of Theseus, between which and the tree the 
wall intervenes. Cephisus' stream is indeed scanty, and 
Ilissus has no stream at all. 

Note 4. Page 190, line 5. 
These Cecrops placed— this Pericles adoru'd. 
This is spoken of the city in general, and not of the 
Acropolis in particular. The temple of Jupiter Olvm- 
pius, by some supposed the Pantheon, was finished by 
Hadrian: sixteen columns are standing, of the most 
beautifid marble and style of architecture. 

Note 5. Page 190, line 10. 
The insulted wall sustains his haled name. 
It is stated by a late oriental traveller, that when the 
wholesale spoliator visited Athens, he caused his own 
name, with that of his wife, to be inscribed on a pillar 
of one of the principal temples. This inscription was 
executed in a very conspicuous manner, and deeplv en- 
graved in the marble, at a very considerable elevation. 
Notwithstanding whioh precautions, some person (douDt 
less inspired by the Patron Goddess), has been at th» 
pains to get himself raised up to the requisite hei^hi, 
and has obliterated the name of the laird, but left thai 
of tne lady untouched. The traveller in ouestion nc 



192 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



COmpanied ihis Btory by a remark, that it must have 
cost some labour and contrivance to get at the place, 
and could only have been effected by much zeal and 
determination. 

Note 6. Page 190, line ei. 
When Villus half avenged Minerva's shame. 
His lordship's name, and that of one who no longer 
bears it, are carved conspicuously on the Parthenon 
above ; in a part not far distant are the torn remnants 
ef the basso-relievos, destroyed in a vain attempt to 
remove them. 

Note 7. Page 190, line 27. 
Frown not on England — England awns him not — 
Athena, no! the plunderer was a Scot! 

The plaster wall on the west side of the temple of 

Minerva Polias bears the following inscription, cut in 

very deep characters : 

Quod mm fecerunt Goti 
Hue fecerunt Scuti. 

Htibhi>u*('s Travels in Greece, etc., p. 345. 

Note 8. Page 190, line 30. 
And well I know within that bastard land. 
Irish bastards, according to Sir Callaghan O'Bral- 
taghan. 

Note 9. Page 190, line 77. 
With palsied band, shall turn each model o'er. 
And own himself an infant of fourscore. 

Mr. West, on seeing "the Elgin collection" (I suppose 
wo shall hear of the Abershaw's and Jack Shepherd's 
collection next), declared himself a mere Tyro in Art. 

Note 10. Page 190, line 80. 
While brawny brutes in stupid wonder staro, 
And marvel at his lordship's stone-aliop there. 

Poor Crib was sadly puzzled when exhibited at Elgin- 
house ; he asked if it was not "a stone-shop : " he was 
right, — it is a shop. 

Note 11. Page 190, line 94. 
And, last of all, amidst the gaping crew. 
Some cahn spectator, as he takes his view, 

"Alas! all the monuments of Roman magnificence, 
all the remains of Grecian taste, so dear to the artist, 
the historian, the antiquary, all depend on the will of 
an arbitrary sovereign ; and that will is influenced too 
often by interest or vanity, by a nephew or a sycophant. 



Is a new palace to be erected (at l'ome) for - an upstait 
family 7 the Coliseum is stripped to furnish materials. 
Does B foreign minister wish to a. lorn the bleak walls 
of a northern castle with antiques? the temples of The- 
seus or Minerva must be dismantled, and the works of 
Phidias or Praxiteles be torn from the shattered frieze. 
That a decrepit uncle, wrapped up in the religious 
duties of his age and station, should listen to the sug- 
gestions of an interested nephew, is natural ; and that 
an oriental despot should undervalue the masterpieces 
of Grecian art, is to be expected ; though in both cases 
the consequences of such weakness are much to be la- 
mented — but that the minister of a nation, famed for 
its knowledge of the language, and its veneration for 
the monuments of ancient Greece, should have been 
the prompter and the instrument of these destructions, 
is almost incredible. Such rapacity is a ciime against 
all ages and all generations : it deprives the past of the 
trophies of their genius and the title-deeds of their 
fame ; the present, of the strongest inducements to 
exertion, the noblest exhibitions that curiosity can 
contemplate; the future, of the masterpieces of art, the 
models of imitation. To guard against the repetition 
of such depredations is the wish of every man of ge- 
nius, the duty of every man in power, and the common 
interest of every civilized nation." — Eustace's Classical 
lour through Italy, p. 269. 

"This attempt to transplant the temple of Vesta from 
Italy to England, may, perhaps, do honour to the late 
Lord Bristol's patriotism or to his magnificence ; but it 
cannot be considered as an indication of either taste or 
judgment." — Ibid. p. 419. 

Note 12. Page 191, line 19. 

' Blest paper credit ' who shall dare to sing ? 

Blest paper credit, last and lies! supply. 

That lends corruption lighter wings to fly. — Pope 

Note 13. Page 191, line 25. 
Then raves for * * * 
The Deal and Dover traffickers in specie. 

Note 14. Page 191, line 38. 
Gone is that gold, the marvel of mankind. 
And pirates barter all that >. left behind. 

See the preceding note. 



£Jie SktiQt ot Certntfu 



January 22, 1816. 



TO JOHN HOBHOUSE, ESQ. 

THIS POEIVZ IS INSCRIBED, 

BY HIS FEIEXD. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



•The grand army of the Turks (in 1715), under the 
Prime Vizier, to open to themselves a way into the 
Heart of the Morea, and to form the siege of Napoli 
di Komania, the most considerable place in all that 
country,' thought it best in the fir* (dace to attack 



1 Napoli di Romania is no. now the most considerable place in 
the Morea, but Tripolitza, where the l'acha resides, and main- 
tains his government. Nap iliisncarArgos. I visited I all three in 



Corinth, upon which they made several storms. The 
garrison being weakened, and the governor seeing it 



IH10-11' and in the course ofjoumeyimg through the country 
from my first arrival in 1809, 1 crossed the Isthmus eight limes 
in my way from Attica to the Morea, over the mountains, 
or in the other direction, when passing from the Gulf of Athens 
to thai ofLepantO. Both the routes am picturesque and beau 
tiful, though very different: that by sea has more sameness, 
but the voyage being always in sight of land, and often very 
near it, presents many attractive views of the islands Salamis, 
-/Egina, Puro, etc., and the coast of the continent. 



THE STEGE 


OF CORINTH. 193 


was impossible to hold out against so mighty a force, 


Fast whirl the fratrmr7its from the wall, 


thought it fit to beat a parley: but while they were 


Which crumbles with the ponderous ball; 


treating about ihe articles, one of the magazines in the 


And from that wall the foe replies, 


Turkish camp, wherein they had six hundred barrels 


O'er dusty plain and smokv skies, 


of powder, blew up by accident, whereby six or seven 


With lires that answer fast and well 


hundred men were killed : which so enraged the infi- 


The summons of the Infidel. 


dels, that they would not grant any capitulation, but 


III. 


stormed the place with so much fury, that they took it, 


and put most of the garrison, with Signor Minolli, the 


But near and nearest to the wall 


governor, to the sword. The rest, with Antonio Betnbo, 


Of those who wish and work its fall, 


proveditor extraordinary, were made prisoners of war." 


With deeper skill in war's black art 


History of the Turks, vol. iii. p. 151. 


Than Othman's sons, and high of heart 




As any chief that ever stood 




Triumphant in tiie fields of blood; 
From post to post, and deed to deed, 




THE 


Fast spurring on his reeking steed, 




Where sallying ranks the trench assail, 


SIEGE OF CORINTH 


And make the foremost Moslem quail ; 
Or where the battery, guarded well, 




Remains as yet impregnable, 

Alighting cheerly to inspire , 




Many a vanish'd vear and age, 


The soldier slackening in his fire ; 


And tempest's hi eath, and battle's rage, 


The first and freshest of the host 


Have swept o'er Corinth ; yet she stands, 


Which Stamboul's sultan there can boas', 


A fortress form'd to Freedom's hands. 


To guide the follower o'er the field, 


The whirlwind's wrath, the earthquake's shock, 


To point the tube, the lance to wield, 


Have left untouch'd her hoary rock, 


Or whirl around the bickering blade, — 


The keystone of a land which still, 


Was Alp, the Adrian renegade ! 


Though fall'n, looks proudly on that hill, 




The landmark to the double tide 


IV. 


That purpl,tng rolls on either side, 


From Venice — once a race of worth 


As if their waters chafed to meet, 


His gentle sires — he drew his birth ; 


Yet pause and crouch beneath her feet. 


Hut late an exile from her shore, 


But could the blood before her she id 


Against his countrymen he bore 


Since first Timoleon's brother bled, 


The arms they taught to bear ; and now 


Or bafllcd Persia's despot fled, 


The turban girt his shaven brow. 


Arise from out the earth which drank 


Through many a change had Corinth pass'd 


The stream of slaughter as it sank, 


With Greece to Venice' rule at last; 


That sanguine ocean would o'erfiow 


And here, before her walls, with those 


Her isthmus idly spread below : 


To Greece and Venice equal foes, 


Or could the bones of all the slain, 


He stood a foe, with all the zeal 


Who perish'd there, be piled again, 


Which young and fiery converts feel, 


That rival pyramid would rise 


Within whose heated bosom throngs 


More mountain-like, through those clear skies, 


The memory of a thousand wrongs. 


Thau von tower-capt Acropolis 


To him had Venice ceased to be 


Winch seems the very clouds to kiss. 


Her ancient civic boast — "the Free ;" 




And in the palace of St. Mark 


II. 


Unnamed accusers in the dark 


On dun Cithreron's ridge appears 


Within the " Lion's mouth " had placed 


The gleani of twice ten thousand spears; 


A charge against him unefFaced : 


And downward to the Isthmian plain, 


He fled in time, and saved his life 


From shore to shore of cither main, 


To waste his future years in strife, 


The tent is pitch'd, the crescent shines 


That taught his land how great her loss 


Along the Moslem's leaguering lines ; 


In him who triumph'd o'er the Cross, 


And the dusk Spain's bands advance 


'Gainst which he rcar'd the Crescei ' lugh. 


Beneath each bearded pacha's glance ; 


And battled to avenge or die. 


And far anil wide as eye can reach, 




The turban'd cohorts throng the beach; 


V. 


And there the Arab's camel kneels, 


Coumourgi 2 — he whose closing scene 


And there his steed the Tartar wheels ; 


Adom'd the triumph of Eugene, 


The Turcoman hath left his herd, 1 


When on Carlowitz' bloody plain, 


The sabre round his loins to gird ; 


The last and mightiest of the slain, 


And there the volleying thunders pour, 


He sank, regretting not to die. 


Till waves grow smoother to the roar. 


Hut curst the Christian's victory— 


The trench is dug, the cannon's breath 


Coumourgi — can his glory cease, 


Wings the far hissing globe of death ; 


That latest conqueror of Greece 


u 2 30 

- 





194 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


Till Christian hands to Greece restore 


Her voice less lively in the song ; 


The freedom Venice gave of yore 7 


Her step, though light, less fleet among 


A hundred years have roll'd away 


The pairs, on whom the morning's glance 


Since he refix'd the Moslem's sway ; 


Breaks, yet unsated with the dance. 


And now he led the Mussulman, 


IX. 


And gave the guidance of the van 


To Alp, who well repaid the trust 


Sent by the state to guard the land 


By cities levell'd with the dust ; 


(Which, wrested from, the Moslem's hand, 


And proved, by many a deed of death, 


While Sobieski tamed his pride 


How firm his heart in novel faith. 


By Buda's wall and Danube's side, 




The chiefs of Venice wrung away 


VI. 


From Patra to Eubcea's bay), 


The walls grew weak ; and fast and hot 


Minotti held in Corinth's towers 


Against them pour'd the ceaseless shot, 


The Doge's delegated powers, 


With unabating fury sent 


While yet the plying eye of peace 


From battery to battlement ; 


Smiled o'er her long-forgotten Greece : 


And thunder-like the pealing din 


And, ere that faithless truce was broke 


Rose from each heated culverin ; 


Which freed her from the unchristian yoke, 


And here and there some crackling dome 


With him his gentle daughter came: 


Was fired before the exploding bomb : 


Nor there, since Menelaus' darne 


And as the fabric sank beneath 


Forsook her lord and land, to prove 


The shattering shell's volcanic breath, 


What woes await on lawless love, 


In red and wreathing columns flaslt'd 


Had fairer form adorn'd the shore 


The flame, as loud the ruin crash'd, 


Than she, the matchless stranger, bore. 


Or into countless meteors driven, 


X. 


Its earth-stars melted into heaven ; 


Whose clouds that day grew doubly dun, 


The wall is rent, the ruins yawn, 


Impervious to the hidden sun, 

With volumed smoke that slowly grew 


And, with to-morrow's earliest dawn, 




O'er the disjointed mass shall vault 


To one wide sky of sulphurous hue. 


The foremost of the fierce assault. 




The bands are rank'd ; the chosen van 


VII. 


Of Tartar and of Mussulman, 




The full of hope, misnamed " forlorn," 
Who hold the thought of death in scorn, 


15ut not for vengeance, long delay'd, 


Alone, did Alp, the renegade, 


And win their way with falchions' force, 
Or pave the path with many a corse, 
O'er which the following brave may rise, 


The Moslem warriors sternly teach 


His skill to pierce the promised breach: 


Within these walls a maid was pent 


Their stepping-stone — the last v. bo dies ' 


His hope would win, without consent 


Of that inexorable sire, 


XI. 


Whose neart refused him in its ire, 


'Tis midnight: on tho mountain's brown 


When Alp, beneath his Christian name, 


The cold round moon shines deeply down j 


Her virgin hand aspired to claim. 


Blue roll the waters, blue the sky 


In happier mood and earlier time, 


Spreads like an ocean hung on high, 


While unimpeach'd for traitorous crime, 


Bespangled with those isles of light, 


Gayest in gondola or hall, 


So wildly, spiritually bright ; 


He glitter'd through the Carnival; 


Who ever gazed upon them shining, 


And tuned 'he softest serenade 


And turn'd to earth without repining, 


That e'er on Adria's waters play'd 


Nor wish'd for wings to flee away, 


At midnight to Italian maid. 


And mix with their eternal ray? 




The waves on either shore lay there 


VIII. 


Calm, clear, and azure as the air; 


Arid many deem'd her heart was won ; 


And scarce their foam the pebbles shook, 


For, sought by numbers, given to none, 


But murmur'd meekly as the brook. 


Hud young Francesca's band remain'd 


The winds were pillow' d on the waves ; 


S'.ill by 'he church's bonds unchain'd: 


The banners drOop'd along their staves, 


And when the Adriatic bore 


And, as they fell around them furling, 


Lanciotto to the Paynim shore, 


Above them shone the crescent curling ; 


Her wonted smiles were seen to fail, 


And that deep silence was imbroke, 


And pensive wax'd the maid, and pale ; 


Save where the watch his signal spoke, 


More constant at confessional, 


Save where the steed neigh'd oft and shrill, 


Mure rare at masque and festival ; 


And echo answer'd from the hill, 


Or seen at such, with downcast eyes, 


And the wide hum of that wild host 


Which conqucr'd hearts they ceased to prize* 


Bustled like leaves from coast to coast. 


VVith listless look she seems to gaze; 


As rose the Muezzin's voice in air 


Willi humbler care he r form arrays ; 


In midnight call to wonted prayer : 



THE SIEGE OF CORINTH. 19/ 


It rose, that chauntcd mournful strain, 


XIII. 


Like some lone spirit's o'er the plain : 

'Twas musical, but sadly sweet, 

Such as when winds and harp-strings meet, 

And take a long unmeasured tone, 

To mortal ministrelsy unknown. 

It seem'd to those within the wall 

A cry prophetic of their fall : 

It struck even the besieger's ear 


His head grows fevcr'd, and his pulse 
The quick successive throbs convulse ; 
In vain from side to side he throws 
His form, in courtship of repose ; 
Or if lie dozed, a sound, a start 
Awoke him with a sunken heart. 
The turban on Ins hot brow pressM, 
The mail weigh'd lead-like on his breast, 


With something ominous and drear, 
An undefined and sudden thrill, 
Which makes the heart a moment still, 
Then beat with quicker pulse, ashamed 
Of that strange sense its silence framed ; 
Such as a sudden passing-bell 
Wakes, though but for a stranger's knell. 


Though oft and long beneath its weight 

Upon his eves had slumber sate, 

Without or couch or canopy, 

Except a rougher field and sky 

Thau now might yield a warrior's bed, 

Than now along the heaven was spread. 

He could not rest, he could hW stay 


XII. 


Within his tent to wail for day, 


The tent of Alp was on the shore ; 


But walk'd him Oirth along the sand, 


The sound was hush'd the prayer was o'er ; 


Where thousand sleepers streu'd the stra:u 


The watch was set, the night-round made, 


What pillow'd them? and why should he 


All mandates issued and obev'd ; 


More wakeful than the humblest he? 


'T is but another anxious night, 


Since more tin lr peril, worse their toil, 


His pains the morrow may requite 


And yet they fearless dream of spoil ; 


With all revenge and love can pay, 


While he alone, where thousands pass'd 


In guerdon for their long delay. 


A night of sleep, perchance their la^t, 


Few hours remain, and he hath need 


In sickly vigil wander'd on, 


Of rest, to nerve for many a deed 


And envied all he gazed upon. 


Of slaughter; but within his soul 




The thoughts like troubled waters roll. 


XIV. 


lie stood alone among the host ; 


He felt his soul become more light 


Not his the loud fanatic boast 


Beneath the freshness of the night. 


To plant the Crescent o'er the Cross, 


Cool was the silent sky, though calm 


Or risk a life with little loss, 


And bathed his brow with airy h;ilin: 


Secure in paradise to be 


Behind, the camp — before him lay, 


By Houris loved immortally : 


In many a winding creek and bay, 


Nor his, what burning patriots feel, 


Lcpanto's gulf: ;uid, on the brow 


The stern exaltedness of zeal, 


Of Delphi's hill, unshaken snow, 


Profuse of blood, untired in toil, 


High and eternal, such as shone 


When battling on the parent soil. 


Through thousand summers brightly gone, 


He stood alone — a renegade 


Along the gulf, the mount, the clime; 


Against the country he betray' d ; 


It will not melt, hke man, to time : 


He stood alone amidst his band, 


Tyrant and slave are swept awav, 


Without a trusted heart or hand : 


Less form'd to wear before the ray, 


They follow'd him, for he was brave, 


But that white veil, the lightest, frailest, 


And great the spoil he got and gave ; 


Which on the might v mount thou hailest, 


They crouch'd to him, for he had skill 


While tower and iree are lorn and rent, 


To warp and wield the vulgar w ill : 


Shines o'er its craggy battlement; 


But still his Christian origin 


In form a peak, in height a cloud, 


With them was little less than sin. 


In texture like a hovering shroud, 


They envied even the faithless fame 


Thus high by parting Freedom spread, 


He earn'd beneath a Moslem name ; 


As from her fond abode she tied, 


Since he, their mightiest chief, had been 


And linger'd on the spot, where long 


In youth a bitter Nazarene. 


Her prophet spirit spake in song. 


They did not know how pride can stoop, 


Oh, still her step at moments falters 


When baffled feelings withering droop; 


O'er wither'd fields and ruin'd altars, 


They did not know how hate can burn 


And fain would wake, in souls too broken, 


In hearts once changed from soft to stern ; 


By pointing to each glorious token. 


Nor all the false and fatal zeal 


But vain her voice, til better days 


The convert of revenge can feel. 


Dawn in those yet remember'd ravs 


He ruled them — man may rule the worst, 


Which shone upon the Persian living, 


By ever daring to be first : 


And saw the Spartan smile in living. 


So lions o'er the jackal sway ; 


XV. 


The jackal points, he fells the prey, 


Then on the vulgar yelling press, 


Not mindless of these mighty times 


To gorge the relics of success. 

. . 


Was Alp, despite his Right and crimes: 



196 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And through this night, as on he wander'd, 

And o'er the past and present ponder'd, 

And thought upon the glorious dead 

Who there in hotter cause had bled, 

He felt how faint and feebly dun 

The fame that could accrue to him, 

Who cheer'd the band, and waved the sword, 

A traitor in a turban'd horde ; 

And led them to the lawless siege, 

Whose best success were sacrilege. 

Not so had those his fancy numbcr'd, 

The chiefs whose dust around him slumbcr'd; 

Their phalanx marshall'd on the plain, 

Whose bulwarks were not then in vain. 

They fell devoted, but undying ; 

The very gale their names seem'd sighing: 

The waters murmur'd of their name ; 

The woods were peopled with their fame; 

The silent pillar, lone and gray, 

Claim'd kindred with their sacred clay; 

Their spirits wrapt the dusky mountain, 

Their memory sparkled o'er the fountain ; 

The meanest rill, the mightiest river 

Roll'd mingling with their fame for ever. 

Despite of every yoke she bears, 

That land is glory's still and theirs ! 

'Tis still a watch-word to the earth : 

When man would do a deed of worth 

He points to Greece, and turns to tread, 

So sanction'd, on the tyrant's head: 

He looks to her, and rushes on 

Where life is lost, or freedom won. 

XVI. 
Still by the shore Alp mutely mused, 
And woo'd the freshness night diffused. 
There shrinks no ebb in that tideless sea,' 
Which changeless rolls eternally ; 
So that wildest of waves, in their angriest mood, 
Scarce break on the bounds of the land for a rood ; 
And the powerless moon beholds them How, 
Heedless if she come or go : 
Calm or high, in main or bay, 
On their course she hath no sway. 
The rock unworn its base doth bare, 
And looks o'er the surf, but it comes not there ; 
And the fringe of the foam may be seen below, 
On the line that it left long ages ago : 
A smooth short space of yellow sand 
Between it and the greener land. 

He wander'd on, along the beach, 

Till within the range of a carbine's reach 

Of the leaguer'd wall ; but they saw him not. 

Or how could he 'scape from the hostile shot? 

Did traitors lurk in the Christian's hold ? 

Were their hands grown stiff", or their hearts wax'd cold ? 

I know i.ot, in sooth ; but from yonder wall 

There flash'd no fire, and there hiss'd no ball, 

Though he stood beneath the bastion's frown, 

That flank'd the sea-ward gate of the town ; 

Though he heard the sound, and could almost tell 

The sullen words of the sentinel, 

As !iis measured step on the stone below 

Clank'd, as he paced it to and fro ; 

And he saw the lean dogs beneath the wall 

Hold o'er the dead 'heir carvinal, 



Gorging and growling o'er carcass and limb; 

They were too busy to bark at him ! 

From a Tartar's skull they had stripp'd the flesh, 

As ye peel the fig when the fruit is fresh ; 

And their while tusks crimch'd o'er the whiter skull,* 

As it slipp'd through their jaws, when their edge grew dull, 

As they lazily mumbled the bones of the dead, 

When they scarce could rise from the spot where they fed\ 

So well had they broken a lingering fast 

With those who had fallen for that night's repast. 

And Alp knew, by the turbans that roil'd on the sand, 

The foremost of these were the best of his band : 

Crimson and green were the shawls of their wear, 

And eacli seal)) had a single long tuft of hair,' 

All the rest was shaven and bare. 

The scalps were in the wild dog's maw, 

The hair was tangled round his jaw. 

Hut close by the shore on the edge of the gulf, 

There sat a vulture flapping a wolf, 

Who had stolen from the hills, but kept away, 

Scared by the dogs, from the human prey ; 

But he seized on his share of a steed that lay, 

Pick'd by the birds, on the sands of the bay. 

XVII. 
Alp turn'd him from the sickening sight : 
Never had shaken his nerves in fight; 
But he bet'er could brook to behold the dying, 
Deep in the tide of their warm blood lying, 
Scorch'd with the death-thirst, and writhing in vain, 
Than the perishing dead who are past all pain. 
There is something of pride in the perilous hour, 
Whatc'er be the shape in which death may lour ; 
For Fame is there to say who bleeds, 
And Honour's eye on daring deeds! 
But when all is past, it is humbling to tread 
O'er the weltering field of the tombless dead, 
And see worms of the earth, and fowls of the air, 
Beasts of the forest, all gathering there ; 
All regarding man as their prey, 
All rejoicing in his decay. 

XVIII. 
There is a temple in ruin stands, 
Fashion'd by long-forgotten hands ; 
Two or three columns, and many a stone, 
Marble and granite, with grass o'trgrown! 
Out upon time ! it will leave no more 
Of the things to come than the things before ! 
Out upon time ! who for ever will leave 
But enough of the past for the future to grieve 
O'er that which hath been, and o'er that which must be: 
What we have seen, our sons shall see ; 
Remnants of things that have pass'd away, 
Fragments of stone, rear'd by creatures of clay ! 

XIX. 

He sate him down at a pillar's base, 
And pass'd his hand athwart his face ; 
Like one in dreary musing mood, 
Declining was his attitude ; 
His head was drooping on his breast, 
Fever'd, throbbing, and opprest ; 
And o'er his brow, so downward bent, 
Oft his beating fingers went, 
Hurriedly, as you may see 
Your own run over the ivory key. 



THE SIEGE OF CORINTH. 



197 



Ere the measured tone is taken 
By the chords you would awaken. 
There he sate all heavily, 
As he heard the night-wind sigh. 

Was it (he wind, through some hollow stone, 6 

Sent that soft and tender moan ? 

He lifted his head, and he look'd on the sea, 

But it was unrippled as glass may be ; 

He look'd on the long grass — it waved not a blade; 

How was that gentle sound convey'd ? 

He look'd to the banners — eaeh Hag lav still, 

So did the leaves on Cithaeron's hill. 

And he felt not a breath come over his cheek; 

What did that sudden sound bespeak? 

He turn'd to the left — is he sure of sight ? 

There sate a lady, youthful and bright ! 

XX. 

He started up witn more of fear 

Than if an armed foe were near. 

" God of my fathers ! what is here ? 

Who art thou, and wherefore sent 

So near a hostile armament /" 

His trembling hands refused to sign 

The cross he deem'd no more divine : 

He had resumed it in that hour, 

But conscience wrung away the power. 

He gazed, he saw : he knew the face 

Of beauty, and the form of grace ; 

It was Francesca by his side, 

The maid who might have been his bride ! 

The rose was yet upon her cheek, 

But mellow'd with a tender streak : 

Where was the play of her soft lips fled ? 

Gone was the smile that enliven'd their red. 

The ocean's calm within their view. 

Beside her eye had less of blue ; 

But like that cold wave it stood still, 

And its glance, though clear, was chill. 

Around her form a thin robe twining, 

Nought Conceal'd her bosom shining; 

Through the parting of her hair, 

Floating darkiy downward there, 

Her rounded arm show'd white and bare : 

And ere yet she made reply, 

Once she raised her hand on high ; 

It was so wan, and transparent of hue, 

You might have seen the moon shine through. 

XXL 

* I come from my rest to him I love best, 

That I may be happy, and he may be blest. 

I have pass'd the guards, the gate, the wall; 

Sought thee in safety through foes and all. 

'T is said the lion will turn and flee 

From a maid in the pride of her purity ; 

And the power on high, that can shield the good 

Thus from the tyrant of the wood, 

Hath extended its mercy to guard me as well 

From the hands of the leagucring infidel. 

come — and if I come in vain, 
Never, oh never, we meet again ! 
Thou hast done a fearful deed 
In falling away from thy father's creed : 



Hut dash that turban to earth, an I sign 
I he sign of the cross, and for ever be mine; 
Wring the black drop from thy heart, 
And to-morrow unites us no more to part." 

"And where should our bridal couch be spread? 

In the midst of the dying and the dead .' 

For to-morrow we give to the slaughter and llame 

The sons and the shrines of the Christian name ■ 

None save thou and thine, I 've sworn, 

Shall be left upon the morn: 

But thee will I bear to a lovely spot, 

Where our hands shall be join'd, and our sorrow forgot. 

There thou yet shalt be my bride, 

Winn once again 1 've rpiell'd the pride 

Of Venice ; and her hated race 

Have felt the arm they would debase. — 

Scourge, with a whip of scorpions, those 

Whom vice and envy made my foes." 

Upon his hand she laid her own — 
Light was the touch, but it thrill'd to the bone, 
And shot a dullness to his heart, 
Which fix'd him beyond the power to start. 
Though slight was that grasp so mortal eoid, 
He could not loose him from its hold ; 
But never did clasp of one so dear 
Strike on the pulse with such feeling of fear, 
As those thin fingers, long and white, 
Froze through his blood by their touch that nidit. 
The feverish glow of his brow was "one, 
And his heart sank so still that it felt like stone, 
As he look'd on the face, and beheld its lnle 
So deeply changed from what he knew : 
Fair but faint — without the ray 
Of mind, that made each feature play 
Like sparkling waves on a sunny day ; 
And her motionless lips lay still as death, 
And her words came forth without her breath, 
And tlere rose not a heave o'er her bosom's swell, 
And there seem'd not a pulse in her veins to dwell. 
Though her eye shone out, yet the lids were nVd, 
And the glance that it gave was wild and unmix'd 
With aught of change, as the eyes may seem 
Of the restless who walk in a troubled dream ; 
Like the figures on arras, that gloomily glare, 
Stirr'd by the breath of the wintry air, 
So seen by the dying lamp's fitful light, 
Lifeless, but life-like, and awful to sight ; 
As they seem, through the dimness, about to come down 
From the shadowy wall where their images frown ; 
Fearfully flitting to and fro, 
As the gusts on the tapestry come and go. 
"If not for love of me be given 
Thus much, then, for the love of Heaven,— 
Again I say — that turban tear 
From oiT thy faithless brow, and swear 
Thine injured country's sons to spare, 
Or thou art lost ; and never shalt sec, 
Not earth — that 's past — but heaven or me. 
If this thou dost accord, albeit 
A heavy doom 't is thine to meet, 
That doom shall half absolve thy sin, 
And Merry's gate may receive thee within. 
But pause one moment more, and take 
The curse of Him thou didst forsake* 



And look once more to heaven, and see 
Its love for ever shut from thee. 
There is a light cloud by the moon — * 
'T is passing, and will pass full soon— 
If, by the time its vapoury sail 
Hath ceased her shaded orb to veil, 
Thy heart within thee is not changed, 
Then God and man are both avenged; 
Dark will thy doom be, darker still 
Tliine immortality of ill." 

Alp look'd to heaven, and saw on high 

The sign she spake of in the sky ; 

Hut his heart was swollen, and turn'd aside, 

By deep interminable pride, 

This first false passion of his breast 

Roll'd like a torrent o'er the rest. 

He sue for mercy ! He dismay'd 

By wild words of a timid maid ! 

He, wrong'd by Venice, vow to save 

Her sons devoted to the grave ! 

No — though that cloud were thunder's worst, 

And charged to crush him — let it burst ! 

He look'd upon it earnestly, 

Without an accent of reply ; 

He watch'd it passing ; it is flown : 

Full on his eye the clear moon shone, 

And thus he spake — " Whate'er my fate, 

I am no changeling — 't is too late: 

The reed in storms may bow and quiver, 

Then rise again ; the tree must shiver. 

What Venice made me, I must be, 

Her foe in all, save love to thee : 

But thou art safe: oh, fly with me! — " 

He turn'd, but she is gone ! 

Nothing is there but the column stone. 

Hath she sunk in the earth, or melted in air? 

He saw not, he knew not ; but nothing is there. 

XXII. 

The night is past, and shines the sun 

As if that morn were a jocund one. 

Lightly and brightly breaks away 

The morning from her mantle gray, 

And the moon will look on a sultry day. 

Hark to the trump, and the drum, 
Ai*t the mournful sound of the barbarous horn, 
And the flap of the banners, that flit as they're borne, 
And the neigh of the steed, and the multitude's hum, 
And the clash, and the shout, "they come, they come !" 
The horsetails 8 are pluck'd from the ground, and the 

sword 
From its sheath ; and they form, and but wait for the 

word. 
Tartar, and Spahi, and Turcoman, 
Strike your tents, and throng to the van ; 
Mount ye, spur ye, skirr the plain, 
That the fugitive may flee in vain, 
When he breaks from the town ; and none escape, 
Aged or young, in the Christian shape; 
While your fellows on foot, in a fiery mass, 
Bloodstain the breach through which they pass. 
'The steeds are all bridled, and snort to ihe rein ; 
Curved is each neck, and flowing each mane; 



White is the foam of their champ on the bit : 

The spears are uplifted ; the matches are lit ; 

The cannon are pointed and ready to roar, 

And crush the wall they have crumbled before : 

Forms in his phalanx each Janizar ; 

Alp at their head ; his right arm is bare, 

So is the blade of his scimitar ; 

The khan and the pachas are all at their post; 

The vizier himself at the head of the host. 

When the culverir.'s signal is fired, then on ; 

Leave not in Corinth a living one — 

A priest at her altars, a chief in her halls, 

A hearth in her mansions, a stone on her walls. 

God and the prophet — Alia Hu ! 

Up to the skies with that wild halloo ! 

"There the breach lies for passage, the ladder to scale, 

And your hands on your sabres, and how should ye fail ? 

He who first downs with the red cross may crave 

His heart's dearest wish; let him ask it, and have!" 

Thus utter'd Coumourgi, the dauntless vizier; 

The reply was the brandish of sabre and spear, 

And the shout of fierce thousands in joyous ire : — 

Silence — hark to the signal — fire ! 

XXIII. 

As the wolves, that headlong go 

On the stately buffalo, 

Though with fiery eyes, and angry roar, 

And hoofs that stamp, and horns that gore, 

He tramples on earth, and tosses on high 

The foremost, who rush on his strength but to die: 

Thus against the wall they went, 

Thus the first were backward bent ; 

Many a bosom, sheathed in brass, 

Strew'd the earth like broken glass, 

Shiver'd by the shot, that tore 

The ground whereon they moved no more : 

Even as they fell, in files they lay, 

Like the mower's grass, at the close of day, 

When his work is done on the levell'd plain ; 

Such was the fall of the foremost slain. 

XXIV. 

As the spring-tides, with heavy plash, 
From the clifls invading dash 
Huge fragments, sapp'd by the ceaseless flow, 
Till white and thundering down they go, 
• Like the avalanche's snow 
On the Alpine vales below ; 
Thus at length outbreathed and worn, 
Corinth's sons were downward borne 
By the long and oft-renew'd 
Charge of the Moslem multitude. 
In firmness they stood, and in masses they fell, 
Heap'd by the host of the infidel, 
Hand to hand, and foot to foot: 
Nothing there, save death, was mute ; 
Stroke, and thrust, and flash, and cry 
For quarter, or for victory, 
Mingle there with the volleying thunder, 
Which makes the distant cities wonder 
How the sounding battle goes, 
If with them, or for their foes ; 
If they must mourn, or may rejoice 
In that annihilating voice, 



THE SIEGE 


OF CORINTH. 199 


Which pierces the deep hills through and through 


Their leader's nervous arm is bare, 


With an echo dread and new : 


Swifter to smite, and never -to spare — 


You might have heard it, on that day, 


Unclothed to the shoulder it waves thcrn on ; 


O'er Salamis and Megara ; 


Thus in the fight he is ever known : 


(We have heard the hearers say,) 


Others a gaudier garb may show, 


Even unto Piraeus bay. 


To tempt the spoil of the greedy foe ; 




Many a hand 's on a richer hilt, 


XXV. 


But none on a steel more ruddily gilt ; 


From the point of encountering blades to the hilt, 


Many a loftier turban may wear, — 


Sabres and swords with blood were gilt. 


Alp is but known by the white arm bare ; 


But the rampart is won, and the spoil begun, 


Look through the thick of the fight, 't is them' 


And all but the after-carnage done. 


There is not a standard on that shore 


Shriller shrieks now mingling come 


So well advanced the ranks before ; 


From within the plunder'd dome ; 


There is not a banner in Moslem war 


Hark to the haste of flying feet, 


Will lure the Delhis half so far; 


That splash in the blood of the slippery street ; 


It glances like a falling star ! 


But here and there, where 'vantage ground 


Where'er that mighty arm is seen, 


Against the foe may still be found, 


The bravest be, or late have been ! 


Desperate groups, of twelve or ten, 


There the craven cries for quarter 


Make a pause, and turn again — 


Vainly to the vengeful Tartar ; 


With banded backs against the wall, 


Or the hero, silent lying, 


Fiercely stand, or fighting fall. 


Scorns to yield a groan in dying ; 




Mustering his last feeble blow 


There stood an old man — his hairs were white, 


'Gainst the nearest levell'd foe, 


But his veteran arm was full of might: 


Though faint beneath the mutual wound, 


So gallantly bore he the brunt of the fray, 


Grappling on the gory ground. 


The dead before him on that day 




In a semicircle lay ; 


XXVII. 


Still he combated unwounded, 


Still the old man stood erect, 


Though retreating, unsurrounded. 


And Alp's career a moment check'd. 


Many a scar of former fight 


" Yield thee, Minotti ; quarter take, 


Lurk'd beneath his corslet bright ; 


For thine own, thy daughter's sake." 


But of every wound his body bore, 




Each and all had been ta'en before ; 


" Never, renegado, never ! 


Though aged, he was so iron of limb, 


Though the life of thy gift would last for ever." 


Few of our youth could cope with him ; 




And the foes whom he singly kept at baj 


" Francesca ! — Oh my promised bride ! 


Outnumber'd his thin hairs of silver gray. 


Must she too perish by thy pride ?" 


From right to left his sabre swept: 




Many an Othman mother wept 


" She is safe." — "Where? where?" — "Inheat'CE, 


Sons that were unborn, when dipp'd 


From whence thy traitor soul is driven— 


His weapon first in Moslem gore, 


Far from thee, and undefiled." 


Ere his years could count a score. 


Grimly then Minotti smiled, 


Of all he might have been the sire, 


As he saw Alp staggering bow 


Who fell that day beneath his ire : 


Before his words, as with a blow. 


For, sonless left long years ago, 


" Oh God ! when died she ?"_" Yesternight - 


His wrath made many a childless foe ; 


Nor weep I for her spirit's flight : 


And since the day, when in the str; ¥ ,n' 


None of my pure race shall be 


His only boy had met his fate, 


Slaves to Mahomet and thee — 


His parent's iron hand did doom 


Come on!" — That challenge is in vain — 


More than a human hecatomb. 


Alp 's already with the slain ! 


If shades by carnage be appeased, 


While Minotti's words were wreaking 


Patroclus' spirit less was pleased 


More revenge in bitter speaking 


Than his, Minotti's son, who died 


Than his falchion's point had found, 


Where Asia's bounds and ours divide. 


Had the time allow'd to wound, 


Buried he lay, where thousands before 


From within the neighbouring porch 


For thousands of years were inhumed 01 th<. shove : 


Of a long-defended church, 


What of them is left to tell 


Where the last and desperate few 


Where they lie, and how they fell ? 


Would the failing fight renew, 


Not a stone on their turf, nor a bone in their g»aves, 


The sharp shot dash'd Alp to the ground , 


But they live in the verse that immortally saves. 


Ere an eye could view the wound 




That crash'd through *.he br?in ol ihe infMi 


XXVI. 


Round he spun, and down he fell ; 


Hark to the Allah shout ! a band 


A flash like fire within hir eyes 


Of the Mussulman bravest and best is at hand : 


Blazed, as he bent no more to rise. 



900 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And then eternal darkness sunk 
Through all the palpitating trunk: 
Nought of life left, save a (piivering 
\Vh< n- his limbs were slightly shivering : 
They turn'd him on his back; his breast 
And brow were stain'd with gore and dust, 
And through his lips the life-blood oozed, 
From its deep veins lately loosed ; 
Hut in his pulse there was no throb, 
Nor on his lips one dying sob ; 
Sigh, nor word, nor struggling breath 
Heralded his way to death ; 
Ere his very thought could pray, 
Unanel'd he pass'd away. 
Without a hope from mercy's aid,— 
To the last a renegade. 

XXVIII. 

Fearfully the yell arose 

Of his followers, and his foes ; 

These in joy, in fury those : 

Then again in conflict mixing, 

Clashing swords and spears trantfixing, 

Interchanged the blow and thrust, 

Hurling warriors in the dust. 

Street by street, and foot by foot, 

Still Minotti dares dispute 

The latest portion of the land, 

Left beneath his high command ; 

With him, aiding heart and hand, 

The remnant of his gallant band. 

Still the church is tenable, 

Whence issued late the fated ball 
That half-avenged the city's fall, 

When Alp, her fierce assailant, fell: 

Thither bending sternly back, 

They leave before a bloody track ; 

And, with their faces to the foe, 

Dealing wounds with every blow, 

The chief, and his retreating train, 

loin to those within the fane : 

There they yet may breathe awhile, 

Shelter'd by the massy pile. 

XXIX. 

Brief breathing-time! the turban'd host, 

With added ranks, and raging boast, 

Press onwards with such strength and heat, 

Their numbers balk their own retreat; 

For narrow the way that led to the spot 

Where still the Christians yielded not; 

And the foremost, if fearful, may vainly try 

Through the massy column to turn and fly : 

They perforce must do or die. 

They die ; but ere their eyes could close 

Avengers o'er their bodies rose ; 

Fresh and furious, fast thev fill 

The ranks un'hinnM, though slaughter'd still; 

And faint the weary Christians wax 

Before the still renew'd attacks : 

And now the Othmans gain the gate ; 

Still resists its iron weight, 

And still all deadly aim'd and hot, 

From every crevicfc conies the shot; 

From every shatter'd window pour 

The volleys of the sulphurous shower: 



Rut the portal wavering grows and weak— 
The iron yields, the hinges creak — 
It bends — it falls — and all is o'er ; 
Lost Corinth may resist no more ! 

XXX. 

Darkly, sternly, and all alone, 

Minotti stood o'er the altar-stone : 

Madonna's face upon him shone, 

Painted in heavenly hues above, 

With eves of light and looks of love ; 

And placed upon that holy shrine 

To fix our thoughts on things divine, 

When pictured there, we kneeling see 

Her and the boy-ged on her knee, 

Smiling sweetly on each prayer 

To heaven, as if to waft it there. 

Still she smiled ; even now she smiles, 

Though slaughter streams along her aisles: 

Minotti lifted his aged eye, 

And made the sign of a cross with a sigh, 

Then seized a torch which blazed thereby ; 

And still he stood, while, with steel and llame, 

Inward and onward the Mussulman came. 

XXXI. 

The vaults beneath the mosaic stone 

Contain'd the dead of ages gone ; 

Their names were on the graven floor, 

But now illegible with gore ; 

The carved crests, and curious hues 

The varied marble's veins diffuse, 

Were smear'd, and slippery — stain'd and strov i 

With broken swords and helms o'erthrown ; 

There were dead above, and the dead below 

Lay cold in many a coffin'd row, 

You might see them piled in sable state, 

By a pale light through a gloomy grate; 

But war had entered their dark caves, 

And stored along the vaulted graves 

Her sulphurous treasures, thickly spread 

In masses by the fleshless dead ; 

Here, throughout the siege, had been 

The Christian's chiefest magazine ; 

To these a late-form'd train now led, 

Minotti's last and stern resource, 

Against the foe's o'erwhelming force. 

XXXII. 

The foe came on, and few remain 

To strive, and those must strive in vain : 

For lack of further lives, to slake 

The thirst of vengeance now awake, 

With barbarous blows they gash the dead, 

And lop the already lifeless head, 

And fell the statues from their niche, 

Am! spoil the shrines of offerings rich, 

And from each other's rude hands wrest 

The silver vessels saints had blest. 

To the high altar on they go ; 

Oh, but it made a glorious show ! 

On its table still behold 

The cup of consecrated gold ; 

Massy and deep, a glittering prize, 

Brightly it sparkles to plunderers' eyes: 



THE SIEGE OF CORINTH. 



201 



That morn it held the holy wine, 

Converted by Christ to his hlood so divine, 

Which his -worshippers drank at the break of day. 

To shrive ;heir souls ere they join'd in the fray. 

Still a few drops within it lay ; 

And round the sacred table glow 

Twelve lofty lamps, in splendid row, 

From the purest metal cast ; 

A spoil — the richest, and the last. 

XXXIII. 

So near they came, the nearest stretch'd 
To grasp the spoil he almost reach'd, 

When old Minotti's hand 
Touch'd with the torch the train — 

'T is fired ! 
Spire, vaults, the shrine, the spoil, the slain, 
The turban'd victors, the Christian band, 
All that of living or dead remain, 
Hurl'd on high with the shiver'd fane, 

In one wild roar expired ! 
The shattered town — the walls thrown down— 
The waves a moment backward bent— 
The lulls that shake, although unrent, 

As if an earthquake pass'd — 
The thousand shape'ess things all driven 
In cloud and flame athwart the heaven, 

By that tremendous blast — 
Proclaim'd the desperate conflict o'er 
On that too-long afflicted shore : 
Up to the sky like rockets go 
All that mingled there below : 
Many a tall and goodly man, 
Scorch'd and shrivell'd to a span, 
When he fell to earth again, 
Like a cinder strew'd the plain : 
Down the ashes shower like rain ; 
Some fell in the gulf, which received the sprinkles 
With a thousand circling wrinkles ; 
Some fell on the shore, but, far away, 
Scatter'd o'er 'he isthmus lav ; 
Christian or Moslem, which be they? 
Let their mothers see and sav ! 
When in cradled rest they lay, 
And each nursing-mother smiled 
On the sweet sleep of her child, 
Little deem'd she such a day 
Would rend those tender limbs away. 
Not the matrons that them bore 
Could discern their offspring mere ; 
That one moment left no trace 
More of human form or face, 
Save a scatter'd scalp or bone : 
And down came blazing rafters, strown 
Around, and many a falling stone, 
Deeply muted in the clay, 
All blacken'd there an 1 reeking lay. 
All the living things that heard 
That deadly carih-shock disappeared : 
The wild birds Hew, the wild dogs Bed) 
And howling left the unburicd dead; 
The camels from their keepers broke ; 
The distant steer fo Book the yoke — 
The nearer steed plunged o'er the plain, 
And burst his girth, and tore his rein; 
V 31 



The bull-frog's note, from out the marsh, 
Deep-mouth'd arose, and doubly harsh ; 
The wolves yell'd on the cavem'd hill, 
Where echo roll'd in thunder still ; 
The jackal's troop, in gather'd cry, 10 
Bay'd from afar complainingly, 
With a mi.\\l and mournful sound, 
Like crying babe and beaten hound: 
With sudden wing and ruffled breast, 
The eagle left his rocky nest, 
And mounted nearer to the sun, 
The clouds beneath hkn seem'd so dun ; 
Their smoke assail'd his startled beak, 
And made him higher soar and shriekt— 
Thus was Corinth lost and won! 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 193, line 38. 
The Turcoman hath left his herd. 
The life of the Turcomans is wandering and patri 
archal : they dwell in tents. 

Note 2. Page 193, line 96. 
Coumourgi — he whose closing scene. 

Ali Coumourgi, the favourite of three sultans, and 
Grand Vizier to Achmet III. after recovering Pelopon- 
nesus from the Venetians, in one campaign, was mor- 
tally wounded in the next, against the Germans, at the 
battle of Peterwaradin (in the plain of Carlowitz), is 
Hungary, endeavouring to rally his guards. He died 
of his wounds next day. His last order was the de 
capitation of General Breuner, and some other Ger 
man prisoners ; and his last words, " Oh that I could 
thus serve all the Christian do«s !" a speech and act 
not unlike one of Caligula. He was a young man of 
great ambition and unbounded presumption: on being 
told that Prince Eugene, then opposed to him, "was 
a great general," he said, " I shall become a greater, 
and at his expense." 

Note 3. Page 196, line 31. 
There shrinks no ebb in th'it tideless sea. 

The reader need hardly be reminded that there are 
no perceptible tides in the Mediterranean. 

Note 4. Page 196, line 65. 
And their while tusks cruncli'd o'er the whiter skull. 
This spectacle I have seen, such as described, be- 
neath the wall of the Seraglio at Constantinople, in the 
little cavities worn by the Bosphorus in the lock, a 
narrow terrace of which projects between the wall and 
the water. I think the fact is also mentioned in Hob- 
house's Travels. The bodies were pi obably those of 
some refractory Janizaries. 

Note 5. Page 196, line 7t. 
And each scalp had a single long tuft of hail 
This tuft, or long lock, is left from a superstition that 
Mahomet will draw them into paradise by it. 

Note 6. Page 197, line 5. 

I must here acknowledge a close, though taliisten 

tional, resemblance in th, c twelve lines to a passage in 

an unpublished poem of N . Coleridge, called " Cins- 

iabel." It was not till ah. - these lines were written 



202 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



that I heard that wild and singularly original and beau- 
tiful poena recited ; and the MS. of that production I 
never saw till very recently, by the kindness of Mr. 
Coleridge himself, who, I hope, is convinced that I have 
not been a wilful plagiarist. The original idea undoubt- 
edly pertains to Mr. Coleridge, whose poem has been 
composed above fourteen years. Let me conclude by a 
hope, that he will not longer delay the publication of a 
production, of which I can only add my mite of appro- 
Dation to the applause of far more competent judges. 
Note 7. Page 198, line S. 
There is a light cloud by the moon. 
I have been told that the idea expressed from lines 
598 to 603, have been admired by those whose appro- 
bation is valuable. I am glad of it : but it is not ori- 
ginal — at least not mine ; it may be found much better 
expressed in pages 182-3-4, of the English version of 
" Vathek" (I forget the precise page of the French), a 



work to which I have before referred ; and never recur 
to, or read, without a renewal of gratification. 

Note 8. Page 198, line 48. 
The horse-tails are pluck'd from the ground, and the eword. 
The horse-tail, fixed upon a lance, a pacha's standard. 

Note 9. Page 199, line 45. 
And since the day, when in tho strait. 
In the naval battle at the mouth of the Dardanelles, 
between the Venetians and the Turks. 

Note 10. Page 201, line G8. 
The jackal's troop in gather'd cry. 
I believe I have taken a poetical license to transplant 
the jackal from Asia. In Greece I never saw nor heard 
these animals ; but among the ruins of Ephesus I have 
heard them by hundreds. They haunt ruins, and fol- 
low armies. 



^arising* 

TO SCROPE BERDMORE DAVIES, ESQ. 

THE FOLLOWING POEM IS INSCHIBED, 
BY OXF WHO HAS LONG ADMIRED HIS TALENTS, AND VALUED HIS FRIENDSHIP. 
January 22, 1816. 



ADVERTISEJIENT. 



Hie following poem is grounded on a circumstance 
mentioned in Gibbon's " Antiquities of the House of 
Brunswick." — I am aware that in modern times the 
delicacy or fastidiousness of the reader may deem 
such subjects unlit for the purposes of poetry. The 
Greek dramatists, and some of the best of our old 
English writers, were of a different opinion : as Al- 
ficri and Schiller have also been, more recently, upon 
the continent. The following extract will explain the 
facts on which the story is founded. The name of 
Azo is substituted for Nicholas, as more metrical. 
" Under the reign of Nicholas III, Ferrara was pol- 
luted with a domestic tragedy. By the testimony of an 
attendant, and his own observation, the Marquis of 
Este discovered the incestuous loves of his wife Pari- 
sina, and Hugo his bastard son, a beautiful and valiant 
youth. They were beheaded in the castle by the sen- 
tence of a father and husband, who published his shame, 
and survived their execution. He was unfortunate, if 
Ihey were guilty; if they were innocent, he was still 
more unfortunate ; nor is there any possible situation in 
which I can sincerely approve the last act of the justice 
of a parent." — Gibbon's Miscellaneous Works, vol. 3, 
p. 470, new edition. 



PARISINA. 



it is the hour .vhen from the boughs 
The nightingale's nigh note is heard; 



It is the hour when lovers' vows 

Seem swtet in every whisper'd word ; 
And gentle winds, and waters near, 
Make music to the lonely ear. 
Each flower the dews have lightly wet, 
And in the sky the stars are met, 
And on the wave is deeper blue, 
And on the leaf a browner hue, 
And in the heaven that clear obscure, 
So softly dark, and darkly pure, 
Which follows the decline of day, 
As twilight melts beneath the moon away. 1 

II. 

But it is not to list to the waterfall 
That Parisina leaves her hall, 
And it is not to gaze on the heavenly light 
That the lady walks in the shadow of night ; 
And if she sits in Este's bower, 
'T is not for the sake of its full-blown flower- 
She listens — but not for the nightingale — 
Though her ear expects as soft a tale. 
There glides a step through the foliage thick, 
And her cheek grows pale — and her heart beats quick, 
There whispers a voice thronoh the rustling leaves, 
And her blush returns, and her bosom heaves : 
A moment more — and they shall meet — 
'T is pas'. — her lover 's at her feet. 

III. 

And what unto them is the world beside, 
With all its change of time and tide ? 
Its living things — its earth and sky — 
Are nothing to their mind and eye. 



PARISINA. 



203 



And heedless as the dead are they 

Of aught around, above, beneath ; 
As if all else had pass'd away, 

They only for each other breathe ; 
Their very sighs are full of joy 

So deep, that, did it not decay, 
That happy madness would destroy 

The hearts which feel its fiery sway : 
Of guilt, of peril, do they deem 
In that tumultuous tender dream? 
Who that have felt that passion's power, 
Or paused, or fear'd in such an hour, 
Or thought how brief such moments last? 
But yet — they are already past! 
Alas ! we must awake before 
We know such visions come no more. 

IV. 

With many a lingering look they leave 

The spot of guilty gladness past ; 
And though they hope, and vow, they grieve, 

As if that parting were the last. 
The frequent sigh — the long embrace — 

The lip that there would cling for ever, 
While gleams on Parisina's face 

The Heaven she fears will not forgive her, 
As if each calmly conscious star 
Beheld her frailty from afar — 
The frequent sigh, the long embrace, 
Yet binds them to their trysting-place. 
But it must come, and they must part 
In fearful heaviness of heart, 
With all the deep and shuddering chill 
Which follows fast the deeds of ill. 

V. 

And Hugo is gone to his lonely bed, 

To covet there another's bride ; 
But she must lay her conscious head 

A husband's trusting heart beside. 
But fever'd in her sleep she seems, 
And red her cheek with troubled dreams, 

And mutters she in her unrest 
A name she dare not breathe by day, 

And clasps her lord unto the breast 
Which pants for one away : 
And he to that embrace awakes, 
And, happy in the thought, mistakes 
That dreaming sigh, and warm caress, 
For such as he was wont to bless ; 
And could in very fondness weep 
O'er her who loves him even in sleep. 

VI. 

He clasp'd her sleeping to his heart, 
And listen'd to each broken word : 
He hears — why doth Prince Azo start, 

As if the Archangel's voice he heard 7 
And well he may — a deeper doom 
Could scarcely thunder o'er his tomb, 
When he shall wake to sleep no more, 
And stand the eternal throne before. 
And well he may — his earthly peace 
Upon that sound is doom'd to cease. 
That sleeping whisper of a name 
Bespeaks her guilt and Azo's shame. 



And whose that name ? that o'er his pillow 
Sounds fearful as the breaking billow, 
Which rolls the plank upon the shore, 

And dashes on the pointed rock 
The wretch who sinks to rise no more ; — 

So came upon his soul the shock. 
And whose that name ? 't is Hugo's, — his- 
In sooth he had not deem'd of this ! — 
'T is Hugo's — he, the child of one 
He loved — his own all-evil son — 
The offspring of his wayward youth, 
When he betray'd Bianca's truth, 
The maid whose folly could confide 
In him who made her not his bride. 

VII. 

He pluck'd his poniard in its sheath, 

But sheathed it ere the point was bare— 
Howe'er unworthy now to breathe, 
He could not slay a thing so fair — 
At least, not smiling — sleeping there- 
Nay, more : — he did not wake her then, 
But gazed upon her with a glance 
Which, had she roused her from her trance, 
Had frozen her sense to sleep again — 
And o'er his brow the burning lamp 
Gleam'd on the dew-drops big and damp. 
She spake no more — but still she slumber'd — 
While, in his thought, her days are number'd. 

VIII. 

And with the morn he sought, and found, 

In many a tale from those around, 

The proof of all he fear'd tg know, 

Their present guilt, his future woe ; 

The long-conniving damsels seek 
To save themselves, and would transfer 
The guilt — the shame — the doom to her • 

Concealment is no more — they speak 

All circumstance which may compel 

Full credence to the tale they tell : 

And Azo's tortured heart and ear 

Have nothing more to feel or hear. 

IX. 

He was not one who brook'd delay : 

Within the chamber of his state, 
The chief of Este's ancient sway 

Upon his throne of judgment sate ; 
His nobles and his guards are there, — 
Before him is the sinful pair ; 
Both young — and one how passing fair ! 
With swordless belt, and fetter'd hand. 
Oh, Christ! that thus a son should stand 

Before a father's face ! 
Yet thus must Hugo meet his sire, 
And hear the sentence of his ire, 

The tale of his disgrace ! 
And 3'et he seems not overcome, 
Although, as yet, his voice be dumb. 

X. 

And still, and pale, and silently 

Did Parisina wait her doom ; 
How changed since !ast her speaking e « 

Glanced gladness round the glittering roun. 



204 BYRON'S WORKS. 


Where high-born men were proud to wait — 


But here, upon the earth beneath, 


Where Beauty watch'd to imitate 


There is no spot where thou and I 


Her gentle voice — her lovely inien — 


Together, for an hour, eould breathe: 


And gather from her air and gait 


Farewell ! I will not see thee die. — 


The graces of its queen : 


But thou, frail thins! shall view his head— 


Then, — had her eye no sorrow wept, 


Away! I cannot speak the rest: 


A thousand warriors forth had leapt, 


Go! woman of the wanton breast ; 


A thousand swords had sheathless shone, 


Not I, hut thou his blood dost shed : 


And made her quarrel all their own. 


Go ! if that siolit thou canst outlive. 


Now, — what is she? and what are they? 


And joy thee in the life I give." 


Can she command, or these obey? 


XIII. 


All silent and unheeding now, 


With downcast eyes and knitting brow, 


And here stern Azo hid his face — 


And folded arms, and freezing air, 


For on his brow the swelling vein 


And lips that scarce their scorn forbear, 


Throbb'd as if back upon his brain 


Her knights and dames, her court — is there : 


The hot blood ebb'd and flow'd again ; 


And he, the chosen one, whose lance 


And therefore bow'd lie for a space, 


Had yet been couch'd before her glance, 


And pass'd his shaking hand along 


Who- — were his arm a moment free — 


His eye, to veil it from the throng : 


Had died or gain'd her liberty ; 


While Hugo raised his chained hands, 


The minion of his father's bride, — 


And for a brief delay demands 


Ho, too, is fetter'd by her side ; 

Nor sees her swoln and full eye swim 


His father's ear : the silent sire 


Forbids not what his words require. 


Less for her own despair than him : 


"It is not that I dread the dcatli — 


Those lids — o'er which the violet vain 


For thou hast seen me by thy side 


Wandering, leaves a tender stain, 


Already through the battle ride, 
And that not once a useless brand 


Shining through the smoothest white 


That e'er did softest kiss invite — 


Thy slaves have wrested from my hand, 


Now seem'd with hot and livid glow 


Hath shed more blood in cause of thine, 


To press, not shade, the orbs below; 


Than e'er can stain the axe of mine : 


Which glance so heavily, and fill. 


Thou gavest, and may'st resume my breath, 


As tear on tear grows gathering still. 


A gift for which I thank thee not ; 


XI. 


Nor are my mother's wrongs forgot, 


And he for her had also wept, 


Her slighted love and ruin'd name, 


But for the eyes that on him gazed: 


Her offspring's heritage of shame ; 


His sorrow, if he felt it, slept ; 


But she is in the grave, where he, 


Stern and erect his brow was raised. 


Her son, thy rival, soon shall be. 


Whate'er the grief his soul avow'd, 


Her broken heart — my sever'd head — 


He would not shrink before the crow J ; 


Shall witness for thee from the dead 


But yet he dared not look on her : 
Remembrance of the hours that were — 


How trusty and how tender were 


Thy youthful love — paternal care. 


His guilt — his love — his present state — 


'T is true, that I have done thee wrong — 


His father's wrath — all good men's hate — 


But wrong for wrong — this deem'd thy bride, 


His earthly, his eternal fate — 


The other victim of thy pride, 


And hers, — oh, hers ! — he dared not throw 


Thou know'st for me was destined long. 


One look upon that deathlike brow! 


Thou saw'st, and coveted'st her charms — 


Else had his rising heart betray'd 


And with thy very crime — 1113' birth, 


Remorse for all the wreck it made. 


Thou taunted'st me — as little worth ; 




A match ignoble for her arms, 


XII. 


Because, forsooth, I could not claim 


And Azo spake : — " But yesterday 


The lawful heirship of thy name, 


I gloried in a wife and son ; 


Nor sit on Este's lineal throne : 


I'hat dream this morning pass'd away ; 


Yet, were a few short summers mine, 


Ere day declines, I shall have none. 


My name should more than Este's shine 


My life must linger on alone ; 


Wich honours all my own. 


Well, — let that pass, — there breathes not one 


I had a sword — and have a brcas. 


Who would nut do as I huvc done: 


That should have won as haught 2 a crest 


Those ties are broken — not by me ; 


As ever waved along the line 


Let that too pass ; — the doom's prepared! 


Of all these sovereign sires of thine. 


H igo, the priest awaits on thee, 


Not always knightly spurs are worn 


And then — thy crime's reward ! 


The brightest by the better born ; 


Away ! address thy prayers to Heaven, 


And mine have lanced my courser's (lank 


Before its evening stars are met— 


Before proud chiefs of princely rank, 


l/<"arn if thou there canst be forgiven ; 


When charging to the cheering cry 


Il» mercy may absolve thee yet. 


Of ' Este and of Victory !' 



PARISINA. 



20A 



I will not plead the cause of crime, 
Nor sue thee, to redeem from time 
A few brief hours or days, that must 
At length roll o'er my reckless dust ;— 
Such maddening moments as my past, 
They could not, and they did not, last— 
Albeit my birth and name be base, 
And thy nobility of race 
Disdain'd to deck a thing like me — 

Yet in my lineaments they trace 

Some features of my father's face, 
And in my spirit — all of thee. 
From thee — this tamelessness of heart — 
From thee — nay, wherefore dost thou start ?- 
From thee in all their vigour came 
My arm of strength, my soul of flame — 
Thou didst not give me life alone, 
But all that made me more thine own. 
See what thy guilty love hath done ! 
Repaid thee with too like a son ! 
1 am no bastard in my soul, 
For that, like thine, abhorr'd control : 
And for my breath, that hasty boon 
Thou gavest and wilt resume so soon, 
I valued if. no more than thou, 
When rose thy casque above thy brow, 
And we, all side by side, have striven, 
And o'er the dead our coursers driven: 
The past is nothing — and at last 
The future can but be the past ; 
Yet would I that I then had dioJ : 

For though thou work'dst my mother's ill, 
And made thy own my destined bride, 

I feel thou art my father still ; 
And, harsh as sounds thy hard decree, 
'Tis not unjust, although from thee. 
Begot in sin, to die in shame, 
My life begun and ends the same : 
As err'd the sire, so err'd the son, 
And thou must punish both in one. 
My crime seems worst to human view, 
But God must judge between us two!" 

XIV. 

He ceased — and stood with folded arms, 
On which the circling fetters sounded ; 
And not an ear but felt as wounded, 
Of all the chiefs that there were rank'd 
When those dull chains in meeting clank'd : 
Till Parisina's fatal charms 
Again attracted every eye — 
Would she thus hear him donm'd to die ? 
She stood, I said, all pale and still, 
The living cause of Hugo's ill : 
Her eyes unmoved, but full and wide, 
Not once had turn'd to either side — 
Nor once did those sweet eyelids close, 
Or shade the glance o'er which they rose, 
But round their orbs of deepest blue 
The circling white dilated grew — 
And there with glassy gaze she stood 
As ice were in her curdled blood ; 
But every now and then a tear, 
So large and slowly gather'd, slid 
From the long dark fringe of that fair lid, 
It was a thing to see, not hear ! 
T2 



And those who saw, it did surprise. 
Such drops could fall from human eyes. 
To speak she thought — the imperfect note 
Was chok'd within her swelling throat, 
Yet seem'd in that low hollow groan 
Her whole heart gushing in the tone. 
It ceased — again she thought to speak, 
Then burst her voice in one long shriek, 
And to the earth she fell like stone, 
Or statue from its base o'erthrown, 
More like a thing that ne'er had life, — 
A monument of Azo's wife, — 
Than her, that living guilty thing, 
Whose every passion was a sting, 
Which urged to guilt, but could not bear 
That guilt's detection and despair. 
But yet she lived — and all too soon 
Recover'd from that deathlike swoon- 
But scarce to reason — every sense 
Had been o'erstrung by pangs intense ; 
And each frail fibre of her brain 
(As bow-strings, when relax'd by rain, 
The erring arrow launch aside) 
Sent forth her thoughts all wild and wide — 
The past a blank, the future black, 
With glimpses of a dreary track, 
Like lightning on the desert path, 
When midnight storms are mustering wrath. 
She fear'd — she felt that something ill 
Lay on her soul, so deep and chill — 
That there was sin and shame she knew : 
That some one was to die — but who ? 
She had forgotten: — did she breathe? 
Could this be still the earth beneath? 
The sky above, and men around ; 
Or were they fiends who now so frown'd 
On one, before whose eyes each eye 
Till then had smiled in sympathy? 
All was confused and undefined, 
To her all-jarr'd and wandering mind ; 
A chaos of wild hopes and fears : 
And now in laughter, now in tears, 
But madly still in each extreme, 
She strove with that convulsive dream: 
For so it seem'd on her to break : 
Oh ! vainly must she strive to wake ! 

XV. 

The convent-bells are ringing, 

But mournfully and slow ; 
In the gray square turret swinging, 

With a deep sound, to and fro. 

Heavily to the heart they go! 
Hark! the hymn is singing — 

The song for the dead below, 

Or the living, who shortly shall be soi 
For a departing being's soul 
The death-hymn poa.s, and the hollow bells k».oT5 
He is near his mortal goal ; 
Kneeling at the friar's knee ; 
Sad to hear — and piteous to see — 
Kneeling on the bare cold ground, 
With the block before and the guards around - 
And the In 'ads-man with his bare arm -eadv, 
That the blow may be both swift and steady 



20G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Feels if the axe be sharp and true — 
Since he set its edge anew : 
While the crowd in a speechless circle gather 
To see the son fall by the doom of the father. 

XVI. 
It is a lovely hour as yet 
Before the summer sun shall set, 
Which rose upon that heavy day, 
And mock'd it with his steadiest ray ; 
And his evening beams are shed 
Full on Hugo's fated head, 
As, his last confession pouring 
To the monk his doom deploring, 
In penitential holiness, 
He bends to hear his accents bless 
With absolution such as may 
Wipe our mortal stains away. 
That high sun on his head did glisten 
As he there did bow and listen — 
And the rings of chesnut hair 
Curl'd half down his neck so bare ; 
But brighter still the beam was thrown 
Upon the axe, which near him shone 

With a clear and ghastly glitter 

Oh ! that parting hour was bitter ! 
Even the stern stood chill'd with awe : 
Dark the crime, and just the law- 
Yet they shudder'd as they saw. 

XVII. 

The parting prayers are said and over 

Of that false son — and daring lover! 

His beads and sins are all recounted, 

His hours to their last minute mounted— 

His mantling cloak before was stripp'd, 

His bright brown locks must now be clipp'd ; 

'T is done — all closely arc they shorn — 

The vest which till this moment worn — 

The scarf which Parisina gave — 

Must not adorn him to the grave. 

Even that must now be thrown aside, 

And o'er his eyes the kerchief tied ; 

But no — that last indignity 

Shall ne'er approach his haughty eye. 

All feelings seemingly subdued, 

In deep disdain were half renew'd, 

When heads-man's hands prepared to bind 

Those eyes which would not brook such blind, 

As if they dared not look on death. 

«' No — yours my forfeit blood and breath— 

These hands are chain'd— but let me die 

At least with an unshackled eye — 

Strike :" — and as the word he said, 

Upon the block he bow'd his head ; 

These the last accents Hugo spoke : 

" Strike" — and flashing fell the stroke-- 

Koll'd the head— and, gushing, sunk 

Back the stain'd and heaving trunk, 

In the dust, which each deep vein 

Slaked with its ensanguined rain ; 

His eyes and lips a moment quiver, 

Convulsed and quick — then fix for ever. 

lie died, as erring man should die, 
Without display, without parade ; 



Meekly had he bow'd and pray'd, 

As not disdaining priestly aid, 
Nor desperate of all hope on high. 
And while before the prior kneeling, 
His heart was wean'd from earthly feeiing ; 
His wrathful sire — his paramour — 
What were they in such an hour ? 
No more reproach — no more despair ; 
No thought but heaven — no word but prayer- 
Save the few which from him broke, 
When, bared to meet the heads-man's stroke, 
He claim'd to die with eyes unbound, 
His sole adieu to those around. 

XVIII. 

Still as the lips that closed in death, 

Each gazer's bosom held his breath: 

But yet, afar, from man to man, 

A cold electric shiver ran. 

As down the deadly blow descended 

On him whose life and love thus ended ; 

And with a hushing sound comprest, 

A sigh shrunk back on every breast ; 

But no more thrilling noise rose there, 
Beyond the blow that to the block 
Pierced through with forced and sullen shock, 

Save one : — what cleaves the silent air 

So madly shrill — so passing wild ? 

That, as a mother's o'er her child, 

Done to death by sudden blow, 

To the sky these accents go, 

Like a soul's in endless woe. 

Through Azo's palace-laitice driven, 

That horrid voice ascends to heaven, 

And every eye is turn'd thereon ; 

But sound and sight alike are gone! 

It was a woman's shriek — and ne'er 

In madlier accents rose despair ; 

And those who heard it, as it past, 

In mercy wish'd it were the last. 

XIX. 

Hugo is fallen ; and, from that hour, 

No more in palace, hall, or bower, 

Was Parisina heard or seen : 

Her name — as if she ne'er had been — 

Was banish'd from each lip and ear, 

Like words of wantonness or fear ; 

And from Prince Azo's voice, by none 

Was mention heard of wife or sun ; 

No tomb — no memory had they ; 

Theirs was unconsecrated clay ; 

At least the knight's, who died that day. 

But Parisina's fate lies hid 

Like dust beneath the coffin lid: 

Whether in convent she abode, 

And won to heaven her dreary road, 

By blighted and remorseful years 

Of scourge, and fast, and sleepless tears ; 

Or if she fell by bowl or steel, 

For that dark love she dared to feel ; 

Or if, upon the moment smote, 

She died by tortures less remote ; 

Like him she saw upon the block, 

With heart that shared the heads-man's shock. 



PARISINA. 



207 



In qmckeri'd brokenness that came, 
In pity, o'er her shatter'd frame, 
None knew — and none can ever know : 
But whatsoe'er its end below, 
Her life began and closed in woe! 1 



XX. 

And Azo found another bride, 

And goodly sons grew by his side ; 

But none so lovely and so brave 

As him who wither'd in the grave ; 

Or, if they were — on his cold eye 

Their growth but glanced unheeded by, 

Or noticed v> ith a smother'd sigh. 

But never tear his cheek descended, 

And never smile his brow unbended ; 

And o'er that fair broad broA' were wrought 

The intersected lines of thought ; 

Those furrows which the burning share 

Of sorrow ploughs untimely there ; 

Scars of the lacerating mind 

Which the soul's war doth leave behind. 

He was past all mirth or woe : 

Nothing more remain'd below 

But sleepless nights and heavy days, 

A mind all dead to scorn or praise, 

A heart which shunn'd itself — and yet 

That would not yield — nor could forget, 

Which when it least appear'd to melt, 

Intently thought — intensely felt : 

The deepest ice which ever froze 

Can only o'er the surface close — 

The living stream lies quick below, 

And flows — and cannot cease to flow. 

Still was his seal'd-up bosom haunted 

By thoughts which nature hath implanted, 

Too deeply rooted thence to vanish : 

Howe'er our stifled tears we banish, 

When, struggling as they rise to start, 

We check those waters of the heart, 

They are not dried — those tears unshed 

But flow back to the fountain-head, 

And, resting in their spring more pure, 

For ever in its depth endure, 

Unseen, unwept, but uncongeal'd, 

And cherish'd most where least reveal'd. 

With inward starts of feeling left, 

To throb o'er those of life bereft ; 

Without the power to fill again 

The desert gap which made his pain ; 

Without '.he hope to meet them where 

United souls shall gladness share, 

With all the consciousness that he 

Had only pass'd a just decree ; 

That they had wrought their doom of ill ; 

Yet Azo's age was wretched still. 

The tainted branches of the tree, 

If lopp'd with care, a strength may give, 
By which the rest shall bloom and live 
All greenly fresh and wildly free : 
But if the lightning, in its wrath, 
The waving boughs with fury scathe, 
The massy trunk the ruin feels, 
And r»"er more a leaf reveals. 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 202, line 14. 

As twilight melts beneath the moon away. 

The lines contained in section I. were printed as set 

to music some time since : but belonged to the poem w here 

they now appear, the greater part of which was composed 

prior to " Lara," and other compositions since published. 

Note 2. Page 201, line 117. 

That should have; won as haught u crest. 

Haught — haughty : — 

"Away haught man, thou art insulting me." 
Shakspeare: Richard II. 
Note 3. Page 207, line 5. 
Her life began and closed in woe. 

" This turned out a calamitous year for the people ot 
Ferrara, for there occurred a very tragical event in the 
court of their sovereign. Our annals, both printed and 
in manuscript, with the exception of the unpolished and 
negligent work of Sardi, and one other, have given the 
following relation of it, from which, however, are re- 
jected many details, and especially the narrative of 
Bandelli, who wrote a century afterwards, and who 
does not accord with the cotemporary historians. 

" By the above-mentioned Stella dell' Assassino, the 
Marquis, in the year 1405, had a son called Ugo, a beau- 
tiful and ingenuous youth. Parisina Malatesta, second 
wife of Niccolo, like the generality of step-mothers, 
treated him with little kindness, to the infinite regret ol 
the Marquis, who regarded him with fond partiality. 
One day she asked leave of her husband to undertake a 
certain journey, to which he consented, but upon con- 
dition that Ugo should bear her company ; for he hoped 
by these means to induce her, in the end, to lay aside the 
obstinate aversion which she had conceived against him. 
And indeed his intent was accomplished but too well, 
since, during the journey, she not only divested herself 
of all her hatred, but fell into the opposite extreme. 
After their return, the Marquis had no longer any occa- 
sion to renew his former reproofs. It happened one day 
that a servant of the Marquis, named Zoese, or, as some 
call him, Giorgio, passing before the apartments of 
Parisina, saw going out from them one of her chamber- 
maids, all terrified and in tears. Asking the reason, she 
told hiin that her mistress, for some slight offence, had 
been beating her ; and, giving vent to her rage, she 
added, that she could easily be revenged, if she chose to 
make known the criminal familiarity which subsisted 
between Parisina and her step-son. The servant took 
note of the words, and related them to his master. He 
was astounded thereat, but, scarcely believing his ears, 
he assured himself of the fact, alas ! too clearly, on the 
18th of May, by looking through a hole made in the 
ceiling of his wife's chamber. Instantly he broke into 
a furious rage, and arrested both of them, together with 
Aldobrandino Rangoni, of Modena, her gentleman, and 
also, as some say, two of the women of her chamber, 
as abettors of this sinful act. He ordered them to be 
brought to a hasty trial, desiring the judges to pronounce 
sentence, in the accustomed forms, up^n tho culprits. 
This sentence was death. Some there were that bestirred 
themselves in favour of the delinquents, and, amongst 
others, Ugoccion Contrario, who was all-powerful with 
Niccolo, and also his aged and much-deserving rphiifitei 



208 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Alberto dal Sale. Both of these, their tears flowing 
down their cheeks, and upon their knees, implored him 
for mercy: adducing whatever reason they could sug- 
gest for sparing the offenders, besides those motives of 
honour and decency which might persuade him to con- 
ceal from the public so scandalous a deed, liut his rage 
made him inflexible, and, on the instant, he commanded 
that the sentence should be put in execution. 

"It was, then, in (he prisons of the castle, and 
exactly in those frightful dungeons which are seen at 
this day beneath the chamber called the Aurora, at the 
foot of the Lion's lower, at the top of the street Giovecca, 
that on the night of the twenty-first of May, were be- 
headed, first, Ugo, and afterwards Parisina. Zoese, he 
that accused her, conducted the latter under his arm to the 
place of punishment. She, all along, fancied that she 
was to be thrown into a pit, and asked, at every step, 
whether she was yet come to the spot ? she was told 
that her punishment was the axe. She inquired what 
was become of Ugo, and received for answer, that he 
was already dead : at the which, sighing grievously, she 
exclaimed, " Now, then, I wish not myself to live;" and 
being come to the block, she dripped herself wilh her 
own hands of all her ornaments, and, wrapping a cloth 
round her head, submitted to the fatal stroke which 
terminated the cruel scene. The same was done with 
Rangoni, who, together with the others, according to 
two calendars in the library of St. Francesco, was buried 
in the cemetery of that convent. Nothing else is known 
respecting the women. 

"The Marquis kept watch the whole of that dreadful 
night, and, as he was walking backwards and forwards, 
inquired of the captain of the castle if Ugo was dead 



yet? who answered him, Yes. He then gave himself 
up to the most desperate lamentations, exclaiming, 
" Oh ! that I too were dead, since I have been hurried on 
to resolve thus against my own Ugo !" And then gnaw- 
ing with his teeth a cane which he had in his hand, he 
passed the rest of the night in sighs and in tears, calling 
frequently upon his own dear Ugo. On the following 
day, calling i-o mind that it would be necessary to make 
public his justification, seeing that the transaction could 
not be kept secret, he ordered the narrative to be drawn 
out upon paper, and sent it to all the courts of Italy. 

" On receiving this advice, the Doge of Venice, Fran- 
cesco Foscari, gave orders, but without publishing his 
reasons, that slop should be put to the preparations for a 
tournament, which under the auspices of the Marquis, 
and at the expense of the city of Padua, was about to 
take place in the square of St. Mark, in order to cele- 
brate his advancement to the ducal chair. 

"The Marquis, in addition to what he had already 
done, from some unaccountable burst of vengeance, 
commanded that as many of the married women as were 
well known to him to be faithless, like his Parisina, 
should, like her, be beheaded. Amongst others, Barba- 
rina, or, as some call her, Laodamia Romei, wife of the 
court judge, underwent this sentence, at the usual place 
of execution, that is to say, in the quarter of St. Giacomo, 
opposite the present fortress, beyond St. Paul's. It can- 
not be told how strange appeared this proceeding in a 
prince, who, considering his own disposition, should, as 
it seemed, have been in such cases most indulgent. 
Some, however, there were, who did not fail to commend 
him." 1 

1 Frizzi— History of Ferrara. 



Kilt ^vwmnv of CluUcw* 



SONNET ON CHILLON. 



Eternal spirit of the chainless mind! 
Brightest in dungeons, Liberty ! thou art, 
For there thy habitation is the heart — 

The heart which love of thee alone can bind ; 

And when thy sons to fetters are consign'd — 
To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, 
Their country conquers with their martyrdom, 

And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. 

Chillon ! thy prison is a holy place, 

And thy sad floor an altar — for 't was trod, 

Until his very steps have left a trace 

Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, 

By Bonnivard!' — May none those marks efface ! 
Fjr they appeal from tyranny to God. 



PRISONER OF CHILLON 



i. 

My hair is gray, but not with years, 

.Nor grew it white 

In a single night, 2 
As men's have grown from sudden fears: 



My limbs are bow'd, though not with toil, 

But rusted with a vile repose, 
For they have been a dungeon's spoil, 

And mine has been the fate of those 
To whom the godly earth and air 
Are bann'd, and barr'd — forbidden fare ; 
But this was for my father's faith 
I sutler' d chains and courted death ; 
That father perish'd at the stake 
For tenets he would not forsake ; 
And for the same his lineal race 
In darkness found a dwelling-place ; 
W e were seven — who now are one, 

Six in youth, and one in age, 
Finish'd as they had begun, 

Proud of persecution's rage ; 
One in fire, and two in field, 
Their belief with blood have seal'd ; 
Dying as their father died, 
For the God their foes denied ; 
Three were in a dungeon cast, 
Of whom this wreck is left the last. 

II. 

There are seven pillars of Gothic mould, 
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old ; 
There are seven columns, massy and gray, 
Dim with a dull imprison'd ray, 



f 


THE PRISONER OF CIIILLON. 209 


A sunbeam which hath lost its way, 


V. 




And through ilie crevice and the cleft 


The other was as purr of mind, 




Of ihe thick wall is fallen and left ; 


But form'd to combat with Ins kind : 




Creeping o'er the floor so damp, 


Strong in Ins franle, and of a mood 




Like a marsh's meteor lamp : 


Which 'gainst the world in war had stood, 




And m each pillar there is a ring, 


And perish'd in the foremost rank 




And in each ring there is a chain; 


With joy: — but no! in chains to pine; 




That iron is a cankering thing, 


His spirit wither'd v>ith their clank, 




For in these limbs its teeth remain, 


I saw it silently decline — 




With marks that will not wear away, 


And so perchance in sooth did mine; 




Till I have done with this new day, 


But yet I forced it on 1,. cheer 




Which now is painful to these eyes, 


Those relics of a home so dear. 




Which have not seen the sun so rise 


He was a hunter of the lulls, 




For years — I cannot count them o'er, 


Had follow'd there the deer and wolf; 




I lost their long and heavy score, 


To him this dungeon was a gulf, 




When my last brother droop'd and died, 


And fetter'd feet the worst of ills. 




And 1 lay living by his side. 


VI. 




III. 


Lake Lcman lies by Chillon's walls : 




They chain'd us each to a column stone, 


A thousand feet in depth !•< low 




And we were three — yet, each alone ; 


Its massy waters meet and flow ; 




We could not move a single pace, 


Thus much the fathom-line was sent 




We could not see each other's face, 


From Chillon's snow-white battlement,' 




But with that pale and livid light 


Which round about the wave enthrals: 




That made us strangers in our sight : 


A double dungeon wall and wave 




And thus together — yet apart, 


Have made — and like a living grave. 




Fetter'd in hand, but pined in heart ; 


Below the surface of the lake 




'T was still some solace in the dearth 


The dark vault lies wherein we lav, 




Of the pure elements of earth, 


We heard it ripple night and dav, 




To hearken to each other's speech, 


Sounding o'er our heads it knock'd ; 




And each turn comforter to each, 


And I have felt the winter's spray 




With some new hope, or legend old, 


Wash through the bars when winds were h'gh 




Or song heroically bold ; 


And wanton in the happy sky : 




But even these at length grew cold. 


And then the very rock hath rock'd, 




Our voices took a dreary tone, 


And I have felt it shake unshock'd, 




An echo of the dungeon-stone, 


Because I could have smiled to see 




A grating sound — not full and free 


The death that would have set me free. 




As they of yore were wont to be : 






It might be fancy — but to me 


VII. 




They never sounded like our own. 


I said my nearer brother pined, 
I said his mighty heart declined, 




IV. 


He loathed and put awav his food ; 




1 was the eldest of the three, 


It was not that 't was coarse and rude, 




And to uphold and cheer the rest 


For we were used to hunter's fare, 




I ought to do — and did my best — 


And for the like had little care: 




And each did well in his degree. 


The milk drawn from the mountain goat 




The youngest, whom my father loved, 


Was changed for water from the moat ; 




Because our mother's brow was given 


Our bread was such as captives' tears 




To him — with eyes as blue as heaven, 


Have moister.'d many a thousand vears, 




For him my soul was sorely moved ; 


Since man fust pent his fellow-men 




And truly might it be distrest 


Like brutes within an iron den : 




To see such bird in such a nest ; 


But what were these to us or him ? 




For he was beautiful as dav — 


These wasted not his heart or limb ; 




(When day was beautiful to me 


My brother's soui was of that mould 




As to young easdes, being free) — 


Which in a palace had grown cold, 




A polar dav, which will not see 


Had his free breathing been denied 




A sunset till its summer's gone, 


The range of the steep mountain's sido 




Its sleepless summer of long light, 


But why delay the truth? — he died. 




The snow-clad offspring of the sun : 


I saw and could not hold his head, 




And thus he was as pure and bright, 


Nor reach bis dying hand — nor dean, 




And in his natural spirit gay, 


Though hard I strove, but strove in vain, 




With tears for nought but others' ills, 


To rend and gnash my bonds in twain. 




And then they flow'd like mountain rills, 


He died — and they uclock'd his chain, 




Unless he could assuage the woe 


And scoop'd for him a shallow grave 




Which he abhorr'd to view below. 


Even from the cold earth of our rave 


■ 


32 





I begg'd them, as a boon, to lay 
His corse in dust whereon the day 
Might shine — it was a foolish thought, 
But when within ray brain it wrought, 
That even in death his free-horn breast 
In such a dungeon could not rest. 
I might have spared my idle prayer — 
They coldly laugh'd — and laid him there : 
The fiat and turfh ss earth above 
The being we ao much did love ; 
His empty chain above it leant, 
Such murder's fitting monument ! 

VIII. 

But he, the favourite and the flower, 

Most cherish'd since his natal hour, 

His mother's image in fair face, 

The infant love of all his race, 

His martyr'd father's dearest thought, 

My latest care, for whom I sought 

To hoard my life, that his might be 

Less wretched now, and one day free ; 

He, too, who yet had held untired 

A spirit natural or inspired — 

He, too, was struck, and day by day 

Was wither'd on the stalk away. 

Oh God ! it is a fearful thing 

To see the human soul take wing 

In any shape, in any mood: — 

I 've seen it rushing forth in blood, 

I 've seen it on the breaking ocean 

Strive with a swoln convulsive motion, 

I 've seen the sick and ghastly bed 

Of sin delirious with its dread : 

But these were horrors — this was woe 

Unmix'd with such — but sure and slow: 

He faded, and so calm and meek, 

So soflly worn, so sweetly weak, 

So tearless, yet so tender — kind, 

And grieved for those he left behind ; 

With all the while a cheek whose bloom 

Was as a mockery of the tomb, 

Whose tints as gently sunk away 

As a departing rainbow's ray — 

An eye of most transparent light, 

That almost made the dungeon bright, 

And not a word of murmur — not 

A groan o'er his untimely lot, — 

A little talk of better days, 

A little hope my own to raise, 

For I was sunk in silence — lost 

In this | ast loss, of all the most ; 

And then the sighs he would suppress 

Of fainting nature's feebleness 

More slowly drawn, grew less and less: 

I hslen'd, but I could not hear — 

I call'd, for I was wild with fear ; 

I knew 'twas hopeless, but my dread 

Would not be thus admonished ; 

1 ca'I'd, and thought I heard a sound — 

1 bunt my chain with one strong bound, 

And rush'd to him : — I found him not, 

/ only stirr'd in this black spot, 

I only lived — / only drew 

Tnc accursed breath of dungeon dew ; 



The last — the sole — the dearest link 
Between me and the eternal brink, 
Which bound me to my failing race, 
Was broken in this fatal place. 
One on the earth, and one beneath, — 
My brothers — both had ceased to breathe: 
I took that hand which lay so still, 
Alas ! my own was full as chill ; 
1 had not strength to stir, or strive, 
But felt that I was still alive — 
A frantic feeling when we know 
That what we love shall ne'er be so. 

I know not why 

I could not die, 
I had no earthly hope — but faith, 
And that forbade a selfish death. 

IX. 

What next befell me then and there 

I know not well — I never knew — 

First came the loss of light, and air, 

And then of darkness too ; 
I had no thought, no feeling — none — 
Among the stones I stood a stone, 
And was, scarce conscious what I wist, 
As shrubless crags within the mist ; 
For all was blank, and bleak, and gray- 
It was not night — it was not day, 
It was not even the dungeon-light, 
So hateful to my heavy sight, 
l?ut vacancy absorbing s' u ice, 
And fixedness — without a place ; 
There were no stars — no earth — no time — 
No check — no change — no good — no ciime— 
But silence, and a stirless breath 
Which neither was of life nor death ; 
A sea of stagnant idleness, 
Blind, boundless, mute, and motionkss! 

X. 

A light broke in upon my brain, 

It was the carol of a bird ; 
It ceased, and then it came again, 

The sweetest song ear ever heard, 
And mine was thankful till my eves 
Ran over with the glad surprise, 
And they that moment could not see 
I was the mate of misery ; 
But then by dull degrees came back 
My senses to their wonted track, 
I saw the dungeon walls and floor 
Close slowly round me as before, 
I saw the glimmer of the sun 
Creeping as it before had done, 
Hut through the crevice where it came 
That bird was perch'd, as loud and tame, 

And tamer than upon the tree ; 
A lovely bird, with azure wings, 
And song that said a thousand things, 

And seem'd to say them all for me! 
I never saw its like before, 
I ne'er shall see its likeness more : 
It seem'd like me to want a mate, 
But was not half so desolate, 
And it was come tc*love me when 
None lived to love me so again, 



THE PRISONER OF CHILLON. 



211 



And cheering from my dungeon's brink, 
Had brought me back to feel and think. 
I know not if it late were free, 

Or broke its cage to perch on mine, 
But knowing well captivity, 

Sweet bird ! I could not wish for thine ! 
Or if it were, in winged guise, 
A visitant from Paradise ; 
For — Heaven forgive that thought ! the while 
Which made me both to weep and smile ; 
I sometimes deem'd that it might be 
My brother's soul come down to mo ; 
But then at last away it flew, 
And then 't was mortal — well I knew, 
For he would never thus have flown, 
And left me twice so doubly lone, — 
Lone — as the corse within its shroud, 
Lone — as a solitary cloud, 

A single cloud on a sunny day, 
While all the rest of heaven is clear, 
A frown upon the atmosphere, 
That hath no business to appear 

When skies are blue, and earth is gay. 

XI. 

A kind of change came in mv fate, 
My keepers grew compassionate ; 
I know not what had made thorn so, 
They were inured to sights of woe, 
But so it was : — my broken chain 
With links unfastcn'd did remain, 
And it was liberty to stride 
Along my cell from side to side, 
And up and down, and then athwart, 
And tread it over every part ; 
And round the pillars one by one, 
Returning where my walk begun, 
Avoiding only, as I trod, 
My brothers' graves without a sod ; 
For if I thought with heedless tread 
My step profaned their lowly bed, 
My breath came gaspingly and thick, 
And my crush'd heart fell blind and sick. 

XII. 

I made a footing in the wall, 

It was not therefrom to escape, 
For I had buried one and all, 

Who loved me in a human shape ; 
And the whole earth would henceforth be 
A wider prison unto mc : 
No child — no sire — no kin had I, 
No partner in my misery ; 
I thought of this, and I was glad, 
For thought of them had made mc mad ; 
But I was curious to ascend 
To my barr'd windows, and to bend 
Once more upon the mountains high, 
The quiet of a loving eye. 

XIII. 

I saw them — and they were the same, 
They were not changed like me in frame ; 
I saw their thousand years of snow 
On high — then wide long lake below, 
And the blue. Rhone in fullest flow j 



I heard the torrents leap and gush 
O'er channell'd rock and broken bush; 
I saw the whitc-wall'd distant town, 
And whiter sails go skimming down ; 
And then there was a little isle, 4 
Which in my very face did Binile, 

The only one in view ; 
A small green isle, it seem'd no more, 
Scarce broader than my dungeon flour, 

But in it there were three tall trees, 
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze, 
And by it there were waters Bowing, 
And on it there were young flowers growing. 

Of gemle breath and hue. • 

The fish swain by the castle- wall, 
And they seem'd joyous each and &L ; 
The eagle rode the rising blast, 
Methought he never Hew so fist 
As then to me he seem'd to By, 
And then new tears came in mv eve, 
And I felt troubled — and would fain 
I had not left my recent chain ; 
And when I di I deaeend again, 
The darkness of mv dim abode 
Fell on me as a heavy load ; 
It was as is a new-dug <;r;ive, 
Closing o'er one we sought to save, 
And yet my glance, too much oppvest, 
Had almost need of such a rest. 

XIV. 

It might be months, or years, or days, 

I kept no count — I took no note, 
I had no hope my eyes to raise, 

Arid clear them of their dreary mote, 
At last men came to set me free, 

I ask'd not why, and reck'd not when 
It was at length the same to me, 
Fetter'd or fetterless to be — 

I leam'd to love despair. 
And thus when they appear'd at lai 
And all my bonds aside were cast, 
These heavy walls to me had grown 
A hermitage — and all my own! 
And half 1 felt as they were come 
To tear me from a second home : 
With spiders I had friendship made, 
And watch'd them in their sullen trade, 
Had seen the mice by moonlight play, 
And whv should I feel less than tlicv .' 
We were all inmates of one place, 
And I, the monarch of each race, 
Had power to kill — vet, strange te tell! 
In <]uiet we had learn'd to dwell — 
My very chains and I jrew friends, 
So much a long communion lends 
To make us what we are : — even 1 
Regain'd my freedom with a sigh. 



iC 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 208, Sonnet, line 13. 
By Honnivurd ! — may none those murks efface 
Francois do Konnivard, fils dc Louis de Bonnivaej. 
originaire de Seyssel et Seigneur de Lunes, nauuit <?r> 



?S2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



1496; il fit ses etudes & Turin. En 1510 Jean- Aime 
de Bonnivard, son onclc, lui resigna lc Prieure de Saint- 
Victor, qui aboutissait aux murs de Geneve, et qui 
f irmait un benefice considerable. 

Ce grand hoinme (Bonnivard merite ce titre par la 
force de son ame, la droiture de son cceur, la noblesse 
de ses intentions, la sagcssc de ses conseils, le courage 
de ses demarches, l'etendue de ses connaissances, et la 
vivaeite de son esprit), ce grand hommc, qui excitera 
['admiration de tous ceux qu'une vertu heroiquc peut 
encore emouvoir, inspirera encore la plus vive recon- 
naissance dans les occurs des Genevois qui aiment Ge- 
neve. Bonnivard en fut toujours un des plus formes 
appuis: pour assurer la liberie de notre Republique, il 
ne craignit pas de perdre souvent la sienne ; il oublia 
son repos ; il meprisa ses richesses ; il ne negligea rien 
pour affermir le bonheur d'une patrie qu'il bonora de son 
cboix : des ce moment il la cherit corame le plus zele 
de ses citoyens ; il la servit avec l'intrepidite d'un heros, 
et il ecrivait son histoire avec la naivete d'un philosophe 
et la chaleur d'un patriote. 

II dit dans le commencement de son histoire de Ge- 
neve, que, des qu'il eut commence de lire C histoire den 
nations, il se scntii entraxni ■par son gout pour les rt- 
publiques, dont il ipimsa toujours les intercts : c'est ce 
gout pour la liberte qui lui fit sans doute adopter Ge- 
neve pour sa patrie. 

Bonnivard, encore jeune, s'annoneahautementcomme 
le defenseur de G eneve contre le Due de Savoye et 
l'evOque. 

En 1519 Bonnivard devint le martyr de sa patrie: le 
Due de Savoye etant entre dans Geneve avec cinq cents 
homtnes, Bonnivard craignit le ressentiment du due ; il 
voulut se retirer a Fribourg pour en eviter les suites ; 
niais il futtrahi par deux hommesqui l'accompagnaient, 
et. conduit par ordre du prince a Grolee, ou il resta pri- 
sonnier pendant deux ans. Bonnivard etait malheureux 
dans ses voyages ; coinme ses malhcurs n'avaient point 
ralenti son zele pour Geneve, il etait toujours un ennemi 
redoutable pour ceux qui la menacaient, et par conse- 
quent il devait etre expose a leurs coups. II fut ren- 
contre en 1530 sur le Jura, par des voleurs, qui le de- 
pouillerent, et qui le mirent encore entre les mains du 
Due de Savoye : ce prince le fit enfrrmcr dans le cha- 
teau de Chillon, ou il resta sans etre interroge jusqu'en 
1536 ; il fut alorsdelivre par les Bernois, qui s'empare- 
lent du pays de Valid. 

Bonnivard, en sortaut de sa captivite, eut le plaisir de 
liouver Geneve libre et reformce: la republique s'em- 
pressa de lui temoigner sa reconnaissance et de le de- 
dommager des maux qu'il avait soufferts ; elle le recut 
bourgeois dc la ville au mois de Juin 1536; elle lui 
donna la maison habitee autrefois par le Vicaire-Gcn- 
dral, et elle lui assigna line pension de 200 ecus d'or 
tant qu'il sejournerait a Geneve. II fut admis dans le 
Conseil des Dcux-Cents en 1537. 

Bonnivard n'a pas fini d'etre utile : apres avoir tra- 
vaille a rendre Geneve libre, il reussit a la rendre tole- 
tatite. Bonnivard engagea le Conseil a accorder aux 
ecclesiastiques et aux paysans un temps suffisant pour 
examiner les propositions qu'on leur faisait ; il reussit 
pjr sa douceur: on pre'che toujours le christianismc 
kvec succes quand on le preche avec charite. 

Bonnivard fut savant ; ses manuscrits, qui sont dans 
» oibli'itheque pubhque, prouvent qu'il avait bien lu les 



auteufs classiques latins, et qu'il avait approfondi la 
theologie et l'histoire. Ce grand honune aimait les 
science?, et il croyait qu'clles pouvaient faire la gloire 
de Geneve ; aussi il ne negligea rien pour les fixer dans 
cette ville naissante; en 1551 il donna sa bibuolheque 
an public; elle fut le commencement de notre bibbo 
theque publique; et ces livres sont en partie les rares 
et belles editions du quinziemc siecle qu'on voit dans 
notre collection. Enfin, pendant la meme annee, co 
Lou patriote institua la republique son heritiere, a con- 
dition qu'elle emploierait ses biens a entretenir le col- 
lege dont on projetait la fondation. 

II parait que Bonnivard mourut en 1570; maison ne 
peut Passurer, parcequ'il y a une lacune dans le Ne- 
crologe depuis le mois de Juillet 1570 jusqu'en 1571. 
Note 2. Page 208, line 3. 
Jn a single night. 

Ludovico Sforza, and others. — The same is asserted 
of Marie Antoinette's, the wife of Louis XVI., though 
not in quite so short a period. Grief is said to havo 
the same effect: to such, and not to fear, this char go 
in hers was to be attributed. 

Note 3. Page 209, line 81. 
Frons Chillon's snow-wliite battlement. 

The Chateau de Chillon is situated between Clarens 
and Villeneuvc, which last is at one extremity of the 
Lake of Geneva. On its left are the entrances of the 
Rhone, and opposite are the heights of Meillerie and 
the range of Alps above Boveret and St. Gingo. 

Near it, on a hill behind, is a torrent ; below it, 
washing its walls, the lake has been fathomed to the 
depth of SCO feet (French measure) ; within it are a 
range of dungeons, in which the early reformers, and 
subsequently prisoners of state, were confined. Across 
one of the vaults is a beam black with age, on which 
we were informed that the condemned were formerly 
executed. In the cells are seven pillars, or, rather 
eight, one being half merged in the wall ; in some o. 
these are rings for the fetters and the fettered ; in the 
pavement the steps of Bonnivard have left their traces 
— he was confined here several years. 

It is by this castle that Rousseau has fixed the catas- 
trophe of his Heloise, in the rescue of one of her chil- 
dren by Julie from the water: the shock of which, and 
the illness produced by the immersion, is the cause of 
her death. 

The chateau is large, and seen along the lake for r 
great distance. The walls are white. 

Note 4. Page 211, line 65. 
And then there wa9 a little isle. 

Between the entrances of the Rhone ancTVillcneuve, 
not far from Chillon, is a very small island; the only 
one I could perceive, in my voyage round and over the 
lake, within its circumference. It contains a few trees 
(I think not above three), and from its singleness and 
diminutive size, has a peculiar effect upon the view. 

When the foregoing poem was composed, I was not 
sufficiently aware of the history of Bonnivard, or I 
should have endeavoured to dignify the subject by an 
attempt to celebrate his courage and his virtues. Some 
account of his life will be found in a note appended to 
the " Sonnet on Chillon," with which I have been fur- 
nished by the kindness of a citizen of that republic, 
which is still proud of the memory of a man worthy of 
the best age of ancient freedom. 



( 213 ) 



A VENETIAN STORY. 



Rosalind. Farewell, Monsieur Traveller: look you. lisp, and wear strange suits ; disable all the benefits 
of your own country ; be out of love with your nativity, and almost chide (Jod I'm making you that coun- 
tenance you are; or I will scarce think that you have Bwam in a (lomlvLi. 

jls You Like It. Jicl IV. Scene I. 
.In tint at ion of the Commentators. 
That is, been at Venice, which was much visited by the young English gentlemen of those times, and was 
then what Paris is note — the seat, of all dissoluteness. — S. A. 



'T is known, at least it should be, that throughout 
All countries of the Catholic persuasion, 

Some weeks before Shrove-Tuesday comes about, 
The people take their fill of recreation, 

And buy repentance, ere they grow devout, 
However high their rank, or low their station, 

With fiddling, feasting, dancing, drinking, masking, 

Anil other things that may be had for asking. 

II. 

The moment night with dusky mantle covers 
The skies (and the more duskily the better), 

The time less liked by husbands than by lovers 
Begins, and prudery flings aside her fetter; 

And gaiety on restless tiptoe hovers, 
Giggling with all the gallants who beset her ; 

And there are songs and quavers, roaring, humming, 

Guitars, and every other sort of strumming". 

III. 

And there arc dresses splendid, but fantastical, 
Masks of all times and nations, Turks and Jews, 

And harlequins and clowns, with feats gvmnastical, 
Greeks, Romans, Yankee-doodles, and Hindoos; 

All kinds of dress, except the ecclesiastical, 
All people, as their fancies hit, may choose ; 

But no one in these parts may quiz the clergy — 

Therefore take heed, ye freethinkers ! I charge ye. 

IV. 

You'd better walk about begirt with briars, 
Instead of coat and small-clothes, than put on 

A single stitch reflecting upon friars, 
Although you swore it only was in fun ; 

They 'd haul you o'er the coals, and stir the fires 
Of Phlegcthon with every mother's son, 

Nor say one mass to cool the cauldron's bubble 

That boil'd your bones, unless you paid thenj double. 

V. 

But, saving jlhis, you may put on whate'er 

You like, by way of doublet, cape, or cloak, 
Such as in Monmoiith-strcct, or in Rag Fair, 

Would rig you out in seriousness or joke ; 
And even in Italy such places are, 

With prettier names in softer accents spoke, 
For, bating Covent-Garden, I can hit on 
No place that's called "Piazza" in Great Britain. 

w 



VI. 

This feast is named the Carnival, which, being 
Interpreted, implies "farewell to flesh:" 

So call'd, because the name and thing agreeing, 
Through Lent they live on fish both salt and frcsn 

Cut why they usher Lent with so much glee in, 
Is more than I can tell, although I guess 

'T is as we take a glass with friends at parting, 

In the stage-coach or packet, just at starting. 

VII. 

And thus they bid farewell to carnal disnes, 
And solid meats, and highly-spiced ragouts, 

To live for forty days on ill-dressed fishes, 
Because they have no sauces to their stews, 

A thing which causes many "poohs" and "pishes," 
And several oaths (which would not suit the Muse • 

From travellers accustorn'd from a boy 

To eai. their salmon, at the least, with soy ; 

VIII. 

And therefore humbly I would recommend 

" The curious in li.-h-saucc," before they cross 

The sea, to bid their cook, or wife, or friend, 
Walk or ride to the Strand, and buy in gross 

(Or if set out beforehand, these may send 
By any means least liable to loss), 

Ketchup, Soy, Chili-vinegar, and Harvey, 

Or, by the Lord ! a Lent v. ill well nigh starve ye ; 

IX. 

That is to say, if j'our religion's Roman, 
And you at Rome would do as Romans do, 

According to the proverb, — although no man, 
If foreign, is obliged to fast ; and you, 

If Protestant, or sickly, or a woman, 
Would rather dine in sin on a ragout — 

Dine, and be d d ! I don't mean to be coarse, 

But that 's the penalty, to say no worse. 



Of all the places where the Carnival 

Was most facetious in the days of yore, 
For dance and song, and serenaoe, and ha/1, 
v And masque), and mime and mystery, and nor» 
Than I have time to tell now, or at all, 
Venice the bell from every city bore, 
And at '.he moment when I fix my story 
Th;tt sea-born rily was in all her glory. 



214 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XI. 

They 've pretty faces yet, ihose same Venetians, 

Black eyes, arch'd brows, and sweet expressions still, 
Such as of old were copied from the Grecians, 

In ancient arts by moderns mimick'd ill; 
And like so many Venuses of Titian's 

(The best's at Florence — see it, if ye will), 
They look when leaning over the balcony, 
Or stepp'd from out a picture by Giorgione, 

XII. 
Whose tints are truth and beauty at their best; 

And when you to Manfrini's palace go, 
That picture (howsoever fine the rest) 

Is loveliest to my mind of all the show : 
It may perhaps be also to your zest, 

And that's the cause I rhyme upon it so, 
'T is but a portrait of his son, and wife, 
And self; but such a woman ! love in life ! 

xni. 

Love in full life and length, not love ideal, 

No, nor ideal beauty, that fine name, 
But something better still, so very real, 

That the sweet model must have been the same : 
A thing that you would purchase, beg, or steal, 

Wer't not impossible, besides a shame: 
The face recalls some face, as 't were with pain, 
You once have seen, but ne'er will see again : 

XIV. 
One of those forms which flit by us, when we 

Are young, and fix our eyes on every face ; 
And, oh ! the loveliness at times we see 

In momentary gliding, the soft grace, 
The youth, the bloom, the beauty which agree 

In many a nameless being we retrace, 
Whose course and home we knew not, nor shall know, 
Like the lost Pleiad ' seen no more below. 

XV. 
I said that like a picture by Giorgione 

Venetian women were, and so they are, 
Particularly seen from a balcony 

(For beauty's sometimes best set off afar); 
And there, just like a heroine of Goldoni, 

Thev peep from out the blind, or o'er the bar, 
And, truth to say, they 're mostly very pretty, 
And rather like to show it, more's the pity! 

XVI. 

For glances beget ogles, ogles sighs, 

Sighs wishes, wishes words, and words a letter, 
Which flies on wings of light-heel'd Mercuries, 

Who do such things because they know no better ; 
And tnen, God knows what mischief may arise, 

When love links two young people in one fetter, 
Vile assignations, and adulterous beds, 
Elopements, broken vows, and hearts, and heads. 

XVII. 
ShaKspcarc described the sex in Desdemona 

As very fair, but yet suspect in fame, 
And to this day, from Venice to Verona, 

Such matters may be probably the same, 
Except that since those times was never known a 

Husband whom mere suspicion could inflame 
To sulFooaio a wife no more than twenty, 
Because she had a "cavalier servente." 



XVIII. 

Their jealousy (if they are ever jealous) 

Is of a fair complexion altogether, 
Not like that sooty devil of Othello's, 

Which smothers women in a bed of feather, 
But worthier of these much more jolly fellows, 

When weary of the matrimonial tether 
His head for such a wife no mortal bothers, 
But takes at once another, or another's. 

XIX. 
Didst ever see a gondola ? For fear 

You should not, I '11 describe it you exactly ; 
'T is a long cover'd boat that 's common here, 

Carved at the prow, built lightly, but compactly 
Row'd by two rowers, each called " Gondolier," 

It glides along the water looking blackly, 
Just like a cotlin clapt in a canoe, 
Where none can make out what you say or do. 

XX. 
And up and down the long canals they go, 

And under the Rialto shoot along, 
By night and day, all paces, swift or slow, 

And round the theatres, a sable throng, 
They wait in their dusk livery of woe, 

But not to them do woful things belong, 
For sometimes they contain a deal of fun, 
Like mourning coaches when the funeral 's done. 

XXI. 
But to my story 'T was some years ago, 

It may be thirty, forty, more or less, 
The Carnival was at its height, and so 

Were all kinds of buffoonery and dress ; 
A certain lady went to see the show, 

Her real name I know not, nor can guess, 
And so we'll call her Laura, if you please, 
Because it slips into my verse with ease. 

XXII. 
She was not old, nor young, nor at the years 

Which certain people call a "certain age," 
Which yet the most uncertain age appears, 

Because I never heard, nor could engage 
A person yet by prayers, or bribes, or tears, 

To name, define by speech, or write on page, 
The period meant precisely by that word, — 
Which surely is exceedingly absurd. 

XXIII. 
Laura was blooming still, had made the best 

Of time, and time return'd the compliment, 
And treated her genteelly, so that, drest, 

She look'd extremely well where'er she went' 
A pretty woman is a welcome guest, 

And Laura's brow a frown had rarely bent ; 
Indeed she shone all smiles, and seem'd to flattei 
Mankind with her black eyes for looking at her. 

XXIV. 
She was a married woman ; 't is convenient, 

Because in Christian countries 'tis a nue 
To view their little slips with eyes more lenient; 

Whereas if single ladies play the fool, 
(Unless within the period intervenient, 

A well-timed wedding makes the scandal cool v , 
I don't know how they ever can get over it, 
Except they manage never to discover it. 



BEPPO. 



215 



XXV. 

Her husband sail'd upon the Adriatic, 

And made some voyages, too, in other seas, 

And when he lay in quarantine for pratique 
(A forty days' precaution 'gainst disease), 

His wife would mount, at times, her highest attic, 
For thence she could discern the ship with ease : 

He was a merchant trading to Aleppo, 

His name Giuseppe, call'd more briefly, Beppo. 2 

XXVI. 

He was a man as dusky as a Spaniard, 

Sunburnt with travel, yet a portly figure ; 
Though colour'd, as it were, within a tan-yard, 

He was a person both of sense and vigour — 
A better seaman never yet did man yard : 

And slie, although her manners show'd no rigour, 
Was deeni'd a woman of the strictest principle, 
So much as to be thought almost invincible. 

XXVII. 
But several years elapsed since they had met ; 

Some people thought the ship was lost, and some 
That he had somehow biunder'd into debt, » 

And did not like the thoughts of steering home ; 
And there were several otfer'd any bet, 

Or that he would, or that he would not come, 
For most men (till by losing render'd sager) 
Will back their own opinions with a wager. 

XXVIII. 
T is said that their last parting was pathetic, 

As partings often are, or ought to be, 
And their presentiment was quite prophetic 

That they should never more each other see, 
(A sort of morbid feeling, half poetic, 

Which I have known occur in two or three), 
Wher. kneeling on the shore upon her sad knee, 
He left this Adriatic Ariadne. 

XX'X. 
And Laura waited long, and wept a little, 

And thought of wearing weeds, as well she might ; 
She almost lost all appetite for victual, 

And could not skep with ease alone at night ; 
She deem'd the window-frames and shutters brittle 

Against a daring housebreaker or sprite, 
And so she thought it prudent to connect her 
With a vice-husband, chiefly to protect her. 

XXX. 
She chose, (and what is there they will not choose, 

If only you will but oppose their choice?) 
'Till Beppo should return from his long cruise, 

And bid once more her faithful heart rejoice, 
A man some women like, and yet abuse — 

A coxcomb was he by the public voice : 
A count of wealth, they said, as well as quality, 
And in his pleasures of great liberality. 

XXXI. 
And then he was a cot »t, and then he knew 

Music and dancing, liddling, French, and Tuscan; 
The last not easy, be ft known to you, 

For few Italians sM*ik the right Etruscan. 
He was a critic uron operas too, 

And knew all niceties of the sock and buskin ; 
And no Venetian audience could endure a 
Song, scene, or air, when he cried "scccatura." 



XXXII. 

His " bravo" was decisive, for that sound 

Ilush'd " academic" sigh'd in silent awe ; 
The fiddlers trembled as he look'd around, 

For fear of some false note's detected flaw. 
The "prima donna's" tuneful heart would bound, 

Dreading the deep damnation of his " bah!" 
Soprano, basso, even the contra-alto, 
Wish'd him five fathoms under the lliaito. 

XXXIII. 
He patronized the improvvisatori, 

Nay, could himself extemporize some stanzas, 
Wrote rhymes, sang songs, could also tell a story, 

Sold pictures, and was skilful in the dance as 
Italians can be, though in this their glory 

Must surely yield the palm to that which France has ; 
In short, he was a perfect cavaliero, 
And to his very valet seem'd a hero. 

XXXIV. 
Then he was faithful too, as well as amorous ; 

So that no sort of female could complain, 
Although they 're now and then a little clamorous, 

He never put the pretty souls in pain : 
His heart was one of those which most enamour us, 

Wax to receive, and marble to retain. 
He was a lover of the good old school, 
Who still become more constant as they cool. 

XXXV. 
No wonder such accomplishments should turn 

A female head, however sage and steady — 
With scarce a hope that Beppo could return, 

In law he was almost as good as dead, he 
Nor sent, nor wrote, nor show'd the least concern, 

And she had waited several years already ; 
And really if a man won't let us know 
That he 's alive, he 's dead, 0( should be so. 

XXXVI. 
Besides, within the Alps, to every woman 

(Although, God knows, it is a grievous sin), 
'T is, I may say, permitted to have two men ; 

I can't te'l who first brought the custom in, 
But "Cavalier Serventes" are quite common, 

And no one notices, nor cares a pin ; 
And we may call this (not to say the worst) 
A second marriage which corrupts ihe Jirst. 

XXXVII. 
The word was formerly a " Cicisbeo," 

But that is now grown vulgar and indecent ; 
The Spaniards call the person a " Cortejo," 3 

For the same mode subsists in Spain, though reccm. 
In short it reaches from the Po to Teio, 

And may perhaps at last be o'er the sea sent. 
But Heaven preserve Old England from such course* ' 
Or what becomes of damage and divorces? 

XXXVIII. 
However, I still think, with all due deference 

To the fair single part of the creation, 
That married ladies should preserve the preference 

In t?tc-tt-tite or general conversation — 
And this I say without peculiar reference 

To England, France, or any other nation - 
Because they know the world, and are »t ease. 
And being natural, nat'.iral.y please. 



216 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XXXIX. 

Tis true, your budding Miss is very charming, 
But shy and awkward ;ii first coming out, 

So much alann'd, that she is quite alarming, 

All giggle, blush ; — half pertness, and half pout ; 

And glancing at Mamma, fur fear there's harm in 
What you, she, it, or they, may be about, 

The nursery stdl lisps out in all they utter — 

Besides, they always smell of bread and butter. 

XL. 

But " Cavalier Servente" is the phrase 

Used in politest circles to express 
This supernumerary slave, who stays 

Close to the lady as a part of dress, 
Her word the only law which he obeys. 

His is no sinecure, as you may guess ; 
Coach, servants, gondola, he goes to call, 
And carries fan, and tippet, gloves, and shawl. 

XLI. 
With all its sinful doings, I must say, 

That Italy's a pleasant place to me, 
Who love to see the sun shine every day, 

And vines (not nail'd to walls) from tree to tree 
Festoon'd, much like the back scene of a play, 

Or melodrame, which people flock to see, 
When the first act. is ended by a dance 
In vineyards copied from the south of France. 

XLII. 
I like on Autumn evenings to ride out, 

Without being forced to bid my groom be sure 
My cloak is round his middle strapp'd about, 

Because the skies are not the most secure; 
. know too that, if stopp'd upon my route, 

Where the green alleys windingly allure, 
Reeling with grapes red wagons choke the way — 
In England 'twould be dung, dust, or a dray. 

XLIII. 
I also like to dine on becaticas, 

To see the sun set, sure he'll rise to-morrow, 
Not through a misty morning twinkling weak as 

A drunken man's dead eye in maudlin sorrow, 
But with all heaven t' himself; that day will break as 

Beauteous as cloudless, nor be forced to borrow 
That sort of farthing-candle light which glimmers 
Where reeking London's smoky cauldron simmers. 

XLiV. 
I love the language, that soft bastard Latin, 

Which melts like kisses from a female mouth, 
And sounds as if it should be writ on satin, 

With syllables which breathe of the sweet south, 
And gentle liquids gliding all so pat in, 

Tnat not a single accent seems uncouth, 
Line our harsh northern whistling, grunting guttural, 
Which we 're obliged to hiss, and spit, and sputter all. 

XLV. 
I like the women too (forgive my folly), 

Fron. the rich peasant-cheek of ruddy bronze, 
And laige black eyes that flash on you a volley 

Of rays thai say a thousand things at once, 
To the high llama's brow, more melancholy, 

But clear, and with a wild and liquid glance, 
Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes, 
Soft as her clime, a/id sunny as her skies. 



XLVI. 

Eve of the land which still is Paradise! 

Italian beauty ! didst thou not inspire 
Raphael, 4 who died in thy embrace, and vies 

With all we know of heaven, or can desire, 
In what he hath bequeath'd us? — in what guise, 

Though flashing from the fervour of the lyre, 
Would wvrils describe thy past and present glow, 
While yet Canova can create below. * 

XLvn. 

" England ! with all thy faults I love thee still," 

I said at Calais, and have not forgot it ; 
I like to speak and lucubrate my fill ; 

I like the government (but that is not it); 
I like the freedom of the press and quill ; 

I like the Habeas Corpus (when we've got it); 
I like a parliamentary debate, 
Particularly when 'tis not too late ; 

XLVIII. 
I like the taxes, when they 're not too many ; 

I like a sea-coal fire, when not too dear; 
I lite a beef-steak, too, as well as any ; 

Have no objection to a pot of beer, 
I like the weather, when it is not rainy, 

That is, I like two months of every year. 
And so God save the regent, church, and king ! 
Which means that I like all and every thing. 

XLIX. 
Out standing army, and disbanded seamen, 

Poor's rate, reform, my own, the nation's debt 
Our little riots just to show we're freemen, 

Our trifling bankruptcies in the gazette, 
Our cloudy climate, and our chilly women, 

All these I can forgive, and those forget. 
And greatly venerate our recent glories, 
And wish they were not owing to the t'>ries. 

L. 
But to my tale of Laura, — for I find 

Digression is a sin, that by degrees 
Becomes exceeding tedious to my mind, 

And, therefore, may the reader too displease— 
The gentle reader, who may wax unkind, 

And, caring little for the author's ease, 
Insist on knowing what he means, a hard 
And hapless situation for a bard. 

LI. 
Oh ! that I had the art of easy writing 

What should be easy reading ! could I scale 
Parnassus, where the Muses sit inditing 

Those pretty poems never know n to fail, 
How quickly would I print (the world delighting) 

A Grecian, Syrian, or Assyrian tale ; 
And sell you, mix'd with western sentimentalism, 
Some samples of the finest orientalism. 



* JK'ote. 
In talking thus, the writer, mure especially 

Of women, would be understood to say, 
Ho speaks as a spectator, not officially. 

And always, reader, in a modest » ;iy ; 
Perhaps, too, in no very great decree shall Iio 

Appear to have offended in this lay. 
Since, as all know, without the sex, our sonnets 

Would seem annou-h'd like their ft.ntrimnTd bonnets 
/Signed) Printer's Deoil 



BEPPO. 



LII. 

But I am but a nameless sort of person 

(A broken dandy lately on my travels), 
And take for rhyme, to hook mv rambling verse on, 

The first that Walker's Lexicon unravels, 
And when I can't find that, I put a worse on, 

Not caring as 1 ought for critics' cavils ; 
[ 've half a mind to tumble down to prose, 
But verse is more in fashion — so here goes. 

LIII. 
The Count and Laura made their new arrangement, 

Which Listed, as arrangements sometimes do, 
For half a dozen years without estrangement ; 

They had their little differences too ; 
Those jealous whiffs, which never any change meant : 

In such affairs there probably are few 
Who have not had this pouting sort of squabble, 
From sinners of high station to the rabble. 

LIV. 
But on the whole they were a happy pair, 

As happy as unlawful love could make them ; 
The gentleman was fond, the lady fair, 

Their chains so slight, 't was not worth while to break 
them : 
The world beheld them with indulgent air ; 

The pious only wish'd "the devil take them!" 
He took them not ; he very often waits, 
Aiid leaves old sinners to be young ones' baits. 

LV. 
But they were young : Oh ! what without our youth 

Would love be ? What would youth be without love ? 
Youth lends its joy, and sweetness, vigour, truth, 

Heart, soul, and all that seems as from above ; 
But, languishing with years, it grows uncouth — 

One of few things experience don't improve, 
Which is, perhaps, the reason why old fellows 
Arc always so preposterously jealous. 

LVI. 
It was the Carnival, as I have said 

Some six-and-thirty stanzas back, and so 
Laura the usual preparations made, 

Which you do when your mind 's made up to go 
To-night to Mrs. Boehm's masquerade, 

Spectator, or partaker in the show ; 
The only difference known between the cases 
Is — here, we have six weeks of " varnish'd faces." 

LVII. 
Laura, when drest, was (as I sang before) 

A pretty woman as was ever seen, 
Fresh as the angel o'er a new inn-door, 

Or frontispiece of a new magazine, 
With all the fashions which the last month wore, 

Colour'd, and silver paper leaved between 
That and the title-page, for fear the press 
Should soil with parts of speech the parts of dress. 

LVIII. 
They went to the Ridotto ; — 'tis a hall 

Where people dance, and sup, and dance again : 
Its proper name, perhaps, were a mask'd ball, 

But that's of no importance to my strain ; 
'T is (on a smaller scale) like our Yauxhall, 

Excepting that it can't be spoilt by rain: 
The company is "mixt" (the phrase I quote is, 
As much as saying, they 're below your notice), 
w 2 33 



LIX. 

For a "mixt company" implies, that, save 

Yourself and friends, and half a hundred more, 

Whom you may bow to without looking grave, 
The rest are but a vulgar set, the bore 

Of public places, where they basely brave 
The fashionable stare of twenty score 

Of well-bred persons, called ".the world:" but I, 

Although I know them, really don't know why. 

LX. 
This is the case in England ; at least was 

During the dynasty of dandies, now 
Perchance succeeded by some other class 

Of imitated imitators : — how 
Irreparably soon decline, alas! 

The demagogues of fashion : all below 
Is frail ; how easily the world is lost 
By love, or war, and now and then by frost! 

LXI. 
Crush'd was Napoleon by the northern Thor, 

Who knock'd his army down with icy hammer, 
Stopp'd by the element':, like a whaler, or 

A blundering novice in his new French grammar , 
Good cause had he to doubt the chance of war, 

And as for fortune — but I dare not d — n her, 
Because were I to ponder to infinity, 
The more I should believe in her divinity. 

LXII. 
She rules the present, past, and all to be yet, 

She gives us luck in lotteries, love, and marriage ; 
I cannot say that she 's done much for me yet ; 

Not that I mean her bounties to disparage, 
We've not yet closed accounts, and we shall se*: yet 

How much she'll make amends for past miscarriage, 
Meantime the goddess I '11 no more importune, 
Unless to thank her when she's made my fortune. 

LXII1. 

To turn, — and to return ; — the devil tike it, 

This story slips for ever through my fingers, 
Because, just as the stanza likes to make it, 

It needs must be — and so it rather lingers ; 
This form of verse began, I can 't well break it, ■ 

But must keep time and tune like public singers : 
But if I once get through my present measure, 
I '11 take another when I 'm next at leisure. 

LXIV. 
1 They went to the Ridotto — 't is a place 

To which I mean to go myself to-morrow, 
Just to divert my thoughts a little space, 

Because I 'm rather hippi'sh, and may borrcw 
Some spirits, guessing at what kind of face 

May lurk beneath each mas"k, and as my sonow 
Slackens its pace sometimes, I'll mak£, or find 
Something shall leave it half an hour behind. 

LXV. 
Now Laura moves along the joyous crowd, 

Smiles in her eyes, and simpers on her lips ; 
To some she whispers, others speaks aloud : 

To some she curtsies, and to some she dips, 
Complains of warmth, and this complaint avow a. 

Her lover brings the lemonade, — she sips; 
She then surveys, condemns, but pities stiii 
Her dearest friends for being drest so ill. 



_ 



218 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXVI. 

One has false curls, another too much paint, 

A thirl — where did she buy that frightful turban? 

4 fourth 's so pale she fears she 's going to faint, 
A fifth's look's vulgar, dowdyish, and suburban, 

A sixth's white silk has got a yellow taint, 

A seventh's thin muslin surely will be her bane, 

And lo ! an eighth appears, — " I '11 see no more !" 

For fear, like Banquo's kings, they reach a score. 

LXVII. 

Meantime, while she was thus at others gazing, 

Others were levelling their looks at her ; 
She beard the men's half-whisper'd mode of praising, 

And, till 'I was done, determined not to stir ■ 
The women only thought it quite amazing 

That at her time of life so many were 
Admirers still, — but men are so debased, 
Those brazen creatures always suit their taste. 

LXYIII. 
For my part, now, I ne'er could understand 

Why naughty women but I won't discuss 

A thing which is a scandal to the land, 

I only don't see why it should be thus ; 
And if I were but in a gown and band, 

Just to entitle me to make a fuss, 
I 'd preach on this till Wilbeiforee and Romilly 
Should quote in their next speeches from my homily. 

LXIX. 
While Laura thus was seen and seeing, smiling, 

Talking, she knew not why and cared not what, 
So that her female friends, with envy broiling, 

Beheld her airs and triumph, and all that ; 
And well-drest males still kept before her filing, 

And passing bow'd and mingled with her chat ; 
More than the rest one person seeru'd to stare 
With pertinacity that's rather rare. 

LXX. 

He was a Turk, the colour of mahogany ; 

And Laura saw him, and at first was glad, 
Because the Turks so much admire philogyny, 

Although their usage of their wives is sad ; 
'T is said they use no better than a dog any 

Poor woman, whom they purchase like a pad : 
They have a number, though they ne'er exhibit 'em, 
Four wives by law, and concubines " ad libitum." 

LXXI. 
They lock them up, and veil, and guard them daily, 

They scarcely can behold their male relations, 
So that their moments do not pass so gaily 

As is supposed the case with northern nations ; 
Confinement, too, must make them look quite palely ; 

And as the Turks abhor long conversations, 
Their days are cither pass'd in doing nothing, 
Oi oathing, nursing, making love, and clothing. 

LXXII. 

They cannot read, and so don't lisp in criticism ; 

Nor write, and so they don't affect the muse ; 
Wen- never caught in epigram or witticism, 

Have no romances, sermons, plays, reviews, — 
In haiams learning soon would make a pretty schism ! 

But luckily these beauties are no " blues," 
No bustling Botherbys have they to show 'em 

That charming passage in the last new poem." 



LXXII1. 

No solemn, antique gentleman of rhyme, 
Who having angled all his life for fame, 

And getting but a nibble at a time, 
St.il fussily keeps fishing on, the same 

Small "Triton of the minnows," the sublime 
Of mediocrity, the furious tame, 

The echo's echo, usher of the school 

Of female wits, boy-bards — in short, a fool ! 

LXXIV. 

A stalking oracle of awful phrase, 

The approving " Good!" (by no means good in tawi 
Humming like flies around the newest blaze, 

The bluest of bluebottles you e'er saw, 
Teasing with blame, excruciating with praise, 

Gorging the little fame he gets all raw, 
Translating tongues he knows not even by letter, 
And sweating plays so middling, bad were better 

LXXV. 

One hates an author, that's all avthor, fellows 

In foolscap uniforms lurn'd up with ink, 
So very anxious, clever, fine, and jealous, 

One don't know what to say to them, or think, 
Unless to puff them with a pair of bellows ; 

Of coxcombry's worst coxcombs e'en the pink 
Are preferable to these shreds of paper, 
These unquench'd snufhngs of the inidmgnt taper. 

LXXYI. 
Of these same we see several, and of others, 

Men of the world, who know the world like men, 
S — tl, It s, M — re, and all the better brothers, 

Who think of something else besides the pen ; 
But for the children of the " mighty mother's," 

The would-be wits and can't-be gentlemen, 
I leave them to their daily "tea is ready," 
Snug coterie, and literary lady. 
LXXVII. 
The poor dear Mussulwomen whom I mention 

Have none of these instructive pleasant people ; 
And one would seem to them a new invention, 

Unknown as bells within a Turkish steeple ; 
I think 'twould almost be worth while to pension 

(Though best-sown projects very often reap ill) 
A missionary author, just to preach 
Our Christian usage of the parts of speech. 

LXXVIII. 

No chemistry for them unfolds her gasses, 
No metaphysics are let loose in lectures, 

No circulating library amasses 

Religious novels, moral tales, and strictures 

Upon the living manners as they pass us ; 
No exhibition glares with annual pictures ; 

They stare not on the stars from out their attics, 

Nor deal (thank God for that !) in mathematics. 

LXXIX. 

Why I thank God for that is no great matter, 
I have my reasons, you no doubt suppose, 

And as, perhaps, they would not highly Hatter, 
I'll keep them for my life (to come) in prose; 

I fear I have a little turn for satire, 

And yet methinks the older that one grows 

Inclines us more to laugh than scold, though laughter 

Leaves us so doubly serious shortly after 



LXXX. 

On, mirth and innocence ! Oh, milk and water ! 

Yc happy mixtures of more happy days! 
In these sad centuries of sin and slaughter, 

Abominable man no more allays 
His thirst with such pure beverage. No matter, 

I love you both, and both shall have my praise : 
Oh, for olel Saturn's reign of sugar-candy! — 
Meantime I drink to your return in brandy. 

LXXXI. 
Our Laura's Turk still kept his eyes upon her, 

Less in the Mussulman than Christian way, 
Which seems to say, "Madam, I do you honour, 

And while I please to stare, you '11 please to stay ;" 
Could staring win a woman this had won her, 

But Laura could not thus be led astray, 
She had stood fire- too long and well to boggle 
Even at this stranger's most outlandish ogle. 

LXXXII. 

The morning now was on the point of breaking, 

A turn of time at which I would advise 
Ladies who have been dancing, or partaking 

In any other kind of exercise, 
To make their preparations for forsaking 

The ball-room ere the sun begins to rise, 
Because when once the lamps and candles fail, 
His blushes make them look a little pale. 

LXXXIII. 
I 've seen some balls and revels in my time, 

And staid them over for some silly reason 
And then I look'd (I hope it was no crime), 

To see what lady best stood out the season ; 
And though I 've seen some thousands in their prime, 

Lovely and pleasing, and who still may please on, 
I never saw but one (the stars withdrawn), 
Whose bloom could after dancing dare the dawn. 

LXXXIV. 

The name of this Aurora I '11 not mention, 
Although I might, for she was nought to me 

More than that patent work of God's invention, 
A charming woman, whom we like to see ; 

But writing names would merit reprehension, 
Yet, if you like to find out this fair slie, 

At the next London or Parisian ball 

You still may mark her check, out-blooming all. 

LXXXV. 

Laura, who knew it would not do at all 

To meet the day-light after seven hours' sitting 
Among three thousand people at a ball, 

To make her curtsy thought it right and fitting ; 
The count was at her elbow with her shawl, 

And they the room were on the point of quitting, 
When lo ! those cursed gondoliers had got 
Just in the verv place where they should not. 

LXXXVI. 
In this they 're like our coachmen, and the cause 

Is much the same — the crowd, and pulling, hauling, 
With blasphemies enough to break their jaws, 

They make a never-intermitted bawling. 
At home, our Bow-street gemmen keep the laws, 

And here a sentry stands within your calling ; 
But, for all that, there is a deal of swearing, 
Ard nauseous words past mentioning or bearing. 



LXXXVII. 

The count and Laura found their boat at last, 

And homeward floated o'er the silent tide, 
Discussing all the dances gone and past ; 

The dancers and their dresses, too, beside ; 
Some little scandal eke : but all aghast 

(As to their palace-stairs the rowers glide), 
Sate Laura by the side of her adorer, 
When lo ! the Mussulman was there before her. 

LXXXVIII. 
" Sir," said the count, with brow exceeding grave, 

" Your unexpected presence here will make 
It necessary for myself to crave 

Its import ! But perhaps 't is a mistake ; 
I hope it is so; and at once to waive 

All compliment, I hope so for your sake ; 
You understand my meaning, or you shall." 
" Sir," (quoth the Turk) "'t is no mistake at all. 

LXXXIX. 

That lady is my wife ! " Much wonder paints 
The lady's changing cheek, as well it might; 

But where an Englishwoman sometimes faints, 
Italian females don 't do so outright ; 

They only call a little on their saints, 

And then come to themselves, almost or quite ; 

Which saves much hartshorn, salts, and sprinkling faojs, 

And cutting stays, as usual in such cases. 

xc. 

She said — what could she say ? Why, not a word : 

But the count courteously invited in 
The stranger, much appeased by what he heard : 

" Such things perhaps we 'd best discuss within,' 
Said he ; " don't let us make ourselves absurd 

In public, by a scene, nor raise a din, 
For then the chief and only satisfaction 
Will be much quizzing on the whole transaction." 

XCI. 
They enter'd, and for coffee call'd, — it came, 

A beverage for Turks and Christians both, 
Although the way they make it 's not the same. 

Now Laura, much recover'd, or less loth 
To speak, cries, " Beppo ! what 's your pagan name? 

Bless me ! your beard is of amazing growth ! 
And how came you to keep away so long ? 
Are you not sensible 't was very wrong ? 

XCII. 
" And are you really, truly, now a Turk ? 

With any other women did you wive ? 
Is 't true they use their fingers for a fork ? 

Well, that's the prettiest shawl — as I'm alive! 
You '11 give it me ? They say you eat no poik. 

And how so many years did you contrive 

To Bless me ! did I ever ? No, I never 

Saw a man grown so yellow ! How 's your liver? 

XCIII. 

"Beppo! that beard of yours becomes you noi 
It shall be shaved before you 're a day older ; 

Why do you wear it? Oh ! I had forgot — 

Pray, don't you think the weather here is colder / 

How do I look ? you sha'n't stir from this spot 
In that queer dress, for fear that some beholder 

Should find you out, and make the story known. 

How short your hair is ! Lord ! how gray it 'a grown "* 



220 



HYRON'S WORKS. 



XCIV. 

What answer Beppo made to these demands, 
Is more than I know. He was cast away 

About where Troy stood once, and nothing stands j 
Became a slave, of course, and for his pay 

Had bread and bastinadoes, till some bands 
Of pirates landing in a neighbouring bay, 

Up join'd the rogues and prosper'd, and became 

A renegado of indifferent fame. 

xcv. 

But he grew rich, and with his riches grew so 
Keen the desire to see his home again, 

He thought himself in duty bound to do so, 
And not be always thieving on the main ; 

Lonely he felt, at times, as Robin Crusoe : 
And so he hired a vessel come from Spain, 

Bound for Corfu ; she was a fine polacca, 

Mann'd with twelve hands, and laden with tobacco. 

XCVI. 

Himself, and much (Heaven knows how gotten) cash, 
He then embark'd with risk of life and limb, 

And got clear off, although the attempt was rash ; 
He said that Providence protected him — 

For my part, I say nothing, lest we clash 
In our opinions : — well, the ship was trim, 

Set sail, and kept her reckoning fairly on, 

Fscept three days of cairn when off Cape Bonn. 

XCVII. 

They reach'd the island, he transferr'd his lading, 
And self and livc-^tock, to another bottom, 

And pass'd for a true Turkey-merchant, trading 
With goods of various names, but I 've forgot 'em. 

However, he got off by this evading, 

Or else the people would perhaps have shot him j 

And thus at Venice landed to reclaim 

His wife, religion, house, and Christian name. 



XCVIII. 

Ilis wife received, the patriarch re-baptized him, 

(He made the church a present by the way); 
He then threw off the garments which disguised him. 

And borrow'd the count's small-clothes for a day ; 
His friends the more for his long absence prized him, 

Finding he 'd wherewithal to make them gav, 
With dinners, where he oft became the laugh of them 
For siories, — but / don't believe the half of them. 

XCIX. 
Whate'er his youth had suffer'd, his old age 

With wealth and talking made him some amends , 
Though Laura sometimes put him in a rage, 

I 've heard the count and he were always friends 
My pen is at the bottom of a page, 

Which being Gnish'd, lure the story ends; 
'T is to be wish'd it had been sooner done, 
But stories somehow lengthen when begun. 



NOTES. 



Note I. Stanza xiv, line 8. 

Liko the lost Pleiad seen no more below. 

" Qua: septan dici six tamen esse solent." — Ovid. 

Note 2. Stanza x.\v, line 8. 

His name Giuseppe, calPM more briefly, Beppo 

Beppo is the Joe of the Italian Joseph. 

Note 3. Stanza xxwii, line 3. 
The Spaniards call the person a " C'ortcjo." 
"Cortejo" is pronounced " Corte/io," with an as- 
pirate, according to the Arabesque guttural. It means 
what there is as yet no precise name for in England, 
though the practice is as common as in any tramontane 
country whatever. 

Note 4. Stanza xlvi, line 3. 
Raphael, who died in thy embrace, and vies. 
For the received accounts of the cause of Raphael's 
death, see his Lives. 



jHn$cj)$K** 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



"Celci qui remplissait alors cette place etoit un 
gentilhomme Polonais, nomme Mazeppa, ne dans le 
palatinat de Padolic ; il avait etc eleve page de Jean 
Casimir, et avait pris h sa cour quelqne teinture des 
belles-lettres. Une intrigue qu'il eut dans sa jeunesse 
avec la femme d'un gentilhomme Polonais, ayant ote 
decouverte, le rnari le fit Her tout mi sur un cheval 
r arouche, et le laissa allcr en cet ctat. Le chcTal, qui 
c"tait du pays do l'Ukraine, y retourna, et y porta Ma- 
zeppa, demi-mort dc fatigue et de faim. Quelques 
paysans ic secoururent : il rcsta long-temps parmi eux, 
et se signala dans olusieurs courses contre les Tartares. 
Lj supcriorite ae ses lumieres lui donna une grande 
consideration parnii les Cosaques : sa reputation s'aug- 
Mientant dc jour en jour, obligea lc Czar a le faire 
Prince ne l'Ukraine." 

Voltaire, Ifisloire de Charles XII. p. 19G. 



" Le roi fuyant et poursuivi eut son cheval tu6 sous 
lui ; le Colonel Gieta, blesse, et perdant tout son sang, 
lui donna le sien. Ainsi on remit deux fois a cheval, dans 
la fuitc, ce conque'rant qui n'avait pu y monter pen- 
dant la bataille." 

Voltaire, Histoire de Charles XII. p. 216. 

" Le roi alia par un autre chemin avec quelques cav- 
aliers. Le carrosse ou il etait rompit dans la niarche; 
on le remit a cheval. Pour comble de disgrace, il 
s'egara pendant la nuit dans un bois; 11', son courage 
ne pouvant plus suppleer a ses forces e'puise'es, les dou- 
leurs de sa blcssure devenues plus insupportablcs par 
la fatigue, son cheval ctant tombe de lassitude, il sa 
concha quelques heures, au pied d'un arbre, en danger 
d'etre surpris a tout moment par les vainqueurs qui ie 
cherchaicnt de tons cotes." 

Voltaire, Histoire de CSupUs XII. \ 218. 



MAZEPPA. 



2?] 





But first, outspent with this long course, 


MAZEPPA. 


The Cossack prince rubb'd down his horse, 




And made for him a leafy bed, 




And smooth'd his fetlocks and his mane, 


i. 


And slack'd his girth, and stripp'd his rein 


T was after dread Pultowa's day, 


And joy'd to see how well he fed ; 


When fortune left the royal Swede, 


For until now he had the dread 


Around a slaughter'd army lay, 


His wearied courser might refuse 


No more to combat and to bleed. 


To browse beneath the midnight dews : 


The power and glory of the war, 


But he was hardy as his lord, 


Faithless as their vain votaries, men, 


And little cared for bed and board ; 


Had pass'd to the triumphant Czar, 


But spirited and docile too, 


And Moscow's walls were safe again, 


Whate'er was to be done, would do ; 


Until a day more dark and drear, 


Shaggy and swift, and strong of limb, 


And a more memorable year, 


All Tartar-like he carried him ; 


Should give to slaughter and to shame 


Obey'd his voice, and came to call, 


A mightier host and haughtier name ; 


And knew him in the midst of all : 


A greater wreck, a deeper fall, 


Though thousands were around, — and night. 


A shock to one — a thunderbolt to all. 


Without a star, pursued her flight, — 




That steed from sunset until dawn 


II. 


His chief would follow like a fawn. 


Such was the hazard of the die ; 


IV. 


The wounded Charles was taught to fly 


This done, Mazeppa spread his cloak, 


By day and night, through field and flood, 


And laid his lance beneath his oak, 


Stain' d with his own and subjects' blood ; 


Felt if his arms in order good 


For thousands fell that flight to aid : 


The long day's march had well withstood— 


And not a voice was heard to upbraid 


If still the powder fill'd the pan, 


Ambition in his humbled hour, 


And flints unloosen'd kept their lock — 


\Vhen truth had nought to dread from power. 


His sabre's hilt and scabbard felt, 


His horse was slain, and Gieta gave 


And whether they had chafed his belt — 


His own — and died the Russians' slave. 


And next the venerable man, 


This too sinks after many a league 


From out his haversack and can, 


Of well-sustain'd, but vain fatigue ; 


Prepared and spread his slender stock 


And in the depth of forests, darkling 


And to the monarch and his men 


The watch-fires in the distance sparkling — 


The whole or portion ofler'd then, 


The beacons of surrounding foes — 


With far less of inquietude 


A king must lay his limbs at length. 


Than courtiers at a banquet would. 


Are these the laurels and repose 


And Charles of this his slender share 


For which the nations strain their strength ? 


With smiles partook a moment there, 


They laid him by a savage tree, 


To force of cheer a greater show, 


In out-worn nature's agony; 


And seem above both wounds and woe ;— 


His wounds were stiff — his limbs were stark — 


And then he said — " Of all our band, 


The heavy hour was chill and dark ; 


Though firm of heart and strong of hand, 


The fever in his blood forbade 


In skirmish, march, or forage, none 


A transient slumber's fitful aid : 


Can less have said, or more have done, 


And thus it was ; but yet through all, 


Than thee, Mazeppa! On the earth 


King-like the monarch bore his fall, 


So fit a pair had never birth, 


And made, in this extreme of ill, 


Since Alexander's days till now, 


His pangs the vassals of his will ; 


As thy Bucephalus and thou : 


All silent and subdued were they, 


All Scythia's fame to thine should vi< Id 


As once the nations round him lay. 


For pricking on o'er flood and field*" 




Mazeppa answer'd — "III betide 


III. 


The school wherein I learn'd to ride !" 


A band of chiefs ! — alas ! how few, 


Quoth Charles — "Old hetman, wherefore ««, 


Since but the fleeting of a day 


Since thou hast learn'd the art so well >" 


Had thinn'd it ; but this wreck was true 


Mazeppa said — " 'T were long to tell ; 


And chivalrous ; upon the clay 


And we have many a league to go 


Each sate him down, all sad and mute, 


With every now and then a blow, 


Beside his monarch and his steed, 


And ten to one at least the foe, 


For danger levels man and brute, 


Before our steeds may graze at case 


And all are fellows in their need. 


Beyond the swift Horysthencs : 


Among the rest, Mazeppa made 


And, sire, your limbs have need of rest, 


His pillow in an old oak's shade— 


And I will be the sentinel 


Himself as rough, and scarce less old, 


Of this your troop." — " But I request," 


The Ukraine's hctman, calm and bold ; 


Said Sweden's monarch, "thou wilt tell 



222 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



This tale of ihine, and I may reap 
Perchance from this the boon of sleep ; 
For at this moment from my eyes 
The hope of present slumber flies." 
" Well, sire, with such a hope, I '11 track 
My seventy years of memory back : 
I think 't was in my twentieth spring,— 
Ay, 't was, — when Casimir was king- 
John Casimir, — I was his page 
Six summers in my earlier age ; 
A learned monarch, faith ! was he, 
And most unlike your majesty : 
He made no wars, and did not gain 
New realms to lose them back again ; 
And (save debates in Warsaw's diet) 
He reign'd in most unseemly quiet ; 
Not that he had no cares to vex, 
He loved the muses and the sex; 
And sometimes these so froward are, 
They made him wish himself at war ; 
But soon his wrath being o'er, he took 
Another mistress, or new book : 
A.nd then he gave prodigious f£tes — 
Vll Warsaw gather'd round his gates 
To gaze upon his splendid court, 
And dames, and chiefs, of princely port: 
He was the Polish Solomon, 
So sung his poets, all but one, 
Who, being unpension'd, made a satire, 
And boasted that he could not flatter. 
It was a court of jousts and mimes, 
Where every courtier tried at rhymes ; 
Even I for once produced some verses, 
And sign'd my odes, Despairing Thirsis. 
There was a certain Palatine, 

A count of far and high descent, 
Rich as a salt or silver mine ;' 
And ne was proud, ye may divine, 

As if from heaven he had been sent : 
He had such wealth in blood and ore, 

As few could match beneath the throne ; 
And he would gaze upon his store, 
And o'er his pedigree would pore, 
Until by some confusion led, 
Which almost look'd like want of head, 
He thought their merits were his own. 
His wife was not of his opinion — 
His junior she by thirty years — 
Grew daily tired of his dominion ; 
And, after wishes, hopes, and fears, 
To virtue a few farewell tears, 
A restless dream or two, some glances 
At Warsaw's youth, some songs, and dances, 
Awaited but the usual chances, 
Those happy accidents which render 
The coldest dames so very tender, 
To deck her count with titles given, 
'T is said, as passports into heaven ; 
But, strange to say, they rarely boast 
Of these who have deserved them most. 

V. 
" I was a goodly stripling then ; W 

At seventy years I so may say, ^^^^ 



1 This comparison of a " salt mine " may perhaps be per- 
mitted to i Pole, as the wealth of the country consists greutly 
in iho salt mines 



That there were few, or boys or men, 
Who, in my dawning time of day, 
Of vassal or of knight's degree, 
Could vie in vanities with me ; 
For I had strength, youth, gaiety, 
A port not like to this ye see, 
But smooth, as all is rugged now ; 

For time, and care, and war, have plough M 
My very soul from out my brow ; 
And thus I should be disavow'd 
By all my kind and kin, could they 
Compare my day and yesterday ; 
This change was wrought, too, long ere age 
Had ta'en my features for his page : 
With years, we know, have not declined 
My strength, my courage, or my mind, 
Or at this hour I should not be 
Telling old tales beneath a tree 
With starless skies my canopy. 

But let me on : Theresa's form — 
Methinks it glides before mc now, 
Between me and yon chesnut's bough, 
The memory is so quick and warm ; 
And yet I find no words to tell 
The shape of her I loved so well : 
She had the Asiatic eye, 

Such as our Turkish neighbourhood 
Hath mingled with our Polish blood, 
Dark as above us is the sky ; 
But through it stole a tender li^ht, 
Like the first moonrise at midnight ; 
Large, dark, and swimming in the stream, 
Which seem'd to melt to its own beam ; 
All love, half languor, and half fire, 
Like saints that at the stake expire, 
And lift their raptured looks on high, 
As though it were a joy to die. 
A brow like a midsummer lake, 

Transparent with the sun therein, 
When waves no murmur dare to make, 
And heaven beholds her face within. 
A cheek and lip — but why proceed? 
I loved her then — I love her still ; 
And such as I am, love indeed 

In fierce extremes — in good and ill. 
But still we love even in our rage, 
And haunted to our very age 
With the vain shadow of the past, 
As is Mazeppa to the last. 

VI 

" We met — we gazed — I saw, and sigh'd, 

She did not speak, and yet replied ; 

There are ten thousand tones and signs 

We hear and see, but none defines — 

Involuntary sparks of thought, 

Which strike from out the heart o'erwrought. 

And form a strange intelligence, 

Alike mysterious and intense, 

Which link the burning chain that binds. 

Without their will, young hearts and minds ; 

Conveying, as the electric wire. 

We know not how, the absorbing fire. — 

I saw, and sigh'd — in silence wept, 

And still reluctant distance kept, 






MAZEPPA. 



003 



Until I was made known to her, 
And we might then and tiiere confer 
Without suspicion — then, even then, 

1 long'd, and was resolved to speak j 
But on my lips they died again, 

The accents tremulous and weak, 
Until om; hour. — There is a game, 

A frivolous and foolish play, 

Wherewith wo while away the day ; 
It is — I have forgot the name — 
AnJ we to this, it seems, were set, 
By some strange chance, which I forget: 
1 reck'd not if I won or lost, 

It was enough for me to be 

So near to hear, and oh ! to seo 
Tin; being whom I loved the most. — 
1 watch'd her as a sentinel, 
(May oars this dark night watch as well!) 

Until I saw, and thus it was, 
That she was pensive, nor perceived 
Her occupation, nor was grieved 
Nnr glad to lose or gain ; but slill 
Play'd on for hours, as if her will 
Vet bound her to the place, though not 
That hers might be the winning lot. 

Then through my brain the thought did pass 

Even as a flash of lightning there, 
That there was something in her air 
Which would not doom me to despair; 
And on the thought my words broke forth, 

All incoherent as they were — 
Their eloquence was little worth, 
But vet she listen'd — 't is enough — 

Who listens once will listen twice ; 

Her heart, be sure, is not of ice, 
And one refusal no rebuff. 

VII. 
" I loved, and was beloved again— 

They tell me, Sire, you never knew 

Those gentle frailties : if 't is true, 
I shorten all my joy or pain, 
To you 't would seem absurd as vain ; 
But all men are not born to reign, 
Or o'er their passions, or, as you, 
Thus o'er themselves and nations too. 
I am — or rather was — a prince, 

A chief of thousands, and could lead 

Them on where each would foremost bleed ; 
But could not o'er myself evince 
The like control — But to resume: 

I loved, and was beloved again ; 
In sooth, it is a happy doom, 

But yet where happiness ends in pain. — 
We met in secret, and the hour 
Which led me to that ladv's bower 
Was fiery expectation's dower. 
My days and nights were nothing — all 
Except that hour, which doth recall 
In the long lapse from youth to age 

No other like itself — I 'd give 

The Ukraine back again to live 
It o'er once more — and be a page, 
The happv page, who was the lord 
Of one soft heart, and his own sword, 



And had no other gem nor wealth 
Save nature's gift of youth and health — 
We met in secret — doubly sweet, 
Some say, they find it so to meet ; 
I know not that — I would have given 

My life but to have call'd her mine 
In the full view of earth and heaven ; 

For I did oft and long repine 
That we could only meet by stealth. 

VIII. 

" For lovers there are many eyes, 

And such there were on us : — the devil 
On such occasions should be civil — 

The devil ! — I 'm loth to do him wrong. 
It might be some untoward saint, 

Who would not be at rest too long, 
But to his pious bile gave vent — 

But one fair night, some lurking spies 

Surprised and seized us both. 

The count was something more than wroth — 

1 was unarm'd ; but if in steel, 

All cap-a-pic, from head to heel, 

What 'gainst their numbers could I do? 

'T was near his castle, far away 
From city or from succour near, 

And almost on the break of day ; 

I did not think to see another, 

My moments seem'd reduced to few ; 

And with one prayer to Mary Mother, 
And, it may be, a saint or two, 

As I resign'd me to my fate, 

They led me to the castle gate : 

Theresa's doom I never knew, 

Our lot was henceforth separate. — 

An angry man, ye may opine, 

Was he, the proud Count Palatine ; 

And he had reason good to be, 

But he was most enraged lest such 
An accident should chance to touch 

Upon his future pedigree ; 

Nor less amazed, that such a blot 

His noble 'scutcheon should have got, 

While he was highest of his line : 
Because unto himself he seem'd 
The first of men, nor less he deem'd 

In others' eyes, and most in mine. 

'Sdeath ! with a page — perchance a king 

Had reconciled him to the thing : 

But with a stripling of a page — 

I felt — but cannot paint his rage. 

IX. 

" ' Bring forth the horse !' — the horse was br< ugh., 

Li truth, he was a noble steed, 

A Tartar of the Ukraine breed, 
Who look'd as though the speed of thought 
Were in his limbs : but he was wild, 

Wild as the wild deer, and untaught, 
With spur and bridle undehled- 

'T was but a day he had been caught , 
And snorting, with erected mane, 
And struggling fiercely, but in vain, 
In the full foam of wrath and dread, 
To me the desert-born was led : 



■22 \ BYRON'S 


WORKS. 




They bound mc on, that menial throng, 


And bounded by a forest black : 


Upon his hack with many a thong ; 


And, save the scarce-seen battlement 




Then loosed him with a sudden lash- 


On distant heights of some strong hold, 




Away ! — away! — and on we dash! 


Against the Tartars built of old, 




Torrents less rapid and less rash. 


No trace of man. The year before 
A Turkish army had march'd o'er ; 




X. 


And where the Spain's hoof hath trod, 




" Away ! — away ! — My breath was gone — 


The verdure flies the bloody sod : — 




I saw not where he hurried on : 


The sky was dull, and dim, and gra\\ 




'T was scarcely yet the break of day, 


And a low breeze crept moaning by — 




And on he foam'd — away ! — away ! — 


I could have answer'd wkh a sigh — 




The last of human sounds which rose, 


But fast we tied, awav, away — 




As I was darted from my foes, 


And I could neither sigh nor pray ; 




Was the wild shout of savage laughter, 


And my cold sweat-drops fell like rain 




Which on the wind came roaring after 


Upon the courser's bristling mane: 




A moment from that rabble rout : 


But, snorting still with rage and fear, 




With sudden wrath I wrench'd my head, 


He flew upon hrs far career: 




And snapp'd the cord, which to the mane 


At times I almost thought, indeed, 




Had bound my neck in lieu of rein, 


He must have slacken'd in his speed : 




And writhing half my form about, 


But no — my bound and slender frame 




HowTd back my curse ; but 'midst the tread, 


Was nothing to his angry might, 




The thunder of my courser's speed, 


And merely like a spur became : 




Perchance they did not hear nor heed: 


Each motion which I made to free 




It vexes me — for I would fain 


My swolu limbs from their agony 




Have paid their insult back again. 


Increased his fury and affright: 




I paid it well in after days : 


I tried my voice, — 't was faint and low, 




There is not of that castle gate, 


But yet he swerved as from a blow ; 




Its drawbridge and portcullis' weight, 


And, starting to each accent, sprang 




Stone, bar, moat, bridge, or barrier left; 


As from a sudden trumpet's clang : 




Nor of its fields a blade of grass, 


Meantime my cords were wet with gore, 




Save what grows on a ridge of wall, 


Which, oozing through my limbs, ran o'er , 




, Where stood the hearth-stone of the hall ; 


And in my tongue the thirst became 




And many a time ye there might pass, 


A something fierier far than flame. 




Nor dream that e'er that fortress was: 


XII. 




I saw its turrets in a blaze, 


" We near'd the wild wood — 'l was so wide, 




Their crackling battlements all cleft, 


I saw no bounds on either side ; 




And the hot lead pour down like rain 


'T was studded with old sturdy trees, 




From off the scorch'd and blackening roof, 


That bent nut to the roughest breeze 




Whose thickness was not vengoance-proof. 


Which howls down from Siberia's waste, 




They little thought that day of pain, 


And strips the forest in its haste, — 




When lanch'd, as on the lightning's Hash, 


But these were few, and far between, 




They bade me to destruction dash, 


Set thick with shrubs more young and green. 




That one day I should come again, 


Luxuriant with their annual leaves, 




With twice five thousand horse, to thank 


Ere strown by those autumnal eves 




The count for his uncourteous ride. 


That nip the forest's foliage dead, 




They play'd me then a bitter prank, 


Discolour'd with a lifeless red, 




When, with the wild horse for my guide, 


Which stands thereon like stiffen'd gore 




I'hey bound me to his foaming flank : 


Upon the slain when battle 's o'er, 




At length I play'd them one as frank — 


And some long winter's night hath shed 




For time at last sets all things even — 


Its frost o'er every tombless head, 




And if we do but watch the hour, 


So cold and stark the raven's beak 




There never yet was human power 


May peck unpierced each frozen cheek : 




Which could evade, if unforgiven, 


'T was a wild waste of underwood, 




The patient search and vigil long 


And here and there a chesnut stood, 




Of him who treasures up a wrong. 


The strong oak, and the hardy pine ; 
But far apart — and well it were, 




XI. 


Or else a different lot were mine — 




•' Away, away, my steed and I, 


The boughs gave way, and did not tear 




Upon the pinions of the wind, 


My limbs ; and I found strength to bear 




All human dwellings left behind ; 


My wounds, already scarr'd with cold — 




We sped like meteors through the sky, 


My bonds forbade to loose my hold. 




When with its crackling sound the night 


We rustled through the leaves like wind, 




Is choouer'd with the northern light : 


Left, shrubs, arid trees, and wolves behind ; 




Town — village — none were on our track, 


By night I heard them on the track, 




Bu* a wild plain of far extent, 


Their troop came hard upon our back, 





MA'ZEPPA. 



With their long gallop, which can tire 
The hound's deep hM«', and hunter's fire: 
Where'er we flew they follow d on, 
Nor left us with the morning sun; 
Behind I saw them, scarce a rood, 
At dayhreak winding through the wood, 
And through the night had heard their feet 
Their stealing, rustling step repeat. 
Oh ! how I wish'd for spear or sword, 
At least to die amidst the horde, 
And perish — if it must be so — 
At bay, destroying many a foe. 
When first my courser's race begun, 
I wish'd the goal already won ; 
But now I doubted strength and speed. 
Vain doubt ! his swift and savage breed 
Had nerved him like the mountain-roc ; 
Nor faster falls the blinding snow 
Which whelms the peasant near the door 
Whose threshold he shall cross no more, 
Bewilder'd with the dazzling blast, 
Than through the forest-paths he past — 
Untircd, untamed, and worse than wild; 
All fjrious as a favour'd child 
Balk'd of its wish ; or fiercer still — 
A woman piqued — who has her will. 

XIII. 

" The wood was past ; 't was more than noon j 

Rut chill the air, although in June; 

Or it might be my veins ran cold — 

Prolong'd endurance tames the bold: 

And I was then not what I seem, 

But headlong as a wintry stream, 

And wore my feelings out before 

I well could count their causes o'er : 

And what with fury, fear, and wrath, 

The tortures which beset my path, 

Cold, hunger, sorrow, shame, distress, 

Thus bound in nature's nakedness ; 

Sprung from a race whose rising blood 

When slirr'd beyond its calmer mood, 

And trodden hard upon, is like 

The rattlesnake's, in act to strike, 

What marvel if this worn-out trunk 

Beneath its woes a moment sunk ? 

The earth gave way, the skies roll'd round, 

I seem'd to sink upon the ground ; 

But err'd, for I was fasti}' bound. 

My heart turn'd sick, my brain grew sore, 

And throbb'd awhile, then beat no more: 

The skies spun like a mighty wheel ; 

I saw the trees like drunkards reel, 

And a slight flash sprang o'er my eyes, 

Which ss.w no farther: he who dies 

Can die no more than then I died. 

O'ertortured by that ghastly ride, 

I felt the blackness come and go, 

And strove to wake ; but could not make 
My senses climb up from below : 
I felt as on a plank at sea, 
When all the waves that dash o'er thee, 
At the same time upheave anil whelm, 
And hurl thee towards a desert realm. 
My undulating life was as 
The fancied lights that flitting pass 
X 34 



Our shut eyes in deep midnight, when 
Fever begins upon the brain ; 
But soon n pass'd, with little pain, 

But a confusion worse than such: 

I own that I should deem it much, 
Dying, to f eel the same ag;un ; 
And yet I do suppose we must 
Feel far more ere we turn to dust : 
No matter ; I have bared my brow 
Full in Dc-ih's face — before — Ami now. 

XIV. 

"My thoughts came back; where was I' Cold 
And Dumb, and giddy : pulse by pulse 

Life reassumed its lingering hold, 

And throb by throb ; till grown a pang 
Which for a moment would convulse, 
My blood reflow'd, though thick and chill ; 

My ear with uncouth noises rang, 
My he.art began once more to thrill ; 

My sight rcturn'd, though dim, alas : 

And thitken'd, as it were, uilh glass. 

Methought the dash of waves was nigh ; 

There was a gleam too of the sky, 

Studded with stars ; — it is no dream ; 

The wild horse swims the wilder stream! 

The bright broad river's gushing tide 

Sweeps, winding onward, far and wide, 

And we are half-way struggling o'er 

To yon unknown and silent shoie. 

The waters broke my hollow trance, 

And with a temporary strength 

My stiffen'd limbs were rebaptized, 

My courser's broad breast proudly braves. 

And dashes off the ascending waves, 

And onward we advance ! 

We reach the slippery shore at length. 
A haven I but little prized, 

For all behind was dark and drear, 

And all before was night and fear. 

How many hours of night or day 

In those suspended pangs I lay, 

I could not tell ; I scarcely knew 

If this were human breath I drew. 

XV. 

" With glossy skin, and dripping mane, 

And reeling limbs, and reeking flank, 
The wild steed's sinewy nerves still strain 

Up the repelling bank. 
We gain the top : a boundless plain 
Spreads through the shadow of the night, 

And onward, onward, onward, seems 

Like precipices in our dreams, 
To stretch beyond the sight ; 
And here and there a speck of white, 

Or scatter'd spot of dusky green, 
In masses broke into the light, 
As rose the moon upon my right. 

But nought distinctly seen 
In the dim waste, would indicate 
The omen of a cottage gate ; 
No twinkling taper from afar 
Stood like a hospitable star ; 
Not even an ignis-fatuu? rose 
To make him merry with my woeat 



22G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Thai very cheat had chcer'd me then ! 
Although detected, welcome still, 
Reminding me, through every ill, 

Of the abodes of men. 

XVI. 

" Onward we went — but slack and slow ; 

His savage force at length o'erspent, 
The drooping courser, faint and low, 

All feebly foaming went. 
A sickly infant had had power 
To guide him forward in that hour; 

But useless all to me. 
His new-born tameness nought avail'd, 
My limbs were bound ; my force had fail'd, 

Perchance, had they been free. 
With feeble effort still I tried 
To rend the bonds so starkly tied— 

But still it was in vain ; 
My limbs were only wrung the more, 
And soon the idle strife gave o'er, 

Which but prolong'd their pain: 
The dizzy race seern'd almost done, 
Although no goal was nearly won : 
Some streaks announced the coming sun — 

How slow, alas ! he came ! 
Metliought that mist of dawning gray 
Would never dapple into day ; 
How heavily it roil'd away — 

Before the eastern flame 
Rose crimson, and deposed the stars, 
And call'd the radiance from their cars, 
And fill'd the earth, from his deep throne, 
With lonely lustre, all his own. 

XVII. 

" Up rose the sun ; the mists were curl'd 
Back from the solitary world 
Which lay around — behind — before: 
What booted it to traverse o'er 
Plain, forest, river ? Man nor brute, 
Nor dint of hoof, nor print of foot, 
Lay in the wild luxuriant soil ; 
No sign of travel — none of toil ; 
The very air was mute ; 
And not an insect's shrill small horn, 
Nor matin bird's new voice was borne 
From herb nor thicket. Many a wcrst, 
Panting as if his heart would burst, 
The weary brute still stagger'd on ; 
And still we were — or seern'd — alone : 
At length, while reeling on our way, 
Alethought I heard a courser neigh, 
From out yon tuft of blackening firs. 
Is it the wind those branches stirs ? 
No, no ! from out the forest prance 

A trampling troop ; I see them come ! 
In one vast squadron they advance ! 

I strove to cry — my lips were dumb. 
The steeds rush on in plunging pride ; 
But where are thry the reins to guide? 
A thousand horse — and none to ride ! 
Witn flowing tail, and Dying mane, 
Wide nostrils — never stretch'd by pain, 
Mouths o.ooUless to the bit or rein, 



And feet that iron never shod, 
And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod, 
A thousand horse, the wild, the free, 
Like waves that follow o'er the sea, 

Came thickly thundering on, 
As if our faint approach to meet ; 
The sight renerved nay courser's feet, 
A moment staggering, feebly Beet, 
A moment, with a faint low neigh, 

He answer'd, and then fell ; 
With gasps and glazing eyes he lay, 

And reeking limbs immoveable, 
His first and last career is done ! 
On came the troop — they saw him stoop, 

They saw me strangely bound along 

His back with many a bloody thong : 
They stop — they start — they .-null' 'lie air, 
Gallop a moment here and there, 
Approach, retire, wheel round an' 1 round, 
Then plunging back with sudden bound, 
Headed by one black mighty steed, 
Who seem'd the patriarch of his breed, 

Without a single speck or hair 
Of white upfin his shaggy hide; 
They snort — they foam — neigh — swerve aside. 
And backward to the forest fly, 
By instinct from a human eye — 

They left me there, to my despair, 
Link'd to the dead and stiffening wretch, 
Whose lifeless limbs beneath me stretch, 
Relieved from that unwonted weight. 
From whence I could not extricate 
Nor him nor me — and there we lay, 

The dying on the dead! 
I little deem'd another day 

Would see my houseless, helpless head. 
And there from morn till twilight bound, 
I felt the heavy hours toil round, 
With just enough of life to see 
My last of suns go down on me, 
In hopeless certainty of mind, 
That makes us feel at length n s'gn'd 
To that which our foreboding years 
Presents the worst and last of fears 
Inevitable — even a boon, 
Nor more unkind for coming soon ; 
Yet shunn'd and dreaded with such care, 
As if it only were a snare 

That prudence might escape: 
At times both wish'd for and implored, 
At times sought with self-pointed sword, 
Yet still a dark and hideous close 
To even intolerable woes, 

And welcome in no shape. 
And, strange to say, the sons of pleasure, 
They who have revell'd beyond measure 
In beauty, wassail, wine, and treasure, 
Die calm, or calmer oft than he 
Whose heritage was misery: 
For he who hath in turn run through 
All that was beautiful and new, 

Hath nought to hope, and nought to leave; 
And, save the future (which is view'd 
Not quite as men are base or good, 
But as their nerves may be endued), 

With nought perhaps lo grieve ' 



MARINO FALIERO. 



243 



win. low, and wished to give !iim another occupation — 
that he,l/> P lost Troy— that Lueretia expelled the Tar- 
quins from Rome — and that Cava brought the Moors to 
Spain — that an insulted husband led the Gauls to Clu- 
sium, JYnd thence to Rome — that a single verse of Fred- 
eric II. of Prussia, on the Abbe de Rernis, and a jest 
on Madame de Pompadour, led to the battle of Ros- 
bach — that the elopement of Dearbhorgil with Mac 
Murchad, conducted the English to the slavery of Ire- 
land — that a personal pique between Marie Antoinette 
and the Duke of Orleans precipitated the first expulsion 
of the Bourbons — and, not to multiply instances, that 
Commodus, Domitian, and Caligula fell victims, not to 
their public t5'ranny, but to private vengeance — and that 
an order to make Cromwell disembark from the ship in 
which he would have sailed to America, destroyed both 
king and commonwealth:. After these instances, on the 
least reflection, it is indeed extraordinary in Dr. Moore 
to seem surprised that a man, used to command, who 
had served and swayed in the most important offices, 
should fiercely resent, in a fierce age, an unpunished 
affront, the grossest that can be offered to a man, be he 
prince or peasant. The age of Faliero is little to the 
purpose, unless to favour it. 

" Tim young man's wrath is like straw on fire, 
But Itkt red-hot steel is t/ir old man's ire." 
"young, men pih.ii cive and soon forget affronts. 
Old ace is slow at both." 

Laugier's reflections are more philosophical : — " Tale 
fu il fine ignominioso di un uomo, che la sua naseita 
la sua eta, il suo carattere dovevano tener loBta.no dal'le 
passioni produttrici di grandi delitti. I suoi talenti per 
lungo tempo escrcitati ne' maggiori impieghi, la sua 
capacita sperimentata ne' governi e nolle ambasciate, 
gli avevano acquistato la stima e la fiducia de' cittadini, 
ed avevano uniti i sufTragi per collocarlo alia testa della 
republica. Innalzato ad un grado che terminava <do- 
riosamenta la sua vita, il risentimento di un' injuria 
leggiera insinuo nel suo cuore tat veleno che bast& a 
corrompere le antiche sue qualita, e a condulo al ter- 



.Tiine dei scellerati ; serio esempio, che prova non es- 

j } rvi da, in cui la prudenza uinana sia sicura e che neW 

|{ rrstano sempre passioni capaci a disonorarlo, ipian- 

x non invigili sr.pra se stesso."— Laugiek, Italian 

ilation, vol. iv. pp. 30, 31. 

Viere did Dr. Moore find that, Marino Faliero begged 
lam.'' ' ,lave searched 'he chroniclers, and find 
Has pt of ,nc k' ' 1 5 il is ,rue that he avowed all. 
As th4 : conduc,ed t0 the place of torture, but there is 
The sel on made of anv application for mercy on his 
In the A' 1 tno ver y circumstance of their having taken 
The prhV rack > s,ems t0 ar gue any thing but his hav- 
His acce\ a want of firmness, which would doubtless 
llso mentioned by those minute historians 
yeans favour him: such, indeed, would be 
: wV character as a soldier, to the a 



They are 
Sentence 



is pi an;1 tU "hirh he died, as it is to the 
\ I know no justification at any distance 
mating a historical character; surely 
The president vX^ ( 'ead and to the unfortunate, and 
Was r.iir.l in, lh\pon a scaffold have generally had 
In forwarding the ily>wn, without attributing to them 
Not only to tin chii •* ,r,ln ? °f the perils which con- 
Mut the complainant, yt death renders, of all others, 
l bektuV black veil which is painted 

the ou aware, from air^ tlicro amongst the doges, 
ovt I »r decision? 



and the Giant's Staircase, where he was crowned, and 
discrowned, and decapitated, struck forcil.lv upon my 
imagination, as did his fiery character and strange storv. 
I went in 1819, in search of his tomb, more than once, 
to the church of San Giovanni e San Paolo ; and, as 1 
was standing before the monument of another family, 
a priest came up to me and said, "I can show v.ui 
finer monuments than that." I told him that I was in 
search of that of the Faliero family, and particularly of 
the Doge Marino's. "Ob," said' he, "I will show it 
you;" and, conducting me to the outside, pointed out 
a sarcophagus in the wall, with an illegible inscription. 
He said that it had been in a convent adjoining, but 
was removed after the French came, am) placed in its 
present situation ; that he had seen the tomb opened at 
its removal ; there were still some bones remaining', but 
no positive vestige of the decapitation. The equestrian 
statue, of which I have made mention in the third act 
as before that church, is not, however, of a Faliero 
but of some other now obsolete warrior, although of a 
later date. There were two other Doges of this family 
prior to Marino: Ordelafo, who fell in battle at Zara, 
in 1117 (where his descendant afterwards conquered 
the Huns), and Vital Faliero, wno reigned in 1082 
The family, originally from Fano, was of the most il- 
lustrious in blood and wealth in the city of once the 
most wealthy, and still the most ancient families in Eu- 
rope. The length I have gone into on this subject, will 
show the interest I have taken in it. Whether I have 
succeeded or not in the tragedy, I have at least trans- 
ferred into our language a historical fact worthy of 
commemoration. 

It is now four years that I have meditated this work, 
and, before I had sufficiently examined the records, I 
was rather disposed to have made it turn on a jealousy 
:n Faliero. Rut perceiving no foundation for this in 
historical truth, and aware that, jealousy is an exhausted 
passion in the drama, I have given it a more historical 
form. I was, besides, well advised by the late Matthew 
Lewis on that point, in talking with him of my inten- 
tion, at Venice, in 1817. " If you make him jealous," 
said he, "recollect that you have to contend with es- 
tablished writers, to say nothing of Shakspearc, and an 
exhausted subject; — stick to the old fiery Doge's natu- 
ral character, which will bear you out, if properly 
drawn ; and make your plot as regular as you can."— 
Sir William Drummond gave me nearly the same 
counsel. How far I have followed these instructions, 
or whether they have availed me, is not for me to de- 
cide. I have had no view to the stage ; in its present 
state it is, perhaps, not a very exalted object of ambi- 
tion ; besides, I have been too much behind the scenes 
to have thought it so at any time. And I cannot con- 
ceive any man of irritable feeling putting himself at 
the mercies of an audience: — the sneering reader, and 
the loud critic, and the tart review, are scattered and 
distant calamities; but tin- trampling of an intellinent 
or of an ignorant audience, on a production which, be 
it good or bad, has been a mental labour to the writer 
is a palpable and immediate grievance, heightened bv 
a man's doubt of their competency to judge, and his 
certainty of Ins own imprudence in electing them his 
judges. Were I capable of writing a play which could 
bo deemed stage-worthy, success would give me no 
I pleasure, and failure great pain. It is for this reasor 



244 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



1 



lhat, even during the time of being one of the com- 
mittee of one of the theatres, I never made the attempt, 
and never will. 1 But surely there is dramatic power 
somewhere, — where Joanna Baillie, and Milman, and 
John Wilson exist. The "City of the Plague" and 
the "Fall of Jerusalem," are full of the best materiel 
for tragedy that has been seen since Horace Walpole, 
except passages of "Ethwald"and " De Montfort." — 
It is the fashion to underrate Horace Walpole, firstly, 
because he was a nobleman, and secondly, because he 
was a gentleman ; but, to say nothing of the composi- 
tion of his incomparable " Letters," and of the " Castle 
of Otranto," he is the " Ultimus Romanorum," the 
author of the " Mysterious Mother," a tragedy of the 
highest order, and not a puling love-play. He is the 
father of the first romance, and of the last tragedy in 
our language, and surely worthy of a higher place than 
any living writer, be he who he may. 

In speaking of the drama of Marino Faliero, I forgot 
to mention that the desire of preserving, though still too 
remote, a nearer approach to unity than the irregulari- 
ty, which is the reproach of the English theatrical com- 
positions, permits, has induced me to represent the 
conspiracy as already formed, and the Doge acceding 
to it, whereas, in fact, it was of his own preparation 
and that of Israel Bertuccio. The other characters 
(except that of the duchess), incidents, and almost the 
time, which was wonderfully short for such a design in 
real life, are strictly historical, except that all the con- 
sultations took place in the palace. Had I followed 
this, the unity would have been better preserved ; but 
I wished to produce the Doge in the full assembly of 
the conspirators, instead of monotonously placing him 
always in dialogue with the same individuals. For the 
real facts, I refer to the extracts given in the Appendix 
in the Italian, with a translation. 



1 "While I was in the sub-committee of Drury-Lane The- 
atre, I can vouch for my colleagues, and 1 hope lor myself, 
that we did our best to bring back the legitimate drama. 1 
tried what I could to get " De Montfort " revived, but in vain, 
and equally in vain in favour of Sotheby's " Ivan," which 
was thought an acting play; and 1 endeavoured also to wake 
Mr. Coleridge to write a tragedy. Those who are not in the 
secret, will hardly believe that the "School for Scandal" is 
the play which has brought least money, averaging the num- 
ber of times it has been acted since its production ; so Mana- 
ger Pibdin assured me. Of what has occurred since Matu- 
rin's " Bertram," I am not aware ; so lhat 1 may be traducing, 
through ignorance, some excellent new writers ; if so, I beg 
their pardon. I havo been absent from England nearly five 
years, and, till last year, I never read un English newspaper 
since my departure, and am now only aware of theatrical 
matters through the medium of the Parisian English Gazette 
of Galignani, and only for the last twelve months. Let me 
then deprecate all offence to tragic or comic writers, to whom 
I wish well, and of whom I know nothing. The long com- 
plaints of the actual state of the drama arise, however, from 
no fault of the performers. I can conceive nothing better 
than Kemble, Cooke, and Kean, in their very different man- 
ners, or than Elliston in gentletnan's comedy, and in seme 
parts of tragedy. Miss O'Neill I never saw, having made 
and kept a determination to see nothing which bIiouM divide 
or disturb my recollection of Siddons. Siddons and Kemble 
were the ideal of tragic action ; I never saw any thing at nil 
resembling them, even in person : for this reason we shall 
Dever see again Coriolanus or Macbeth. When Kean is 
Dlanieil f,jr want of dignity, we should remember that it is 
a grace and not an nrt, and not to be attained by study. In 
*ll not supernatural parts, he is perfect ; even his very de- 
fects belong, or seem to belong, to the parts themselves, and 
appear truer to nature. But of Kemble we may say, with 
reference to his acting, what the Cardinol de Retz said of the 
Marquis o'" Montrose, "that he was the only man he ever 
B« who reminded him of jie heroes of Plutarch." 



DRAMATIS PERSON/E. 



1 1 

1 " Signare di Notle" one o) 
Signor of the Night, ^ Officers belonging to the 
) public. 



MEN. 

Marino Fai.iero, Doge of Venice. 
Bertuccio Faliero, Nejthew of t/w Doge. 
Lioni, a Patrician and Senator. 
Bem.ntei.de, Chief of tlie Council of Ten. 
Michel Steno, one of the three Cajti of the Forty. 
Israel Bertuccio, Chief of the Arsenal. 
Philip Calendaro, ) 
Daoolino, > Conspirators. 

Bektrand, 5 

" Signore di Notle." one of On 
Re- 
publit 
First Citizen. - « 

Second Citizen. 
Third Citizen. 

VlNCENZO, 1 

Pietro, > Officers belonging to the Ducal Palace. 
Battista, j 

Secretary of the Council of Ten. 

Guards, Conspirators, Citizens, the Council of Ten, th» 
Giunta, etc., etc. 

WOMEN. 
Angiolinj, Wife to the Doge. 
Marianna, her Friend. 
Female Attendants, etc. 



Scene, Venice — in the year 1355. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. 

An Antechamber in the Duccd Palace. 

Pietro speaks, in entering, to Battista. 

pietro. 

Is not the messenger return'd ? 

battista. 

Not yet ; 
I have sent frequently, as you commanded, 
But still the signory is deep in council 
And long debate on Steno's accusation. 

pietro. 
Too long — at least so thinks the Doge. 
battista. 

How b 
These moments of suspense ? 

PIETRO. 

With struggling, 
Placed at the ducal table, cover'd o'er ""e 
With all the apparel of the state ; petite, 
Despatches, judgments, acts, reprieve? 
He sits as rapt in duty : but whene'r 
He hears the jarring of a distant dr°yh 
Or aught that intimates a coming 
Or murmur of a voice, his quick°"ght to leave; 
And he will start up from his c ,|s virw'd 
And seat himself again, and or i.'""'l, 
Upon some edict; but I hav* endued), 
For the last hour he has noP grieve • 



MARINO 


FALIERO. 245 


BATTISTA. 


VINCEN/.O. 


'Tis said he is much moved, and doubtless 'twas 


No, my lord ; you know 


Foul scorn in Steno to offend so grossly. 


The secret customs of the courts in Venice. 


PIETRO. 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Av, if a poor man : Steno 's a patrician, 


True; but there still is something given to guess. 


Young, galliard, gay, and haughty. 


Which a shrewd gleaner and quick eye would catch at, 


BATTISTA. 


A whisper, or a murmur, or an :iir 


Then you think 


More or less solemn spread o'er the tribunal*. 
The Forty are but men — most worthy men, 


He will not be judged hardly. 


PIETRO. 

'T were enough 


And wise, and just, and cautions — this I grant — 
And secret as the grave to which they doom 


He be judged justly ; but 'tis not for us 


The guilty ; hut with all this, in their aspects — 


To anticipate the sentence of the Forty. 


At least in some, the juniors of the number— 


BATTISTA. 


A searching eye, an eye like yours, Vincenzo, 
Would read the sentence ere it was pronounced. 


And here it comes. — What news, Vincenzo? 


Enter Vincln/.o. 






VINCEN/.O 


VINCENZO. 

'Tis 


My lord, I came away upon the moment, 


Decided ; but as yet his doom 's unknown : 


And had no leisure to take note of that 


I saw the president in act to seal 


Which pass'd among the judges, even in seeming; 


The parchment which will bear the Forty's judgment 


My station near the accused too, Michael Steno 
Made me 


Unto the Doge, and hasten to inform him. 


[Exeunt. 


DOGE (ahruptly). 


And how look'd he ? deliver that. 

VINCENZO. 




SCENE II. 


Calm, but not overcast, he stood resign'd 


The Ducal Chamber. 


To the decree, whate'er it were ; — but lo ! 


Marino Faliero, Doge; and his nephew, Bertuccio 


It comes, for the perusal of his hignness. 


Faliero. 


Enter the Secretary of the Forty. 


bertuccio faliero. 


SECRETARY. 


It cannot be but they will do you justice. 


The high tribunal of the Forty sends 


DOGE. 


Health and respect to the Doge Faliero, 


Ay, such as the Avogadori did, 


Chief magistrate of Venice, and requests 


Who sent up my appeal unto the Forty 


His highness to peruse and to approve 


To try him by his peers, his own tribunal. 


The sentence pass'd on Michel Steno, born 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Patrician, and arraign'd upon the charge 


His peers will scarce protect him ; such an act 


Contain'd, together with its penalty, 


Would bring contempt on all authority. 


Within the rescript which I now present. 


DOGE. 


DOGE. 


Know you not Venice? know you not the Forty? 


Retire, and wait without. — Take thou this papei : 


But we shall see anon. 


[Exeunt Secretary and Vincenzo 


Bertuccio Faliero (addressing Vixcenzo, Oien 


The misty letters vanish from my eyes ; 


entering). 


I cannot fix them. 


How now — what tidings ? 


bertuccio faliero. 


VINCENZO. 


Patience, my dear uncle : 


I am charged to tell his highness that the court 


Why do you tremble thus ? — nay, doubt not, all 


Has pass'd its resolution, and that, soon 


Will be as could be wish'd. 


As the due forms of judgment are gone through, 


DOGE. 


The sentence will be sent up to the Doge : 


Say on. 


In the mean time the Forty doth salute 


bertuccio faliero (reading). 


The prince of the republic, and entreat 


" Decreed 


His acceptation of their duty. 


In council, without one dissenting voice, 


DOGE. 


That Michel Steno, by his own confession, 


Yes— 


Guilty on the last night of carnival 


They are wondrous dutiful, and ever humble. 


Of having graven on the ducal throne 


Sentence is past, you say ? 


The following words " 


VINCENZO. 


DOGE, 


It is, your highness : 


Wouldst thou repeat h»jn ' 


The president was sealing it, when I 


Wouldst thou repeat them — thou, a Faliero, 


Was call'd in, that no moment might be lost 


Harp on the deep dishonour of our house, 


In forwarding the intimation due, 


Dishonour'd in its chief — that chief the prince 


Not only to the chief of the republic, 


Of Venice, first of cities? — To the sentence. 


But the complainant, both in one united. 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Forgive me, my good lord ; I will obey — 


Arc you aware, from aught you have perceived, 


(Reads) " That Michel Steno be dctain'd a month 


Of their decision ? 


In close arrest." 



246 BYRON'S WORKS. 


DOGE. 


Will point the finger, and the haughty noble 


Proceed. 


May spit upon us : where is our redress? 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


BERTUCCIO FAI.IEUO. 


My lord, 't is finish'd. 


The law, my prince — 


DOOE. 


DOOE {interrupting him). 


II >w, say you ? — finish'd ! Do I dream ? — 'T is false — 


You see what it has done : 


Give me the paper — {Snatches the paper, and reads). 


I ask'd no remedy but from the law — 


" 'Tis decreed in council 


I .sought no vengeance but redress by law — 


That Michel Stenq" Nephew, thine arm! 


I call'd no judges but those named by law — 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


As sovereign, I appeal'd unto my subjects, 


Nay, 


The very subjects who had made me sovereign, 


Cheer up, be calm ; this transport is uncall'd for — 


And gave me thus a double right to be so. 


Let me seek some assistance. 


The rights of place and choice, of birth and service, 


DOGE. 


Honours and years, these scars, these hoary hairs, 


Stop, sir — stir not — 


The travel, toil, the perils, the fatigues, 


T is past. 


The blood and sweat of almost eighty years, 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Were weigh'd i' the balance, 'gainst the foulest stain, 


I cannot but agree with you 


The grossest insult, most contemptuous crime 


The sentence is too slight for the offence : 


Of a rank, rash patrician — and found wanting ! 


It is not honourable in the Forty 


And this is to be borne ? 


To affix so slight a penalty to that 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Which was a foul affront to you, and even 


I say not that : 


To them, as being your subjects ; but 't is not 


In case your fresh appeal should be rejected, 


Yet without remedy ; you can appeal 


We will find other means to make all even. 


To them once more, or to the Avogadori, 


DOGE. 


Who, seeing that true justice is withheld, 


Appeal again! art thou my brother's son? 


Will now take up the cause they once declined, 


A scion of the house of Faliero ? 


And do you right upon the bold delinquent. 


The nephew of a Doge ? and of that blood 


Think vou not thus, good uncle? why do you stand 


Which hath already given three dukes to Venice? 


So fix'd ? you heed me not: — I pray you, hear me ! 


But thou say'st well — we must be humble now. 


doge {dashing down the ducal bonnet, and offering 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


to trample upon it, exclaims, as lie is with- 


My princely uncle ! you are too much moved : — 


held by his nephew). 


I grant it was a gross offence ; and grossly 


Oh, that the Saracen were in Saint Mark's! 


Left, without fitting punishment ; but still 


Thus would I do him homage. 


This fury doth exceed the provocation, 


EERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Or any provocation: if we are wrong'd, 


For the sake 


We will ask justice ; if it be denied, 


Of heaven and all its saints, my lord 


We '11 take it ; but may do all this in calmness — 


DOGE 


Deep vengeance is the daughter of deep silence. 


Away! 


I have yet scarce a third part of your years, 


Oh, that the Genoese were in the port! 


I love our house, I honour you, its chief, 


Oh that the Huns whom I o'erthrew at Zara 


The guardian of my youth, and its instructor- 


Were ranged around the palace ! 


Hut though I understand your grief, and enter 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


In part of your disdain, it doth appal me 


'T is not well 


To see your anger, like our Adrian waves, 


In Venice Duke to say so. 


O'ersweep all bounds, and foam itself to air. 


DOGE. 


DOGE. 


Venice' Duke ! 


I tell thee — matt I tell thee — what thy father 


Who now is Duke in Venice? let me see him, 


Would have required no words to comprehend ? 


That he may do me right. 


Hast thou no feeling save the external sense 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Of torture from the touch? hast thou no soul — 


If you forget 


No pride — no passion — no deep sense of honour? 


Four office, and its dignity and duty, 


BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 


Remember that of man, and curb this passion. 


'T is the first time that honour has been doubted, 


The Duke of Venice 


And were the last, from any other sceptic. 


doge {interrupting him). 


DOGE. 


There is no such thing- 


You know the full offence of this born villain, 


It is a word — nay, worse — a worthless by-word: 


This creeping, coward, rank, acquitted felon, 


Tne most despised, wrong'd, outraged, helpless wretch, 


Who threw his sting into a poisonous libel, 


Who begs h.s bread, if 'tis refused by one, 


And on the honour of — Oh, God! — my wife, 


May win it from another kinder heart; 


The nearest, dearest part of all men's honour, 


Rut he who is denied his right by those 


Left a base slur to pass from mouth to mouth 


Whose place it is to do no wrong, is poorer 


Of loose mechanics, with all coarse foul comments, 


Thii'i the rejected beggar — he's a slave — 


And villanous jests, and blasphemies obscene ; 


And that am I, and thou, and all our house, 


While sneering nobles, in more polish'd guise, 


Even from this hour; the meanest artisan 


Whisper'd the tale, and smiled uuon the lie 



/ 



MARINO FALIERO. 



217 



Which made me look like them — a courteous wittol, 
Patient — ay, proud, it may be, of dishonour. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

But still it was a lie — you knew it false, 
And so did all men. 

DOGE. 

Nephew, the high Roman 
Said " Caesar's wife must not even be suspected," 
And put her from him. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

True — but in those days 

DOGE. 

What is it that a Roman would not suffer, 
That a Venetian prince must bear? Old Dandolo 
Refused the diadem of all the Caesars, 
A nd wore the ducal cap I trample on, 
Because 't is now degraded. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

'T is even so. 

DOGE. 

It is — it is : — I did not visit on 

The innocent creature, thus most vilely slander'd, 

Because she took an old man for her lord, 

For that he had been long her father's friend 

And patron of her house, as if there were 

No love in woman's heart but lust of youth 

And beardless faces ; — I did not for this 

Visit the villain's infamy on her, 

But craved my country's justice on his head, 

The justice due unto the humblest being 

Who hath a wife whose faith is sweet to him, 

Who hath a home whose hearth is dear to him, 

Who hath a name whose honour 's all to him, 

When these are tainted by the accursing breath 

Of calumny and scorn. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

And what redress 
Did you expect as his fit punishment ? 

DOGE. 

Death ! Was I not the sovereign of the state — 
Insulted on his very throne, and made 
A mockerv to the men who should obey me ? 
Was I not injured as a husband ? scorn'd 
As man? reviled, degraded, as a prince? 
Was not offence like his a complication 
Of insult and of treason? and he lives ! 
Had he, instead of en the Doge's throne, 
Stamp'd the same brand upon a peasant's stool, 
His blood had gilt the threshold, for the carle 
Had stabb'd him on the instant. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Do not doubt it : 
He shall not live till sunset — leave to me 
The means, and calm yourself. 

DOGE. 

Hold, nephew ! this 
Would have sufficed but yesterday : at present 
I have no further wrath against this man. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

What mean you ? is not the offence redoubled 
By this most rank — 1 will not say — acquittal, 
For it is worse, being full acknowledgment 
Of the offence, and leaving it unpumsh'd7 

DOGE. 

It is redoubled, but not now by him ; 



The Forty hath decreed a month's arrest — 
We must obey the Forty. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Obey them ! 
Who have forgot their duly to the sovereign ? 

DOGE. 

Why, yes ; — boy, you perceive it then at last: 

Whether as fellow-citizen who sues 

For justice, or as sovereign who commands it, 

They have defrauded me of both my rights 

(For here the sovereign is a citizen); 

But, notwithstanding, harm not thou a hiir 

Of Steno's head — he shall not wear it long. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Not twelve hours longer, had you left to me 

The mode and means : if you had calmly heard me 

I never meant this miscreant should escape, 

But wish'd you lo repress such gusts of passion, 

That we more surely might devise together 

His taking off. 

DOGE. 

No, nephew, he must live ; 
At least, just now — a life so vile as his 
Were nothing at this hour ; in th' olden time 
Some sacrifices ask'd a single victim ; 
Great expiations had a hecatomb. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Your wishes are my law ; and yet I fain 
Would prove to you how near unto my heart 
The honour of our house must ever be. 

DOGE. 

Fear not ; you shall have time and place of proof: 
But be not thou too rash, as I have been. 
I am ashamed of my own anger now j 
I pray you, pardon me. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Why, that 's my uncle ! 
The leader, and the statesman, and the chief 
Of commonwealths, and sovereign of himself! 
I wonder'd to perceive you so forget 
All prudence in your fury, at these years, 
Although the cause 

DOGE. 

Ay, think upon the cause- 
Forget it not : — when you lie down to rest, 
Let it be black among your dreams ; and when 
The morn returns, so let it stand between 
The sun and you, as an ill-omen'd cloud 
Upon a summer-day of festival : 
So will it stand to me ; — but speak not, stir not,— 
Leave all to me ; — we shall have much to do, 
And you shall have a part. — But now retire, 
'T is fit I were alone. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

( Tuhing up and placing the ducal bonnet on the table) 

Ere I depart, 
I pray you to resume what you have spurn'd, 
Till you can change it hapiy for a crown. 
And now I take my leave, imploring you 
In all things to rely upon my duty 
As doth become your near and faithful kinsman, 
And not less loyal citizen and subject. 

[Exit Bertuccio Fa hero 

DOGE {solus). 

Adieu, my worthy nephew. — Hollow bauble ! 

[ Taking up the ducal cap 



24 8 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Beset with all the thorns that line a crown, 

Without investing the insulted brow 

With the all-swaying majesty of kings ; 

Thou idle, gilded, and degraded toy, 

Let me resume thee as I would a vizor. [Puts it on. 

How my brain aches beneath thee ' and my temples 

Throb feverish under thy dishonest weight. 

Could I not turn thee to a diadem? 

Could I not shatter the liriarean sceptre 

Winch in this hundred-handed senate rules, 

Milking the people nothing, and the prince 

A imgeant? In my life 1 have achieved 

Tasks nc* less difficult — achieved for them 

Who thus repay me! — Can 1 not requite them? 

Oil, for one year ! Oh, but for even a day 

Of my full youth, while yet my body served 

My soul, as serves the generous steed his lord ! 

I would have dash'd amongst them, asking few 

In aid to overthrow these svvoln patricians ; 

But now I must look round for other hands 

To serve this hoary head ; but it shall plan 

In such a sort as will not leave the task 

Herculean, though as yet 't is but a chaos 

Of darkly-brooding thoughts : my fancy is 

In her first work, more nearly to the light 

Holding the sleeping images of things, 

For the selection of the pausing judgment — 

The troops are few in 

Enter Vincenzo. 

There is one without 
Craves audience of your highness. 

DOGE. 

I 'in unwell — 
I can see no t ne, not even a patric-an — 
Let him refer his business to l he council. 

VINCENZO. 

My lord, I vvnl deliver your reply ; 

It cannot much import — he's a plebeian, 

The master of a galley, I believe. 

DOGE. 

How ! did you say the patron of a galley 7 
That is — I mean — a servant of the state : 
Admit him, he may be on public service. 

[Edit Vincenzo 
doge (solus). 
This patron may be sounded ; I will try him. 
I know the people to be discontented; 
They have cause, since Sapienza's adverse day, 
When Genoa conquer'd : they have further cause, 
Since they are nothing in the state, and in 
The city worse than nothing — mere machines, 
To serve the nobles' most patrician pleasure. 
I ho troops have long arrears of pay, oft promised, 
And murmur deeply — any hope of change 
Will draw them forward : they shall pay themselves 
Wuh plunder: — but the priests — I doubt the priesthood 
Will not be with us ; they have hated me 
Since that rash hour, when, madden'd with the drone, 
I smote the tardy bishop at Treviso, 1 
Quickening his holy march : yet, nc'ertheless, 
They may be won, at least their chief at Heme, 
liy some well-timed concessions; but, above 
All tilings, I must be speedy ; at my hour 
Of twilight, little light of life remains. 
Could I free Venice, and avenge my wrongs, 
Pad lived loo long, and willingly would sleep 



Next moment with my sires ; and, wanting this, 

Better that sixty of my fourscore years 

Had been already where — how soon, I care not — 

The whole must be extinguish'd ; — better that 

They ne'er had been, than drag me on to be 

The thing these arch oppressors fain would make me. 

Let me consider — of efficient troops 

There arc three thousand posted at 

Enter Vincenzo and Iskael Bertuccio. 
vincenzo. 

May it please 
Your highness, the same patron whom I spake of 
Is here to crave your patience. 

DOGE. 

Leave the chamber, 
Vincenzo. — 

[Exit Vincenzo. 
Sir, you may advance — what would you 7 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Redress. 

DOGE. 

Of whom 7 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Of God and of the Doge. 

DOGE. 

Alas ! my friend, you seek it of the twain 
Of least respect and interest in Venice. 
You must address the council. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

'T were in vain ; 
For he who injured me is one of them. 

DOGE. 

There 's b'ood upon thy face — how came it there ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

'T is mine, and not the first I 've shed for Venice, 
But the first shed by a Venetian hand : 
A noble smote me. 

DOGE. 

Doth he live? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Not long 

But for the hope I had and have, that you, 
My prince, yourself a soldier, will redress 
Him, whom the laws of discipline and Venice 
Permit not to protect himself; if not — 
I say no more. 

DOGE. 

But something you would do— 
Is it not so 7 

ISRAEL EERTUCCIO. 

I am a man, my lord. 

DOGE. 

Why, so is he who smote you. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

He is call'd so ; 
Nay, more, a noble one — at least, in Venice : 
But since he hath forgotten that I am one, 
And treats me like a brute, the brute may turn— 
'T is said the worm will. 

DOGE. 

Say his name and lineage 1 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Barbaro. 

DOGE. 

What was the cause, or the pretext? 



ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I am the chief ol the arsenal, employed 

At present in repairing certain "alleys 

But roughly used by the Genoese last year. 

This morning comes the noble Barbaro 

Full of reproof, because our artisans 

IT.id left some frivolous order of his house, 

To execute the state's decree : I dared 

To j.istify the men — he raised his hand ; — 

Behold my blood ! the first time it e'er fiW'd 

Dishonourably. 

DOGE. 

Have you long time served ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

So long as to remember Zara's siege, 

And fight beneath the chief who beat the Huns there, 

Sometime my general, now the Doge Faliero. — 

DOGE. 

How ! are we comrades ? — the state's ducal robes 
Sit newjy on me, and you were appointed 
Chief of the arsenal ere I came from Rome ; 
So that I recognised you not. Who placed you? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

The late Doge ; keeping still my old command 
As pation of a galley: mv new office 
Was given as the reward of certain scars 
(So was your predecessor pleased to say): 
I little thought his bounty would conduct me 
To his successor as a helpless plaintiff", 
At least, in such a cause. 

DOGE. 

Are you much hurt? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Irreparably in my self-esteem. 

DOGE. 

Speak out ; fear nothing : being stung at heart, 
What would you do to be revenged on this man ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

That which I dare not name, and yet will do. 

DOGE. 

Then wherefore came you here ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I come for justice, 
Because my general is Doge, and will not 
See his old soldier trampled on. Had any, 
Save Faliero, fill'd the ducal throne, 
This blood had been wash'd out in other blood. 

DOGE. 

You come to me for justice — unto me ! 
The Doge of Venice, and I cannot give it • 
I cannot even obtain it — 't was denied 
To me most solemnly an hour aga 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

How says your highness ? 

DOGE. 

Steno is condemn'd 
To a month's confinement. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

What ! the same who dared 
To stain the ducal throne with those foul words 
That have cried shame to every ear in Venice ? 

DOGE. 

Ay, doubtless they have echo'd o'er the arsenal, 
Keeping due time with every hammer's clink, 
As a good jest to jolly artisans; 
Or making chorus to the creaking oar, 
Z S7 



In the vile tune of every galley slave, 
Who, as he Bung the merry stave, exulted 
He was not a shamed dotard, like the Doge 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 
Is it possible? a month's imprisonment ! 
No more for Steno ? 

DOGE. 

You have heard the offence, 
And now you know his punishment ; and then 
You ask redress of me ! (Jo to the Forty, 
Who pass'd the sentence upon Michel Steno; 
They'll do as much by Barbaro, no doubt. 

isu \EI. BERTtTCCJO. 
Ah ! dared I speak my feelings ! 

DOGE. 

Give them breath. 
Mine have no further outrage to endure. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Then, in a word, it rests but on your word 
To punish and avenge — I will not sav 
My petty wrong, for what is a mere blow, 

However vile, to such a thing as I am ? 

But the base insult done your state and person. 

DOGE. 

You overrate my power, which is a pageant. 
This cap is not the monarch's crown ; these robes 
Might move compassion, like a beggar's rao-s • 
Nay, more, a beggar's are his own, and these 
But lent to the poor poppet, who must [day 
Its part with all its empire in this ermine. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Wouldst thou be king ? 

DOCE. 

Yes — of a happy people. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Wouldst thou be sovereign lord of Venice ? 

DOGE. 

4y, 

If that the people shared that sovereignty, 

So that nor thev nor 1 ui re further slaves 
To this o'ergrown aristocratic hydra, 
The poisonous heads of whose envenom'd body 
Have breathed a pesnlei.ee upon us all. 

ISRAEL HK'ITI'HIii. 

Yet, thou wast born ami still hast lived patrician. 

DOGE. 

In evil hour was I so born ; mv birth 

Hath made me Doge to be insulted: but 

I lived and toil'd a soldier and a servan* 

Of Venice and her people, not the senate ; 

Their good and my own honour were mv guerdon. 

I have fought and bled ; commanded, ay, and conqu°' A . 

Have made and marr'd peace oft in embassies, 

As it might chance to be our country's 'vantage; 

Have traversed land and sea in constant duty, 

Through almost sixty years, ami still for Venice, 

My fathers' and mv birth-place, whose dear spues 

Rising at distance o'er the blueLegOOR, 

It was reward enough (or tne lo view 

Once more ; but not for anv knot of men. 

Nor sect, nor faction, did I bleed or sweat ! 

Ii.it would you know why I have done all this i 

Ask of the bleeding pelican why she 

Hath ripp'd her bosom? Had the bird a voice, 

She'd tell thee 't was for all her little ones 



250 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

And vet they made thee Duke. 

DOGE. 

They made me so ; 
I sought it not ; the flattering fetters met me 
Returning from my Roman embassy, 
And never having hitherto refused 
Toil, charge, or duty for the s'ato, I did not, 
At these late years, decline what was the highest 
Of all in seeming, but of all most base 
In what we have to do and to endure : 
Rear witness for me thou, my injured subject, 
When I can nei'her right myself nor thee. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

\'ou shall do both, if you possess the will, 
And many thousands more no*, less oppress'd, 
Who wait but for a signal — will you give it? 

DOGE. 

You speak in riddles. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Which shall soon be read, 
At peril of my life, if you disdain not 
To lend a patient ear. 

DOGE. 

Say on. 

ISRAEL, BERTUCCIO. 

Not thou, 
Nor I alone, are injured and abused, 
Contemn'd and trampled on, but the whole people 
Groan with the strong conception of their wrongs: 
The foreign soldiers in the senate's pay 
Are discontented for their long arrears ; 
The native mariners and civic troops 
Feel with their friends ; for who is he amongst them 
Whose brethren, parents, children, wives, or sisters, 
Have not partook oppression, or pollution, 
From the patricians? And the hopeless war 
Against the Genoese, which is still maintain'd 
With the plebeian blood, and treasure wrung 
From their hard earnings, has inflamed them further: 
Even now — but I forget that, speaking thus, 
Perhaps I pass the sentence of my death ! 

DOGE. 

And, suffering what thou hast done, fear'st thou death? 
Be silent then, and live on, to be beaten 
By those for whom thou hast bled. 

ISRAEL, BERTUCCIO. 

No, I will speak 
At every hazard ; and if Venice' Doge 
Should turn delator, be the shame on him, 
And sorrow too ; for he will lose far more 
Than I. 

DOGE. 

From me fear nothing ; out with it. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Know, then, that there are met and sworn in secret 

A band of brethren, valiant hearts and true ; 

Men v»iic have proved all fortunes, and have long 

Grieved over that of Venice, and have right 

To <!o so • having served her in all climes, 

And having rescued her from foreign foes, 

Would do the same from those within her walls. 

They are not numerous, nor yet too few 

For their great purpose ; they have arms, and means, 

And newts and hopes, and faith and patient courage. 



DOGE. 

For what then do they pause ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

An hour to strike. 
DOGE (astiile). 
Saint Mark's shall strike that hour! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I now have placed 
My life, my honour, all my earthly hopes 
Within thy power, but in the firm belief 
That injuries like ours, sprung from one cause, 
Will generate one vengeance : should it be so, 
Be our chief now — our sovereign hereafter. 

DOGE. 

How many are ye ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I 'II not answer that 
Till I am answer'd. 

DOGE. 

How, Sir ! do you menace? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

No; I affirm. I have betray'd myself ; 

Hut there's no torture in the mystic wells 

Which undermine your palace, nor in those 

Not less appalling cells, " the leaden roofs," 

To force a single name from me of others. 

The Pozzi and the Piombi were in vain ; 

They might wring blood from me, but treachery nevet, 

And I would pass the fearful " Bridge ol Sighs," 

Joyous that mine must be the last that e'er 

Would echo o'er the Stygian wave which lions 

Between the murderers and the murder'd, washing 

The prison and the palace walls: there are 

Those w ho would live to think on 't and avenge me. 

DOGE. 

If such your power and purpose, why come here 
To sue for justice, being in the courss 
To do yourself due right ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Because the man 
Who claims protection from authority, 
Showing his confidence and his submission 
To that authority, can hardly be 
Suspected of combining to destroy it. 
Had I sale down too humbly with this blow, 
A moody brow and mutter'd threats had made me 
A mark'd man to the Forty's inquisition ? 
But loud complaint, however angrily 
It shapes its phrase, is little to be fear'd, 
And less distrusted. But, besides all this, 
I had another reason. 

DOGE. 

What was that ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Some rumours that the Doge was greatly moved 

By the reference of the Avogadori 

Of Michel Steno's sentence to the Forty 

Had reach'd me. I had served you, honour'd you, 

And felt that you were dangerously insulted, 

Being of an order of such spirits as 

Requite tenfold both good and evil ; 't was 

My wish to prove and urge you to redress. 

Now you know all ; and that I speak the truth. 

My peril be the proof. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



251 



DOGE. 

You have deeply ventured j 
Bui all must do so who would greatly win : 
Thus far I '11 answer you — your secret's safe. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Ai:J is this all? 

DOGE. 

Unless with all entrusted, 
What would you have me answer ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I would have you 
Trust him who leaves his life in trust with you. 

DOGE. 

But I must know your plan, your names, and numbers ; 
The last may then be doubled, and the former 
Matured and strengthen'd. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

We 're enough already ; 
You are the sole ally we covet now. 

DOGE. 

But bring me to the knowledge of your chiefs. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

That shall be done, upon your formal pledge 
To keep the faith that we will pledge to you. 

DOGE. 

When? where? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

This night I '11 bring to your apartment 
Two of the principals ; a greater number 
Were hazardous. 

DOGE. 

Stay, I must think of this. 
What if I were to trust myself amongst you, 
And leave the palace? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

You must come alone. 

DOGE. 

With but my nephew. 

ISRAEL EERTUCCIO. 

Not were he your son. 

DOGE. 

Wretch ! darest thou name my son ? He died in arms, 

At Sapienza, for this faithless state. 

Oh ! that he were alive, and I in ashes ! 

Or that he were alive ere I be ashes ! 

I should not need the dubious aid of strangers. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Not one of all those strangers whom thou doubtest 

But will regard thee with a filial feeling, 

So that thou keep'st a father's faith with them. 

DOGE. 

The die is cast. Where is the place ol meeting ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

At midnight I will be alone and mask'd 
Where'er your highness pleases to direct me, 
To wait your coming, and conduct you where 
You shall receive our homage, and pronounce 
Upon our project. 

DO^F. 

At wh?t hour arises 
The moon ? 

ISR\«=L BERTUCCIO. 

Late* j-.it the atmosphere is thick and dusky; 
T is » sirocvo. 

DOOE. 

At tne midnight hour, then. 



Near to the church where sleep my sires ; the same, 

Twin-named from the apostles John and Paul ; 

A gondola, 2 with one oar only, will 

Lurk in the narrow channel which glides by. 

Be there. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I will not fail. 

DOGE. 

And now retire 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

In the full hope your highness will not falter 

In your great purpose. Prince, I take my leave. 

[Exit Israel Bertuccio. 
doge (solus). 
At midnight, by the church Saints John and Pau., 
Where sleep my noble fathers, I repair — 
To what ? to hold a council in the dark 
With common ruffians leagued to ruin states ! 
And will not my great sires leap from the vault, 
Where lie two Doges who preceded me, 
And pluck me down amongst them 1 Would they could . 
For I should rest in honour with the honour'd. 
Alas ! I must not think of them, but those 
Who have made me thus unworthy of a name, 
Noble and brave as aught of consular 
On Roman marbles : but I will redeem it 
Back to its antique lustre in our annals, 
By sweet revenge on all that's base in Venice, 
And freedom to the rest, or leave it black 
To all the growing calumnies of time, 
Which never spare the fame of him who fails, 
But try the Csesar, or the Catiline, 
By the true touchstone of desert — success. 



ACT II. 

SCENE I. 

An Apartment in the Ducal Palace. 
Angiolina (wife of the Doge) ami Marianrj 

ANGIOLINA. 

What was the Doge's answer ? 

MARIAKNA. 

That he was 
That moment summon'd to a conference ; 
But 't is by this time ended. I perceived 
Not long ago the senators embarking ; 
And the last gondola may now be seen 
Gliding into the throng of barks which stud 
The glittering waters. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Would he were return'd ! 
He has been much disquieted of late ; 
And Time, which has not tamed his fiery spirit 
Nor yet enfeebled even his mortal frame, 
Which seems to be more nourish'd by a soul 
So quick and restless that it would consume 
Less hardy clay — Time has but little power 
On his resentments or his griefs. Unlike 
To other spirits of his order, who, 
In the first burst of passion, pour away 
Their wrath or sorrow, all tilings wear in him 
An aspect of eternity : his thoughts, 
His feelings, passions, good or evil, all 
Have nothing of old age ; and his bold brow 
Bears but the scars of mind, me tntugnis cf veaii 



l 25'-2 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


Not their decrepitude: and he of late 


And not the quality they prize ; the first 


Has been more agitated than his wont. 


Have found it ;i hard task to hold their honour, 


Would he were come! for I alone have power 


If they require it to be bkuon'd forth j 


Upon his troubled spirit. 


And those who have not kept it seek its seeming 


MARIANNA. 


As they would look out for un ornament 


It is true, 


Of which they feel the want, hut not because 


His highness has of late been greatly moved 


They think it so; they live in others' thoughts, 


By the affront of Steno, and with cause ; 


And would seem honest as they must seem fair. 


But the offender doubtless even now 


MARI ANNA. 


Is doom'd to expiate his rash insult with 


You have strange thoughts for a patrician dame. 


Such chastisement as will enforce respect 


ANGIOLINA. 


To female virtue, and to noble blood. 


And yet they were my father's ; with his name. 


ANGIOLINA. 


The sole inheritance he left. 


'T was a gross insult ; but I heed it not 


MA III ANN A. 


For the rash scorner's falsehood in itself, 


You want none ; 


But for the etfect, the deadly deep impression 


Wife to a prince, the chief of the republic. 


Which it has made upon Faliero's soul, 


ANGIOLINA. 


The proud, the fiery, the austere — austere 


I should have sought none, though a peasant's hrida, 


To all save me : I tremble when I think 


But feel not less the love and gratitude 


To what it may conduct. 


Due to my father, who bestow'd my hand 


MAUIANNA. 


Upon his early, tried, and trusted friend, 


Assuredly 


The Count Val di Marino, now our Doge. 


The Doge cannot suspect you 1 


MARIANNA. 


ANGIOLINA. 


And with that hand did he bestow your heart? 


Suspect me ! 


ANGIOLINA. 


Why Steno dared not : when he scrawPd his lie, 


He did so, or it had not been bestow'd. 


Grovelling by stealth in the moon's glimmering light, 


MAKIANNA. 


His own still conscience smote him for the act, 


Yet this strange disproportion in your years, 


And every shadow on the walls frown'd shame 


And, let me add, disparity of tempers, 


Upon his coward calumny. 


Might make the world doubt whether such an union 


MARIANNA. 


Could make you wisely, permanently happy. 


'T were fit 


ANGIOLINA. 


1 He should be punish'd grievously. 


The world will think with worldlings : but my heart 


ANGIOLINA. 


Has sti'l been in my duties, which are many, 


He is so. 


But never difficult. 


MARIA UNA. 


MARIA NN A. 


What ! is the sentence pass'd 1 is he condemn' d ? 


And do you love him ? 


ANGIOLINA. 


ANGIOLINA. 


I know not that, but he has been detected. 


I love all noble qualities which merit 


MARIANNA. 


Love, and I loved my father, who first taught me 


And deem you this enough fur such foul scorn ? 


To single out what we should love in others, 


ANGIOLINA. 


And to subdue all tendency to lend 


1 would not be a judge in my own cause, 


The best and purest feelings of our nature 


Nor do I know what sense of punishment 


To baser passions. He bestow'd my hand 


May reach the soul of ribalds such as Steno; 


Upon Fauero : he had known him noble, 


But if his insults sink no deeper in ^|fc» 


Brave, generous, rich in all the qualities 


The minds of the inquisitors than they VF 


Of soldier, citizen, and friend ; in all 


Have ru'lled mine, he will, for all acquittance, 


Such have I found him as my father said. 


Be left to his own shamelcssncss or shame. 


His faults are those that dwell in the high bosoms 


MARIA N.N A. 


Of men who have commanded ; too much pride, 


Some sacrifice is due to slandcr'd virtue. 


And the deep passions fiercely foster'd by 


ANGIOLINA. 


The uses of patricians, and a life 


Why, what is virtue if it needs a victim? 


Spent in the storms of state and war ; and also 


Or if it mast depend upon men's words? 


From the quick sense of honour, which becomes 


The dying Roman said, " 't was but a name :" 


A duty to a certain sign, a vice 


It were indeed no more, if human breath 


When overstrain'd, and this I fear in him. 


Could make or mar it. 


And then he has been rash from his youth upwards, 


MAKIANNA. 


Yet temper'd by redeeming nobleness 


^Yet full many a dame, 


In such sort, that the wariest of republics 


Stainless and faithful, would feel all the wrong 


Has lavished all its chief employs upon him, 


Of such a slander ■ and less rigid ladies, 


From his first fight to his last embassy, 


Such as abound in Venice, would be loud 


From which on his return the dukedom met him. 


Anu all-inexorable in their cry 


MAKIANNA. 


For pisticc. 


But, previous to this marriage, had your heart 


ANGIOLINA. 


Ne'er beat for any of the noble youth, 


This but proves it is the name 


Such as in years had been more meet to niatr.b 



MARINO FALIERO. 



C 25A 



Beauty like yours ? or since have you ne'er seen 
One, who, if your fair hand were still to give, 
Might now pretend to Loredano's daughter? 

ANGIOLINA. 

I answer'd your first question when I said 
I married. 

MA RI ANNA. 

And the second? 

ANGIOLINA. 

Needs no answer. 

MARIANNA. 

I pray you pardon, if I have offended. 

ANGIOLINA. 

I feel no wrath, hut some surprise : I knew not 
That wedded bosoms could permit themselves 
To ponder upon what they now might choose, 
Or aught, save their past choice. 

MARIANNA. 

'T is their past choice 
That far too often makes them deem they would 
Now choose more wisely, could they cancel it. 

ANGIOLINA. 

It may be so. I knew not of such thoughts. 

MARIANNA. 

Here comes the Doge — shall I retire ? 

ANGIOLINA. 

It may 
Be better you should quit me ; he seems wrapt 
In thought. — How pensively he takes his way ! 

[Exit Marianna. 
Enter the Doge and Pietro. 
Doge {musing). 
There is a certain Philip Calendaro 
Now in the arsenal, who holds command 
Of eighty men, and has great influence 
Besides on all the spirits of his comrades. 
This man, I hear, is bold and popular, 
Sudden and daring, and yet secret : 't would 
Be well that he were won : I needs must hope 
That Israel Bertuccio has secured him, 
But fain would be 

PIETRO. 

My lord, pray pardon me 
For breaking in upon your meditation ; 
The Senator Bertuccio, your kinsman, 
Charged me to follow and inquire your pleasure 
To fix an hour when he may speak with you. 

DOGE. 

At sunset. — Stay a moment — let me see — 

Say in the second hour of night. [Exit Pietro. 

ANGIOLINA. 

My lord! 

DOGE. 

My dearest child, forgive me — why delay 
So long approaching me ? — I saw you not. 

ANGIOLINA. 

You were absorb'd in thought, and he who now 
Has parted from you might htive words of weight 
To bear you from the senate. 

DOGE. 

From the senate ? 

ANGIOLINA. 

I would not interrupt him in his duty 
And theirs. 

DOGE. 

The senate's duty ! you mistake ; 
'T is we who owe all service to the senate. 
z2 



ANGIOhlNA. 

I thought the Dukc had held command in Venice. 

DOGE. 

He shall. — But let that pass. — We will be jocund. 
How fares it with you ? have you been abroad ? 
The day is overcast, but the calm wave 
Favours the gondolier's light skimming oar; 
Or have you held a levee of yuur friends / 
Or has your music made vou solitary ? 
Say — is there aught that you would will within 
The little sway now left the Duke ? or aught 
Of fitting splendour, or of honest pleasure, 
Social or lonely, that would glad your heart, 
To compensate for many a dull hour, wasted 
On an old man oft moved wiih many cares ? 
Speak, and 't is done. 

ANGIOLINA. 

You 're ever kind to me— 
I have nothing to desire, or to request, 
Except to see you ortener and calmer. 

DOGE. 

Calmer ? 

ANGIOLINA. 

Ay, calmer, my good lord. — Ah, why 
Do you still keep apart, and walk almip, 
And let such strong emotions stamp your brow, 
As, not betraying their full import, yet 
Disclose too much ? 

DOGE. 

Disclose too much! — of what' 
What is there to disclose ? 

ANGIOLINA. 

A heart so ill 
At ease. 

DOGE. 

'T is nothing, child. — But in the state 
You know what daily cares oppress all those 
Who govern this precarious commonwealth ; 
Now suffering from the Genoese without, 
And malcontents within — 't is this which makes ma 
More pensive ard less tranquil than my wont. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Yet this existed luig before, and never 
Till in these late days did I see you thus. 
Forgive me : there is something at your heart 
.More than the mere discharge of public duties, 
Which long use and a talent like to yours 
Have render'd light, nay, a necessity, 
To keep your mind from stagnating. 'T is not 
In hostile states, nor perils, thus to shake you : 
You, who have stood all storms and never sunk, 
And climb'd up to the pinnacle of power, 
And never fainted by the way, and stand 
Upon it, and can look down steadily 
Along the depth beneath, and ne'er feel dizzy. 
Were Genoa's galleys riding in the port, 
Were civil fury raging in Saint Mark's, 
You are not to be wrought on, but wool, I fall, 
As vou have risen, with an unalter'd brow: 
Your feelings now are of a ditfercnt kind ; 
Something has stung your pride, not patriotism. 

DOGE. 

Pride! Angiolina? Alas! none is left me. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Yes — the same sin that overthrew the angels, 
And of all sins most easily bescu 



?54 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Mortals the nearest to the angelic nature : 
The vile are only vain ; the great are proud. 

DOGE. 

I had the pride of honour, of your honour, 

Deep at my heart — But let us change the theme. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Ah no ! — As I have ever shared your kindness 
In all things else, let me not be shut out 
From your distress : were it of public import, 
You know I never sought, would never seek 
To win a word from you ; but feeling now 
Your grief is private, it belongs to me 
To lighten or divide it. Since the day 
When foolish Steno's ribaldry, detected, 
Unfix'd your quiet, you are greatly changed, 
And I would soothe you back to what you were. 

DOGE. 

To what I was ! — Have you heard Steno's sentence? 

ANGIOLINA. 

No. 

DOGE. 

A month's arrest. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Is it not enough ? 

DOGE. 

Enough ! — Yes, for a drunken galley slave, 
Who, stung by stripes, may murmur at his master; 
But not for a deliberate, false, cool villain, 
Who stains a lady's and a prince's honour, 
Even on the throne of his authority. 

ANGIOLINA. 

There seems to be enough in the conviction 
Of a patrician guilty of a falsehood: 
All other punishment were light unto 
His loss of honour. 

DOGE. 

Such men have no honour ; 
They have but their vile lives — and these are spared. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Tou would not have him die for this offence? 

DOGE. 

Not now : — being still alive, I 'd have him live 
Long as he can ; he has ceased to merit death ; 
The guilty saved hath damn'd his hundred judges, 
And he is pure, for now his crime is theirs. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Oh ! had this false and flippant libeller 
Shed his young blood for his absurd lampoon, 
Ne'er from that moment could this breast have known 
A joyous hour, or dreamless slumber more. 

DOGE. 

Does not the law of Heaven say blood for blood ? 

And he who taints kills more than he who sheds it. 

Is it the pain of blows, or shame of blows, 

That makes such deadly to the sense of man ? 

Do not the laws of man say blood for honour ? 

And less than honour, for a little gold? 

Say not the laws of nations blood for treason? 

Is 't nothing to have fill'd these veins with poison 

For their once healthful current? is it nothing 

To have siain'd your name and mine ? the noblest names? 

Is 't nothing to have brought into contempt 

A prince before his people 7 to have fail'd 

In the respect accorded by piankind 

To youth in woman, and old age ir. man ? 

To virtue in your sex, and dignity 



In ours ? — But let them look to it who have saved him. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Heaven bids us to forgive our enemies. 

DOGE. 

Doth Heaven forgive her own? Is Satan saved 
From wrath eternal ? 

ANGIOLINA. 

Do not speak thus wildly — 
Heaven will alike forgive you and your foes. 

DOGE. 

Amen! May Heaven forgive them. 

ANGIOLINA. 

And will you? 

DOGE. 

Yes, when they are in heaven ! 

ANGIOLINA. 

And not till ther. ? 

DOGE. 

What matters my forgiveness ? an old man's, 

Worn out, scorn'd, spurn'd, abused ; what matters thee 

My pardon more than my resentment? both 

Being weak and worthless ? I have lived too long. 

But let us change the argument. — My child ! 

My injured wife, the child of Loredano, 

The brave, the chivalrous, how little deem'd 

Thy father, wedding thee unto his friend, 

That he was linking thee to shame ! — Alas 

Shame without sin, for thou art faultless. Hadst thou 

But had a different husband, any husband 

In Venice save the Doge, this blight, this brand, 

This blasphemy had never fallen upon thee. 

So young, so beautiful, so good, so pure, 

To suffer this, and yet be unavenged ! 

ANGIOLINA. 

I am too well avenged, for you still love me, 
And trust, and honour me ; and all men know 
That you are just, and I am true : what more 
Could I require, or you command ? 

DOGE. 

'T is well, 
And may be better ; but whate'er betide, 
Be thou at least kind to my memory. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Why speak you thus ? 

DOGE. 

It is no matter why ; 
But I would still, whatever others think, 
Have your respect both now and in my grave. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Why should you doubt it? has it ever fail'd ? 

DOGE. 

Come hither, child ; I would a word with you. 
Your father was my friend ; unequal fortune 
Made him my debtor for some courtesies, 
Which bind the good more firmly : when opprer 
With his last malady, he will'd our union : 
It was not to repay me, long repaid 
Before by his great loyalty in friendship ; 
His object was to place your orphan beauty 
In honourable safety from the peri's 
Which, in this scorpion nest of vice, assail 
A lonely and undower'd maid. I did not 
Think with him, but would not oppose the thougln 
Which soothed his death-bed. 

ANGIOLINA. 

I have not forgotten 
The nobleness with which you bade me sDeak, 



MARINO FALIERO. 



255 



If iny young heart held any preference 

Which would have made me happier; nor your offer 

To make mv dowry equal to the rank 

Of aught in Venice, and forego all claim 

My father's last injunction gave you. 

DOGE. 

Thus, 
'T was not a foolish dotard's vile caprice, 
Nor the false edge of aged appetite, 
Which made me covetous of girlish beauty, 
And a young bride ; for in my fieriest youth 
I sway'd such passions ; nor was this my age, 
Infected with that leprosy of lust 
Which taints the hoariest years of vicious men, 
M:iking thorn ransack to the very last 
The dregs of pleasure for their vanish'd joys ; 
Or buy in selfish marriage some young victim, 
Too helpicss to refuse a state that 's honest, 
Too feeling not to know herself a wretch. 
Our wedlock was not of this sort ; you had 
Freedom from me to choose, and urged in answer 
i'our father's choice. 

ANGIOLINA. 

I did so ; I would do so 
In face of earth and heaven ; for I have never 
Repented for my sake ; sometimes for yours, 
lit pondering o'er your late disquietudes. 

DOGE. 

I knew my heart would never treat you harshly ; 

1 knew my days could not disturb you long ; 

And then the daughter of my earliest friend, 

His worthy daughter, free to choose again 

Wealthier and wiser, in the ripest bloom 

Of womanhood, more skilful to select 

By passing these probationary years ; 

Inheriting a prince's name and riches ; 

Secured, by the short penance of enduring 

An old man for some summers, against all 

That law's chicane or envious kinsmen might 

Have urged against her right: my best friend's child 

Would choose more fitly in respect of years, 

And not less truly in a faithful heart. 

ANGIOLINA. 

My lord, I look'd but to my father's wishes, 

Hallow'd by his last words, and to my heart 

For doing all its duties, and replying 

With faith to him with whom I was affianced. 

Ambitious hopes ne'er cross'd my dreams ; and, should 

The hour you speak of come, it will be see* so. 

DOGE. 

I do believe you ; and I know you true: 

For love, romantic love, which in my youth 

I knew to be illusion, and ne'er saw 

Lasting, but often fatal, it had been 

No lure for me, in my most passionate days, 

And could not be so now, did such exist. 

But such respect, and mildly paid regard 

As a true feeling for your welfare, and 

A free compliance with all honest wishes ; 

A kindness to your virtues, watchfulness 

Not shown, but shadowing o'er such little failings 

As vouth is apt in ; so as not to check 

Rashly, but win you from them ere you knew 

Ydu had been won, but thought the change your choice ; 

A pride not in your beauty, but your conduct. — 

A trust in you — a patriarchal love, 



And not a doting homage — friendship, faith — 
Such estimation in your eyes as these 
Might claim, I hoped for. 

ANGIOLINA. 

And have ever had. 

DOGE. 

I think so. For the difference in our years, 

You knew it, choosing me, and chose : I trusted 

Not to my qualities, nor would have faith 

In such, nor outward ornaments of nature, 

Were I still in my five-and-tweniieih spring : 

I trusted to the blood of Lpredajio, 

Pure in your veins ; I trusted to the soul 

God gave you — lo the truths your father taught vq>— 

To your belief in heaven — to your mild virtues — 

To your own faith and honour, fo r my own. 

ANGIOLINA. 

You have done well. — I thank you for that trust, 
Which I have never for one moment ceased 
To honour you the more for. 

DOCK. 

Where is honour, 
Innate and precept-strengthen'd, 't is the rock 
Of faith connubial ; where it is not — where 
Light thoughts are lurking, or the vanities 
Of worldly pleasure rankle in the heart, 
Or sensual throbs convulse it, well I know 
'Twere hopeless for humanity to dream 
Of honesty in such infected blood, 
Although 't were wed to him it covets most : 
An incarnation of the poet's god 
In all his marble-chiseli'd beauty, or 
The demi-deity, Alcides, in 
His majesty of superhuman manhood, 
Would not suffice to bind where virtue is not ; 
It is consistency which forms and proves it* 
Vice cannot fix, and virtue cannot change. 
The once fallen woman must for ever fall, 
For vice must have variety, while virtue 
Stands like the sun, and all which rolls around 
Drinks life, and light, and glory from her aspect. 

ANGIOLINA. 

And seeing, feeling thus this truth in others, 
(I pray you pardon me), but wherefore yield you 
To the most fierce of fatal passions, and 
Disquiet your great thoughts, with restless hate 
Of such a thing as Steno ? 

DOGE. 

You mistake me. 
It is not Steno who could move me thus ; 
Had it been so, he should but let that pass. 

ANGIOLINA. 

What is 't you fe«! so deeply, ihen, even now i 

1)001). 

The violated majesty of Venice 

At once insulted in her lord and laws. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Alas! why will you thus consider it? 

DOGE. 

I have thought on 't till — but lei me lead you bank 
To what I urged ; all these things being noted, 
I wedded you ; the world then did me justice 
Upon the motive, and my conduct proved 
They did me right, while yours was all to praise 
You had all freedom — all respect — all trust 
From me and mine j and, born of those «vhf» maJ« 



256 



r.YUON'S WORKS. 



Princes at home, and swept kings from their thrones 
On foreign shores, in all things you appe&f'd 
Worthy to be our first of native dames. 

ANGIOLINA. 

To what does this conduct .' 

DOGE. 

To thus much — that 
A miscreant's angry breath may blast it all — 
A villain whom, for his unbridled bearing, 
Even in the midst of our great festival, 
1 caused to be conducted forth, and taught 
How to demean himself in ducal chambers ; 
A wretch like this may leave upon the wall 
The blighting venom of his sweltering heart, 
And this shall spread itsejf m general poison; 
And woman's innocence, man's honour, pass 
Into a by-word ; and the doubly felon 
(Who first insulted virgin modesty 
By a gross affront to your attendant damsels, 
Amidst the noblest of our dames in public) 
Requite himself for his most just expulsion, 
By blackening publicly his sovereign's consort, 
And be absolved by his upright compeers. 

ANGIOLINA. 

But he has been condemn'd into captivity. 

DOGE. 

For such as him, a dungeon were acquittal ; 
And his brief term of mock-arrest will pass 
Within a palace. But I 've done with him ; 
The rest must oe with you. 

ANGIOLINA. 

With me, my lord ? 

DOGE. 

Yes, Angiolina. Do not marvel ; I 

Have let this prey upon me till I feel 

My life cannot be long ; and fain would have you 

Regard the injunctions you will find within 

This scroll. {Giving her a paper) Fear not ; they 

are for your advantage : 
Read them hereafter, at the fitting hour. 

ANGIOLINA. 

My lord, in life, and after life, you shall 
Be honour'd still by me : but may your days 
Be many yet — and happier than the present ! 
This passion will give way, and you will be 
Serene, and what you should be — what you were. 

DOGE. 

I will be what I should be, or be nothing ; 

But never more — oh ! never, never more, 

O'er the few days or hours which yet await 

The blighted old age of Faliero, shall 

Sweet quiet shed her sunset ! Never more 

Those summer shadows rising from the past 

Of a not ill-spent nor inglorious life, 

Mellowing the last hours as the night approaches, 

Shall soothe me to my moment of long rest. 

I had but little more to ask, or hope, 

Save the regards due to the blood and sweat, 

And the soul's labour through which I have toil'd 

To make my country honour'd. As her servant — 

Her servant, though her chief — I would have gone 

Down to my ratuers with a nan.e serene 

And pure as theirs ; but this has been denied me. — 

Would 1 had died at Zara ! 

AftGIOLINA. 

There you saved 



The state ; then live to save her still. A day, 
Another day like that would be I he best 
Reproof to them, and sole revenge for you. 

DOGE. 

But one such day occurs within an age ; 
My life is little less than one, and 't is 
Enough for Fortune to have granted onre, 
That which scarce one more favour'd citizen 
May win in many slates and years. But why 
Thus speak I? Venice has forgot that dav — 
Then why should I remember it '! — Farewell, 
Sweet Angiolina ! I must lo my cabinet ; 
There 's much for me to do — and the hour hastens 

ANGIOLINA. 

Remember what you were. 

DOGE. 

It were in vain ; 
Joy's recollection is no longer joy, 
While sorro.v's memory is a sorrow still. 

ANGIOLINA. 

At least, whate'er may urge, let me implore 

That you will take some little pause of rest : 

Your sleep for many nights has been so turbid, 

That it had been relief to have awaked you, 

Had I not hoped that nature would o'erpower 

At length the thoughts which shook your slumbers thus. 

An hour of rest will give you to your toils 

With fitter thoughts and freshen'd strength. 

DOGE. 

I cannot— 
I must not, if I could ; for never was 
Such reason to be watchful : yet a few — 
Yet a few days and dream-perturbed nights, 
And I shall slumber well — but where ? — no matter. 
Adieu, my Angiolina. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Let me be 
An instant — yet an instant your companion; 
I cannot bear to leave you thus. 

DOCE. 

Come then, 
My gentle child — forgive me ; thou wert made 
For better fortunes than to share in mine, 
Now darkling in their close toward the deep vale 
Where Death sits robed in his all-sweeping shadow. 
When I am gone — it may be sooner than 
Even these years warrant, for there is that stirring 
Within — above — around, that in this city i 

Will make the cemeteries populous 
As e'er they were by pestilence or war, — 
When I am nothing, let that which I was 
Be still, sometimes a name on thy sweet lips, 
A shallow in thy fancy, of a thing 
Which would not have thee mourn it, but remember ;— 
Let us begone, my child — the time is pressing. 

[Exeunt. 



SCENE II. 

A retired spot near the Arsenal. 
Israel Bertuccio and Philip Calend>ro. 

CALENDARO. 

How sped you, Israel, in your late complaint ? 

ISRAEL PERTUCCIO. 

Why, well. 



MARINO 


FALIERO. 25" 


CALEXDARO. 


CALEXDARO. 


Is't possible? will he be punish'd? 


These brave words have breathed new life 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Into my veins ; I am sick of these protracted 


Yes. 


And hesitating councils: day on day 


CALEXDARO. 


Crawl'd on, and added but another link 


tYilh whal ? a mulct or an arrest? 


To our long fetters, and some fresher wrong 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Inflicted on our brethren or ourselves, 


With death !— 


Helping to swell our tyrants' bloated strength. ' 


CALENDARO. 


Let us but deal upon them, and I care not 


Sow you rave, or must intend revenge, 


For the result, which must lie death or freedom! 


Such as I counseled von, with your own hand. 


I 'in weary to the heart of finding neither. 


ISRAEL BEHTUCCIO. 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Yes ; and for one sole draught of hate, forego 


We will be free in life or death ! the grave 


The great redress we meditate for Venice, 


Is chainless. Have you all the musters ready? 


And change a life of hope for one of exile ; 


And are the sixteen companies completed 


Leaving one scorpion crush'd, and thousands stinging 


To sixty '! 


My friends, mv family, my countrymen ! 


CALEXDARO. 


No, Calendaro; these same drops of blood, 


All save two, in which there are 


Shed shamefully, shall have the whole of his 


Twenty-five wanting to make up the number. 


For their requital — but not only his ; 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


We will not strike for private wrongs alone : 


No matter; we can do without. Whose are they 7 


Such are for selfish passions and rash men, 


CALEXDARO. 


Bui are unworthy a tyrannicide. 


Bertram's and old Soranzo's, both of whom 


CALENDARO. 


Appear less forward in the cause than we are. 


You have more patience than 1 care to boast. 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Had I been present when vou bore this insult, 


Your fiery nature makes you deem all those 


1 must have siain him, or expired myself 


Who are not restless, cold : but there exists 


In the vain effort to repress my wrath. 


Oft in concentred spirits not less daring 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Than in more loud avengers. Do not doubt them. 


Thank Heaven you were not — all had else been marr'd : 


CALEXD \R0. 


As 'tis, our cause looks prosperous s'lll. 


I do not doubt the elder ; but in Bertram 


CALEXDARO. 


There is a hesitating softness, fatal 


You saw 


To enterprise like ours: I've seen that man 


The Doge — what answer gave he ? 


Weep like an infant o'er the misery 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Ol others, heedless of his own, though greater ; 


That there was 


And, in a recent quarrel, I beheld him 


No punishment for such as Barbaro. 


Turn sick at sight of blood, although a villain's. 


CALENDARO. 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


I toio vou so before, and that 't was idle 


The truly brave are soft of heart and eyes, 


To think of justice from such hands. 


And feel for what their duty bids them do. 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


I have known Bertram long ; there doth not bn;a.be 


At least, 


A soul more full of honour. 


It lull'd suspicion, showing confidence. 


CALENDARO. 


Had 1 been silent, not a sbirro but 


It may be so, 


Had kept me in his eye, as meditating 


I apprehend less treachery than weakness ; 


A silent, solitary, deep revenge. 


Yet, as he has no mistress, and no wife 


CALEXDARO. 


To work upon his milkincss of spirit, 


But wherefore not address you to the Council? 


He may go through the ordeal ; it is well 


The Doge is a mere puppet, who can scarce 


He is an orphan, friendless save in us : 


Obtain right for himself. Why speak to him ? 


A woman or a child had made him less 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Than either in resolve. 


You shall know that hereafter. 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


CALEXDARO. 


Such ties are not 


Why not now? 


For those who arc called to the hir;h des'inies 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 


Which purify corrupted commonwealths; 


Be patient but till midnight. Get your musters, 


We must forget all feelings save the nr.r — 


And bid your friends prepare their companies: — 


We must resign all passions save our purpose— 


Set all in readiness to strike the blow, 


We must behold no object save our country— 


Perhaps in a few hours ; we have long waited 


And 011I3' look on dea.h as beautiful, 


For a tit time — that hoir is on the dial, 


So that the sacrifice ascend to heaven. 


It may be, of to-morrow's sun: delay 


And draw down freedom on her evermore. 


Beyond mav breed us double danger. See 


CALEXDARO. 


That all be punctual at our place of meeting, 


But, if we fail ? 


And arm'd, excepting those of the Sixteen, 


ISRAEL BERTUCCIO 


Who will remain among the troops to wait 


They never fail who die 


The signal. 

38 

— ■ 


In a great cause : the block may soak their gor« 



253 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Their heads may sodden in the svm ; their limbs 

Be strung to city gates and castle walls — 

Fut still their spirit walks abroad. Though years 

Elapse, and others share as dark a doom, 

Thev but augment the deep and sweeping thoughts 

Which o'erpower all others, and conduct 

The world at last to freedom. What were we, 

If Brutus had not lived? He died in giving 

Rome liberty, but left a deathless lesson — 

A name which is a virtue, and a soul 

Which multiplies itself throughout all time, 

When wicked men wax mighty, and a state 

Turns servile : he and his high friend were styled 

" The last of Romans !" Let us be the first 

Of true Venetians, sprung from Roman sires. 

CALENDARO. 

Our fathers did not fly from Attila 

Into these isles, where palaces have sprung 

On banks redeem'd from the rude ocean's ooze, 

To own a thousand despots in his place. 

Better bow down before the Hun, and call 

A Tartar lord, than these swoln silk-worms masters ! 

The first at hast was man, and used his sword 

As sceptre : these unmanly creeping things 

Command our swords, and rule us with a word 

As with a spell. 

ISRAEL EERTUCCIO. 

It shall be broken soon. 
You say that all things are in readiness ; 
To-day I have not been the usual round, 
And why thou knowest ; but thy vigilance 
Will better have supplied my care: these orders 
In recent council to redouble now 
Our efforts to repair the galleys, have 
Lent a fair colour to the introduction 
')f manv of our cause into the arsenal, 
As new artificers for their equipment, 
Or fresh recruits obtain'd in haste to man 
The hoped-for fleet. — Are all supplied with arms? 

CALENDARO 

Ab who were deem'd trust-worthy : there are some 

W nom it were well to keep in ignorance 

Till it be time to strike, and then supply them ; 

When in the heat and hurry of the hour 

They have no opportunity to pause ; 

But needs must on with those who will surround them. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

You have said well. — Have you remark'd all such? 

CALENDARO. 

I 've noted most : and caused the other chiefs 
To use like caution in their companies. 
As far as I have seen, we are enough 
To make the enterprise secure, if 't is 
Commenced to-morrow ; but till 'tis begun, 
Each hour is pregnant with a thousand perils. 

ISRAEL EERTUCCIO. 

Let the Sixteen meet at the wonted hour, 
Except Soranzo, Nicoletto Blondo, 
And Marco Giuda, who will keep their watch 
Within the arsenal, and hjld all ready, 
Expccia-.t of the signal we will fix on. 

CALENDARO. 

We will »ot fail 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Let all the rest be there : 
1 har« itranger to present to them. 



CALENDARO. 

A stranger! doth he know the secret? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Yes. 

CALENDARO. 

And have you dared to peril your friends' lives 
On a rash confidence in one we know not ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I have risk'd no man's life except my own — 
Of that be certain: he is one who may 
Make our assurance doubly sure, according 
His aid : and, if reluctant, he no less 
Is in our power: he comes alone with me, 
And cannot 'scape us ; but he will not swerve. 

CALENDARO. 

I cannot judge of this until I know him: 
Is he one of our order ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Ay, in spirit, 
Although a child of gTcatness; he is one 
Who would become a throne, or overthrow one — 
One who has done great deeds, and seen great changes , 
No tyrant, though bred up to tvranny ; 
Valiant in war, and sage in council ; noble 
In nature, although haughtv ; quick, yet wary: 
Yet, for all this, so full of certain passions, 
That if once stirr'd and baffled, as he has been 
Upon the tenderest points, there is no Fury 
In Grecian story like to that which wrings 
His vitals with her burning hands, till he 
Grows capable of all things for revenge ; 
And add too, that his mind is liberal ; 
He sees and feels the people are oppress'd, 
And shares their sufferings. Take him all in all, 
Wc have need of such, and such have need of us. 

CALENDARO. 

And what part would you have him take with us ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

It may be, that of chief. 

CALENDARO. 

What ! and resign 
Your own command as leader ? 

ISRAEL EEllll'l CIO. 

Even so. 
My object is to make your cause end well, 
And not to push myself to power. Experience, 
Some skill, and your own choice, had inark'd me cat 
To act in trust as your commander, till 
Some worthier should appear: if I have found sup 1 * 
As you yourselves shall own more worthy, think you 
That I would hesitate from selfishness, 
And, covetous of brief authority, 
Slake our deep interest on my single thoughts, 
Rather than yield to one above me in 
All leading qualities? No, Cakndaro, 
Know your friend better ; but you all shall judge.— 
Away ! and let us meet at the fix'J hour. 
Be vigilant, and all will yet go well. 

CALENDARO. 

Worthy Bertuccio, I have known you ever 
Trusty and brave, with head and heart to plan 
What I have still been prompt to execute. 
For my own part, I seek no other chief; 
What the rest will decide I know n >t, but 
I am with you, as J have ever been, 



MARINO FALIERO. 



259 



In all our undertakings. Now farewell, 
Until the hour of midnight sees us meet. 



[Exeunt. 



ACT III. 

SCENE I. 

Scene, the Space between t)ie Canal and the Church of 
San Giovanni e San Paulo. An equestrian Statue 
itfore it. — A Gondola lies in the Canal at some dis- 
lance. 

Enter the Doge alone, disguised. 
doge (solus). 

' am before the hour, the hour whose voice, 

Pealing into the arch of night, might strike 

These palaces with ominous totlenng, 

And rock their marbles to the corner-stone, 

Waking the sleepers from some hideous dream 

Of indistinct but awful augurv 

Of that which will befall them. Yes, proud city ! 

Thou must be cleansed of the black blood which makes 
thee 

A lazar-house of tyranny : the task 

Is forced upon me, I have sought it not ; 

And therefore was I punished, seeing this 

Patrician pestilence spread on and on, 

Until at length it smote me in my slumbers, 

A nd I am tainted, and must wash away 

The plague-spots in the healing wave. Tall fane ! 

Where sleep my fathers, whose dim statues shadow 

The floor which doth divide us from the dead, 

Where all the pregnant hearts of our bold blood, 

Moulder'd into a mite of ashes, hold 

In one shrunk heap what once made many heroes, 

When what is now a handfull shook the earth 

Fane of the tutelar saints who guard our house ! 

Vault where two Doges rest — my sires! who died 

The one of toil, the other in the field, 

With a long race of other lineal chiefs 

And sages, whose great labours, wounds, and state 

I have inherited, — let the graves gape, 

Till all thine aisles be peopled with the dead, 

And pour them from thy portals to gaze on me ! 

I call them up, and them and thee to witness 

What it hath been which put me to this task 

Their pure high blood, their blazon-roll of glories, 
Their mighty name dishonour'd all in me, 
Not by me, but by the ungrateful nobles 

We blight to make our equals, not our lords: 

And chiefly thou, Ordelafo the brave, 
Who perish'd in the field where I since conquer'd, 
Battling at Zara, did the hecatombs 
Of thine and Venice' foes, there offer'd up 
By thy descendant, merit such acquittance? 
Spirits ! smile down upon me, for my cause 
Is yours, in all life now can be of yours — 
Your fame, your name, all minnled up in mine, 
And in the future fortunes of our race ! 
Let me but prosper, and I make this citv 
Free and immortal, and our hous"'s name 
Worthier of what you were, now and hereafter ! 
Enter Israel Bertuccio. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Who goes there ? 



DOGE. 

A friend to Venice. 

ISAAEL BERTUCCIO. 

'T is he, 
Welcome, my lord, — you are before the time. 

DOGE. 

I am ready to proceed to your assembly. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Have with you. — I am proud and pleased to see 

Such confident alacrity. Your doubts 

Since our last meeting, then, are all dispell'd? 

DOGE. 

Not so— but I have set my little left 
Of life upon this cast: the die was thrown 
When I first listcn'd to your treason — Start not! 
Thai is the word ; I cannot shape my ton«ue 
To syllable black deeds into smooth names, 
Though I be wrought on to commit them. When 
I heard you tempt your Sovereign, and forbore 
To have you dragg'd to prison, I became 
Your guiltiest accomplice : now you mav, 
If it so please j'ou, do as much by me. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Strange words, my lord, and most unmerited ; 
I am no spy, and neither are we traitors. 

DOGE. 

Wei — JVe ! — no matter — you have earn'd the n«-v 

To talk of us. — But to the point. — If this 

Attempt succeeds, and Venice, render'd free 

And flourishing, when we are in our graves, 

Conducts her generations to our tombs, 

And makes her children, with their little hands, 

Strew flowers o'er their deliverers' ashes, then 

The consequence will sanctify the deed, 

And we shall be like the two Bruti in 

The annals of hereafter ; but if not, 

If we should fail, employing bloody means 

And secret plot, although to a good end, 

Still we arc traitors, honest Israel ; — thou 

No less than he who was thy sovereign 

Six hours ago, and now thy brother rebel. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

'T is not the moment to consider thus, 

Else I could answer. — Let us to the meeting, 

Or we may be observed in lingering here. 

DOGE. 

We are observed, and have been. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

We observed » 
Let me discover — and this steel 

DOGE. 

Put up ; 
Here are no human witnesses : — look there— 
What see you? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Only a tall warrior's statue 
Bestriding a proud steed, in the dim light 
Of the dull moon. 

DOGE. 

That warrior was the sire 
Of my sire's fathers, and that statue was 
Decreed to him by the twice-rescued city : — 
Think you that he looks down on us, or no? 

ISRAEL BERTUCC:0. 

My lord, these are mere uhantasiei : there. ar« 
No eyes in marble. 



260 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



DOGE. 

But there arc in death. 
[ tell thee, man, there is a spirit in 
Such thing! that acts and siiea, unseen, though felt ; 
And, if there he a spell to stir the dead, 
'T is in such deeds as we are now upon. 
Deem'st thou the souls of such a race as mine 
Can rest, when he, their last descendant chief, 
Stands plotting on the brink of their pure graves 
With stung plebeians? 

It.Il.VEL BERTUCCIO. 

It had been as well 
To nave ponder'd this before, — ere you etnbark'd 
In our great enterprise. — Do you repent? 

DOGE. 

No — but I feel, and shall do to the last. 

I cannot quench a glorious life at once, 

Nor dwindle to the thing I now must be, 

And take men's lives by stealth, without some pause: 

Yet doubt me not ; it is this very feeling, 

And knowing what has wrung me to be thus, 

Which is vour best security. There 's not 

A roused mechanic in your busy plot 

So wrong'd as I, so fallen, so loudly call'd 

To his redress : the very means I am forced 

By these fell tyrants to adopt is such, 

That I abhor them doubly for the deeds 

Which I must do to pay them back for theirs. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Let us away !— hark ! the hour strikes. 

DOGE. 

On — on- 
It is out knell, or that of Venice. — On. — 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Say, rather, 't is her freedom's rising peal 

Of triumph— This way — we are near the place. 

[Exeunt. 

SCENE II. 

The House where the Conspirators meet. 

Dagolino, Doro, Bertram, Fedele Trevisano, 

Calendaro, Antonio dei.le Bende, etc., etc 

calendaro {entering). 

Are all here ? 

DAGOLINO. 

All with you : except the three 
On duty, and our leader Israel, 
Who is expected momently. 

CALENDARO. 

Where's Bertram? 

BERTRAM. 

Here! 

CALENDARO. 

Have you not been able to complete 
The numuer wanting in your company ? 

BERTRAM. 

I had mark'd out some ; but I have not dared 
To trust them with the secret, till assured 
That they were worthy faith. 

CALENDARO. 

There is no need 
Of trusung to their faith : who, save ourselves 
\nd our more chosen comrades, is aware 
Kully of our intent? they th.nk themselves ' 
Engageil in secret to the Signory, 



To punish some more dissolute young nobles 

Who hart dofied the law in their excesses; 

But once dniwn up, and their new swords well flesh'd 

In the rank hearts of the more odious senators) 

They will not hesitate to follow up 

Their blow upon the others, when they see 

The example of their chiefs ; and I for one 

Will set them such, that they for very shame 

And safety, will not pause till all have perish'd. 

BERTRAM. 

How say you ? all ? 

CALENDARO. 

Whom wouldst thou spare f 

BERTRAM. 

I tpine 
I have no power to spare. I only question'd, 
Thinking that even amongst these wicked men, 
There might be some, whose age and qualities 
Might mark them out for pity. 

CALENDARO. 

Yes, such pity 
As when the viper hath been cut to pieces, 
The separate fragments quivering in the sun 
In the last energy of venomous life, 
Deserve and have. Why, I should think as soon 
Of pitying some particular fang which made 
One in the jaw of the swoln serpent, as 
Of saving one of these : they form but links 
Of one luiig chain — one mass, one breath, one body , 
They eat, and drink, and live, and breed together, 
Revel and lie, oppress, and kill in concert, — 
So let them die as one ! 

DAGOI.INO. 

Should one survive, 
He would be dangerous as the whole : it is nol 
Their number, be it tens or thousands, but 
The spirit of this aristocracy, 
Winch must be r^'ed out ; and ; f 'here were 
A single shoot of the whole tree in life, 
'T would fasten in the soil, and spring again 
To gloomy verdure and to bitter fruit. 
Bertram, we must be firm ! 

CALENDARO. 

Look to i'. well, 
Bertram ; I have an eye upon thee. 

BEKTK.'M. 

Who 
Distrusts me? 

CALENDARO. 

Not I ; for if I did so, 
Thou wouldst not now be there to talk of trust: 
It is thy softness, not thy want of faith, 
Which makes thee to be doubted. 

BERTRAM. 

You should know, 
Who hear me, who and what I am ; a man 
Roused like yourselves to overthrow oppression ; 
A kind man, I am apt to think, as some 
Of vou have found me; and if brave or no, 
You, Calendaro, can pronounce, who have seen me 
Put to 'he proof; or, if you should have doubts, 
I '11 clear them on your person. 

CALENDARO. 

You are welcome, 
When once our enterprise is o'er, which must not 
Be interrupted by a private brawl. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



261 



BERTRAM. 

I am no brawler; but can bear myself 

As far among the foe as any lie 

Wiin bears me; else why have I been selected 

To be of your chief comrades ? but no less 

I own my natural weakness: I have not 

Yet learned to think of indiscriminate murder 

Without some sense of shuddering ; and the sight 

Of blood which spouts through hoary scalps is not 

To me a thing of triumph, nor the death 

Of men surprised, a glory. Well — too well 

I know that »r must do such things on those 

Whose acts have raised up such avengers; but 

If there were some of those who cou'd be saved 

From out this sweeping fate, for our own sakes 

And for our honour, to take olf some stain 

Of massacre, which else pollutes it wholly, 

I had been glad ; and see no cause in this 

For sneer, nor for suspicion ! 

DAGOLINO. 

Calm thee, Bertram; 
For we suspect thee not, and take good heart. 
It is the cause, and not our will, which asks 
Such actions from our hands : we '11 wash away 
All stains in Freedom's fountain! 
Enter Israel Bertuccio and ihe Doge, disguised. 

DAGOLINO. 

Welcome, Israel. 

CONSPIRATORS. 

Most welcome. — Brave Bertuccio, thou art late — 
Who is this stranger? 

CALENDARO. 

It is time to name him. 
Our comrades are even now prepared to greet him 
In brotherhood, as I have made it known 
That thou wnuMst add a brother to our cause. 
Approved by thee, and thus approved by all, 
Such is our trust in all thine actions. Now 
Let him unfold himself. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Slranoer, step forth! 
[The Doge discovers himself. 

CONSPIRATORS. 

To arms ! — we are betray'd — it is the Doge ! 
Down with them both ! our traitorous captain, and 
The tyrant he hath sold us to. 

CALENDARO [drawing Jiis sword). 
Hold! Hold! 
Who moves a step against them dies. Hold ! hear, 
Bertuccio. — What ! are you appall'd to see 
A lone, unguarded, weaponless old man 
Amongst you ? — Israel, speak ! what means this mystery? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Let them advance and strike at their own bosoms, 

Ungrateful suicides ! for on our lives 

Depend their own, their fortunes, and their hopes. 

DOGE. 

Strike ! — If I dreaded death, a death more fearful 
Than any your rash weapons can inflict, 
I should not now be here: — Oh, noble Courage! 
The eldest born of Fear, which makes you bravo 
Against this solitary hoary head ! 
See thu bold chiefs, who would reform a state 
And shake down si nates, mad with wrath and dread 
A.t sight of one patrician. — Butcher ma. 
2 A 



Von can : I care not. — Israel, are these men 
The mighty hearts you spoke of? look upon them! 

CALENDARO. 

Faith! he hath shamed us, and deservedly. 
Was this your trust in your true chief Bertuccio, 
To turn your swords against him and his guest? 
Sheathe them, and hear him. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I disdain to speak. 
They might and must have known a heart like mine 
Incapable of treachery; and the power 
They gave me to adopt all fitting means 
To further their design was ne'er abused. 
They might be certain that whoe'er was brought 
By me into this council, had been led 
To take his choice — as brother, or as victim. 

DOGE. 

And which am I to be? your actions leave 
Some cause to doubt the freedom of the choice. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

My lord, we would have perish'd here together, 
Had these rash men proceeded ; but, behold, 
They arc ashamed of that mad moment's impulse, 
And droop their heads ; believe me, they are such 
As I described them. — Speak tcf them. 

CALENDARO. 

Ay, speak 
We are all listening in wonder. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

{Addressing die Conspirators). 

You are safe, 
Nay, more, almost triumphant — listen then, 
And know my words for truth. 

DOGE. 

You see me here 
As one of you hath said, an old, unarm'd, 
Defenceless man ; and yesterday you saw me 
Presiding in the hall of ducal state, 
Apparent sovereign of our hundred isles, 
Robed in official purple, dealing out 
The edicts of a power which is not mine, 
Nor yours, but of our masters — the patricians. 
Why I was there you know, or think you know ; 
Why I am here he who hath been most wrong'd, 
He who among you hath been most insulted, 
Outraged and trodden on, until he doubt 
If he be worm or no, may answer for me, 
Asking of his own heart what brought ..;m here? 
You know my recent story, all men know it, 
And judge, of it far ditferently from those 
Who sate in judgment to heap scorn on scorn. 
But spare me the recital — it is here, 
Here at my heart, the outrage — but my words, 
Already spent in unavailing plaints, 
Would only show my feebleness the more, 
And I eonie here to stiengthen even the strung, 
And urge them on to deeds, and not to wai 
With woman's weapons ; but I need not urge yon 
Our private wrongs have sprung from public vice* 
In this — I cannot call it commonwealth 
Nor kingdom, "Inch hath neither prince nor pcopi* 
But all the sins of the old Spartan stale 
Without its virtues — temperance and valour. 
The lords of Lacedemon were true soldiers, 
But ours are Sybarites, while, we are Helots, 
Of whom I am the lowest, mos enslaved. 



262 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Although drest out to head a pageant, as 

The Greeks of yore made drunk their slaves to form 

A pastime for their children. You are met 

To overthrow this monster of a state, 

This mockery of a government, this spectre, 

Which must be exorcised with blood, and then 

We will renew the times of truth and justice, 

Condensing in a fair free commonwealth 

Not rash equality, but equal rights, 

Proportion'd like the columns to the temple, 

Giving and taking strength reciprocal, 

And making firm the whole with grace and beauty, 

So that no part could be removed without 

Infringement of the general symmetry. 

In operating this great change, I claim 

To be one of you — if you trust in me ; 

If not, strike home, — my life is compromised, 

And I would rather fall by freemen's hands 

Than live another day to act the tyrant 

As delegate of tyrants : such I am not, 

And never have been — read it in our annals : 

I can appeal to my past government 

In many lands and cities ; they can tell you 

If I were an oppressor, or a man 

Feeling and thinking for my fellow-men. 

Haply had I been what the senate sought, 

A tiling of robes and trinkets, dizen'd out 

To sit in state as for a sovereign's picture ; 

A popular scourge, a ready sentence-signer, 

A stickler for the Senate and "The Forty," 

A sceptic of all measures which had not 

The sanction of " The Ten," a council fawner, 

A tool, a fool, a puppet, — they had ne'er 

Foster'd the wretch who stung me. What I suffer 

Has reach'd me through my pity for the people ; 

That many know, and they who know not yet 

Will one day learn : meantime, I do devote, 

Whate'er the issue, my last days of life — 

My present power, such as it is, not that 

Of Doge, but of a man who has been great 

Before he was degraded to a Doge, 

And still has individual means and mind ; 

I stake my fame (and I had fame) — my breath 

(The least of all, for its last hours are nigh) — 

My heart — my hope — my soul — upon this cast ! 

Such as I am, I otfer me to you 

And to your chiefs, accept me or reject me, 

A prince who fain would be a citizen 

Or nothing, and who has left his throne to be so. 

CALENDARO. 

Long live Faliero ! — Venice shall be free ! 

CONSPIRATORS. 

Long live Faliero ! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Comrades! did I well? 
Is not this man a host in such a cause 7 

DOGE. 

This is no time for eulogies, nor place 
For exultation. Am I one of you ? 

CALENDARO. 

Ay, and the first amongst us, as thou hast been 
Of Venice — be our general and chief. 

DOGE. 

Chief! — General! — I was general at Zara, 
And cluet in RhoJes and Cyprus, prince in Venice; 
.annoi silmo that is. I am not fit 



To lead a band of patriots : when I lay 

AsiJe the dignities which I have borne, 
'T is not to put on others, but to be 
Mate to my fellows — but now to the point: 
Israel has stated to me your whole plan — 
'Tis bold, but feasible if I assist it, 
And must be set in motion instantly. 

CALENDARO. 

E'en when thou wilt — is it not so, my friends I 
I have disposed all for a sudden blow ; 
When shall it be then? 

DOGE. 

At sunrise. 

BERTRAM. 

So soon ? 

DOGE. 

So soon ! — so late — each hour accumulates 

Peril on peril, and the more so now 

Since I have mingled with you ; know you not 

The Council, and " The Ten !" the spies, the eyes 

Of the patricians dubious of their slaves, 

And now more dubious of the prince they have made one? 

I tell you you must strike, and suddenly, 

Full to the hydra's heart — its heads will follow. 

CALENDARO. 

With all my soul and sword I yield assent ; 
Our companies are ready, sixty each, 
And all now under arms by Israel's order; 
Each at their different place of rendezvous, 
And vigilant, expectant of some blow ; 
Let each repair for action to his post! 
And now, my lord, the signal ? 

DOGE. 

When you hear 
The great bell of Saint Mark's, which may not *>e 
Struck without special order of the Doge 
(The last poor privilege they leave their prince), 
March on Saint Mark's! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

And there? 

DOGE. 

By different routes 
Let your march be directed, every sixty 
Entering a separate avenue, and still 
Upon the way let your cry be of war 
And of the Genoese fleet, by the first dawn 
Discern'd before the port ; form round the palace, 
Within whose court will be drawn out in arms 
My nephew and the clients of our house, 
Many and martial ; while the bell tolls on, 
Shout ye, " Saint Mark ! — the foe is on our waters l" 

CALENDARO. 

I see it now — but on, my noble lord. 

DOGE. 

All the patricians flocking to the Council, 
(Which they dare not refuse, at the dread signal 
Pealing from out their patron saint's proud tower) 
Will then be gathered in unto the harvest, 
\nd we will reap tliern with the sword for sickle. 
If some few should be tardy or absent then, 
T will be but to be taken faint and single. 
When the majority are put to rest. 

CALENDARO. 

Would that the hour were cow ' t/% will not "scotch. 
But kul. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



263 



BERTRAM. 

Or.ce more, sir, with your pardons, I 
Would now repeat the question which I ask'd 
Before Bertuccio added to our cause 
This great ally who renders it more sure, 
And therefore safer, and as such admits 
Some dawn of mercy to a portion of 
Our victims — must all perish in this slaughter? 

CALENDARO. 

All who encounter me and mine, be sure, — 
The mercy they have shown, I show. 

CONSPIRATORS. 

All! all! 
(s this a time to talk of pity ? when 
Have they e'er shown, or felt, or feign'd it ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Bertram, 

This false compassion is a folly, and 

Injustice to thy comrades and thy cause ! 

Dost thou not see, that if we single out 

Some for escape, they live but to avenge 

The fallen 1 and how distinguish now the innocent 

From out the guilty ? all their acts are one— 

A single emanation from one body, 

Together knit for our oppression ! 'T is 

Much that we let their children live ; I doubt 

If al! of these even should be set apart : 

The hunter may reserve some single cub 

From out the tiger's litter, but who e'er 

Would seek to save the spotted sire or dam, 

Unless to perish by their fangs? However, 

I will abide by Doge Faliero's counsel: 

Let him decide if any should be saved. 

DOGE. 

Ask me not — tempt me not with such a question- 
Decide yourselves. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

You know their private virtues 
Far better than we can, to whom alone 
Their public vices, and most foul oppression, 
Have made them deadly ; if there be amongst them 
One who deserves to be repeal'd, pronounce. 

DOGE. 

Dolfino's father was my friend, and Lando 
Fought by my side, and Marc Cornaro shared 
My Genoese embassy; I saved the life 
Of Veniero — shall I save it twice? 
Would that I could save them and Venice also! 
All these men, or their fathers, were my friends 
Till they became my subjects ; then fell from me 
As faithless leaves drop from the o'erbiown flower, 
And left me a lone blighted thorny stalk, 
Which, in its solitude, can shelter nothing ; 
So, as they let me wither, let them perish ! 

CALENDARO. 

They cannot co-exist with Venice' freedom ! 

DOGE. 

Ye, though you know and feel our mutual mass 

Of many wrongs, even ye are ignorant 

What fatal poison to the springs of life, 

To human ties, and all that's good and dear, 

Lurks in the present institutes of Venice. 

All these men were my friends ; I loved them, they 

Requited honourably my regards ; 

We served and fought ; we smiled and wept in concert ; 

We revell'd or we sorrow'd side by side ; 



We made alliances of blood and marriage ; 

We grew in years and honours fairly, till 

Their own desire, not my ambition, made 

Them choose me for their princ?, and then farewell ! 

Farewell all social memory ! all thoughts 

In common! and sweet bonds which link old friend 

ships, 
When the survivors of long years and actions, 
Which now belong to history, soothe the days 
Which yet remain by treasuring each other, 
And never meet, but each beholds the mirroi 
Of half a century on his brother's brow, 
And sees a hundred beings, now in earth, 
Flit round them, whispering of the days gone by, 
And seeming not all dead, as long as two 
Of the brave, joyous, reckless, glorious band, 
Which once were one and many, still retain 
A breath to sigh for them, a tongue to speak 
Of deeds that else were silent, save on marble — • 
Oime ! Oime ! — and must I do this deed '! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO 

My lord, you are much moved : it is not now 
That such things must be dwelt upon. 

DOGE. 

Your patience 
A moment — I recede not : mark with me 
The gloomy vices of this government. 
From tiie hour that made mc Doge, the Doge THLf 

made me — 
Farewell the past! I died to all that had been, 
Or rather they to me: no friends, no kindness, 
No privacy of life — all were cut off: 
They came not near me, such approach gave umbrape 
They could not love me, such was not the law ; 
They thwarted me, 't was the state's policy ; 
They baffled me, 't was a patrician's duty ; 
They wrong'd me, for such was to right the state ; 
They could not right me, that would give suspicion : 
So that I was a slave to my own subjects ; 
So that I was a foe to my own friends ; 
Begirt with spies for guards — with robes for powe - 
With pomp for freedom — gaolers for a council — 
Inquisitors for friends — and hell for life ! 
I had one only fount of quiet left, 
And that they poison'd ! My pure household god* 
Were shiver'd on my hearth, and o'er their shrine 
Sale grinning ribaldry and sneering scorn. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

You have been deeply wrong'd, and now shall Lr 
Nobly avenged before another night. 

DOGE. 

I had borne all — it hurt me, but I bore it — 
Till this last running over of the cup 
Of bitterness — until this last loud insult, 
Not only unredress'd, but sanction'd ; then 
And thus, I cast all further feelings from me ■ 
The feelings which they crush'd for me, long, loi\g 
Before, even in their oath of false allegiance ! 
Even in that very hour and vow, they abjured 
Their friend, and made a sovereign, as boys rnaki* 
Playthings, to do their pleasure and be broken ' 
I from that hour have seen but senators 
In dark suspicious conflict with the Doge, 
Brooding with him in mutual hate and fear ; 
They dreading he should snatch the tyrannv 
From out their grasp, and be abhorring tyrants. 



264 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



To me, then, these men have no private life, 
Nor claim to lies th<:y ban cut oil" from others; 
As aerators for arbitrary acts 
Amenable, I look on them — as such 
Let them be dealt u)>on. 

CALL.VDARO. 

And now to action ! 
Hence, brelhien, to our posts, and may this be 
The last night of mere words : I 'd fain be doino ! 
Saint Mark's great bell at dawn shall find me wakeful ! 

ISK VEL BERTUCCIO. 

Disperse then to your posts ; be firm and vigilant; 
Think on the wrongs we bear, the rights we claim. 
This day and night shall be the last of peril ! 
Watch for the signal, and then march: I go 
To join my band; let each be prompt to marshal 
Ili~ separate charge: the Doge will now return 
To the palace to prepare all for the blow. 
We part to meet in freedom and in glory ! 

CAI.EXDARO. 

Doge, when I greet you next, mv homage to vou 
Shall be the head of Steno on this sword! 

DOCK. 

No ; let him be reserved unto the last, 

Nor turn aside to strike at such a prey, 

Till nobler gam« is ouarried : his offence 

Was a mere eouuition of the vice, 

The general corruption generati d 

By the foul aristocracy ; he could not — 

He dared not in more honourable days 

Have risk'd it ! I have merged all private wrath 

Against him, in the thought of our great purpose. 

A slave insults me — I require his punishment 

From his proud master's hands; if he refuse it, 

The offence grows his, and let him answer it. 

CALENDARO. 

Yet, as the immediate cause of the alliance 
Which consecrates our undertaking more, 
I owe him such dec]) gratitude, that fain 
I would repay him as tie merits ; may I ? 
DOCE. 

You would but lop the hand, and I the head ; 

You would but smite the scholar, I the master ; 

You would but punish Steno, I the senate. 

I cannot pause on individual hate, 

In She absorbing, sweeping, whole revenge, 

Which, like the sheeted lire from heaven, must blast 

Without distinction, as it fell of yore, 

Where the Dead Sea hath quench'd two cities' ashes. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Away, then, to your posts ! I but remain 

A moment to accompany the Doge 

To our late place of tryst, to see no spies 

Have been upon the scout, and thence I hasten 

To where my allotted band is under arms. 

CALENDARO. 

Farewell, then, until dawn. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Success go with you ! 

CONSPIRATORS. 

We wiii not fail — away ! My lord, farewell ! 

\Th( longptreUori salute f/ie Door, and Isfael Ber- 

ttoc 10, and retire, headed by Philip Calendaro. 

I'll Dixit: and Israel Bektuccio remain. 



ISRAEL EHTCCCIO. 

We have them in the toi - it cannot fail ! 
Now thou'rt indeed a sovereign, and wilt make 
A name immortal greatet than the greatest : 
Free citizens have struck >t kings ere now ; 
Cx'sars have fallen, and even patrician hands 
Have crush'd dictators, as the popular steel 
Has reach'd patricians; but until this hour, 
What prince has plotted for his people's freedom ' 
Or risk'd a life to liberate his subjects? 
For ever, and for ever, they conspire 
Against the people, to abuse their hands 
To chains, but laid aside to carry weapons 
Against the fellow nations, so that yoke 
On yoke, and slavery and death may whet, 
Not glut, the never-gorged Leviathan ! 
Now, my lord, to our enterprise ; 't is great, 
And greater the reward ; why stand you rapt ? 
A moment back, and you were all impatience ! 

doge. 
And is it then decided ? must they die ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Who? 

DOGE. 

My own friends by blood and courtesy, 
And many deeds and days — the senators? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

You pass'd their sentence, and it is a just one. 

DOGE. 

Ay, so it seems, and so it is to you ; 

Vou are a patriot, a plebeian Gracchus — 

The rebel's oracle — the people's tribune — 

I blame you not, you act in your vocation ; 

They smote you, and oppress'd you, and despised yoh. 

So they have 7/ie : but ynu ne'er spake with them ; 

You never broke their bread, nor shared their salt; 

You never had their wine-cup at your lips ; 

You grew not up with them, nor laugh'd, nor wept, 

Nor hold a revel in their company ; 

Ne'er smiled to see them smile, nor claim'd their smite 

In social interchange for yours, nor trusted, 

Nor wore them in your heart of hearts, as I have: 

These hairs of mine arc gray, and so are theirs, 

The elders of the council ; I remember 

When all our locks were like the raven's w'ing, 

As we went forth to take our prey around 

The isles wrung from the false Mahometan : 

And can I see them dabbled o'er with blood 

Each stab to tnem will seem my suicide. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Doge ! Doge ! this vacillation is unworthy 

A child ; if you are not in second childhood 

Call back your nerves to your own purpose, nor 

Thus shame yourself and me. By heavens ! I 'd rath* 

Forego even now, or fail in our intent, 

Than see the man I venerate subside 

From high resolves into such shallow weakness ! 

You have seen blood in battle, shed it, both 

Your own *nd that of others : can you shrink then 

From a few drops from veins of hoary vampires, 

Who but give back what they have drain'd from millions? 

DOGE. 

Bear with me ! Step by step, and blow on blow 
I will divide with you ; think not I waver: 



MARINO FALIERO. 



265 



Ah ! no ; it is the certainty of all 

Which I must do doth make me tremble thus. 

But let these last and lingering thoughts have way, 

To which you only and the night are conscious, 

Ami both regardless: when the hour arrives, 

'T is mine to sound the knell, and strike the blow, 

Which shall unpeople many palaces, 

And hew the highest gencalogic trees 

Down to the earth, stnew'd with their bleeding fruit, 

And crush their blossoms into barrenness ; 

This will I — must I — have I sworn to do, 

Nor aught can turn me from my destiny : 

But still I quiver to behold what I 

Must be, and think what I have been! Bear witJi me. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Re-man your breast ; I feel no such remorse, 
I understand it not: why should you change? 
You acted, and you act on your free will. 

DOGE. 

Ay, there it is — you feel not, nor do I, 

Else 1 should stab thee on the spot, to save 

A thousand lives, and, killing, do no murder ; 

You feel not — you go to this butcher-work 

As if these high-born men were steers for shambles ! 

When all is over, vou '11 be free and merry, 

And calmly wash those hands incarnadine; 

But I, outgoing thee and all thy fellows 

In this surpassing massacre, shall be, 

Shall see, and feel — oh God ! oh God ! 'tis true, 

And thou dost well to answer that it was 

" My own free will and act ;" and yet vou err, 

For I will do this ! Doubt not — fear not ; I 
Will be your most unmerciful accomplice ! 

And yet I act no more on my free will, 

Nor my own feelings — both compel me back ; 

But there is hell within me and around, 

And, like the demon who believes and trembles, 

Must I abhor and do. Away ! away ! 

Get thee unto thv fellows, I will hie me 

To gather the retainers of our house. 

Doubt not, Saint Mark's great bell shall wake all Venice, 

Except her slaughter'd senate : ere the sun 

Be broad upon the Adriatic, there 

Shall he a voice of seeping, which shall drown 

The roar of waters in the cry of blood! 

1 am resolved — come on. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

With all my soul ! 
Keep a firm rein upon these bursts of passion ; 
Remember what these men have dealt to thee, 
And that this sacrifice will be succeeded 
By ages of prosperity and freedom 
To this unshackled city : a true t rant 
Would have depopulated empires, nor 
Have felt the strange compunction which hath wrun« you 
To punish a few traitors to the people ! 
Trust me, such were a pity more misplaced 
Than the late mercy of the state to Steno. 

DOGE. 

Man, thou hast struck upon the chord which jars 
Aii nature from my heart. Hence to our task ! 

[Exeunt. 
2 a 2 39 



ACT IV. 

SCENE I. 

Pciazto of the Patrician Liont. Lioni tai/ing aside 
the ma*k and chmk which the Venetian Nobles wort 
in public, attended by a Domestic. 

LIONI. 

I will to rest, right weary of this revel, 
The gayest we have held for many moons, 
And yet, I know not why, it chocr'd me not; 
There came a heaviness across mv heart, 
Which in the lightest movement of the dance, 
Though eye to eye and band in hand united, 
Even with the lady of my love, oppress'd me, 
And through my spirit chill'd my blood, until 
A damp like death rose o'er mv brow ; I strove 
To laugh the thought away, but 'twould not be ; 
Through all the music ringing in mv cars 
A knell was sounding as distinct and clear, 
Though low and far, as e'er the Adrian wave 
Rose o'er the city's murmur in the night, 
Dashing against the outward Lido's bulwark; 
So that I left the festival before 
It reach'd its zenith, and will woo my pillow 
For thoughts more tranquil, or furgotfulness. 
Antonio, take my mask and cloak, and light 
The lamp within my chamber. 

ANTONIO. 

Yes, my lord ; 
Command you no refreshment? 

LIONI. 

Nojght, save sleep, 
Which will not be commanded. Let me hope it, 

[Exit Antonio. 
Though my breast feels too anxious ; I will try 
Whether the air will calm my spirits ; 'tis 
A goodly night; the cloudy wind which blew 
From the Levant hath crept into its cave, 
And the broad moon has brighten'd. What a stillness. 
[ Goes to an open lattice. 
And what a contrast with the scene I left, 
Where the tall torches' glare, and silver lamps' 
More pallid gleam alonn the tapestried walls, 
Spread over the reluctant gloom which haunts 
Those vast and dimly-latticed galleries 
A dazzling mass of artificial light, 
Which show'd all things, but nothing as they were. 
There Age essaying to recall the past, 
After long striving for the hues of youth 
At the sad labour of the toilet, and 
Full many a glance at the too faithful mirror, 
Prankt forth in all the pride of ornament, 
Forgot itself, and trusting to the falsehood 
Of the indulgent beams, which show, yet hide, 
Believed itself forgotten, and was fool'a. 
There Youth, which needed not, nor thought of such 
Vain adjuncts, lavish'd its true bloom, and health, 
And bridal beauty, in the unwholesome press 
Of flush'd and crowded wassailrrs, and wasted 
Its hours of rest in dreaming this was pleasure, 
And so shall wast": them till the sunrise streams 
On sallow cheeks and sunken eyes, which should no* 
Have worn this aspect yet for many a year. 
The music, and the banquet, and the vvir.e- 



2G6 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The garlands, the rose odours, and the flowers — 
The sparkling eves and Bashing ornaments — 
The white arms and lite raven hair — the hraids 
And bracelets ; swanlike hosoms, and the necklace, 
An India in itself, yet dazzling not 
The eye like what it circled ; the thin robes 
Floating like light clouds 'twill our gaze and heaven; 
The many twinkling feet so small and sylphlike, 
Suggesting the more secret symmetry 
Of the fair forms which terminate so well — 
All the delusion of the dizzy scene, 
Its false and true enchantments — art and nature, 
Which swam before my giddy eyes, that drank 
The sifiht of beauty as the parch'd pilgrim's 
On Arab sands the false mirage, which offers 
A lucid lake to his eluded thirst, 
Are gone. — Around me are the stars and waters — 
Worlds mirror'd in the ocean, goodlier sight 
Than torches glared back by a gaudy glass ; 
And the great element, which is to space 
What ocean is to earth, spreads its blue depths, 
Soften'd with the first breathings of the spring ; 
The high moon sails upon her beauteous way, 
Serenely smoothing o'er the lofty walls 
Of those tall piles and sea-girt palaces, 
Whose porphyry pillars, and whose cosily fronts, 
Fraught with the orient spoil of many marbles, 
Like altars ranged along the broad canal, 
Seem each a trophy of some mighty deed 
Rear'd up from out the waters, scarce less strangely 
Than those more massy and mysterious giants 
Of architecture, those Titanian fabrics, 
Which point in Egypt's plcins to times that have 
No other record. All is gentle: nought 
Stirs rudely ; but, congenial with the night, 
Whatever walks is gliding like a spirit. 
The tinklings of some vigilant guitars 
Of sleepless lovers to a wakeful mistress, 
And cautious opening of the casement, showing 
That he is not unheard ; while her young hand, 
Fair as the moonlight of which it seems part, 
So delicately white, it trembles in 
The act of opening the forbidden lattice, 
To let in love through music, makes his heart 
Thrill like his lyre-strings at the sight; — the dash 
Phosphoric of the oar, or rapid twinkle 
Of the far lights of skimming gondolas, 
And the responsive voices of the choir 
Of boatmen answering back with verse for verse ; 
Some dusky shadow chequering the Rialto ; 
Some glimmering palace roof, or tapering spire, 
Are all the sights and sounds which here pervade 
The ocean-born and earth-commanding city. 
How sweet and soothing is this hour of calm ! 
I thank thee, night ! for thou nast chased away 
Those horrid bodements which, amidst the throng, 
I tould not dissipate : and, with the blessing 
Ol thy benign and quiet influence, 
Now will I to my couch, although to rest 

Is a.most wronging such a night as this 

[A knocking is heard from mthoul. 
Hark ! what is that? or who at such a moment? 
Enter Antonio. 

ANTONIO. 

My lord, a man without, on uigent business, 
Implores to be admitted. 



LIONI. 

Is he a stranger? 

ANTONIO. 

His face is muffled in his cloak, but both 
His voice and gestures seem familiar to me; 
I craved his name, but this he seem'il reluctant 
To trusl, save to yourself; most earnestly 
He sues to be permitted to approach you. 

I.IONI. 

'T is a strange hour, and a suspicious bearing! 
And yet there is slight peril : 't is not in 
Their houses noble men are struck at ; still, 
Although I know not that I have a foe 
In Venice, 't will be wise to use some caul ion. 
Admit him, and retire ; but call up quickly 
Some of thy fellows, who may wait without. — 
Who can this man be ? 
Exit Antonio, and returns with Bertram muffled. 

BERTRAM. 

My good lord Lioni, 
I have no time to lose, nor thou — dismiss 
This menial hence ; I would be private with you. 

lioni. 
It seems the voice of Bertram — go, Antonio. 

[ Knt Antonio- 
Now, stranger, what would you at such an hour ? 

BERTRAM (discovering hints/If). 
A boon, my noble patron ; you have granted 
Many to your poor client, Bertram ; add 
This one, and make him happy. 

LIONI. 

Thou hast known me 
From boyhood, ever ready to assist thee 
In all fair objects of advancement, which 
Beseem one of thy station ; I would promise 
Eru thy request was heard, but that the hour, 
Thy bearing, and this strange and hurried mode 
Of suing, gives me to suspect this visit 
Hath some mysterious import — but say on — 
What has occurred, some rash and sudden broiJ > — 
A cup too much, a scuffle, and a stab? — 
Mere things of every day ; so that thou hast not 
Spilt noble blood, I guaranty thy safety ; 
But then thou must withdraw, for angry friends 
And relatives, in the first burst of vengeance, 
Are things in Venice deadlier than the laws. 

BERTRAM. 

My lord, I thank you ; but 

LIONI. 

But what ? You have iio 
Raised a rash hand against one of our order? 
If so, withdraw and lly, and own it not ; 
I would not slay — but then I must not save thee ! 
He who has shed patrician blood 

BERTRAM. 

I come 
To save patrician blood, and not to shed it ! 
And thereunto I must be speedv, for 
Each minute lost may lose a life : since Time 
Has changed his slow scythe for the two-edged sw-trn 
And is about to take, instead of sand, 
The dust from sepulchres to fill his hour-glass ! — 
Go not tltnu forth to-morrow ! 

LIONI. 

Wherefore nct?- 
W T hat means this menace t 



MARINO FALIERO. 2G? 


BERTRAM. 


BERTRAM. 


Do not seek its meaning, 


Nor now, nor ever ; whatsoe'er betide, 


But do as I implore thee ; — stir not forth, 


I would have saved you : when to manhood"* growth 


Whate'er be stirring ; though the roar of crowds — 


We sprung, and you, devoted to the state, 


The cry of women, and the shrieks of babes — 


As suits your station, the more humble Eertram 


The groans of men — the clash of arms — the sound 


Was left unto the labours of the humble, 


Of rolling drum, shrill trump, and hollow bell, 


Still you forsook me not : and if my fortunes 


Peal in one wide alarum ! — Go not forth 


Have not been towering, 't was no fault of him 


Until the tocsin's silent, nor even then 


Who oft-times rescued and supported me 


Till I return ! 


When struggling with the tides of circumstance 


LIONI. 


Which bear away the weaker : noble blood 


Again, what does this mean ? 


Ne'er mantled in a nobler heart than thine 


BERTRAM. 


Has proved to me, the poor plebeian Bertram. 


Again, I tell thee, ask not ; but by all 


Would that thy fellow senators were like thee ! 


Thou holdest dear on earth or heaven — by all 


LIONI. 


The souls of thy great fathers, and thy hope 


Why, what hast thou to say against the senate ? 


To emulate them, and to leave behind 


BERTRAM. 


Descendants worthy both of them and thee — 


Nothing. 


By all thou hast of blest in hope or memory — 


LIONI. 


By all thou hast to fear here or hereafter — 


I know that there are angry spirits 


By all the good deeds thou hast done to me, 


And turbulent mutterers of stifled treason, 


Good I would now repay with greater good, 


Who lurk in narrow places, and walk out 


Remain within — trust to thy household gods 


Muffled to whisper curses to the night ; 


And to my word for safety, if thou dost 


Disbanded soldiers, discontented ruffians, 


As I now counsel — but if not, thou art lost ! 


And desperate libertines who brawl in taverns. 


LIONI. 


Thou herdest not with such : 't is true, of late 


I am indeed already lost in wonder : 


I have lost sight of thee, but thou wert wont 


Surely thou ravest ! what have / to dread ? 


To lead a temperate life, and break thy bread 


Who are my foes ? or, if there be such, why 


With honest mates, and bear a cheerful aspect. 


Art thou leagued with them ? — thou ! or, if so leagued, 


What hath come to thee ? in thy hollow eye 


Why comest thou to tell me at this hour, 


And hueless cheek, and thine unquiet motions, 


And not before ? 


Sorrow and shame and conscience seem at war 


BERTRAM. 


To waste thee. 


I cannot answer this. 


BERTRAM. 


Wilt thou go forth despite of this true warning ? 


Rather shame and sorrow light 


LIONI. 


On the accursed tyranny which rides 


I was not born to shrink from idle threats, 


The very air in Venice, and makes men 


The cause of which I know not : at the hour 


Madden as in the last hours of the plague 


Of council, be it soon or late, I shall not 


Which sweeps the soul deliriously from life ! 


Be found among the absent. 


LIONI. 


BERTRAM. 


Some villains have been tampering with thee, Bertram; 


Say not so f 


This is not thy old language, nor own thoughts ; 


Once more, art thou determined to go forth ? 


Some wretch has made thee drunk with disaffection , 


LIONI. 


But thou must not be lost so ; thou wert good 


I am , nor is there aught which shall impede me ! 


And kind, and art not fit for such base acts 


BERTRAM. 


As vice and villany would put thee to: 


Then Heaven have mercy on thy soul ! — Farewell 


Confess — confide in me — thou know'st my nature - 


[Going-. 


What is it thou and thine are bound to do, 


LIONI. 


Which should prevent thy friend, the only son 


Stay — there is more in this than my own safety 


Of him who was a friend unto thy father, 


Which makes me call thee back ; we must not part thus: 


So that our good-will is a heritage 


Bertram, I have known thee long. 


We should bequeath to our posterity 


BERTRAM. 


Such as ourselves received it, or augmented , 


From childhood, signor, 


I say, what is it thou must do, that I 


f ou have been my protector : in the days 


Should deem thee dangerous, and keep the house 


Of reckless infancy, when rank forgets, 


Like a sick girl? 


Or, lather, is not yet taught to remember 


BERTRAM. 


Its coid prerogative, we play'd together ; 


Nay, question me no further: 


Our sports, our smiles, our tears, were mingled oft ; 


I must be gone 


My father was your father's client, I 


LIONI. 


His son's scarce less than foster-brother; years 


And I be murdcr'd! — say, 


Saw us together — happy, heart-full hours ! — 


Was it not thus thou said'st, my gentle Bertram I 


Oh God! the difference 'twixt those hours and this! 


BERTRAM. 


LIONI. 


Who talks of murder 7 what said I of murder? 


Bertram, 'tis thou who hast forgotten them. 


'T is false ! I did not utter such a wo-d 







268 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LIONI. 

Thou didst not ; but from out thy wolfish eye, 

So changed from what I knew it, there glares forth 

The gladiator. If my life's thine object, 

Take it — I am unarm'd, — and then away! 

I would not hold my breath on such a tenure 

As the capricious mercy of such things 

As thou and those who have set thee to thy task-work, 

BERTRAM. 

Sooner than spill thy blood, I peril mine ; 
Sooner than harm a hair of thine, I place 
In jeopardy a thousand heads, and some 
As noble, nay, even nobler than thine own. 

LIONI. 

Ay, is it even so? Excuse me, Bertram; 
I am not worthy to be singled out 
From such exalted hecatombs — who arc they 
That are in danger, and that muke the danger? 

BERTRAM. 

Venice, and all that she inherits, are 

Divided like a house against itself, 

And so will perish ere to-morrow's twilight ! 

lioni. 
More mysteries, and awful ones ! But now, 
Or thou, or I, or both, it may be, are 
Upon the verge of ruin ; speak once out, 
And thou art safe and glorious ; for 't is more 
Glorious to save than slay, and slay i' the dark too— 
Fie, Bertram ! that was not a craft for thee ! 
How would it look to see upon a spear 
The head of him whose heart was open to thee, 
Borne by thy hand before the shuddering people? 
And such may be my doom; for here I swear, 
Whate'er the peril or the penalty 
Of thy denunciation, I go forth, 
Unless thou dost detail the cause, and show 
The consequence of all which led thee here ! 

BERTRAM. 

Is there no way to save thee ? minutes fly, 
And thou art lost ! thou ! my sole benefactor, 
The only being who was constant to me 
Through every change. Yet, make me not a traitor ! 
Let me save thee — but spare my honour ! 

LIONI. 

Where 

Can lie the honour in a league of murder? 
And who are traitors save unto the state ? 

BERTRAM. 

A league is still a compact, and more binding 
In honest hearts when words must stand for law ; 
And in my mind, there is no traitor like 
He whose domestic treason plants the poniard 
Within the breast which trusted to his truth. 

LIONI. 

And who will strike the steel to mine? 

BERTRAM. 

Not I ; 
1 could have wound my soul up to all things 
Save this. Thou must not die ! and think how dear 
Thy life is, when I risk so many lives, 
Nay, more, the life of lives, the liberty 
Of future generations, not to be 
The assassin thou miscall'st me ; — once, once more 
I do adjure thee, pass not o'er thy threshold! 

LIONI. 

It is in vfiin. -t/ns moment I go forth. 



berth \ M. 
Then perish Venice rather than my friend! 
1 will disclose — ensnare — betray — destroy — 
Oh, what a villain I become for thee ! 

liori. 
Say rather, thy friend's saviour and the slate's! — 
Speak — pause not — all rewards, all pledges for 
Thy safely and thy welfare ; wealth such as 
The stale accords her worthiest servants; nay, 
Nobility itself 1 guaianty thee, 
So that thou art sincere and penitent. 

BERTRAM. 

1 have thought again: it must not be — I love thee— 
Thou knowest it — that I stand here is the proof, 
Not least though last ; but, having done my duty 
By thee, I now must do it by my country ! 
Farewell ! — we meet no more in life ! — farewell ! 

I.IONI. 

What, ho! Antonio — Pedro— to the door! 

See that none pass — arrest this man! 

Enter Antonio and other armed Domestics, who seize 

BERTRAM. 

lioni (continues). 

Take care 
He hath no harm ; bring me my sword and cloak, 
And man the gondola with four oars — quick — 

[Exit Antonio. 
We will unto Giovanni Gradenigo's, 
And send for Marc Cornaro: — Fear not, Bertram; 
This needful violence is lor thy safety, 
No less than for the general weal. 

BERTRAM. 

Where wouldst thou 
Bear me a prisoner? 

LIORI* 

Firstly, to " The Ten ;" 
Next, to the Doge. 

BERTRAM. 

To the Doge ? 

LIONI. 

Assuredly ; 
Is he not chief of the state? 

BERTRAM. 

Perhaps at sunrise 

LIONI. 

What mean vou ? — but we '11 know anon. 

BERTRAM. 

Art sure ? 

LIONI. 

Sure as all gentle means can make ; and if 
They fail, you know "The Ten" and their tribunal, 
And that Saint Mark's has dungeons, and the dungeons 
A rack. 

BERTRAM. 

Apply to it before the dawn 
Now hastening into heaven. — One moie such woid, 
And you shall perish piecemeal, by the death 
Ye think to doom to me. 

Re-enter Antonio. 

ANTONIO. 

The bark is ready, 
My lord, and all prepared. 

LIONI. 

Look to the prisons . 
Bertram, I'll reason with thee as we go 
To the Magnifico's, sage Gradenigo. \Exmnl. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



2G9 



SCENE H. 

The Ducal Palace — Uie Doge's Apartment. 
The Doge and his nephew Bertuccio Faliero. 
doge. 
Are all the people of our house in muster? 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

They are array'd, and eager for the signal, 
Within our palace precincts at San Polo. 4 
I come for your last orders. 

DOGE. 

It had been 
As well had there been lime to have got together 
From my own fief, Val di Marino, more 
Of our retainers — but it is too iate. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Methinks, my lord, 't is better as it is ; 

A sudden swelling of our retinue 

Had waked suspicion ; and, though fierce and trusty, 

The vassals of that district are too rude 

And quick in quarrel to have long maintain'd 

The secret discipline we need for such 

A service, till our foes are dealt upon. 

DOGE. 

True ; but when once the signal has been given, 

Tliese are the men for such an enterprise : 

These city slaves have all their private bias, 

Their prejudice against or for this noble, 

Which may induce them to o'erdo, or spare 

Where mercy may be madness ; the fierce peasants, 

Serfs of my country of Val di Marino, 

Would do the bidding of their lord without 

Distinguishing for love or hate his foes ; 

Alike to them Marcello or Cornaro, 

A Gradenigo or a Foscari ; 

They are not used to start at those vain names, 

Nor bow the knee before a civic senate : 

A chief in armour is their suzerain, 

And not a thing in robes. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

We are enough ; 
And for the dispositions of our clients 
Against the senate, I will answer. 

DOGE. 

Well, 

The die is thrown ; but for a warlike service, 
Done in the field, commend me to my peasants ; 
They made the sun shine through the host of Huns 
When sallow burrhers slunk back to their tents, 
And cower'd to hear their own victorious trumpet. 
If there be small resistance, you will find 
These citizens all lions, like their standard ; 
But if there 's much to do, you '1! wish with me 
A band of iron rustics at our backs. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Thus thinking, I must marvel you resolved 
To strike the blow so suddenly. 

DOGE. 

Such blows 
Must be struck suddenly or never. When 
I had o'ermaster'd the weak false remorse 
Which yearn'd about my heart, too fondly yielding 
A moment to the feelings of old days, 
I was most fain to strike ; and, firstly, that 
I might not yield again to such emotions ; 
And, secondly because of all tliese men, 



Save Israel and Philip Calendaro, 

I knew not well the courage or the faith : 

To-day might find 'mongst them a traitor to us, 

As yesterday a thousand to the senate ; 

But once in, with their hilts hot in their hands, 

They must on for their own sakes ; one stroke struck, 

And the mere instinct of the first-born Cain, 

Which ever lurks somewhere in human hearts, 

Though circumstance may keep it in abeyance, 

Will urge the rest on like to wolves ; the sight 

Of blood to crowds begets the thirst of more, 

As the first wine-cup leads to the long revel ; 

And you will find a harder task to quell 

Than urge them when they have commenced ; but till 

That moment, a mere voice, a straw, a shadow, 

Is capable of turning them aside. — 

How goes the night l 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Almost upon the dawn. 

DOGE. 

Then it is time to strike upon the bell. 
Are the men posted ? 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

By this time they are ; 
But they have orders not to strike, until 
They have command from you through me in person. 

DOGE. 

'T is well. — Will the morn never put to rest 

Tliese stars which twinkle yet o'er all the heavens? 

I am settled and bound up, and being so 

The very efTort which it cost me to 

Resolve to cleanse this commonwealth with fire 

Now leaves my mind more steady. I have wept, 

And trembled at the thought of this dread duty ; 

But now I have put down all idle passion, 

And look the growing tempest in the face, 

As doth the pilot of an admiral galley ; 

Yet (wouldst thou think it, kinsman ?) it hath oeen 

A greater struggle to me, than when nations 

Beheld their fate merged in the approaching fight, 

Where 1 was leader of a phalanx, where 

Thousands were sure to perish — Yes, to spill 

The rank polluted current from the veins 

Of a few bloated despots needed more 

To steel me to a purpose such as made 

Timoleon immortal, than to face 

The toils and dangers of a life of war. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

It ^!;,.1.1< ns me to see your former wisdom 
Subdue the furies which so wrung you ere 
You were decided. 

DOCF-. 

It was ever tin's 
With me ; the hour of agitation came 
In the first glimmerings of a purpose, when 
Passion had too much room to sway ; hut ir. 
The hour of action I have stood as calm 
As were the dead who lay around me : tnis 
They knew who made me what I am, and trusted 
To the subduing power which I preserved 
Over my mood, when its first burst was spent 
But they were not aware that there are things 
Which make revenge a virtue by reflection, 
And not an impulse of mere anger: though 
The laws sleep, justice wakes, and injured soul» 
Oft do a public right with private wrong. 



270 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And justify their deeds unto themselves. — 
Methinks Die day breaks— is it not so ? look, 
Thine eyes are clear with youth ; — the air puts on 
A morning freshness, and, at^east to me, 
The sea looks grayer through the lattice. 

BERTUCCIO FAHERO. 

True, 
The mom is dappling in the sky. 

DOCK. 

Away, then! 
See that they strike without delay, and with 
The first toll from St. Mark's, inarch on the palace 
With all our house's strength ; here I will meet you — 
The Sixteen and their companies will move 
In separate columns at the self-same moment — 
Be sure you post yourself by the great gate, 
I would not trust " The Ten " except to us — 
The rest, the rabble of patricians, may 
Glut the more careless swords of those leagued with us. 
Remember that the cry is still " Saint Mark ! 
The Genoese are come — ho ! to the rescue ! 
Saint Mark and liberty !" — Now — now to action ! 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Farewell then, noble uncle ! we will meet 
Iu freedom and true sovereignty, or never! 

DOGE1 
Come hither, my Bertuccio— one embrace — 
Speed, for the day grows broader — Send me soon 
A messenger to tell me how all goes 
Win n you rejoin our troops, and then sound — sound 
The storm-bell from Saint Mark's! 

[Exit Bertuccio Faliero. 
doge (solus). 

He is gone, 
And on each footstep moves a life. — 'T is done. 
Now the destroying angel hovers o'er 
Venice, and pauses ere he pours the vial, 
Even as the eagle overlooks his prey, 
And for a moment poised in middle air, 
Suspends the motion of his mighty wings, 
Then swoops with his unerring beak. — Thou day ! 
That slowly walk'st the waters ! march — march on — 
I would not smite i' the dark, but rather see 
That no stroke errs. And you, ye blue sea-waves ! 
I have seen you dyed ere now, and deeply too, 
With Genoese, Saracen, and Hunriish gore, 
While that of Venice flow'd too, but victorious: 
Now thou must wear an unmix'd crimson ; no 
Barbaric blood can reconcile us now 
Unto that horrible incarnadine, 
But friend or foe will roll in civic slaughter. 
And have I lived to fourscore years for this ? 
I, who was named preserver of the city ? 
I, at whose name the million's caps were flung 
Into the air, and cries from tens of thousands 
Kose up, imploring Heaven to send me blessings, 
And fame and length of days — to see this day I 
Hm this day, black within the calendar, 
Shall he succeeded by a bright millennium. 
Doge Uandolo survived to ninety summers 
To vaiiquisn umpires and refuse their crown ; 

will lesion a crown, and make the state 
Renew its freedom — but oh ! by whai means 7 
The noble end must justiiy them — What 
Are a few drops of human blood? 'tis false, 
The blood of tyrants is not human? they, 



Like to incarnale Molochs, feed on ours, 

Until 't is time to give them to the tombs 

Which they have made so populous. — Oh world ! 

Oh men ! what are ye, and our best designs, 

That we must work by crime to punish crime ? 

And slay as if Death had but this one gate, 

When a few years would make the sword superfluous'' 

And I, upon the verge of the unknown realm, 

Yet send so many heralds on before me ? — 

I must not ponder this. 

[A pause. 
Hark ! was there not 
A murmur as of distant voices, and 
The tramp of feet in martial unison? 
What phantoms even of sound our wishes raise ! 
It cannot be — the signal hath not rung — 
Why pauses it? My nephew's messenger 
Should be upon his way to me, and lie 
Himself perhaps even now draws grating back 
Upon its ponderous hinge the steep tower portal, 
Where swings the sullen huge oracular bell, 
Which never knells but for a princely death, 
Or for a state in peril, pealing forth 
Tremendous bodements ; let it do its office, 
And be this peal its awfullest and last. 
Sound till the strong tower rock ! — What, silent still ? 
I would go forth, but that my post is here, 
To be the centre of re-union to 
The oft-discordant elements which form 
Leagues of this nature, and to keep compact 
The wavering or the weak, in case of conflict: 
For if they should do battle, 't will be here, 
Within the palace, that the strife will thicken ; 
Then here must be my station, as becomes 
The master-niover. — Hark ! he comes — he comes, 
My nephew, brave Bertuccio's messenger. — 
What tidings? Is he marching? Hath he sped? — 
They here! — all's lost — yet will I make an effort. 
Enter a Signor of the Night, 5 with Guards, etc. 
signor of the night. 
Doge, I arrest thee of high treason ! 

DOGE. 

Me! 
Thy prince, of treason ! — Who are they that dare 
Cloak their own treason under such an order ? 

Miixnr, OF the night (showing liis order). 
Behold my order from the assembled Ten. 

DOGE. 

And where are they, and why assembled ? no 
Such council can be lawful, till the prince 
Preside there, and that duty 's mine : on lliino 
I charge thee, give me way, or marshal me 
To the council chamber. 

SICNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

Duke, it may not be; 
Nor are they in the wonted 1 1 all of Council, 
But sitting in the convent of Saint Saviour's. 

DOGE. 

You dare to disobey me then ? 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

I serve 
The state, and needs must serve it faithfully. 
My warrant is the will of those who rule it. 

DOGE. 

And till that warrant has my signature 
It is illegal, and, as ?ioui applied, 



AIARINO FALIERO. 



271 



Rebellions — H.ist thou weigh'd well thy life's worth, 
That thus you dare assume a lawless function ? 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

*T is not mv office to reply, hut act — 

I am placed here as guard upon thy person, 

And not as judge to hear or to decide. 

doge (aside). 
I must gain time — So that the storm-bell sound, 
All may be well vet. — Kinsman, speed — speed — speed ! 
Our fate is trembling in the balance, and 
Woe to the vanqulsh'd ! be they prince and people, 
Or slaves and senate — 

[The great brll of St. Mark's tolls. 
Lo ! it sounds — it tolls ! 

doge (aloinl). 
Hark, Signor of the Night ! and you, ye hirelings, 
Who wield your mercenary staves in fear, 
It is your knell — Swell on, thou lusty peal! 
Now, knaves, what ransom for your lives? 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

Confusion! 
Si and to your arms, and guard the door — all 's lost, 
Unless thai fearful bell be silenced soon. 
The officer hath miss'd his path or purpose, 
Or met some unforeseen and hideous obstacle. 
Anselmo, with thy company proceed 
Straight to the tower ; the rest remain with me. 

[Exit a part of the Guard. 

DOGE. 

Wretch! if thou wouldst have thy vile life, implore it ; 
It is not now a lease of sixty seconds. 
Av, send ihv miserable ruffians forth ; 
They never shall return. 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

So let it be ! 
They die then in their duty, as will I. 

DOGE. 

Fool ! the hi<;h easle flies at nobler game 
Than thou and thy base myrmidons, — live on, 
So thou provok'st not peril by resistance, 
And learn (if souls so much obscured can bear 
To gaze upon the sunbeams) to be free. 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

And learn thou to be captive — It hath ceased, 

[The hell ceases to loll. 
The traitorous signal, which was to have set 
The bloodhound mob on their patrician prey — 
The knell hath rung, but if is not the senate's ! 

doge (after a pause). 
All 's silent, and all 's lost ! 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

Now, Do<;e, denounce me 
As rebel slave of a revolted council! 
Have I not done my duty? 

DOGE. 

Peace, thou thing ! 
Thou hast done a worthy deed, and earn'd the price 
Of blood, and they who use thee will reward thee. 
Rut thou wert sent to watch, and not lo prate, 
As thou said'st even now — then do thine office, 
But let it be in silence, as behoves thee, 
Since, though thy prisoner, I am thy prince. 

SIGNOR OF THE NIGHT. 

did not mean to fail in the respect 
Due to your rank : in this I shall obey you. 



doge (aside). 
There now is nothing left me save to die ; 
And yet how near success ! I would have fallen, 
And proudly, in the hour of triumph, but 
To miss it thus ! 

Enter other Signors of the Night u\th Bertuccio 
Faliero prisoner. 

SECOND SIGNOR. 

We took him in the act 
Of issuing from the tower, where, at his order, 
As delegated from the Doge, the signal 
Had thus begun to sound. 

first signor. 

Arc all the passes 
Which lead up to the palace well secured? 

second signor. 
They are — besides, it matters not ; the chiefs 
Are all in chair.s, and some even now on trial — 
Their followers are dispersed, and many taxen. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

Uncle! 

DOGE. 

It is in vain to war with Fortune ; 
The glory hath departed from our house. 

BERTl'CCIO FALIERO. 

Who would have deem'd it? — Ah! one moment soonci 

DOGE. 

That moment would have changed the face of ages ; 
This gives us to eternity — We 'II meet it 
As men whose triumph is not in success, 
But who can make their own minds all in all 
Equal to everv fortune. Droop not, 't is 
But a brief passage — I would go alone, 
Yet if they send us, as 't is like, together, 
Let us go worthy of our sires and selves. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

I shall not shame you, uncle. 

FIRST SIGNOR. 

Lords, our orders 
Are to keep guard on both in separate chambers, 
Until the Council call ye to your trial. 

DOGE. 

Our trial ! will they keep their mockery up 

Even to the last? but let them deal upon us 

As we had dealt on them, but with less pomp. 

'T is but a game of mutual homicides, 

Who have cast lots for the first death, and they 

Have won with false dice ? — Who hath been our Judas 7 

FIRST SIGNOR. 

I am not warranted to answer that. 

BERTUCCIO FALIERO. 

I '11 answer for thee — 't is a certain Bertram, 
Even now deposing to the secret giunta. 

DOGE. 

Bertram, the Bergamask ! With what vile tooiS 
We operate to slay or save! This creature, 
Black with a double treason, now will earn 
Rewards and honours, and be stampt in stoiy 
With the geese in the Capitol, which gabbled 
Till Borne awoke, and had an annual triumph, 
While Manlius, who hurl'd down the Gauls, was cas\ 
From the Tarpcian. 

FIRST SIGNOR. 

He aspired to treason 
And sought to rule the state. 



272 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



DOGE. 

IIo saved the state, 
And sought but lo reform what he revived — • 
But this is idle— Come, sirs, do your work. 

FIRST SIQWOR. 
Noble Bertuccio, we must now remove you 
Into an inner chamber. 

KERTLCCIO FALIERO. 

Farewell, uncle ! 
If we shall meet again in life I know not, 
lint they perhaps will lot our ashes mingle. 

DOGE. 

Yes, and our spirits, which shall yet go forth, 

And do what our frail clay, thus clogg'd, hath fail'd in ! 

They cannot quench the memory of those 

Who would have hurl'd them from their guilty thrones, 

And such examples will find heirs, though distant. 



ACT V. 

SCENE I. 
The I fnll of the Council of Tt n astembled with the 
additional Senators, who, on the Trials of the Con- 
spirators for the Treason ofM vrino Fai.iero, com- 
posed what arts railed the Giunta. — Guards, Offi- 
cers, etc., etc. — Israel Bertuccio and Philip 
C alendaro as Prisoners. — Bertram, Lioni, and 
Witnesses, etc. 

The Chief of the Ten, Benintende. 
benintende. 
There now rests, after such conviction of 
Their manifold and manifest olfcnces, 
But to pronounce on these obdurate men 
The sentence of the law : a grievous task 
To those who hear and those who speak. Alas ! 
That it should fall to me, and that my days 
Of office should be stigmatized through all 
The years of coming time, as bearing record 
To this most foul and complicated treason 
Against a just and free state, known to all 
The earth as being the Ch.istian bulwark 'gainst 
The Saracen and the schismatic Greek, 
The savage Hun, and not less barbarous Frank ; 
A city which has open'd India's wealth 
To Europe; the last Roman refuge from 
O'erwhelming Attila ; the ocean's queen ; 
Proud Genoa's prouder rival ! 'T is to sap 
The throne of such a city, these lost men 
Have risk'd and forfeited their worthless lives — 
So let them die the death. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

We are prepared ; 

I uur racks have done that for us. Let us die. 

BENINTENDE. 

II ye have that to say which would obtain 
Abatement of your punishment, the Giunta 
Will hear you ; i. you have aught to confess, 
Now is your time, perhaps it may avail ye. 

ISRAEL PERTUCCIO. 

We stand to hear, and not to speak. 

BENINTENDE. 

Your crimes 
Are ful'v proved by your accomplices, 
And all which circumstance can add to aid them ; 
W we would hear from vour own lips complete 



Avuwal of your treason : on the verge 
Of thai dn an gulf which none repass, the truth 
Alone can profit yon on earth or heaven — 
Say, then, what was your motive? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Justice ; 

BE.MSTENIIE. 

What 
Your object? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO 

Freedom ! 

BENINTENDE. 

You are brief, sir. 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

So my life grows : I 
Was bred a soldier, not a senator. 

BENINTENDE. 

Perhaps you think by this blunt brevity 

To brave your judges to postpone the sentence? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Do you be brief as I am, and, believe me, 
I shall prefer that mercy to your pardon. 

BENINTENDE. 

Is this your sole reply to the tribunal ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Go, ask your racks what they have wrung from us, 

Or place us there again ; we have still some blood left, 

And some slight sense of pain in these wrench'd limbs' : 

But this ye dare not do ; for if we die there — 

And you have left us little life to spend 

Upoll vour engines, gorged with pangs already — 

Ye lose the public spectacle with which 

You would appal vour slaves to further slavery ! 

Groans are not words, nor agony assent, 

Nor affirmation truth, iT nature's sense 

Should overcome the soul into a lie, 

For a short respite — Must we bear or die? 

BENINTENDE. 

Say, who were your accomplices? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

The senate ! 

BENINTENDE. 

What do you mean ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Ask of the suffering people, 
Whom your patrician crimes have driven to crime. 

BENINTENDE. 

You know the Doge ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I served with him at Zara 
In the field, when you were pleading here your way 
To present office ; we exposed our lives, 
While you but hazarded the lives of others, 
Alike by accusation or defence ; 
And, for the rest, all Venice knows her Doge, 
Through his great actions, and the senate's insults ! 

BENINTENDE. 

You have held conference with him ? 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I am weary — 
Even wearier of your questions than your tortures: 
I pray you pass to judgment. 

BENINTENDE. 

It is coming. — 
And you, too, Philip C alendaro, what 



MARINO FALIERO 



273 



Have you to say why you should not be doom' J ? 

CA I. END Alio. 

I never was a man of many words, 

And now have few left worth the utterance. 

BENINTENDE. 

A further application of yon engine 
Mav change your tone. 

calend vno. 

Most true, it will do so; 
A former application did so ; hut 
It will not change my words, or, if it did 

BENINTENDE. 

What then ? 

CALENDARO. 

Will my avowal on yon rack 
Stand good in law ? 

BENINTENDE. 

Assuredly. 

CALENDARO. 

Whoe'er 
The culprit be whom I accuse of treason ? 

BE.MSTE.VDE. 

Without doubt, he will be brought up to trial. 

CALENDARO. 

And on this testimony would he perish? 

BENINTENDE. 

So your confession be detail'd and full, 
He will stand here in peril of his life. 

CALEND 1RO, 

Then look well to thy proud self, President! 
For by the eternity which yawns before me, 
I swear that Ihnu, and only thou, shalt be 
The traitor I denounce upon that rack, 
If I be strctch'd there for the second time. 

ONE OF THE GIUNTA. 

Lord President, 'twere best to proceed to judgment , 
There is no more to be drawn from these men. 

BENINTENDE. 

Unnappy men! prepare for instant death. 

The nature of your crime — our law — and peril 

The state now stands in, leave not an hour's respite — 

Guards! lead them forth, and upon the balcony 

Of the red columns, where, on festal Thursday, 6 

The Doge stands to behold the chase of bulls, 

Let them be justified : and leave exposed 

Their wavering relics, in the place of judgment, 

To the full view of the assembled people ! 

And Heaven have mercy on their souls ! 

THE GIUNTA. 

Amen ! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Signors, farewell ! we shall not all again 
Meet in one place. 

BENINTENDE. 

And lest they should essay 
To stir up the distracted multitude — 
Guards! let their mouths be gagg'd,' even in the act 
Of execution. — Lead them hence! 

CALENDARO. 

What ! must we 
Not even sav farewell to some fond friend, 
N<»r leave a last word with our confessor ? 

BENINTENDE. 

A priest is waiting in the ante-chamber ; 
But, for your fiiends, such interviews would be 
Painful to them, and useless all to you. 
2 B 40 



CALENDARO. 

I knew that we were gagg'd in life ; at least, 
All those who had not In art to risk their lives 
I'pon their open thoughts; but still 1 deem'd 
That, in the last few moments, the same idle 
Freedom of speech accorded to the dying, 
Would not now be denied to us ; but since— 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Even lit them have their way, brave Calendaro* 

What matter a few syllables 7 Id 'a die 

Without the slightest show of favour from them; 

So shall our blood more readily arise 

To Heaven against them, an.i more testify 

To their atrocities, than could a volume 

Spoken or written of our' dying words ! 

They tremble at our voices — nay, they dread 

Our very silence — let them live in far! — 

Leave them unto their thoughts, and let us now 

Address our own above ! — Lead on ; we are ready. 

CALENDARO. 

Israel, hadst thou hut hearken'd unto me, 

It had not now been thus ; and yon pale villain, 

The coward Bertram, would 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

Peace, Calendaro! 
What brooks it now to ponder upon this ? 

BERTRAM. 

Alas ! I fain you died in peace with me : 
I did not seek this task ; 't was forced upon me : 
Say, you forgive me, though I never can 
Retrieve my own forgiveness — frown not thus ! 

ISRAEL BERTUCCIO. 

I die and pardon thee ! 

calendaro (spilling nt him). 
I die and scorn thee! 
[Exeunt Israel Bertuccio and Philit Calek 
daro, Guardk, etc. 

BENINTENDE. 

Now that these criminals have been disposed of, 

T is time that we proceed to pass our sentence 

Upon the greatest traitor upon record 

In any annals, the Doge Faliero! 

The proofs and pror.ss are complete; the time 

And crime require a quick procedure : shall 

He now be call'd in to receive the award 1 

THE GIUNTA. 

Ay, ay. 

BENINTENDE. 

Avogadon, order that the Doge 
Be brought before the council. 

ONE OF THE GIUNTA. 

And the rest, 
When shall they be brought up ? 

BENINTENDE. 

When all the chieU 
Have been disposed of. Some have (lid to Chiozza; 
But there are thousands in pursuit of them, 
And such precaution ta'en on terra linna, 
As well as in the islands, that we hope 
None will escape to utter in strange lands 
His libellous tale of treason 'gainst the senate. 
Enter the Doge as Prisoner, with Guards, etc. a*. 

BENINTENDE. 

Doge — for such still you are, and by the law 
Must be consider'd, till the hour shall come 
When you must doff the ducal bonnet from 



274 BYRON'S WORKS. 




That head, which could not wear a crown more noble 
Than empires can confer, in quiet honour, 
But it must plot to overthrow your peers, 


DOGE. 

The signory of Venice ! You betray'd me — 
You — you, who sit there, traitors as ye are ! 


Who made you what you are, and quench in blood 
A city's glory — we have laid already 
Before you in your chamber at full length, 
Bv the Avogadori, all the proofs 


From my equality with you in birth, 

And my superiority in action, 

You drew me from my honourable toils 

In distant lands — on flood — in field — in cities — 




"\\" 1 « i < -ri have appear' d against you; and more ample 
Ne'er rear'd their sanguinary shadows to 


You singled me out like a victim, to 

Stand orown'd, but bound and helpless, at the altai 




Confront a traitor. What have you to say 
In your defence ? 

DOGE. 


Where ym alone could minister. I knew not — 

hi not — wish'd not — dream'd not the election, 
Which reach'd me first at Borne, and I obey'dj 




What shall I say to ye, 


But found, on my arrival, that besides 




Since my defence must be your condemnation? 
You are at once offenders and accusers, 


The jealous vigilance which always led you 
To mock and mar your sovereign's best intents, 




Judges and executioners ! — Proceed 


You had, even in the interregnum of 




Upon your power. 


My journey to the capital, curtail'd 




BENINTENDE. 

Your chief accomplices 
Having confess'd, there is no hope for you. 


And mutilated the few privileges 

Yet left the duke : ail this I bore, and would 

Have borne, until my very hearth was stain'd 




DOGE. 

And who be they? 


By the pollution of your ribaldry, 

And he, the ribald, whom I see amongst you — 




BENINTENDE. 


Fit judge in such tribunal ! 




In number many ; but 
The first now stands before you in the court, 
Bertram, of Bergamo, — would you question him ? 

DOGE (looking at him contemjjtuously). 
No. 


benintende {interrupting him), 
Michel Sieno 

Is here in virtue of his office, as 

0^ of the Forty ; " The Ten " having craved 

A Giunta of patricians from the senate 




BENINTENDE. 


To aid our judgment in a trial arduous 




And two others, Israel Bertuccio, 


And novel as the present, he was set 




And Philip Calendaro, have admitted 
Their fellowship in treason with the Doge ! 


Free from the penalty pronounced upon him, 
Because the Doge, who should protect the law, 




DOGE. 

And where are they ? 


Seeking to abrogate all law, can claim 
No punishment of others by the statutes 




BENINTENDE. 


Which he himself denies and violates ! 




Gone to their place, and now 


DOGE. 




Answering to Heaven for what they did on earth. 


His punishment ! I rather see hin the~e, 




DOGE. 


Where he now sits, to glut him with my death, 




Ah • the plebeian Brutus, is he gone ? 
And the quicit Cassius of the arsenal ? — 


Than in the mockery of castigalion, 

Which your foul, outward, juggling show of juetic* 




How did they meet their doom? 


Decreed as sentence ! Base as was his crime, 




BENINTENDE. 

Think of your own ; 
It is approaching. You decline to plead, then ? 


'Twas purity compared with your protection. 

BENINTENDE. 

And can it be, that the great Doge of Vr nlo, 




DOGE. 

I cannot plead to my inferiors, nor 


With three parts of a century of years 
And honours on his head, could thus allow 




Can recognise your legal power to try me : 
Show me the law ! 


His fury, like an angry boy's, to master 
All feeling, wisdom, faith, and fe.ar, on such 




BENINTENDE. 

On great emergencies, 
The law must be remodell'd or amended : 
Our fathers had not fix'd the punishment 


A provocation as a young man's petulance ? 

DOGE. 

A spark creates the flame ; 't is the last drop 
Which makes the cup run o'er, and mine was fi'.l 




Of such a crime, as on the old Roman tables 
The sentence against parricide was left 
In pure forgetfulness ; they could not render 
That penal, which had neither name nor thought 


Already : you oppress'd the prince and people ; 
I would have freed both, and have fail'd in bo'.h : 
The price of such success would have been glory, 
Vengeance, and victory, and such a name 




In their great bosoms : who would have foreseen 
That nature could be filed to such a crime 
As sens 'gainst sires, and princes 'gainst their realms? 
Your sin hath made us make a law which will 


As would have mule Venetian history 

Rival to that of Greece and Syracuse, 

When they were freed, and flourish'd ages after, 

And mine lo Gclon and to Thrasybulua : 




Become a precedent 'gainst such naught traitors, 
As would with treason mount to tyranny ; 
No' even contented with a sceptre, till 


Failing, I know the penalty of failure 
Is present infamy and death — the future 
Will judge, when Venice is no more, or free ; 




They can convert .i to a two-edged sword ! 


Till then, the truth is in abeyance. Pause not ; 




Was not the place of Doge sufficient for ye ? 
What 's nobler tha" the signory of Venice ? 


I would have shown no mercy, and I seek noun , 
My life was staked upon a mighty hazard, 





MARINO FALIERO. 



27/ 



And being lost, lane what I would have taken ! 
I would have stood alone amidst your tombs ; 
Now you may flock round mine, and trample on it, 
As you have done upon my heart while living. 

BENINTENDE. 

Vou do ccifess then, and admit the justice 
Of our tribunal ? 

DOGE. 

I confess to have fail'd : 
Fortune is female ; from my youth her favours 
Were not withheld ; the fault was mine to hope 
Her former smiles again at this late hour. 

BEX'IKTD'DE. 

You do not then in aught arraign our equity? 

DOGE. 

Noble Venetians! stir me not with questions. 

I am resign'd to the worst; but in me still 

Have something of the blood of brighter days, 

And am not over-patient. Pray you, spare me 

Further interrogation, which boots nothing, 

Except to turn a trial to debate. 

I shall but answer that which will offend you, 

And please your enemies — a host already: 

'T is true, these sullen walls should yield no echo ; 

But walls have ears — nay, more, they have tongues 

and if 
There were no other way for truth to o'erleap them, 
You who condemn me, you who fear and slay me, 
Yet could not bear in silence to your graves 
What you would hear from me of good or cul; 
The secret were too mighty for your souls : 
Then let it sleep in mine, unless you court 
A danger which would double that vou escape. 
Such my defence would be, had I full scope 
To make it famous ; for true words are tilings, 
And dying men's are things which long outlive, 
And oftentimes avenge them ; bury mine, 
If ye would fain survive ine: take this counsel, 
And though too oft ye made me live in wrath, 
Let me die calmly ; you i lay grant me this;— 
1 deny nothing — defend nothing — nothing 
I ask of you, but silence for myself, 
And sentence from the court 

BENINTENDE. 

This full admission 
Spares us the harsh necessity of ordering 
The torture to elicit the whole truth. 

DOGE. 

The torture ! you have put me there already 
Daily since I was Doge ; but if you will 
Add the corporeal rack, you may ; these limbs 
Will yield with age. to crushing iron ; but 
There 's that within my heart shall strain your engines. 
Enter an Officer, 
officer. 
Noble Venetians ! Duchess Faliero 
Requests admission to the Oiunta's presence. 

BENINTENDE. 

Say, conscript fathers, 8 shall she be admitted? 

ONE OF THE GIUNTA. 

She may have revelations of importance 
Unto the stale, to justify compliance 
With her request. 

BENINTENDF. 

Is this the general will ? 



It is. 

DOGE. 

Oh, admirable laws of Venice ! 
Which would admit the wife, in the full hope 
That she might testily against the husband. 

What glory to the chaste Venetian dames' 

But such blasphemers 'gainst all honour, as 
Sit here, do well to act in their vocation. 
Now, villain Steno ! if this woman fail, 
I '11 pardon thee thy lie, and thy escape. 
The Duchess enters. 

BENINTENDE. 

Lady! this just tribunal has resolved, 

Though the request be strange, to grant it, and, 

Whatever be its purport, to accord 

A patient hearing unh the due respect 

Which fits your ancestry, \oiir rank, and virtues 

Hut you turn pale — ho! there, look to the lady! 

l'lace a chair instantly. 

A NO I 1. IN A. 

A moment's faintness— 
'Tis past ; I pray you pardon me, I sit not 
In presence of my prince, and of my husband, 
While he is on Ins feet. 

BENINTENDE. 

Your pleasure, lady? 

ANGI0L1NA. 

Strange rumours, but most true, if all I hear 
And see be sooth, have reach'd me, and I come 
To know the worst ; even at the worst ; forgive 
The abruptness of my entrance and my bearing. 

Is it 1 cannot speak — I cannot shape 

The question — but you answer it ere spoken, 
With eyes averted, and with gloomy brows— 
Oh God ! this is the silence of the grave ! 
BENINTENDE {nftcr u pnuse). 
Spare us, and spare thyself the repetition 
Of our most awful, but inexorable 
Duty to Heaven and man ! 

AiNGlOLINA. 

Yet speak ; I cannot — 
I cannot — no— even now believe these things ; 
Is lie condemn'd ? 

BENINTENDE. 

Alas! 

ANGIO'.INA. 

And was he guilty ? 

BENINTENDE. 

Lady! the natural distraction of 

Thy thoughts at such a moment makes the question 

Merit forgiveness ; else a doubt like this 

(Against a just and paramount tribunal 

i Were deep offence. Hut question even the Doge ; 

I And if he can deny the proofs, believe h : m 

| Guiltless as thy own bosom. 

A.NGIOLINA. 

Is it so ? 
My lord — my sovereign — mv poor father's friend— 
The mighty in the field, the sage in council; 
Unsay the words of this man ' — Thou art si. cut • 

BFNINTEN1E. 

He hath abendy own'd to his own guilt, 
Nor, as thou seest, doth he deny it njw. 



276 



JiYRON'S WORKS. 



ANGIOLINA. 

Ay, but he must not die ! Spare his few years, 
Winch grief unci shame will soon cut down to days! 
One day of baffled crime must not efface 
Near sixteen lustres crowded with brave acts. 

EENINTENDE. 

His doom must be fulfill'd without remission 
Of time or penalty — 't is a decree. 

ANGIOLINA. 

He hath been guilty, but there may be mercy. 

BENINTENDE. 

Not in this case with justice. 

anciolin v. 

Alas ! signor, 
He who is only just is cruel ; who 
Upon the earth would live, were all judged justly? 

BENINTENDE. 

His punishment is safety to the state. 

ANGIOLINA. 

He was a subject, and hath served the state : 
He was your general, and hath saved the state ; 
He is your sovereign, and hath ru'ed the state. 

ONE OF THE COUNCIL. 

He is a traitor, and betray'd the state. 

ANGIOLINA. 

And, but for him, there now had been no state 
To save or to destroy ; and you, who sit 
There to pronounce the death of your deliverer, 
Had now been groaning at a Moslem oar, 
Or digging in the Hunnish mines in fetters! 

ONE OF THE COUNCIL. 

No, lady, there are others who would die 
Rather than breathe in slavery ! 

ANGIOLINA. 

If there are so 
Within these walls, thou art not one of the number : 
The truly brave are generous to the fallen ! — 
Is there no hope ? 

BENINTENDE. 

Lady, it cannot be. 
angiolina (turning tn the Doge). 
Then die, Faliero! since it must be so; 
But with the spirit of my father's friend. 
Thou hast been guilty of a great offence, 
Half-caneell'd by the harshness of these men. 
I would have sued to them — have pray'd to them— 
Have begg'd as famish'd mendicants for bread — 
Have wept as they will cry unto their God 
For mercy, and be answer'd as they answer — 
Had it been fitting for thy name or mine, 
And if the cruelty in their cold eyes 
Had not announced the heartless wrath within. 
Then, as a prince, address thee to thy doom ! 

DOGE. 

[ have h/ed too long not to know how to die! 

Thy suing to these men were but the bleating 

Of I he lamb to the butcher, or the cry 

Of seamen to the surge : I would not lake 

A life eternal, granted at the hands 

O r wretches, from whose monstrous villanies 

i sought to free the groaning nations! 

MICHEL STENO. 

Doge, 
A word with thee, and with this noble lady, 
Whom 1 have grievously offended. VVoulci 



Sorrow, or shame, or penance on my pari, 
Could cancel the inexorable past ! 
Hut since that cannot be, as Christians let us 
S;iy farewell, and iii peace: with full conlritiop 
I crave, not pardon, but compassion from you, 
And give, however weak, my prayers for both. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Sage Benintende, now chief judge of Venice, 

I 6|>eak to thee in answer to yon signor, 

Inform the ribald Steno, that his words 

Ne'er weigh'd in mind with Loredano's daughtei 

Further than to create a moment's pity 

For such as he is ; would that others had 

Despised him as I pity ! I prefer 

My honour to a thousand lives, could m< h 

Be multiplied in mine, but would not have 

A single life of others lost for that 

Which nothing human can impugn — the sense 

Of virtue, looking not to what is called 

A good name for reward, but to itself. 

To me the scomer's words were as the wind 

Unto the rock: but as there are — alas! 

Spirits more sensitive, on which such things 

Light as ihe whirlwind on the waters ; souls 

To whom dishonour's shadow is a substance 

More terrible than death here and hereafter ; 

Men whose vice is, to start at vice's scoffing, 

And who, though proof against all blandishments 

Of pleasure, and all pangs of pain, are feeble 

When the proud name on which they pinnacled 

Their hopes is breathed on, jealous as the eagle 

Of her high aiery; let what we now 

Behold, and feel, and suffer, be a lesson 

To wretches how they tamper in their spleen 

With beings of a higher order. Insects 

Have made the lion mad ere now ; a shaft 

I' the heel o'erthrew the bravest of the brave ; 

A wife's dishonour was the bane of Troy ; 

A wife's dishonour unking'd Rome for ever ; 

An injured husband brought the Gauls to Clusium. 

And thence to Rome, which perish'd for a time; 

An obscene gesture cost Caligula 

His life, while earth yet bore his cruelties ; 

A virgin's wrong made Spain a Moorish province , 

And Steno's lie, couch'd in two worthless lines, 

Hath decimated Venice, put in peril 

A senate which halh stood eight hundred years, 

Discrown'd a prince, cut off his crownless head, 

And forged new fetters for a groaning people ! 

Let the poor wretch, like to the courtesan 

Who fired Persepolis, be proud of this, 

If it so please him — 't were a pride fit for him ! 

But let him not insuit the last hours of 

Him, who, whate'er he now is, was a hero, 

By the intrusion of his very prayers; 

Nothing of good can come from such a source, 

Nor would we aught with him, nor now, nor ever. 

We '.cave him to himself, that lowest depth 

Of human baseness. Pardon is for men, 

And not for reptiles — we have none for Steno, 

And no resentment ; things like him must sting, 

And higher beings suffer; 'tis the charter 

Of life. The man who dies by the adder's fang 

May have the crawler crush'd, but feels no anger: 

'Twas the worm's nature; and some men are worm* 

In soul, more than the living tilings of tombs. 



MARINO FALTERO. 



doge (to Benixtende). 
Signor, complete that which you deem your duty. 

BENINTENDE. 

Before we can proceed upon that duty, 

We would request the princess to withdraw; 

'T will move her too much to be witness to it. 

ANGIOLINA. 

[ know it will, and yet 1 must endure it ; 
For 't is a part of mine — I will not quit, 
Except by force, my husband's side. — Proceed! 
Nay, fear not either shriek, or S'gh, or teoj ! 
Though my heart burst, it shall be silent.— Speak ! 
I have tiiat within which shall o'ermaster all. 

BENINTENDE. 

Marino Faliero, Doge of Venice, 

Count of Val di iMarino, Senator, 

And sometime General of the Fleet and Army, 

Noble Venetian, many times and oft 

Entrusted by the state with high employments, 

Even to the highest, listen to the sentence. 

Convict by many witnesses and proots, 

And by thine own confession, of the guilt 

Of treachery and treason, yet unheard of 

Until this trial — the decree is death. 

Thy goods are confiscate unto the state, 

Thy name is razed from out her records, save 

Upon a public day of thanksgiving 

For this our most miraculous deliverance, 

When thou art noted in our calendars 

With earthquakes, pestilence, and foreign foes, 

And the <rreat enemy of man, as subject 

Of grateful masses for Heaven's grace in snatching 

Our lives and country from thv wickedness. 

The place wherein as Doge thou shouldst be painted, 

Willi thine illustrious predecessors, is 

To be left vacant, with a death-black veil 

Flung over these dim words engraved beneath, — 

" This piace is of Marino Faliero, 

Decapitated for his crimes." 

DOGE. 

JVhnt crimes ? 
Were it not better to record the fads, 
So that the contemplate* might approve, 
Or at the least learn whence the crimes arose? 
When the beholder knows a Doge conspired, 
Let him be told the cause — it is your history. 

BENINTENDE. 

Time must reply to that ; our sons will judge 
Their fathers' judgment, which I now pronounce. 
As Doge, clad in the ducal robes and cap, 
Thou shall be led hence to the Giant's Staircase, 
Where thou and all our princes are invested ; 
And there, the ducal crown being first resumed 
Upon the spot where it was first assumed, 
Thy head shall be struck off; and Heaven have mercy 
Upon thy soul ' 

DOGE. 

Is this the Giunta's scnUnce? 



BENINTENDE. 



ft is. 



DOGE. 

I can endure it. — And the time? 

BENINTENDE. 

Must be immediate. — Make thy peace with God; 
Within an hour thou must be in his presence. 
2 b 2 



DOGE. 

I am already ; and my blood will rise 

To Heaven before the souls of those who shed it.- 

Are all my lands confiscated? 

BENINTENDE. 

They are : 
And goods, and jewels, and all kind of treasure, 
Except two thousand ducats — these dispose of. 

DOGE. 

That 's harsh — I would have fain reserved the lands 
Near to Treviso, which I hold by investment 
From Laurence, the Count-bishop of Ceneda, 
In fief perpetual to myself and heirs, 
To portion them (leaving my city spoil, 
My palace and my treasures, to your forfeit) 
Between my consort and my kinsmen. 

BENINTENDE. 

These 

Lie under the state's ban, their chief, thy nephew 
In peril of his own life ; but the council 
Postpones his trial for the present. If 
Thou will'st a state unto thy wulow'd princess 
Fear not, for we will do her justice. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Signors, 
I share not in your spoil ! From henceforth, .enow 
I am devoted unto God alone, 
And take my refuge in the cloister. 

DOGE. 

Come ! 
The hour may be a hard one, but 't will end. 
Have I aught else to undergo save death ? 

BENINTENDE. 

You have nought to do except confess and die 
The priest is robed, the scimilar is bare, 

And both await without But, above all, 

Think not to speak unto the people ; they 
Are now by thousands swarming at the cates, 
But these are closed: the Ten, the Avogadori, 
The Giunta, and the chief men of the Fortv, 
Alone will be beholders of thy doom, 
And they are ready to attend the Do"e. 

DOGE. 

The Doge ! 

BENINTENDE. 

Yes, Doge, thou hast lived and thou shall die 

A sovereign ; till the moment which precedes 

The separation of that head and trunk, 

That ducal crown and head shall be united. 

Thou hast forgot thy dignity in deigning 

To plot with petty traitors ; not so we, 

Who in the very punishment acknowledge 

The prince. Thy vile accomplices have dieu 

The dog's death, and the wolf's; but thou shall fall 

As falls the lion by the hunters, girt 

By those who feel a proud compassion for 'bee. 

And mourn even the inevitable death 

Provoked by thy wild wrath and regal fierceness. 

Now we remit thee to thy preparation : 

Let it be brief, and we ourselves will be 

Thv guides to the place where first we were 

United to thee as thy subjects, and 

Thy senate ; and must now be parted from luce 

As such for ever on the selfsame spot. — 

Guards ! form the Doge's escort to his chambc/. 

[Jixe>4iu 



273 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



SCENE II. 

The Doge's Apartment. 

The Doge cm prisoner, and the Duchess attending him. 

DOGE. 

Now that the priest is gone, 't were useless all 

To linger out the miserable minutes; 

But one pang more, the pang of parting from thee, 

And I will leave the few last grains of sand, 

Which yet remain of the accorded hour, 

Still falling — I have done with Time. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Alas! 
And I have been the cause, the unconscious cause; 
And for this funeral marriage, this black union, 
Which thou, compliant with my father's wish, 
Didst promise at his death, thou hast seal'd thine own. 

DOGE. 

Not so : there was that in my spirit ever 
Which shaped out for itself some great reverse; 
The marvel is, it came not until now— 
And yet it was foretold me. 

ANGIOLINA. 

How foretold you ? 

DOGE. 

Long years ago— so long, they are a doubt 

In memory, and yet they live in annals : 

When I was in my youth, and served the senate 

And signory as podesta and captain 

Of the town of Treviso, on a day 

Of festival, the sluggish bishop who 

Convcy'd the Host aroused my rash young anger, 

By strange delay, and arrogant reply 

To my reproof; I raised my hand and smote him, 

Until he reel'd beneath his holy burthen; 

And, as he rose from earth again, he raised 

His tremulous hands in pious wrath towards Heaven. 

Thence pointing to the Host, which had fallen from him, 

He tuni'd to me, and said, " The hour will come 

When He thou hast o'erthrown shall overthrow thee: 

The glory shall depart from out thy house, 

The wisdom shall be shaken from thy soul, 

And in thy best maturity of mind, 

A madness of the heart shall seize upon thee ; 

Passion shall tear thee when all passions cease 

In other men, or mellow into virtues ; 

And majesty, which decks all other heads, 

Shall crown to leave thee headless ; honours shall 

But prove to thee the heralds of destruction, 

And hoary hairs of shame, and both of death, 

But not such death as fits an aged man." 

Thus saying, he pass'd on. — That hour is come. 

ANGIOLINA. 

And with this warning couldst thou not have striven 

To avert the fatal moment, and atone 

By penitence for that which thou hadst done? 

DOGE. 

I own the words went to my heart, so much 

That I rcmember'd them amid the maze 

Of life, as if they form'd a spectral voice, 

Which shook me in a supernatural dream ; 

Arid 1 repented ; but 'twas not for me 

To pull in resolution : whai must be 

1 could not change, and would not fear. Nay, more 

Thou canst r.ot have forgot what all remember, 

That on mv day of landing here as Doge, 



On my return from Rome, a mist of such 
Unwonted density went on before 
The bucentaur, like the columnal cloud 
Which ushcr'd Israel out of Egypt, till 
The pilot was misled, and disembark'd us 
Between the pillars ot Saint Mark's, wheie 'ti* 
The custom of the state to put to death 
lis criminals, instead of touching at 
The Riva dells Paglia, as the wont is, — 
So that all Venice shudder'd at the omen. 

ANGIOLINA. 

Ah ! little boots it now to recollect 
Such things. 

DOGE. 

And yet I find a comfort in 
The thought that these things are the worn of Fate ; 
For I would rather yield to gods than men, 
Or cling to any creed of destiny, 
Rather than deem these mortals, most of whom 
I know to be as worthless as the dust, 
And weak as worthless, more than instruments 
Of an o'er-ruling power ; they in themselves 
Were all incapable — they could not be 
Victors of him who oft had conquer'd for them ! 

ANGIOLINA. 

Employ the minutes left in aspirations 

Of a more healing nature, and in peace 

Even with these wretches take thy flight to heaven. 

DOGE. 

I am at peace : the peace of certainty 

That a sure hour will come, when their sons' sons, 

And this proud citv, and these azure waters, 

And all which makes them eminent and bright, 

Shall be a desolation and a curse, 

A hissing and a scoff' unto the nations, 

A Carthage, and a Tyre, an Ocean-Babel ! 

ANGIOLINA. 

Speak not thus now : the surge of passion still 
Sweeps o'er thee to the last ; thou dost deceive 
Thyself and canst not injure them — be calmer. 

DOGE. 

I stand within eternity, and see 

Into eternity, and I behold — 

Ay, palpable as I see thv sweet face 

For the last time — the days which I denounce 

Unto all time against these wave-girt walls, 

And they who are indweMers. 

GUARD (coming forward). 

Doge of Venice, 
The Ten are in attendance on your highness. 

DOGE. 

Then farewell, Angiolina ! — one embrace — 
Forgive the old man who hath been to thee 
I A fond but fatal husband— love my memory — 
I would not ask so much for me still living, 
But thou canst judge of me more kindly now, 
Seeing my evil feelings are at rest. 
Besides, of all the fruit of these long years, 
Glory, and wealth, and power, and fame, and name. 
Which generally leave some (lowers to bloom 
Even o'er the grave, I have nothing left, not even 
A little love, or friendship, or esteem, 
No, not enough to extract an epitaph 
From ostentatious kinsmen ; in one tvuir 
I have uprooted all my former life, 
And outlived every thin?, except thy heart. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



279 



The pure, the good, the gentle, which will oft 
With unimpair'd but not a clamorous grief 

Still keep Thou turn'st so pale — Alas ! she faints, 

She hath no breath, no pulse ! Guards ! lend your aid — 
I cannot leave her thus, and yet 't is better, 
Since every lifeless moment spares a pang. 
When she shakes off this temporary death, 
I shall be with the Eternal — Call her women — 
One look ! — how cold her hand,! as cold as mine 
Shall be ere she recovers. — Gently tend her, 
And take my last thanks. — I am ready now. 

[The attendants of Angiolina enter and sur- 
round their mistress, who has fainted. — 
Ex-cunt the Doge, Guards, etc., etc. 



SCENE III. 

The Court of the Ducal Palace: the outer gates are 
shut against the people. — The Doge enters in his 
ducal ruhes, in procession with the Council of Ten 
and other Patricians, attended by the Guards, till 
they arrive at the top of the " Giant's Staircase" 
(where the Doges took the oatlis); the Executioner is 
Klationcd there with his sword. On arriving, a Chief 
of the Ten takes off tlie duccd cap from tlie Doge's 
head. 

DOGE. 

So, now the Doge is nothing, and at last 

I am again Marino Faliero : 

'T is well to be so, though but for a moment. 

Here was I rrown'd, and here, bear witness, Heaven! 

With howgmuch more contentment I resign 

That shining mockery, the ducal bauble, 

Than I received the fatal ornament. 

ONE OF THE TEX. 

rhou tremblest, Faliero ! 

DOGE. 

'Tis with age, then. 9 

BENINTENDE. 

Faliero! hast thou aught further to commend, 
Compatible with justice, to the senate? 

DOGE. 

I would commend my nephew to their mercy, 
My consort to their justice ; for melhinks 
My death, and such a death, might settle all 
Between the state and me. 

BENINTENDE. 

They shall be cared for ; 
Even notwithstanding thine unheard-of crime. 

DOGE. 

Unheard-of! ay, there's not a history 
But shows a thousand crown'd conspirators 
Against the people ; but to set them free 
One sovereign only died, and one is dying. 

BENINTENDE. 

And who are they who fell in such a cause? 

DOGE. 

The King of Sparta, and the Doge of Venice — 
Agis and Faliero ! 

BENINTENDE. 

Hast thou more 
To utter or to do? 

DOGE. 

May I speak? 

BENINTENDE. 

Thou may'st ; 



Hut recollect the people are without, 
Beyond the compass of the human voice. 

DOGE. 

I speak to Time and to Etcrnitv, 

Of which I grow a portion, not to man. 

Ye elements \ in which to be resolved 

I hasten, let my voice be as a spirit 

Upon you ! Ye blue waves! which bore my banner ! 

Ye winds ! which flutter'd o'er as if you loved it, 

And fill'd my swelling sails as they were Wafted 

To many a triumph ! Thou, my native earth, 

Which I have bled for, and thou foreign earth, 

Which drank this willing blood from many a wound ! 

Ye stones, in which my gore will not sink, but 

Reek up to Heaven! Ye skies, which will receive it! 

Thou sun ! which shinest on these things, and Thou 

Who kindlest and who quenchest suns ! — Attest ! 

I am not innocent — but are these guiltless ? 

I perish, but not unavenged ; far ages 

Float up from the abyss of time to be, 

And show these eyes, before they close, the doom 

Of this proud city, and I leave my curse 

On her and hers for ever: Yes, the hours 

Are silently engendering of the day, 

When she who built 'gainst Attila a bulwark, 

Shall yield, and bloodlessly and basely yield 

Unto a bastard Attila, without 

Shedding so much blood in her last defence 

As these old veins, oft drain'd in shielding her, 

Shall pour in sacrifice. — She shall be bought 

And sold, and be an appanage to those 

Who shall despise her! — She shall stoop to be 

A province for an empire, petty town 

In lieu of capital, with slaves for senates, 

Beggars for nobles, panders for a people ! ,a 

Then, when the Hebrew 's in thy palaces, ' ' 

The Hun in thy high places, and the Greek 

Walks o'er thy mart, and smiles on it for his ! 

When thy patricians beg their bitter bread 

In narrow streets, and in their shameful need 

Make their nobility a plea for pity ! 

Then, when the few who still retain a wreck 

Of their great fathers' heritage shall fawn 

Bound a barbarian Vice of Kings' Vice-gerent 

Even in the palace where they sway'd as sovereigns. 

Even in the palace where they slew their sovereign, 

Proud of some name they have disgraced, or spruit 

From an adultress boastful of her guilt 

With some large gondolier or foreign soldier, 

Shall bear about their bastardy in triumph 

To the third spurious generation ; — when 

Thy sons are in the lowest scale of being, 

Slaves turn'd o'er to the vanquish'd by the victors, 

Despised bv cowards for greater cowardice, 

And scom'd even by the vicious for such vices 

As in the monstrous grasp of their conception 

Defy all codes to image or to name them ; 

Then, when of Cyprus, now thy subject kingdom, 

All thine inheritance shall be her shame 

EntaiPd on thy less virtuous daughters, grown 

A wider proverb for worse prostitution ; — 

When all the ills of conquer'd states shall cfing the* 

Vice without splendour, sin without relief 

Even from the gloss of love to smooth it o'er, 

But in its stead coarse lusts of habitude, 

Prurient yet passionless, cold studied lewdness 



230 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Depraving nature's frailly to an art ; — 
When these ami more are heavy on thee, when 
Smiles without mirth, and pastimes without pleasure, 
South without honour, age without respect, 
Mee ss and weakness, and a sense of woe 

'(J It which thpu wilt not strive, and dar'st not murmur, 

liave made thee last and worst of peopled deserts; 

Then, in (lie last gasp of thine agony, 

Amidst thy manv murders, think of mine! 

Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes! 12 

Gehenna of the waters! thou sea Sodorn! 

Thus I de-vote thee to the infernal gods! 

Thee and thy serpent seed ! 

[Hire Ike Doge turns, and addresses the Exe- 
cution) r. 

Slave, do thine office ; 
Strike as I struck the foe ! Strike as 1 would 
Have struck those tyrants ! Strike deep as my curse ! . 
Strike — and but once! 

[1'lie Does throws himself upon his knees, 
and us the Executioner ruiscs hit sword 
the scene closi -.. 



SCENE IV. 

Tlie Piatta tend Piaaetta of Saint MarVs.—lfu Peo- 
ple in crowds gathered round the grated gales of the 
Ducal Palace, which are shut. 

FIRST CITIZEN. 

I have gain'd the gate, and can discern the Ten, 
Robed in their gowns of state, ranged round the Doge. 

SECOND CITIZEN. 

cannot reach thee with mine utmost effort. 
How is it? Ii t us hear al least, since sight 
Is thus prohibited unto the people, 
Except the occupiers of those bars. 

FIRST CITIZEN. 

One has approach'd the Doge, and now they strip 

The ducal bonnet from his head — and now 

He raises his keen eye to heaven. I see 

Them glitter, and his lips move — Hush! hush! No, 

'T was but a murmur — Curse upon the distance! 

His words are inarticulate, but the voice 

Swells up like niutter'd thunder; would we could 

But gather a sole sentence ! 

SECOND CITIZEN. 

Hush ! we perhaps may catch the sound. 

FIRST CITIZEN. 

'T is vain. 
cannot hear him. — How his hoary hair 
Sti earns on the wind like foam upon the wave ! 
Now — now — he kneels — and now they form a circle 
Round him, and all is hidden — but I see 

The lifted sword in air Ah ! hark ! it falls ! 

[ The people murmur. 

THIRD CITIZEN. 

Then they have murder'd him who would have freed us. 

FOt'RTH CITIZEN. 

He was a kind man to the commons ever. 

FIFTH CITIZEN. 

■Wisely tncy did to keep their porlals barr'd. 
Would we had known the work they were preparing 
Ki n wo were summon 1 d here ; we would have brought 
Wr.aoons, and ibrced them! 

SIXTH CITIZEN. 

Are you sure he's dead? 



FIRST CITIZEN. 

I saw the sword fall — Lo! what have we here? 
[Enter on the Balcony of the Palace which fronts Saint 
Murk's Place a Chief of the Ten,' 3 with a bloody 
sword, lie wuics it thrice before the people, and 
exclaims, 
"Justice hath dealt upon the mighty traitor!" 

[The gutts are opened, the pupuluce rush in towards 
the " Giant's Staircase," where Uic execution lias 
taken place. The foremost of them eaclaims to 
those hthind, 

The gory head rolls down the "Giant's step- !" 

[The curtain falls. 



NOTES. 



Notel. Page 248, line 59. 
I smote the tardy bishop at "l revise 
A historical fact. See Marin Sanuto's Lives of the 
Dcges. 

Note 2. Page 251, line 69. 

A gondola with one oar only. 

A gondola is not like a common boat, but is as easily 

rowed with one oar as with two (though of course not 

so swiftly), and often is so from motives of privacy, and 

(since the decay of Venice) of economy. 

Note 3. Page 260, line 65. 
Tiny think themselves 
Engaged in secret to the Sifiiory. 
A historical fact. 

Note 4. Page 209, line 8. 
Within our palace procincts at San Polo. 
The Doge's private family palace. 

Note 5. Page 270, line 105. 
" Signor of the Night." 
"I Signori di Notte" held an important charge \t 
the old Republic. 

Note 6. Page 273, line 43. 
Festal Thursday. 
" Giovedi Crasso," "fat or greasy Thursday," which 
I cannot literally translate in the text, was the day. 

Note 7. Page 273, line 57. 
Guarda! let their mouths be gagg'd, even in the act. 
Historical fact. See Sanuto, in the appendix to this 
tragedy. 

Note 8. Page 275, line 59. 
Say, conscript fathers, shall she be admitted 1 
The Venetian senate took the same title as the Ro- 
man, of "Conscript Fathers." 

Note 9. Page 279, line 30. 
"f U with age, then. 
This was the actual reply of Bailli, mairc of Paris, to 
a Frenchman who made him the same r< proach on his 
way to execution, in the earliest part of their revolution. 
I find in reading over (since the completion of this 
tragedy), for the first time these six years, " Venice 
Preserved," a similar reply on a different occasion !>y 
Renault, and other coincidences arising from the sol>- 
ject. I need hardly remind the gentlest reader, that 
such coincidences must be accidental, from the very 
facility of their detection by reference to so popular a 



MARINO FALIERO. 



281 



play on the stage and in the closet as Otvvay's chef- 
d'oeuvre. 

Note 10. Page 279, line 35. 
Ecsigars for nobles, panders for a people 

Should the dramatic picture seem harsh, let the 
reader look to the historical, of the period prophesied, 
or rather of the few years preceding that period. \ ol- 
taire calculated their "nostre benemerite Merctrici," 
at twelve thousand of regulars, without including vol- 
unteers and local militia, on what authority I know not ; 
but it is perhaps the only part of the population not 
decreased. Venice once contained two hundred thou- 
sand inhabitants; there arc now about ninety thou- 
sand, and these ! ! Few individuals can conceive, and 
none could describe the actual state into which the 
more than infernal tyranny of Austria has plunged this 
unhappy city. 

Note 11. Page 279, line 3d. 
Then, when the Hebrew 's in thy palaces. 

The chief palaces on the Brenta now belong to the 
Jews ; who, in the earlier times of the Republic, were 
only allowed to inhabit Mestri, and not to enter the 
city of Venice. The whole commerce is in the hands 
of the Jews and Greeks, and the Huns form the gar- 
rison. 

Note 12. Page 2S0, line 10. 
Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes ! 

Of the first fifty Doges, Jive abdicated—; five were 
banished with their eyes put out — -Jive were massacred 
— and nine deposed ; so that nineteen out of fifty lost 
the throne by violence, besides two who fell in battle : 
this occurred long previous to the reign of Marino 
Faliero. One of his more immediate predecessors, An- 
drea Dandolo, died of vexation. Marino Faliero him- 
self perished as related. Amongst his successors, Fos- 
cari, after seeing his son repeatedly tortured and ban- 
ished, was deposed, and died of breaking a blood- 
vessel, on hearing the bell of Saint Mark's toll for the 
election of his successor. Murosini was impeached for 
he loss of Candia ; but this was previous to his duke- 
dom, during which he conquered the Morea, and was 
styled the Peloponnesian. Faliero might truly say, 
Thou den of drunkards with the blood of princes ! 

Note 13. Page 280, line 70. 
Chief of the Ten. 
"Un Capo de'Dieci" are the words of Sanuto's 
Chronicle. 



APPENDIX. 



I. 
MCCCLIV. 

MARINO FALIERO, DOGE XLIX. 
"Fu eletto da quarantuno Elettori, il quale era Cav- 
ahere e contc di Valdemarino in Trivigiana, ed era 
ncco, e si trovava ambasciadore a Roma. E a di 9, di 
Setiemhre, dopo sepolto il suo predecessore, fu chiamato 
il gran Consiglio, e fu preso di fare il Doge ginsta il so- 
lito. E furono fatti i cinque Correttori, Ser Bernardo 
Giustiiiiani Procuratore, Ser Paolo Loredano, Ser Fi- 
lippo Aurio, Ser Pietro Trivisano, e Ser Tommaso 
Viadro. I quali a dl 10, misero queste correzioni alia 
promozione del Dosie : che i Consiglieri non odano gli 
Oratori e Nunzi de' Signori, senza i Capi de' quaranta, 
41 



ne possano rispondere ad alouno, se non saranno quattro 
Consiglieri e due Capi de' Quaranta. E che osservino 
la forma del suo Capitolare. E che Messer lo Dogo 
si metta nella miglior parte, qiiando i giudici tra loro 
non fossero d'acconio. E ch' egli non possa far ven- 
dere i suoi imprestiti, salvo con legittima causa, e col 
voler di cinque Consiglieri, di due Capi de' Quaranta, 
e delle due parti del Consiglio de' Pregati. Item, che 
in luogo di tre mila pelli di Conigli, che debbon dare l 
Zaratini per regalia al Doge, non trovandosi tante pelli, 
gli diano Ducati ottanta l'anno. E poi a di 11, detto, 
misero etiam altre correzioni, che se il Doge, che sara 
eletto, fosse fuori di Venezia, i savj possano provvedere 
del suo rilorno. E quando fosse il Doge ammalato, sia 
Vicedoge uno de' Consiglieri, da essere eletto tra loro. 
E che il detto sia noininato Viceluogotcnente di Messer 
lo Doge, quando i giudici faranno i suoi atti. E nota, 
perch£ fu fatto Doge uno, ch'era assente, che fu Vice- 
doge Ser Marino Badoe ro piii vecchio de' Consiglieri. 
Item, che il governo del Ducato sia commesso a' Con- 
siglieri, e a' Capi de' Quaranta, quando Vachere il 
Ducato finche sara eletto 1' altro Doge. E cosi a di 11 
di Settembre fu creato il prefato Marino Faliero Doge. 
E fu preso, che il governo del Ducato sia commesso a' 
Consiglieri e a' Capi de' Quaranta. I quali stiano in 
Palazzo di continuo, fino che Terra il Do;;e. Sicche di 
continuo stiano in Palazzo due Consiglieri e un Capo 
de' Quaranta. E subito furono speditc lcttere al detto 
Doge, il quale era a Roma Oratore al Legato di Papa 
Innocenzo VI. ch' era in Avignone. Fu preso net gran 
Consiglio d'uleggere dodici ambasciadori incontro a 
Marino Faliero Doge, il quale veniva da Roma. E gi- 
unto a Chioggia, il Podesta mando Taddeo Giustiniani 
suo figliuolo incontro, con quindici Ganzaruoli. E poi 
venuto a S. Clemente nel Bucintoro, venne un gran 
caligo, adeo che il Bucintoro non si pote levarc. Laonde 
il Doge co' gentiluomini nolle piatte vennero di lungo 
in qucsta Terra a' 5 d'Ottobre del 1354. E dovendo 
smontare alia riva della Paglia per lo caligo andarono 
ad ismontare alia riva della Piazza in mezzo alle due co- 
lonne dove si fa la Giustizia, che fu un mahssimo au- 
gurio. E a' 6, la mattina venne alia Chiesa di San 
Marco alia laudazione di quello. Era in questo tempo 
Canceilier Grande Messer Benintende. I quarantuno 
Elettori furono, Ser Giovanni Contarini, Ser' Andrea 
Giustiniani, Ser Michele Morossini, Ser Simone Dan- 
dolo, Ser Pietro Lando, Ser Marino Gradenigo, Ser 
Marco Dolfino, Ser Nicolo Faliero, Ser Giovanni Qui- 
rini, Ser Lorenzo Soranzo, Ser Marco Bemho, Sere 
Stefano Belegno, Ser Francesco Loredano, Ser Ma- 
rino Veniero, Ser Giovanni Mocenigo, Ser Andrea 
Barbaro, Ser Lorenzo Barbarigo, Ser Bettino da Mol- 
lino, Ser' Andrea Arizzo Procuratore, Ser Marco Celsi, 
Ser Paolo Donato, Ser Bertucci Grimani, Ser PietM 
Steno, Ser Luca Duodo, Ser' Andrea Pisani, Set Fran- 
cesco Caravello, Ser Jacopo Trivisano, Sere Schiavo 
Marccllo, Ser MalTeo Aimo, Sor Marco Capello, Ser 
Pancrazio Giorgio, Ser Giovanni Foscarini, Sir Tom- 
maso Viadro, Sere Schiava I'olani, Ser Nareo Polo, 
Ser Marino Sagredo, Sere Stefano Mariani, Ser Fran- 
cesco Sunano, Ser Olid Pasqualigo, Ser' Andrea 
Gritti, Ser Btiono da Afoato. 

" TrattatO <li Mrxxir Marino Faliero Doge, tl.ttto tU 
una Cronka antica. Essendo Tenuto il G iovedi della 
Caccia, fu fatta ginsta il solito la Caccia. E a' que' 



tempi dopofattala Caccia s'andavain Palazzo rlcl Doge 
u> una di quelle sale, e con donne facevasi una fcstic- 
chiola, dove si ballava fino alia prima cauipana, e ve- 
niva una coiazione ; la quale spesa faceva Messer k> 
Doge, quando v' era la Dogaressa. E poscia tutti anda- 
vano a rasa sua. Sopra la qual festa, pare, che Sir Mi- 
chele Sterio, molto giovane e povero gentiluomo, ma 
ardito e astuto, il quale era innamorato in certa donzclla 
della Dogaressa, essendo sul Solajo appresso le donne, 
facesse cert' alto non convenient^, adeo che il Doge co- 
mandu ch' b' fosse buttato giu dal Solajo. E cosi quegli 
scudieri del Doge los|)insero giu Ji (jiiel Solajo. Laonde 
a Ser Michele parve, che fosscgli stata fatta troppo 
grande ignominia. E non considerando altramente il 
fine, ma sopra quella passione fornita la festa, e andati 
tutti via, quella notte egli undo, e sulia eadrega, dove 
srili v,i il Doge Delia Sala dell' Udienza (perche allora i 
Dogi non tencvano panno di seta sopra la cadrega, ma 
sedevano in una cadrega di legno) scrisse alcune parole 
disoneste del Doge e della Dogaressa, cio>> : Marin Fu- 
ller/, dalla hella mog'ic : Attn In gode, ed egli la vinn- 
1'iiie. E la mattina furono vedute tali parole serine. 
E parve una brutta cosa. E per la Signoria fu com- 
messa la cosa agh Avvogadori del Comune con grande 
efficacia. I quoli Avvogadori subito diedero taglia grande 
per venire in cliiaro della veritii di clii avca scritto tal 
lettera. E tandem si neppe, che Michele Sterio aveale 
scritte. E fu per li Quaranta preeb di ritenerlo; e ri- 
tcnuto confessii, che in q\icila passione d' essere stato 
spintogiii dal Solajo, presente la sua amante, egli aveale 
scritte. Onde poi fu placitato nel detto Consiglio, e 
parve al Consiglio si per rispetto all' eta, come per la 
caldezza d'amore, di condannarlo a compicre due mesi 
in prigione scrrato, e poi ch' e' fosse bandito di Venezia 
e dal distretto per un' anno. Per la qual copdennagione 
tanto piccola il Doge ne prese grande sdegno, paren- 
dogli che non fosse stata falta quella estimazione della 
cosa, che ricercava la sua dignita del Ducato. E diceva, 
ch' cglino doveano averlo fatto appiecare per la gola, o 
saltern bandirlo in perpetuo da Venezia. E perche 
(quando dee succedere un' efTetto e nccessario che vi 
concorrala c an gi one a fare tal' effetto) era destinato, che 
a Messer. Marino Doge fosse tagliata la testa, perciboc- 
corse, che entrata la Quaresirna il giorno dopo che fu 
condannato il detto Ser Michele Sterio, un gentiluomo 
da Ca Barbaro, di natura collerico, andasse all' Arsenale, 
domandasse certe cose ai Padroni, ed era alia presenza 
de 1 Signori l'Ammiragliodell' Arsenale. II quale intesa 
la domanda, dissc, che non si poteva fare. Quel gen- 
tiluomo venne a parole coll' Ammiraglio, e diedegli un 
pugno Btl un'occhio. E perche avea un'anello in dito, 
coll' anello gli ruppe la pelle, e fece sangue. E l'Ammi- 
raglio cosi batiuto e insanguinato andb al Doge a lamen- 
tarsi, acciocche il Doge facesse fare gran punizione con- 
tra il detto da Cli Barbara: ffDogedisse: Cheiwoiclie 
(i facda ? Guarda le ignominiose parole srrilte ill me, c 
il modo c'Si stato punito quel ribaldo di Michele Steno, 
die le sensu. E quale ttimn lianno i Quaranta fatto 
deHa -persona nostra 2 Laonde 1' Ammiraglio gli disse : 
M, seer I" Doge, se vai volete farii Signore, e fare ta- 
eliare tutti ijiicsti beeehi gcntiluomi ni a pezzi, mi bas'a 
Panimo, dandomi voi ajuto, di fani Slgnote di quuta 
Terra. R allora voi potrcte castigare tutti costoro. In- 
tese questo, il Doge dissc, Come si pu^t fare una simile 
toad E cosi entrarona in ragionamento. 
" It Doge man*', a chiamere Ser Bcrtuccio Faliero auo 



nipole, il quale stava con lui in Palazzo, e entrarono 
in questa macchinazione. Ne si partironodi li,cheman- 
darono per Filippo Calendaro,uomomarittimoedi gran 
aeguito, e per Bertoccio lerftello, ingegnerc e uomo astu- 
tuBtmo. E consigliatisi insicmc diede ordine di chia- 
mare alcuni altri. E cosi per alcuni giorni la notte si 
ridncevano insieme'in Palazzo in casa del Doge. E cbia- 
marono a parte a parte altri, videlicet Niccold Fa- 
giuolo, Giovanni da Corfu, Stefano Fagiano, Niccolb 
dalle Bende, NiccoI6 Biondo, e Stefuno Trivisano. E 
ordintl di fare sedici o diciassette Capi in diversi luoghi 
della Terra, i quali avessero cadaun di loro quarant' uo- 
cnini prowigionati, pveparati, non dicendo a' detii suoi 
quaranta quello, che volessero fare. Ma che il giorno 
stabilito si mostrasse di far quistione tra loro in diversi 
luoghi, acciocohe il Doge facesse sonare a San Marco le 
campane, le quali non si possono suonare, s' egli nol 
la. E al suono delle campane questi sedici o 
diciassette co' suoi uoniini venisaero a San Marco alle 
Btrade, cbe buttano in Piazza. E cosi i nobili e primarj 
cittadinijCh'e venissero in Piazza, per saperedel romore 
ci6 ch'( r i, li tafgliassero a pezzi. E seguito questo, che 
fosse ehi&malo |>er Signore Messer Marino Faliero Doge. 
E fermate le cose tra loro, stabilito fu, che questo do- 
vess' essere a' 15 d'Aprile del 1355 in giorno di Merco- 
ledl. La quale macchinazione trattata fu tra loro (anto 
scgretamente, che mai ne pure se ne sospetto, non che 
se ne sapesse cos' alcuna. Ma il Signor' Iddio, che ha 
sempre ajutato questa gloriosissima citta, e che per le 
santimonie e giustizie sue mai non I'ha abbandonata, 
is|>in'i a un Beltramo Bergamasco, il quale fu messo 
Capo di quarant' uomini per uno de' detti congiurati 
(il quale intese qualche parola, sicchc comprese 1'efTeto, 
che doveva succedere, e il qual era di casa di Ser Nic- 
colo Lionidi Santo Stefano) diandare adi **** d'Aprile 
a casa del detto Ser Niccolb Lioni. E gli disse ogru 
cosa dell' ordin dato. II quale intese le cose, rimase 
come morto ; e intese molte particolarita, il detto Bel- 
tramo il prego che lo tenesse segre'o, e glielo disse, 
acciocche il detto Ser Niecolii non si partisse di casa a 
dl 15, acciocche egli non fosse morto. Etl egli volendo 
partirsi, il fece ritenere a suoi di casa, e serrarlo in una 
camera. Ed esso and("i a casa di M. Giovanni Gradeni<»o 
Nasone, il quale fu poi Doge, che stava anch' egli a 
Santo Stefano ; e disscgli la cosa. La quale paren- 
dogli, com'cra, d'una grandissima importanza, tutti e 
due audarono a casa di Ser Marco Cornaro, che stava 
a San Felice. E dettogli il tutto, tutti e tre delibera- 
rono di venire a casa del detto Ser Niccolo Lioni, ed 
csaminare il detto Beltramo. E quello esaminato, in- 
tese le cose, il fecero stare scrrato. E andarono tutti e 
tre a San Salvatore in sacristia, e mandorono i loro fa- 
migli a chiamare i Consiglieri, gli Avvogadori, i Capi 
de' Dieci, e que' del Consiglio. E ridotti insieme dissero 
loro le cose. I quali rimasero morti. E deliberarono di 
mandarc pel detto Beltramo, e fattolo venire cauta- 
mente, ed esaminatolo, e verificate le cose, ancorche ne 
aentissero gran passione, pure pensarono la pro^-visione. 
E mandarono pe' Capi de' Quaranta, pe' Signori di 
notte, pe Capi de' Sesticri, e pe Cinque della Pace. E 
ordrnato, ch' eglino co' loro uomini trovassero degli 
alln buoni uoniini, e mandas-ero a casa de' capi de' 
congiurati, ut supra mettessero loro le mani addosso. 
E tolsero i detti le Maestrerie dell' Arsenale, accioche 
provvisionati de' congiurati non potessero offenderh. 
E si ridussero in Palazzo verso la sera. Dove ridotu 



MARINO FALTERO. 



283 



fecero sen-are le porte della corte del Palazzo. E man- 
darono a ordinare al campanaro, che non sonasse le 
campane. E cosl fu eseguito, e messe le mani addosso 
a tutti i nominati di sopra, furono que' condotti al 
Palazzo. E vedcndo il Consiglio de' Dieci, che il Doge 
era nella cospira/.ione, presero di eleggere venti de' 
primarj della Terra, di giunta al detto Consiglio a con- 
sigliare, non per6 che potessero mettere pallolta. 

" I Consiglieri furono questi : Ser Giovanni Mocenigo, 
del Sestiero di San Marco ; Ser Almorb Veniero da Santa 
Marina, del Sestiero di Castello ; Ser Tommaso Viadro, 
del Sestiero di Caneregio; Ser Gtovanni Sanudo, del 
Sestiero di Santa Croce ; Ser Pietro Trivisano, del Se- 
stiero di San Paolo, Ser Pantalione Barbo il Grande, del 
Sestiero d'Ossoduro. Gli Avvogadori del Comune fu- 
rono Ser Zufredo Morosini, e Ser Orio Pasqualigo, e 
questi non ballottarono. Que' del Consiglio de' Dieci ; 
furono : Ser Giovanni Marcello, Ser Tommaso Sanudo, 
e Ser Micheletto Dolfino, Capi del detto Consiglio de' 
Dieci ; Ser Luca da Legge, e Ser Pietro da Mosto, Inqui- 
sitori del detto Consiglio: Ser Marco Polani, Ser Marino 
Veniero, Ser Lando Lombardo, Ser Nicoletto Trivisano 
da Sant' Angiolo. Questi elessero tra loro una Giunta, 
nella notte ridotti quasi sul romper del giorno, di ver.ti 
nobili di Venezia de' migliori, de' piu savj, e de' piu an- 
tichi, per consultare, non per6 che mettessero pallot- 
tola. E non vi vollero alcuno da Ca Faliero. E cac- 
ciarono fuori del Consiglio Niccolb Faliero, e un' altro 
Niccolb Faliero da San Tommaso, per essere della ca- 
sata del Doge. E questa provigione di chiamare i venti 
della Giunta fu molto commendata per tutta la Terra. 
Questi furono i venti della Giunta, Ser Marco Giusti- 
niani, Procuratore, Ser' Andrea Erizzo, Procuratore, Ser 
Lionardo Giustiniani, Procuratore, Ser' Andrea Conta- 
rini, Ser Simone Dandolo, Ser Niccolo Volpe, Ser Gio- 
vanni Loredano, Ser Marco Diedo, Ser Giovanni Gra- 
denigo, Ser' Andrea Cornaro, Cavaliere, Ser Marco So- 
ranzo, Ser Rinierida Mosto, Ser Gazano Marcello, Ser 
Marino Morosino, Sere Stefano Belegno, Ser Niccolb 
Lioni, Ser Filippo Orio, Ser Marco Trivisano, Ser Ja- 
copo Bragadino, Ser Giovanni Foscarini. E chiamati 
questi venti nel Consiglio de' Dieci, fu mandato per 
Messer Marino Faliero Doge, il quale andava pel Pa- 
lazzo con gran gente, gentiluomini, e altra buona gente, 
che non sapeano ancora come il fatto stava. In questo 
tempo fu condotto, preso, e legato, Bertuccio Israello, 
uno de' Capi del traltato per que' di Santa Croce, e an- 
cora fu preso Zanello del Brin, Nicoletto di Rosa, e 
Nicoletto Alberto, il Guardiaga, e altri uomini da mare, 
e d' altre condizioni. I quali furono esaminati, e trovata 
la verita del tradimento. A dl 16 d'Aprile fu senten- 
ziato pel detto Consiglio de' Dieci, che Filippo Calan- 
dario. e Bertucci Israello fossero appiccati alle colonne 
rossR del balconate del Palazzo, nelle quali sta a vedere 
il Doge la festa della Caccia. E cosl furono appiccati 
con spranghe in bocca. E nel giorno segucnte' questi 
furono condannati, Niccolb Zuccuolo, Nicoletto Blondo, 
Nicoletto Doro, Marco Geuda, Jacomello Dagolino, Ni- 
coletto Fedele figliuolo di Filippo Calcndaro, Marco To- 
rello, detto Israello, Stefano Trivisano, cambiatore di 
SanU Margherita, Antonio dalle Bende. Furono tutti 
presi a Chioggia, che fuggivano, e dipoi in diversi giorni 
a due a due, ed a uno a uno, per sentenza fatta nel detto 
Consiglio de' Dieci, furono appiccati per la go!a alle co- 
lonne, continuqndo dalle rosse del Palazzo, seguendo fin 



verso il Canale. E altri presi furono lasciati, perchfc 
sentirono il fatto, ma non vi furono tal che fu dato loro 
ad intendere per questi capi, che venissero coll' arme, 
per prendere alcuni malfattori in servigio della Signoria, 
ne altro sapeano. Fu encora liberato Nicoletto Alberto, 
il Guardiaga, e Bartolommeo Ciriuola, e suo figliuolo, 
e molti altri, che non erano in colpa. 

E a dl 16 d' Aprilc, giorno di Venerdl, fu scntenziato 
nel detto Consiglio de' Dieci, di tagliare la testa a Mes- 
ser Marino Faliero Doge sul pato della scala di pietra, 
dove i Dogi giurano il primo sagrarnento, quando mon- 
tano prima in Palazzo. E cosl serrato il Palazzo, la 
mattina seguente a ora di terza, fu tagliata la testa al 
detto Doge a di 17 d' Aprile. E prima la berretta fu 
tolta di testa al detto Doge, avanti cne venisse giu dalla 
scala. E compiuta la giustizia, pare che un Capo de' 
Dieci andasse alle Colonne del Palazzo sopra la Piazza, 
e mostrasse la spada insanguinata a tutti, dicendo: E 
atala fatta la gran giustizia del Traditvre. E apcrta la 
porta, tutti entrarono dentro con gran furia a vedere il 
Doge, ch' era stato giustiziato. E' da sapere, che a fare 
la detta giustizia non fu Ser Giovanni Sanudo il Consi- 
gliere, perche era andato a casa per difetto della persona, 
siech& furono quattordici soli, che ballottarono, cio6 
cinque Consiglieri, e nove del Consiglio de' Dieci. E fu 
preso, che tutti i beni del Doge fossero confiscati nel 
Comune, e cosl degli altri traditori. E fu conceduto 
al detto Doge pel detto Consiglio de Dieci, ch' egli po- 
tesse ordinare del suo per ducati due mila. Ancora fu 
preso, che tutti i Consiglieri, e Avvogadori del Comune, 
que' del Consiglio de' Dieci, e della Giunta, ch' erano 
stati a fare la detta sentenza del Doge, e d'altri, avessero 
licenza di portar' arme di dl e di notte in Venezia e da 
Grado fino a Gavarzere, ch' e sotto il Dogato, con due 
fanti in vita loro, stando i fanti con essi in casa al suo 
pane e al suo vino. E chi non avesse fanti, potesse dar 
tal licenza a' suoi figliuoli ovvero fratelli, due perb e non 
piu. Eziandio fu data licenza dell' arme a quattro Notaj 
della Cancelleria, cioe della Corte Maggiore, che furono 
a prendere le deposizioni e inquisizioni, in perpetuo a 
loro soli, i quali furono Amadio, Nicoletto di Loreno, 
StefTanello, e Pietro de' Compostelli, Scrivani de' Si- 
gnori di notte. Ed essendo stati impiccati i traditori, c 
tagliata la testa al Doge, rimase la Terra in gran riposo 
e quiete. E come in una cronica ho trovato, fu por- 
tato il corpo del Doge in una barca con otto doppieri 
a seppelire nella sua area a San Giovanni e Paolo, la 
quale al presente e in quell' andito per mezzo la Chie- 
suola di Santa Maria della Pace, fatta fare pel Vescovo 
Gabriello di Bergamo, e un cassone di pietra con queste 
lettere : Hicjacet Dominus Marinm Faletro Dux. E 
nel gran Consiglio non gli e stato fatto alcun brieve, ma 
il luogo vacuo con lettere, che dicono cosi : Hie est loan 
Murini Faletro, decapitati pro criminibus. E pare, che 
la sua casa fosse data alia Chiesa di Sant' Apostolo, la 
qual era quella grande sul ponte. Tamen vedo il con- 
trario che e pure di Ck Faliero, o che i Fu'ieri la ricu- 
perassero con danari dalia Chiesa. Ne voglio restar dj 
scrivere alcuni, che volevano, che fosse messo nel suo 
breve, cioe : Marinus Faletro Dux. Temeritas me cepti. 
Pienas lui decapitatus pro criminibus. Altri vi feccru 
un distico assai degno al suo mcrito, il quale 6 queslo, 
da cessere posto su la sua sepoltura : 

"Dux Venntiim jnrot hie, patrinm qui pnxWe tcntao* 
Serptrn, decus, cenaum, perdulit, utijuc caput. ' 



231 



BYRON'S WOR 



" Non voglio restar di scrivere quello chc ho letto in 
ina cronica, cioe, che Marino Faliero trovandosi Po- 
desta e Capitano a Treviso, e dovcndosi fare una pro- 
cessionc, il vescovo stctte troppo a far venire il Corpo 
di Cristo. II detto Faliero era di tanla supcrbia c ar- 
roganza, chc diede un buifetto al prcfalo Vescovo, per 
modo ch' egli quasi cackle in terra. Peril fu pennesso, 
die il Faliero pcrdette I'intelletlo, c fece la mala morte, 
come ho scrilto di sopra." 

******* 

Cronica di Sariutn — Muratori S. S. Rerum Italicarum 
—vol. xxii. 6iS— 639. 



ir. 

MCCCLIV. 
MARINO FALIERO, OOGE XLIX. 

On the eleventh day of September, ir. the year of our 
Lord 1354, Marino Faliero was elected and chosen to be 
the Duke of the Commonwealth of Venice. He was 
Count of Valde.-narino, in the Marches of Treviso, and 
a Knight and a wealthy man to boot. As soon as the 
election was completed, it was resolved in the Great 
Council, that a deputation of twelve should be des- 
patched to Marino Faliero, the Duke, who was then on 
his way from Rome ; for, when he was chosen, he was 
ambassador at the court of the Holy Father, at Rome, 
— the Holy Father himself held his court at Avignon. 
When Messer Marino Faliero, the Duke, was about to 
land in this city, on the fifth day of October, 1354, a 
thick haze came on, and darkened the air ; and he was 
enforced to land on the place of Saint Mark, between 
the two columns, on the spot where evil doers are put 
to death ; and all thought that this was the worst of 
tokens. — Nor must I forget to write that which I have 
read in a chronicle. — When Messer .Marino Faliero was 
podesta and Captain of Treviso, the bishop delayed 
jorning in with the holy sacrament, on a day when a 
procession was to take place. Now the said Marino Fa- 
liero was so very proud and wrathful, that he buffeted 
the bishop, and almost struck him to the ground. And 
therefore, Heaven allowed Marino Faliero to go out of 
his right senses, in order that he might bring himself to 
an evil death. 

When this Duke had held the dukedom during nine 
months and six days, he being wicked and ambitious, 
sought to malic himself lord of Venice, in the manner 
which I have read in an ancient chronicle. When the 
Thursday arrived upon which they were wont to hunt 
the bull, the bull-hunt took place as usual ; and, accord- 
ing to the usage of those times, after the bull-hunt had 
ended, th^y all proceeded unto the palace of the Duke, 
and assembled together in one of his halls ; and they 
disported themselves with the women. And until the 
first bell tolled they danced, and then a banquet was 
nerved up. My Lord the Duke paid the expenses there- 
of, provided he nad a Duchess, and after the banquet 
they alj returned to their homes. 

Now to this feast there came a certain Ser Michele 
Sietio, a gentleman of poor estate and very young, but 
crafty and daring, and who loved one of the damsels of 
the Duchess. Ser Michele stood amongst the women 
upon the solajo ; and he behaved indiscreetly, so that 
my Lord tne Duke ordered that he snottld be kicked oft' 
tne solajo ; and the esquires of the Duke flung him 
4ovm fron the solajo accordingly. Ser Michele thought 



that such an affront was beyond all bearing; and when 
the feast was over, and all other persons had left tht 
palace, he, continuing heated with anger, went to the 
hall of audience, and wrote certain unseemly words re- 
lalin_' to the Duke and the Duchess, upon the chair in 
which the Duke was used to sit; for in those days the 
Duke did not cover his chair with cloth of sendal, but 
he sat in a chair of wood. Ser Michele wrote thereon: 
— " I\Inrin Falicr, the husband of lite fuir wife ; others 
lays hir, but he ka-j/s her.'''' In the morning the words 
were seen, and the matter was considered to be very 
scandalous ; and the Senate commanded the Avvogadori 
of the Commonwealth to proceed therein with the 
greatest diligence. A largess of great amount was im- 
mediately proffered by the Avvogadori, in order to dis- 
cover who had written these words. And at length it 
was known that Michele Steno had written them. It 
was resolved in the Council of Forty that he should be 
arrested ; and he then confessed, that in a fit of vexa- 
tion and spite, occasioned by his being thrust off the 
solajo in the presence of his mistress, he had written 
the words. Therefore the Council debated thereon. 
And the Council took his youth into consideration, and 
that he was a lover, and therefore they adjudged that 
he should be kept in close confinement during two 
months, and that afterwards he should be banished from 
Venice and the state during one year. In consequence 
of this merciful sentence the Duke became exceedingly 
wroth, it appearing to him that the Council had not 
acted in such a manner as was required by the respect 
due to his ducal dignity ; and he said that they ought 
to have condemned Ser Michele to be hanged by the 
neck, or at least to be banished for life. 

Now it was fated that my Lord Duke Marino was to 
have his head cut oft". And as it is necessary, when any 
effect is to be brought about, that the cause of such ef 
feet must happen, it therefore came to pass, that on the 
very day after sentence had been pronounced on Ser 
Michele Steno, being the first day of Lent, a gentleman 
of the house of Barbaro, a choleric gentleman, went 
to the arsenal and required certain things of the mas- 
ters of the galleys. This he did in the presence of the 
admiral of the arsenal, and he, hearing the request, 
answered, — No, it cannot be done. — High words arose 
between the gentleman and the admiral, and the gen- 
tleman struck him with his fist just above the eye ; and 
as he happened to have a ring on his finger, the ring 
cut the admiral and drew blood. The admiral, all 
bruised and bloody, ran straight to the Duke to com- 
plain, and with the intent of praying him to inflict 
some heavv punishment upon the gentleman of Ca Bar- 
baro. — "What wouldst thou have me do for thee?" 
answered the Duke; — "think upon the shameful gioe 
which hath been written concerning me ; and think on 
the manner in which they have punished that ribald 
Michele Steno, who wrote it ; and see how the Council 
of Forty respect our person." — Upon this the admiral 
answered ; — " My Lord Duke, if you would \\ ish lo m:il<e 
yourself a prince, and to cut all those cuckoldy gentle- 
men to pieces, I have the heart, if you do but help me, 
to make vou prince of all this state ; and then you may 
punish them all." — Hearing this, the Duke said ; — " How 
can such a matter be brought about?" — and so they 
discoursed thereon. 

The Dukccallcd for hisnephew, Ser Bertucrio Faliero, 
who lived with him in the palace, and they communed 



MARINO FALIERO. 



286 



about this plot. And, without leaving the place, they 
Bent for Philip Calendaro, a seaman of great repute, anil 
'or Bertuccio Israello, who was exceedingly wily and 
tunning. Then, taking counsel amongst themselves, 
they agreed to call in some others ; and so for several 
nights successively, they met with the Duke at home in 
his palace. And the following men were called in singly ; 
to wit; — Niccolo Fagiuolo, Giovanni da Corfu, Stefano 
Fagiano, Niccolo dalle Bende, Niccolo Biondo, and Ste- 
fano Trivisano. — It was concerted that sixteen or seven- 
teen leaders should be stationed in various parts of the 
city, each being at the head of forty men, armed and 
prepared ; but the followers were not to know their des- 
tination. On the appointed day they were to make af- 
frays amongst themselves here and there, in order that 
the Duke might have a pretence for tolling the bells of 
San Marco : these bells are never rung but by the order 
of the Duke. And at the sound of the bells, these six- 
teen or seventeen, with their followers, were to come 
to San Marco, through the streets which open upon the 
Piazza. And when the noble and leading citizens should 
come into the Piazza, to know the cause of the riot, then 
the conspirators were to cut them in pieces ; and this 
work being finished, my Lord Marino Faliero the Duke 
was to be proclaimed the Lord of Venice. Things 
having been thus settled, they agreed to fulfil their in- 
tent on Wednesday, the fifteenth day of April, in the 
year 1355. So covertly did they plot, that no one ever 
dreamt of their machinations. 

But the Lord, who hath always helped this most 
glorious city, and who, loving its righteousness and 
holiness, hath never forsaken it, inspired one Beltramo 
Bergamasco to be the cause of bringing the plot to light 
in the following manner. This Beltramo, who belonged 
to Ser Niccolo Lioni of Santo Stefano, had heard a word 
or two of what was to take place ; and so, in the before- 
mentioned month of April, he went to the house of the 
aforesaid Ssr Niccolo Lioni, and told him all the partic- 
ulars of the plot. Ser Niccolo, when he heard all 
these things, was struck dead, as it were, with affright. 
He heard all the particulars, and Beltramo prayed him 
to keep it all secret ; and if he told Ser Niccolo, it was 
in order that Ser Niccolo might stop at home on the 
fifteenth of April, and thus save his life. Beltramo was 
going, but Ser Niccolo ordered his servants to lay hands 
upon him and lock him up. Ser Niccolo then went to 
the house of Messer Giovanni Gradenigo Nasoni, who 
afterwards became Duke, and who also lived at Santo 
Stefano, and told him all. The matter seemed to him 
to be of the very greatest importance, as indeed it was; 
and they two went to the house of Ser Marco Cornaro, 
who lived at San Felice ; and, bavins spoken with him, 
thev aH three then determined to go back to the house 
of Ser Niccolo Lioni, to examine the said Beltramo; 
and having questioned him, and heard all that he had to 
say, they left him in confinement. And then they all 
three went into the sacristy of San Salvatore, and sent 
their men to summon the Councillors, the Avvogadori, 
the Capi de' Dieci, and those of the Great Council. 

When all were assembled, the whole story was told 
to them. They were struck dead, as it were, with 
affright. They determined to send for Beltramo. He 
was brought in before them. They examined him, and 
ascertained that the matter was true ; and, although 
they were exceedingly troubled, yet they determined 
upon their measures. And they sent for the Capi de' 
2 C 



Quaranta, the Signori di Notte, the Capi de' Sesticri, 
and the Cinque della Pace; and they were ordered to 
associate to their men other good men and true, who 
were to proceed to the houses of the ringleaders of the 
conspiracy and secure them. And they secured the 
foreman of the arsenal, in order that the conspirators 
might not do mischief. Towards nightfall they asscm- 
bled in the palace. When they were aseembled in the 
palace, they caused the gates of the quadrangle of the 
palace to be shut. And they sent to tht keeper of the 
bell-tower, and forbade the tolling of the bells. All Ih s 
was carried into effect. The before-mentioned con- 
spirators were secured, and they were brought to tha 
palace; and as the Council of Ten saw that the Duke 
was in the plot, they resolved that twenty of the lead- 
ing men of the state should be associated to thorn, for 
the purpose of consultation and deliberation, but that 
they should not be allowed to ballot. 

The counsellors were the following: Ser Giovanni 
Mocenigo, of the Sestiero of San Marco ; Ser Almoro 
Veniero da Santa Marina, of the Sestiero of Castel'.o; 
Ser Tommaso Viadro, of the Sestiero of Caneregio; Ser 
Giovanni Sanudo, of the Sestiero of Santa Croce ; Ser 
Pietro Trivisano, of the Sestiero of San Paolo ; Ser 
Pantalione Barbo il Grande, of the Sestiero of Ossoduro. 
The Avvogadori of the Commonwealth were Zufredo 
Morosini, and Ser Orio Pasqualigo ; and these did not 
ballot. Those of the Council of Ten were Ser Giovanni 
Marcello, Ser Tommaso Sanudo, and Ser Mieheletto 
Dolfino, the heads of the aforesaid Council of Ten. 
Ser Luca da Legge, and Ser Pietro da Mos'o, inquisi- 
tors of the aforesaid Council. And Ser Marco Polani, 
Ser Marino Veniero, Ser Lando Lombardo, and Ser 
Nicoletto Trivisano, of Sant' Angelo. 

Late in the night, just before the dawning, they 
chose a junta of twenty noblemen of Venice from 
amongst the wisest and the worthiest and the oldest. 
They were to give counsel, but not to ballot. And they 
would not admit any one of Ch Faliero. Ami Niccolo 
Faliero, anil another Niccolo Faliero, of San Tommaso, 
were expelled from the Council, because they belonged 
to the family of the Doge. And this resolution of 
creating the junta of twenty was much praised through- 
out the state. The following were the members of the 
junta of twenty: — Str Marco Giustiniani, Procuratore, 
Ser' Andrea Erizzo, Procuratore, Ser Lionardo Qatar 
tiniani, Procuratore, Ser'AndreaComtarini, SereSimone 
Dandolo, Ser Niccolo Volpe, Ser Giovanni Lon-dano, 
Ser Marco Diedo, Ser Giovanni Gradenigo, Ser Andrea 
Comoro, Cavaliere, Ser Marco Soranzo, Ser Rinieri 
daMosto, Ser Gazano Marcello, Ser Marino Morosini, 
Ser Stefano Belegno, Ser Niccolo Lioni, Ser Filippo 
Orio, Ser Marco Trivisano, Ser Jacopo Bragadmo, Ser 
Giovanni Foscarini. 

These twenty were accordingly called in to the 
Council of Ten; and they sent for my Lord Marino 
Faliero the Duke; and my Lord Marino was then 
consorting in the palace w.th people of great estate, 
aentlemen, and other good men, none of whom knew 
yet how the fact stood. 

At the same time Bertuccio Israello, who, as one of 
the ringleaders, was to head the conspirators HI Santa 
Croce, was arrested and bound, and Drought before the 
Council. Zanellodel Brin, Nicoletto di Rosa, Nicolctio 
Alberto, and the Guardiaga, were also taken together, 
with several seamen, and people of various rimts. 



086 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



These were examined, and the truth of the plot was 
ascertained. 

On the sixteenth of April, judgment was given in the 
Council of Ten, that Filippo Calendaro and Bertuccio 
Israello should be hanged upon the red pillars of the 
balcony of the palace, from which the Duke is wont to 
look at the bull-hunt : and they were hanged with gags 
in their mouths. 

The next day the following were condemned: — Nic- 
colo Zuccuolo, Nicoletto Blondo, Nicoletto Doro, Marco 
Ghlda, Jacomello Dagolino, Nicoletto Fidele, the son of 
Philip Calendaro, Marco Torello, called Israello, Stefano 
Tnvisuno, the money-changer of Santa Margherita, and 
Antonio dalle Bende. These were all taken at Chiozza, 
for they were endeavouring to escape. Afterwards, by 
virtue of the sentence which was passed upon them in 
the Council of Ten, they were hanged on successive 
days, some singly and some in couples, upon the col- 
umns of tne palace, beginning from the red columns, 
and so going onwards towards the canal. And other 
prisoners were discharged, because, although they had 
been involved in the conspiracy, yet they had not assist- 
ed in it : for they were given to understand by some of 
the heads of the plot, that they were to come armed 
and prepared for the service of the state, and in order 
to secure certain criminals, and they knew nothing else. 
Nicoletto Alberto, the Guardiaga, and Bartolommeo 
Ciriuola and his son, and several others, who were not 
guilty, were discharged. 

On Friday, the sixteenth day of April, judgment was 
also given, in the aforesaid Council of Ten, that my 
Lord Marino Faliero, the Duke, should have his head 
cut off", and that the execution should be done on the 
landing-place of the stone staircase, where the Dukes 
take their oath when they first enter the palace. On 
the following day, the seventeenth of April, the doors 
of the palace being shut, the Duke had his head cut off, 
about the hour of noon. And the cap of estate was 
taken from the Duke's head before he came down stairs. 
When the execution was over, it is said that one of the 
Council of Ten went to the columns of the palace over 
against the place of St. Mark, and that he showed the 
Dloody sword unto the people, crying out with a loud 
voice " The terrible doom hath fallen upon the trai- 
tor!" — and the doors were opened, and the people all 
rushed in, to see the corpse of the Duke who had been 
beheaded. 

It must be known, that Ser Giovanni Sanudo, the 
( ouncillor, was not present when the aforesaid sentence 
Mas pronounced ; because he was unwell and remained 
at Home. So that only fourteen balloted; that is to 
say, five councillors, and nine of the Council of Ten. 
And it «as adjudged, that all the lands and chattels of 
the Duke, as well as of the other traitors, should be 
forfeited to the state. And, as a grace to the Duke, it 
was resolved in the Council of Ten, that he should be 
allowed to dispose of two thousand ducats out of his 
own property. And it was resolved, that all the coun- 
cillors and all the Avvogadori of the commonwealth, 
those of the Council of Ten, and the members of the 
(tlhia who had assisted in passing sentence on the Duke 
and tne other traitors, should have the privilege of car- 
rying nnns both by day and by night in Venice, and 
lf#>m Grodo to Cavazere. And they were also to be 
snowed two footmen carrying arms, the aforesaid foot- 



men living and boarding with them in their own houses. 
And he who did not keep two footmen might transfer 
the privilege to his sons or his brothers ; but only to 
two. Permission of carrying arms was also granted tv 
the four Notaries of the Chancery, that is to say, of the 
Supreme Court, who took the depositions ; and they 
were Amedio, Nicoletto di Lorino, StefTanello, and 
Pietro de Compostelli, the secretaries of the Signori di 
Notte. 

After the traitors had been hanged, and the Duke had 
had his head cut otF, the state remained in great tran- 
quillity and peace. And, as I have read in a chronicle, 
the corpse of the Duke was removed in a barge, with 
eight torches, to his tomb in the church of San Giovanni 
e Paolo, where it was buried. The tomb is now in 
thai aisle in the middle of the little church of Santa 
Maria della Pace, which was built by Bishop Gabriel o( 
Bergamo. It is a coffin of stone, with these words en- 
gtaved thereon : " Hcicjacet Duminus Morinus Fuktro 
Dux.'''' — And they did not paint his portrait in the hall 
of the Great Council : — But in the place where it ought 
to have been, you see these words : — " Hie est Incus 
Mariiii Fuletro decapitati pro critninibus " — and it is 
thought that his house was granted to the church of 
Bant' Apostolo; it was that great one near the bridge. 
Yi l this could not be the case, or else the family bought 
it back from the church ; for it still belongs to Ca Fa- 
liero. I must not refrain from noting, that some wished 
to write the following words in the place where his 
portrait ought to have been, as aforesaid : — " Marinttt 
Fulilrii Dujc, tcmeritas me cejiit, poena* lui, tkcapitatus 
pro critoinitua." — Others, also, indited a couplet, worthy 
of being inscribed upon his tomb. 

" Dux Venetum jacet tide, patriam qui prodere tentans, 

Sceptn, decus, censum, peid.dit, atque caput." 

[T am obliged for this excellent translation of the old chronicle to Mr. 

F. Cohen, to whom the reader will find himself indebted for a version 

that 1 could not myself (though after many years' intercourse with Italian,) 

have given bv any means so purely and so faithfully.] 



III. 

" Al giovane Doge Andrea Dandolo succedette un 
vecchio, il quale tardi si pose al timone della repubblica, 
ma sempre prima di quel, che facea d' uopo a lui, ed alia 
patria: egli e Marino Faliero personnaggio a me nolo 
per antica dimestichezza. Falsa era 1' opinione intorno 
a lui, giacche egli si mostro fomito piu di coraggio 
che di senno. Non pago della prima dignita, entr6 con 
sinistro piede nel pubblico Palazzo: imperciocche 
questo Doge dei Veneti, magistrato sacro in tutti i se- 
coli, che dagli antichi fu sempre venerato qual nume in 
quolla citth 1' altr' jeri fu decollate nel vestibolo dell' 
istesso Palazzo. Discorrerei fin dal principio le cause 
di un tale evento, se cosl vario, ed ambiguo non ne 
fosse il grido. Nessuno pert) lo scusa, tutti affermano, 
che egli abbia voluto cangiar qualche cosa nell' online 
della repubblica a lui tramandato dai maggiori. Che 
desiderava egli di piu ? Io son d'avviso, che egli abbia 
ottenuto cio, che non si concedette a nessun altro: 
nicotic adempiva gli ufficj di legato presso il Pontefice, 
e sulle rive del Rodano trattava la pace, che io prima 
di lui avevo indarno tentato di conchiudere, gli fu con- 
ferito 1' onorc del Ducato, che ne chiedeva, ne s' aspet- 
tava. Tomato in patria, penso a quello, cui nessuno 
non pose mente giammai, e sofTrl quello che a niun r . 
accade mai de solfrire : giacche in quel luogo celeber 



MARINO FALIERO. 



2s: 



ritno, e chiarissimo, e bollissimo infra tutti quclli, die 
io vidi, ove i suoi antenali avevano ricevuti grandissimi 
onori in mozzo alle ponipe trionfali, ivi egh fu trasci- 
nato in modo servile, e spogliato delle insegne ducali, 
perdette la testa, e maechio col proprio sangue le soglie 
del tempio, 1' atrio del Palazzo, e le scale marmoree ren- 
dute spesse volte illustn o dalle solemn festivita, o dalle 
osti't spoglie. Ho notato il luogo, ora noto il tempo: 
e 1' anno del Natale di Cristo i355, fu il giomo 18 d'A- 
prile. Si alto e il grido sparso, che se alcuno esaminera 
la disciplina, e le cqstumanze di quella citta, e quanto 
mutamentq di cose venga mioacciato dalla niorte di un 
sol uomo (quaotunque mojti akri, come narrano, es- 
sendo cotnpUci, o subirono 1' istesso supplicio, o lo 
aspettano) si acporgeta, die nulla di piii granide awenne 
ai no-in tempi nell' Italia. Tu torse qui attendi il mio 
giudizio; ussob/O il popolo, se credere alia fama, benche 
abbia potitto e castigore ptii mitamente, e con tnaggior 
i vendicare il buq dolore; ma non cost facil- 
mente, si modera un' ira giusta insieme, e grande in 
un Dumeroso popolo principalmente, net quale il pre- 
etpitoso, e I instabile volgo aguzza gli stimuli dell' ira- 
condia con rapidi, e seobsigliati damori. Cotnpatisco, 
e nell' istesso tempo mi adiro con quell' infelice uomo. 
il quale adocno di un' insolito onore, non so che cosa 
si volesse negli estremi anni deila sua vita: la cala- 
mity di lui diviene sempre piu grave, perche dalla 
scnteoza contra di esso promulgata apparirh, che egli fu 
non solo misero, ma insano, e demente, e che con vane 
aril si usurpo per tantj anni una falsa fama di sapienza. 
Anunoniseo i Dogi, i quali gli succederanno, die questo 
e un esempio posto innanzi ai loro occhi, quale specchio 
net quale veggano di essere non Signori, ma Duci, anzi 
nemineno Duci, ma onorati servi della Rcpubblica. 
Tu s'a sano ; e giacche fluttuano le publicche cose, sfor- 
ziamoci di governar modestissiinamente i privati nostri 
affan." 

Levati. Viaggi di Pelrarca, vol. iv. p. 323. 

The above Italian translation from the Latin epistles 
of Petrarch, proves — 

Istly, That Marino Faliero was a personal friend of 
Petrarch's: "antica dimestichezza," old intimacy, is the 
pnrase of the poet. 

2dly, That Petrarch thought that he had more courage 
than conduct, " piu di coraggio che di senno." 

Silly, That there was r-ome jealousy on the part of 
Petrarch ; for ho says that Marino Faliero was treating 
of the peace which he himself had " vainly attempted 
to conclude." 

4ihly, That the honour of the dukedom was con- 
ferred upon him, which he neither sought nor expected, 
'• che n> chiedeva nes' aspt ttava," and which had never 
been granted to any other in like circumstances, "cio 
die non si oopcedfitte a nessun altio;" "proof of the 
high esteem in which he must have been held." 

Othly, That he had a reputation for wisdom, only 
forfeited by the last enterprise of his life, "si surpo 
per tanti anni una falsa fama di sapienza." — "He had 
usurped for so many years a false fame of wisdom ;" 
rather a difficult task, I should think. People are gene- 
rally found out before eighty years of age, at least in a 
republic, 

From these, and the other historical notes which I 
have collected, it may be inferred that Marino Faliero 
possessed many of the qualities, but not the success of 



a hero ; and that his passions were too violent. The 
paltry and ignorant account of Dr. Moore falls to the 
ground. Petrarch says, " that there had been no 
greater event in his times" (our times literally), "nostri 
tempi," in Italy. He also differs from the historian in 
saying that Faliero was " on the banks of the Rhone," 
instead of at Rome, when elected ; the other accounts 
say, that the deputation of the Venetian senate met 
him at Ravenna. How this may have been, it is not 
for me to decide, and is of no great importance. Had 
the man succeeded, he would have changed the face of 
Venice, and perhaps of Italy. As it is, what are they 
both? 



IV. 

Extrait de Pouvrage. — Hisloire de la Repuhlique dt 
Veuise, par P. Bam, de PAcadcmie FrancmSS, 
torn. v. liv. xxxv. p. 95, etc. Edition de Paris, 
MDCCCXIX. 

"A ces attaqnea si frequcntes que le gouvernement 
dirigeait contre le clerge, a ces luttes etablies entre les 
dilierens corps constitutes, a ces entreprises de la masse 
de la noblesse contre les depositaires du pcuvoir, a 
toutes ces propositions d'innovation qui se terminaient 
toiijours par des coups d'etat ; il faut ajouter une autre 
cause, non moins propre a propager le niepris des an- 
ciennes doctrines, c'itait /'era s de la corruption. 

" Cette liherte de rnoeurs, qu'on avail long-temps van- 
tee comme le charme principal de la societe de Venise, 
etait devenue un desordre scandaleux ; le lien du mariage 
t'tait moins sacre dans ce pays catholiqut que dans ceux 
ou les lois civiles et religieuses permettent de le dis- 
soudre. Faute de pouvoir rompre le contrat, on sup- 
posait qu'il n'avait jamais existe, et les moyens de nul- 
lile, aliegues avec impudeur par les epoux, etaient 
admis avec la meme facilite par des magistrats et par 
des pretres egalement corrompus. Ces divorces onlores 
d'un autre nom devinrent si frequents, oue l'acts le plus 
important de la societe civile se trouva de la competence 
d'un tribunal d'exception, et que ce fut a la police de 
reprimer le scandale. Le conseil des dix ordonna, en 
1782, que toute femme qui intenterait une demande en 
dissolution de mariage serait obligee d'en attendre le 
jugement dans un couvent que le tribunal designerait.' 
Bientot apres il evoqua devant lui toutes les causes de 
cette nature. 2 Cet empielement sur la jurisdiction 
ecclesiastique ayant occasionne des reclamations de la 
part de la cour de Rome, le conseil se reserva le droit 
de deboutcr les epoux de leur demande ; et conscntit a 
la renvoyer devant l'officialite, toutes les foies qu'il ne 
l'aurait pas rejetee. 3 

" II y eut un moment ou sans doute le renversement 
des fortunes, la perte des jcunes gens, les discordes do- 
mestiques, determiberent ie gouvernement a s'ecarter 
des maximes qu'il s'etait faites sur la liberie de monurs 
qu'il pennettait a ses sujets: on cnassa de Venise toutes 
les courtisanes. Mais leur absence ne suflisait pas pou\ 
ramener aux bonnes mocnrs toute une population elevea 
dans la plus honteuse licence. Le desordre pencil a 
dans l'iuteVieur des families, dans les cloitres ; et 1'on se 



1 Corrcspnndance do M. SoMicJ' , charge d'allaiits ,» 
France, depeehe du 24 Aoilt, Y!&£. 
3 Ibid. I'.'i.eclie du3l Aout. 
3 Ibid. Dui>cche du 3 Efrmeinlire. 1785 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



crut oblige' de rttppaler, d'indemnisermeme ' dcsfemmes 
qui surprenaient quelquefois d'importants scent--, el 
on'on pouvail employs! iitilcmciit a miner des homines 
que leu; fortune await pu rsnJre dangereux. DepttJB, 
la licence est toujours allee croissant, et Ton a vu non 
Settlement dee meres trafiquer de la virginite de leurs 
filles, mais la vendre par un contral, dont I'authf nlicitt- 
etait garantie par la signature d'un officicr public, et 
I'execution mise sous la protection des lois. 2 

" Lcs parloirs des convents ou ctaient renfermees les 
filles nobles, les maisons des courtisancs, quoique la 
police y eutretint soigneusement un grand nombre de 
surveillans, ctaient les seuls points de reunion de la bo- 
cictc de Venise, et dans ces deux endroits si divers on 
etait cgalement libre. La musique, lcs collations, la 
galanterie, n'etaient pas plus interdites dans lcs parloirs 
que dans les casins. II y avait un grand nornbre de 
casins destines aux reunions publiques, oil le jen ftail 
la principale occupation de la societc. C'£tait un sin- 
guligr spectacle de voir autour d'une table des personnes 
des deux sexes en masque, et de graves personnages en 
robe de magistrature, implorant le hasard, passant des 
angoisses du desespoir aux illusions de l'esperance, et 
ccki sans profcrcr une parole. 

" Les riches avaient des casins particuliers ; mais ils 
y vivaient avec mysterc ; leurs femmes delaissees trou- 
vaient un dedommagement dans la libcrte dont elles 
jouissaient ; la corruption des niceurs les avait privees 
de tout lcur empire ; on vient de parcourir toute 1'his- 
loire de Venise, et on ne les a pas vues une seule fois 
exerccr la moindre influence." 



Extract from the History of the Republic of Venice, by 

P. Daru, Member of the French Academy, vol. v. 

b. xxxv. p. 95, etc. Paris Edit. 1819. 

"To these attacks, so frequently pointed by the 
governr.«jflC against the clergy, — to the continual strug- 
gles between the different constituted bodies,— to these 
enterprises, carried on by the mass of the nobles against 
the depositaries of power, — to all those projects of inno- 
vation, which always ended by a stroke of state policy, — 
we must add a cause not less fitted to spread contempt 
for ancient doctrines ; this was the excess of corruption. 

"That freedom of manners, which had been long 
boasted of as the principal charm of Venetian society, 
had degenerated into scandalous licentiousness ; the tie 
of marriage was less sacred in that Catholic country, 
than among those nations where the laws and religion 
admit, of its being dissolved. Because they could not 
break the contract, they feigned that it had not existed ; 
and the ground of nullity, immodestly alleged by the 
married pair, was admitted with equal facility by priests 
and magistrates, alike corrupt. These divorces, veiled 
under another name, became so frequent, that the most 
important act of civil society was discovered to be 
amenable to a tribunal of exceptions ; and to restrain 
the open scandal of such proceedings became the office 
of the police. In 1782 the Council of Ten decreed, that 



every woman who should sue for a dissolution of her 
marriage should be compelled to await the decision of 
the judges in some convent, to be named by the court.' 
Soon afterwards the same council summoned all causes 
of that nature before itself. 2 This infringement on 
ecclesiastical jurisdiction having occasioned some re- 
monstrance from Rome, the council retained only the 
right of rejecting the petition of the married persons, 
and consented to refer such causes to the holy office as 
it should not previously have rejected. 3 

" There was a moment in which, doubtless, the de- 
struction of private fortunes, the ruin of youth, the do- 
mestic discord, occasioned by these abuses, determined 
the government to depart from its established maxims 
concerning the freedom of manners allowed the subject. 
All the courtesans were banished from Venice, but their 
absence was not enough to reclaim and bring back 
good morals to a whole people brought tip in the most 
scandalous licentiousness. Depravity reached the very 
bosoms of private families, and even into the cloister ; 
and they found themselves obliged to recall, and even 
to indemnify* women who sometimes gained posses- 
sion of important secrets, and who might be usefully 
employed in the ruin of men whose fortunes might 
have rendered them dangerous. Since that time licen- 
tiousness has gone on increasing, and we have seen 
mothers, not only selling the innocence of their daugh- 
ters, but selling it by a contract, authenticated by the 
signature of a public officer, and the performance of 
which was secured by the protection of the laws. 6 

" The parlours of the convents of noble ladies, and 
the houses of the courtesans, though the police carefully 
kept up a number of spies about them, were the only 
assemblies for society in Venice : and in these two 
places, so different from each other, there was equal free- 
dom. Music, collations, gallantry, were not more forbid- 
den in the parlours than at the casinos. There were a 
number of casinos for the purpose of public assemblies, 
where gaming was the principal pursuit of the company. 
It was a strange sight to see persons of either sex, mask- 
ed, or grave personages in their magisterial robes, round 
a table, invoking chance, and giving way at one instant 
to the agonies of despair, at the next to the illusions of 
hope, and that without uttering a single word. 

" The rich had private casinos, but they lived incog- 
nito in them ; and the wives whom they abandoned 
found compensation in the liberty they enjoyed. The 
corruption of morals had deprived them of their em- 
pire. We have just reviewed the whole history of 
Venice, and we have not once seen them exercise the 
slightest influence." 

From the present decay and degeneracy of Venice 
under the barbarians, there are some honourable indi- 
vidual exceptions. There is Pasqualigo, the last, and, 
alas ! posthumous son of the marriage of the Doges with 
the Adriatic, who fought his frigate with far greater 
gallantry than any of his French coadjutors in the me- 



1 Lc decret de rappe! Iob ddsignait sons le nnm OS nostrr 

itt mcretria. Ou lrnr nssigua tin funds el des maisons 
kppelees ( "use ramvane, d'oii vient lu denomination iniurieuae 
de I aran i m 

2 Mayer. Description de Venise, torn. ii. ct M. Archenholtz, 
Tableau dc l' Italic, torn. i. chap. 2. 



1 Correspondence of Mr. Pchlick, French charge d'affaires. 
Despatch of 24th August, 1738. 

2 Ibid. Despatch. 31st August 

3 lUd. Despatch. 3d September, 1785. 

4 The decree for their recall designates them asnostrebene 
merite meretrici. A fund and some houses called Cast rum 
pane were assigned to them : hence the opprobrious appellation 
of ' arampane. 

r > Mayer, D«sertp£tono/P r «7ft«,vol.u.andM. Archenbuitz 
Picture of Italy, vol. i. chap. 2. 



MARINO FALIERO. 



289 



morable action ofFLissa. I came home in the squadron 
Willi the prizes in 1811, and recollect to have heard Sir 
William Hoste, and the other officers engaged in that 
glorious conflict, speak in the highest terms of Pasqua- 
Iigo's behaviour. There is the Abbate Morelli. There 
is Alvise Querini, who, after a long and honourable 
diplomatic career, finds some consolation for the wrongs 
of his country, in the pursuits of literature, with his 
nephew, Vittor Benzon, the son of the celebrated beauty, 
the heroine of " La Biondina in Gondoletta." There are 
the patrician poet Morosini, and the poet Lamberti, the 
author of the " Biondina," etc. and many other estima- 
te productions ; and, not least in an Englishman's esti- 
mation, Madame Michelli, the translator of Shakspcare. 
There are the young Dandolo, and the improvvisatore 
Carrer, and Giuseppe Albrizzi, the accomplished son 
of an accomplished mother. There is Aglietti, and, 
were there nothing else, there is the immortality of 
Canova. Cicognara, Mustoxiihi, Bucati, etc., etc. I do 
not reckon, because tne one is a Greek, and the others 
were born at least a hundred miles off, which, through- 
out Italy, constitutes, if not a foreigner, at least a 
Stranger (forestiere). 



VI. 

Extrait de Pouvrage — Hintoire littcraire cTItaHe, par 
P. L. Ginguene, torn. ix. chap, xxxvi. p. 144. Edi- 
tion de Paris, MDCCCXIX. 

" It. y a une prediction fort singuliere sur Venise : 'Si 
tu ne changes pas,' dit-elle a cette republique altiere, ' ta 
liberte, qui deja s'enfuit, ne comptera pas un siecle apres 
& millieme annee.' 

" En faisant remonter l'epoque de la liberte Veni- 
tienne jusqu'a l'etablissement du gouvcrnement sousle- 
quel la republique a fleuri, on trouvera que ['election 
du premier Doge date de G97, et si l'on y ajoute un 
siecle apres mille, e'est-a-dire onze cents ans, on trou- 
vera encore que le sens de la prediction est litteralo- 
ment celui-ci : ' Ta liberte ne comptera pas jusqu'a l'an 
1797.' Rappelez-vous maintenant que Venise a cesse 
d'etre fibre en l'an cinq de la Republique francaise, ou 
en 1799 ; vous verrez qu'il n'y eut jamais de prediction 
plus precise et plus ponctuellement suivie de l'efTet. 
Vous noterez done comme tres remarquables ces trois 
vers de l'Alamani, adresses a Venise, que personne 
pourlanl n'a remarques : 

' Se non cangi pensier, l'un secol solo 
Non contera sopra 'I miilesimo anno 
Tua liberta, che va fuggendo a volo.' 

Bien des proprieties ont passe pour telles, et bien des 
gens ont ete appeles prophetes a meilleur marche." 



VII. 

Extract from the Literary History nf Ita.y, hy P. L. 
Ginguene 1 , vol. ix. p. 144. Paris Edit. 1819. 

"There is one very singular prophecy concerning 
Venice : ' If thou dost not change,' it says to that proud 
republic, ' thy liberty, which is already on the wing, will 
not reckon a century more than the thousandth year.' 

" If we carry back the epocha of Venetian freedom to 
the establishment of the government under which the re> 
public flourished, we shall find that the date of the elec 
tion of the first Doge is 697 ; and if we add one century 
to a thousand, that is, eleven hundred years, we shall 
4ad the sense of the prediction to be literally this : ' Thy 
2c2 42 



liberty will not last till 1797.' Recollect that Venice 
ceased to be free in the year 1790, the fifth year of the 
French republic ; and you will perceive that there never 
was prediction more pointed, or more exactly followed 
by the event. You will, then fore, note as very remark- 
able the three lines of Alamanni. addressed to Venice, 
which, however, no one has pointed out: 

'Se non cangi pensier, l'un secol solo 
Non contera sopra, '1 niillesirno anno 
Tua libertk, die va raggendo a volo.' 

Many prophecies have passed for such, and many me 
have been called prophets for much less." 

If the Doge's prophecy seem remarkable, look to the ubovo 
made by Alamanni two bandied and seventy years ego. 



The author of" Sketches Descriptive of Italy," etc. 
one of the hundred tours lately published, is extremely 
anxious to disclaim a possible charge of plagiarism 
from "Childe Harold" and " Beppo." He adds, that 
still less could this presumed coincidence arise from 
" my conversation," as he had repeatedly declined an 
introduction to me while in Italy. 

Who this person may be, I know not ; but he must 
have been deceived by all or any of those who " repeat- 
edly offered to introduce" him, as I have invariably 
refused to receive any English with whom I was not 
previously acquainted, even when they had letters 
from England. If the whole assertion is not an inven- 
tion, I request this person not to sit down with the 
notion that he could have been introduced, since there 
has been nothing I have so carefully avoided as any 
kind of intercourse with his countrymen, — excepting 
the very few who were a considerable time resident 
in Venice, or had been of my previous acquaintance. 
Whoever made him any such offer was possessed of 
impudence equal to that of making such an assertion 
without having had it. The fact is, that I hold in utter 
abhorrence any contact with the travelling English, as 
my friend the Consul-Gcneral Hoppner, and the Coun- 
tess Bcnzoni (in whose house the Conversazione most- 
ly frequented by them is held), could amply testify, 
were it worth while. I was persecuted by these tourists 
even to my riding-ground at Lido, and reduced to the 
most disagreeable circuits to avoid them. At Madame 
Benzoni's I repeatedly refused to be introduced to 
them ; — of a thousand such presentations pressed upon 
me, I accepted two, and both were to Irish women. 

I should hardly have descended to speak of such 
trifles publicly, if the impudence of this "sketcher" 
had not forced me to a refutation of a disingenuous 
and gratuitously impertinent assertion ; — so meant to 
be, for what could it import to the reader to be told 
that the author " had repeatedly declined an introduc- 
tion," even had it been true, which, for the reasons I 
have above given, is scarcely possible. Except Lords 
Lansdowne, Jersey, and Lauderdale ; Messrs. Scott, 
Hammond, Sir Humphry Davy, the late M. Lewis, W. 
Bankes, Mr. Hoppner, Thomas Moore, Lord Kinnaird, 
his brother, Mr. Joy, and Mr. Hobhouse, I do not re- 
collect to have exchanged a word with another English 
man since I left their country ; and almost all these 1 
had known before. The others — and God knows the ie 
were some hundreds — who bored me with letters or vis- 
its, I refused to have any communication with, and shaU 
be proud and happy when that wish becomes mutual 



{ 290 ) 
A HISTORICAL TRAGEDY. 



PREFACE. 



in publishing the Tragedies of Sardanapalus, and of 
Tlte Two Foscari, I have only to repeat that they were 
not composed with the most remote view to the stage. 

On the attempt made by the managers in a former 
instance, the public opinion has been already expressed. 

With regard to my own private feelings, as it set ma 
that they are to stand for nothing, I shall Bay nothing. 

For the historical foundation of the compositions in 
question, the reader is referred to the Notes. 

The author has in one instance attempted to pre- 
serve, and in the other to approach the " unities ;" con- 
ceiving that, with any very distant departure from 
them, there may be poetry, but can be no drama. He 
is aware of the unpopularity of this notion, in pre- 
sent English literature ; but it is not a system of bis 
own, being merely an opinion which, not very loni: 
ago, was the law of literature throughout the world, 
and is still so in the more civilized parts of it. But 
" Nous avons change tout cela," and are reaping the 
advantages of the change. The writer is far from con- 
ceiving that any thing he can adduce by personal pre- 
cept or example can at all approach his regular, or even. 
irregular predecessors : he is merely giving a reason why 
he preferred the more regular formation of a structure, 
however feeble, to an entire abandonment of all rules 
whatsoever. Where he has failed, the failure is in the 
architect, — and not in the art. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



lh this tragedy it has been my intention to follow the 
account of Diodorus Siculus, reducing it, however, to 
such dramatic regularity as I best could, and trying to 
approach the unities. I therefore suppose the rebellion 
to explode and succeed in one day by a sudden con- 
spiracy, instead of the long war of the history. 



DRAMATIS PERSON/E. 
MEN. 
SjiftDANAPALUs, King of Nineveh and Assyria, etc. 
Arbaces, the to the Throne. 

Beleses, o Cltul'lean and Soothsayer. 
Salemenes, the King's Brother-in-laio. 
Alt aua, an Assyrian Officer of the Palace. 
Pania. 
Zames. 
Sfkro. 

li.VI.El. 

WOMEN. 

Zarina, the Quern. 

Mvnmn, an Ionian female slave, and the favourite 

of Sardanapalus. 
IVomen composing the Harem of Sardanapalus, 
Guards, Attendants, Chaldean Priests, 
Medes, etc., etc. 



Scene— a Hall in the Royal Palace of Nineveh. 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. 

A Hall in the Palace. 

salemenes (solus). 

II: !, tth wrong'd his queen, but still he is her lord; 

He hath wrong'd my sister, still he is my brother; 

He hath wrong'd Ins people, still be is their sovereign. 

And I must be his friend as well as subject; 

He must not perish thus. I will not see 

The blood of Niinrod and Semiramis 

Sink in the earth, and thirteen hundred years 

Of empire ending like a shepherd's tale; 

He hiust be roused. In his effeminate heart 

There is a careless courage, which corruption 

Has not all quench'd, and latent chi 

Represt by circumstance, hut not destroy'd — 

.Steep'd but not drown'd, in deep voluptuousness'- 

If born a peasant, he had been a man 

To have reach'd an empire - Ito an empire born, 

He will bequeath none ; noMiing but a name, 

Which his sons will not prize in heritage : 

Yet, not all lost, even yet he may redeem 

His sloth and shame, by only being that 

Which he should be, as easily as the thing 

He should not be and is. Were it less toil 

To sway his nations than consume his life? 

To head an army than to rule a harem? 

He sweats in palling pleasures, dulls his soul, 

And saps his goodly strength, in toils which yield not 

Health like the chase, nor glory like the war — 

He must be roused. Alas! there is no sound 

[Sound of soft in'. i within. 

To rouse him, short of thunder. Hark ! the lute, 
The lyre, the timbrel; the lascivious Hnklings 
Of lulling instruments, the softening 
Of women, and of beings less than women, 
Must chime in to the echo of his revel, 
While the great king of all we know of earth 
Lolls crown'd with roses, and his diadi m 
I.ii s negligently by, to be caught up 
By the first manly hand which dares to snatch it. 
Lo, where they come! already I perceive 
The reeking odours of the p< rfumed trains, 
And see the bright gems of the glittering girls, 
Who are his comrades and his council, Hash 
Along the gallery, and amidst the damsels, 
As femininely garb'd, and scarce less female, 
The grandson of Semiramis, the man-queen. — 

nesl Shall I await him? yes, and front him, 
And tell him what till good men tell each other, 
Speaking of him and his. They conic, the slaves, 
Led by the monarch subject to his slaves. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



291 



SCENE II. 
Enter Sardan\palus, e/Tennnaldy dressed, his Head 
crowned with Flowers, and his Rob* negligently ./low- 
ing, attended by a Train of Women and young 
Slaves. 
sardanapalOs (speiding In some of Ids attendants). 
Lei the pavilion over the Euphrates 
Be garlanded, and lit, and furnfsh'd forth 
For an especial banquet; at the hour 
Of midnight we will sup there ; see nought wanting, 
And bid the galley be prepared. There is 
A cooling breeze which crisps the broad char river: 
We will embark anon. Fair nymphs, who deign 
To share the soft hours of Sardanapalus, 
We'll meet again in that the sweetest hour, 
When we shall gather like the stars above us, 
And you will form a heaven as bright as theirs ; 
Till then, let each be mistress of her time, 
And thou, mv own Ionian Myrrha, choose, 
Wilt thou along with them or me ? 

MYRRHA. 

My lord 

SARDANAPALUS. 

*ly lord, my life! why answerest thou so coldly! 

H is the curse of kings to be so answered. 

eitulc thy own hours, thou rulest mine — say, wouldst thou 

Accompany our guests, or charm away 

The moments from me ? 

MVRRHA. 

The king's choice is mine. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I pray thee say not so ^ my chiefest joy 

Is to contribute to thine every wish. 

I do not dare to breath my own desire, 

Lest it should clash with thine ;) for thou art still 

Too prompt to sacrifice thy thoughts for others. 

MYRRHA. 

I would remain: I have no happiness 
Save in beholding thine ; yet 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yet ! what yet ? 
Thy own sweet will shall be the only barrier 
Which ever rises betwixt thee and me.\ 

MYRRHA. 

I think the present is the wonted hour 
Of council ; it were better I retire. 

salemenes (comes forward, and says). 
The Ionian slave says well ; let her retire. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Who answers? How now, brother? 

S ALEMENES. 

The aueen's brother, 
And your most faithful vassal, royal lord. 

sardanapalus (addressing his train). 
As I have said, let all dispose their hours 
Till midnight, when again we pray your presence. 

[The court retiring. 
( ro Myrrha, tvho is going.) 
M/rrha! I thought Mom wouldst remain. 

MYRRHA. 

Great king, 
Tho.i didst not say so. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Hut thou lookedst it; 
F know each glance of those Ionic eyes, 
"*>ieh aaid ■' j wouldst not leave me. 



MYRRHA. 

Sire ! your brother 

S V I.EMEXES. 

His consort's brother, minion of Ionia ! 
How darest thou name me and not blush? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Not blush I 
Thou hast no more eyes than heart to make her crimson 
Like to the dying day on Caucasus, 
Where sunset tints tin: snow with rosy shadov •;, 
And then reproach her with thine own cold blindness, 
Which will not see it. What, in tears, mv Myrrha? 

SALEME.VES. 

Let them flow on ; s!ie weeps for more than one, 
And is herself the cause of bitterer tears. 
SA v. n is'.ni US. 

Cursed be lie who caused those tears to flow ! 

6 \ I 1 MENKS. 

Curse not thyself — millions do that already. 

SAR I> AV APAI.fS. 

Thou dost forget thee: make rile no) remi mber 
I am a monarch. 

SAI.FMKNES. 

Would thou couldsl ! 

Mi KK11A. 

Mv sovereign, 
I pray, and thou too, prince, permit my ab i nc . 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Since it must he so, and this churl has check'd 
Thy gentle spirit, ^" ; but recollect 
That we must forthwith meet : I had rather lose 
An empire than thy presence. [Exit MvKKHA, 

sale.Menes. 

It may he, 
TJiou wilt lose both, and both for ever! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Brother, 
I can at least command myself, who list* n 
To language such as this; yet urge me not 
Buyund my easy nature. 

SALEMENES. 

T is beyond 
That easv, far too easy, idle nature, 
Which I would urge thee. Oh that4 could rouse then 
Though H were against myself. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

By the god Baal ! 
The man would make me tvrant. 



SALEMENES. 



..., 



So thou art. 



A Think'st thou there is no tyranny but that 
Of blood and chains? | The despotism of vice — 
The weakness and the wickedness of luxury — 
The negligence — the apathy — the evils 
Of sensual sloth — produce ten thousand tyrants, 
Whose delegated cruelty surpasses 
The worst acts of one IWrgetic master, 
However harsh and hard in his own bearing. 
The faise and fond examples of thy lusts 
Corrupt no less than they oppress, ami sap 
In the same moment al 1 thy pageant power, 
And those who should sustain it ; so that whetnen 
A foreign foe invade, or civil broil 
Distract within, both will alike prove fatal . 
The first thy subjects have no heart to conquer, 
f he last they rather would assist than vanquish 



292 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



SA ItDANAPALUS. 

Why, what makes thee the mouth-piece of the people? 

8 ALEMENES. 

Forgiveness of the queen, my sister's wrongs ; 
A natural love unto my infant nephews ; 
Faith to the king, a faith he may need shortly, 
In more than words ; respect for Nimrod's line ; 
Also, another thing thou knowest not. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What's that? 

SALEMENES. 

To thee an unknown word. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yet speak it, 
I love to learn. 

SALEMENES. 

Virtue. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Not know the word ! 
Never was word yet rung so in my ears — 
Worse than the rabble's shout, or splitting trumpet; 
I 've heard thy sister talk of nothing else. 

SALEMENES. 

To change the irksome theme, then, hear of vice. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

From whom ? 

SALEMENES. 

Even from the winds, if thou couldst listen 
Unto the echoes of the nation's voice. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Come, I 'm indulgent as thou knowest, patient 

As thou hast often proved — speak out, what moves thee ? 

SALEMENES. 

Thy peril. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Say on. 

SALEMENES. 

Thus, then: all the nations, 
For they are many, whom thy father left 
In heritage, are loud in wrath against thee. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'Gainst me ! What would the slaves? 

SALEMENES. 

A king. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And what 
Am I then ? 

SALEMENES. 

In their eyes a nothing ; hut 
In mine a man who might be something still. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The railing drunkards ! why, what would they have ? 
Have they not peace and plenty? 

SALEMENES. 

Of the first, 
More than is glorious ; of the kist, far less 
Than the king recks of. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Whose then is the crime, 
But the false satraps, who provide no better? 

SALEMENES. 

And somewhat in the monarch who ne'er looks 
Beyond nis palace walls, or if he stirs 
Beyond them, 'tis but to some mountain palace, 
Till summer aeats wear down. O glorious Baal! 



Who built up this vast empire, and wirt made 
A god, or at the least shinest like a god 
Through the long centuries of thy renown, 
This, thy presumed descendant, ne'er In Ik Id 
As king the kingdoms thou didst leave as hero, 
Won with thy blood, and toil, and lime, and peril * 
For what? to furnish him imposts for a revel 
Or multiplied extortions for a minion. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I understand thee — thou wouldst have me go 
Forth as a conqueror. By all the stars 
Which the Chaldeans read ! the restless slaves 
Deserve that I should curse them with llieir wishes, 
And lead them forth to glory. 

SALEMENES. 

Wherefore not? 
Scmiramis — a woman only — led 
Tiiese our Assyrians to the solar shores 
Of Ganges. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is most true. And how return'd ? 

SALEMENES. 

Whv, like a man — a hero ; baffled, but 

Not vanquish'd. Willi but twenty guards, she mado 

Good her retreat to Bactria. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And how many 
Left she behind in India to the vultures? 

SALEMENES. 

Our annals say not. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Then I will say for them — 
That she had better woven within her palace 
Some twenty garments, than with twenty guards 
Have fled to Bactria, leaving to the ravins, 
And wolves, and men — the fiercer of the three, 
Her mvriads of fond subjects. Is this glory? 
Then let me live in ignominy ever. 

SALEMENES. 

All warlike spirits have not the same fate. 
Scmiramis, the glorious parent of 
A hundred kings, although she fail'd in India, 
Brought Persia, Media, Bactria, to the realm 
Which she once sway'd — and thou mightst sway. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I sway them- 
She but subdued them. 

SALEMENES. 

It may be ere long 
That they will need her sword more than your sceptre 

SARDANAPALUS. 

There was a certain Bacchus, was there not ? 

I've heard my Greek girls speak of such — they say 

He was a god, that is, a Grecian god, 

An idol foreign to Assyria's worship, 

Who conquer'd this same golden realm of Ind 

Thou pratest of, where Semiramis was vanquish'd. 

SALEMENES. 

I have heard of such a man ; and thou perceivest 
That he is deem'd a god for what he did. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And in his gedship I will honour him — 

Not much as man. What, ho ! my cupbearer I 

SALEMENES. 

What means the king ? 



SARDANAPALUS. 



293 



SARDANAPALUS. 

To worship your new god 
And ancient conmieror. Some wine, I say. 
Enter Cupbearer. 
sakdanat ALUS (wit/reusing the Cuphearer). 
Rrin;; me the aolden goblet thick with gems, 
Winch hears the name of Nimrod's chalice. Hence, 
Fill full, ant 1 >niar it quickly. [Exit Cupbearer. 

SALEMENES. 

Is this moment 
A fitt<n« cnc for the resumption of 
fhv yet unslept-off revels? 

Re-enter Cuphearer, with wine. 
SARDANAPALUS (Inking the cup from him). 
Noble kinsman, 
'f these barbarian Greeks of the far shores 
And skirts of these our realms lie not, this Bacchus 
Conquer' d the whole of India, did he not? 

SALEMENES. 

He did, and thence was deem'd a deity. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Not so : — of all his conquests a few columns, 

Which mav he his, and might be mine, if I 

Thought them worth purchase and conveyance, are 

The landmarks of the seas of gore he shed, 

The realms he wasted, and the hearts he broke. 

But here, here in this goblet, is his title 

To immortality — the immortal grape 

From which he first express'd the soul, and gave 

To gladden that of man, as some atonement 

For the victorious mischiefs he had done. 

Had it not been for this, he would have been 

A mortal still in name as in his grave ; 

And, like my ancestor Scmiramis, 

A sort of semi-glorious human monster. 

Here's that which deified him — let it now 

Humanize thee ; my surly, chiding brother, 

Pledge me to the Greek god ! 

SALEMENES. 

For all thy realms 
I would not so blaspheme our country's creed. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

rhat is to sav, thou thinkest him a hero, 

That he shed blood by oceans ; and no god, 

Because he turn'd a fruit to an enchantment, 

Which cheers the sad, revives the old, inspires 

The voung, makes Weariness forget his toil, 

And Fear her danger ; opens a new world 

When this, the present, palls. Well, then / pledge thee, 

And /i;/?i as. a true man, who did his utmost 

In good or evil to surprise mankind./ [Drinks. 

SALEMENES. 

Wilt thou resume a revel at this hour ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And if I did, 't were better than a trophy, 

Bern" bought Without a tear. But that is not 

Mv present purpose: since thou wilt not pledge me, 

Continue what thou pleasest. 

(To tlie Cupbearer). Boy, retire. 

[Exit Cupbearer. 

SALEMENES. 

would but have recall'd thee from thy dream : 
Better by me awaken'd than rebellion. 



SARDANAPALUS. 

Who should rebel ? or why? what cause? pretext? 

I am the lawful king, descended from 

A race of kings who knew no predecessors. 

What have I done to thee, or to the people, 

That thou shouldst rail, or they rise up against me ? 

SALEMENES. 

Of what thou hast done to me, I speak not. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Bill 

Thou think'st that I have wrong'd the queen : is 't nc; it . 

SALEMENES. 

Think ! Thou hast wrong'd her ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Patience, prince, and hear m» 
She has all power and splendour of her station, 
Respect, the tutelage of Assyria's heirs, 
The homage and the appanage of sovereignly. 
I married her as monarchs wed — for state, 
And loved her as most husbands love their wives , 
If she or thou supposedst I could link me 
Like a Chaldean peasant to his mate, 
Ye knew nor me, nor monarchs, nor mankind. 

SALEMENES. 

I pray thee, change the theme ; my blood disdains 
Complaint, and Salemenes' sister seeks not 
Reluctant love even from Assyria's lord ! 
Nor would she deign to accept divided passion 
With foreign strumpets and Ionian slaves. 
The queen is silent. 

SAKDANAPALUS. 

And why not her brother ? 

SALEMENES. 

I only echo thee the voice of empires, 

Which he who long neglects not long will govern. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The ungrateful and ungracious slaves ! they murmu. 

Because I have not shed their blood, nor led them 

To dry into the desert's dust by myriads, 

Or whiten with their bones the banks of Ganges ; 

Nor decimated them with savage laws, 

Nor sweated them to build up pyramids, 

Or Babylonian walls. 

SALEMENES. 

Yet these are trophies 
More worthy of a people and their prince 
Than songs, and lutes, and feasts, and concubines, 
And lavish'd treasures, and contemned virtues. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Or for my trophies I have founded cities : 

There 's Tarsus and Anchialus, both built 

In one day — what could that blood-loving beldame 

My martial grandam, chaste Semiramis, 

Do more, except destroy them ? 

SALEMENES. 

'T is most true : 
I own thy merit in those founded cities, 
Built for a whim, recorded with a verse 
Which shames both them and thee to coming age*. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Shame me! By Baal, the cities, though weil built, 

Are not more goodly than the verse ! Say what 
Thou wilt 'gainst me, mv mode of life or rule 
But nothing 'gainst the truth of that brief record. 
Why, those few lines contain the history 



2'J1 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Of all things human; hear — " Sardanapalus 

The king, and son of Anacyndaraxes, 

In one day built Anchialus and Tarsus. 

Eat, drink, and love ; the rest 's not worth a fillip." 

SALEMENES. 

A worthy moral, and a wise inscription, 
For a king to put up before his subjects ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Ob, thou wouldst have me doubtless set up edicts — 
" Obey the king — contribute to his treasure — 
Recruit his phalanx — spill your blood at bidding — 
Fall down and worship, or get up and toil." 
Or thus — " Sardanapalus on this spot 
Slew fifty thousand of his enemies. 
These are their sepulchres, and this his trophy." 
I leave such things to conquerors ; enough 
For me, if I can make my subjects feel 
The weight of human misery less, and glide 
Ungroaning to the tomb ; I take no license 
Which I deny to them. We all are men. 

SALEMENES. 

Thy sires have been revered as gods 

SARDANAPALUS. 

In dust 
And death, where they are neither gods nor men. 
Talk not of such to me ! the worms are gods ; 
At least they banqueted upon your gods, 
And died for lack of farther nutriment. 
Those gods were merely men ; look to their issue — 
I feel a thousand mortal things about me, 
But nothing godlike, unless it may be 
The thing which you condemn, a disposition 
To love and to be merciful, to pardon 
The follies of my species, and (that's human) 
To be indulgent to my own. 

SALEMENES. 

Alas ! 
The doom o f Nineveh is seal'd. — Woe — woe 
To the unrivall'd city ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What dost dread ? 

SALEMENES. 

Thou art guarded by thy foes : in a few hours 
The tempest may break out which overwhelms thee 
And thine and mine ; and in another day 
What is shall be the past of Belus' race. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What must we dread? 

SALEMENES. 

Ambitious treachery, 
Winch has environ'd thee with snares ; but yet 
There is resource : empower mc with thy signet 
To quell the machinations, anu I lay 
The. heads of thy chief foes oefore thy feet. 

SARDAN AI-A1.US. 

The heads — how many ? 

SALEMENES. 

Must I stay to number 
WliMn even '.bine own 's in peril? Let me go; 
Give me thy signet — trust me with the rest. 

SARDANAPALl'S. 

I will trust no man with unlimited lives. 

Wh"n w«j take those from others, we nor know 

What we have taken, nor the thing we give. 

SALEMENES. 

VVoui'ist thou not take their lives who seek for thine? 



SARDANAPALUS. 

That \s a hard question. — But, I answer Yes. 
Cannot the thing be done without? Who are they 
Whom thou suspectcst ? — Let them be arrested. 

SALEMENES. 

I would thou wouldst not ask me ; the next moment 
Will send my answer through thy babbling Iroop 
Of paramours, and thence fly o'er the palace, 
Even to the city, and so baffle all. — 
Trust me. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Thou knowest I have done so ever; 
Take thou the signet. [Gives tlte Signet 

SALEMENES. 

I have one more request. — 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Name it. 

SALEMENES. 

That thou this night forbear the banquet 
In the pavilion over the Euphrates. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Forbear the banquet! Not for all the plotters 
That ever shook a kingdom ! Let them come, 
And do their worst: I shall not blench for them ; 
Nor rise the sooner ; nor forbear the goblet ; 
Nor crown me with a single rose the less ; 
Nor lose one joyous hour I fear them not. 

SALEMENES. 

But thou wouldst arm thee, wouldst thou not, if needful 7 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Perhaps. I have the goodliest armour, and 

A sword of such a temper ; and a bow 

And javelin, which might furnish Nimrod forth : 

A little heavy, but yet not unwieldy. 

And now I think on't, 't is long since I've used them, 

Even in the chase. Hast ever seen them, brother ? 

SALEMENES. 

Is this a time for such fantastic trifling ? — 
If need be, wilt thou wear them ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Will I not ?— 
Oh ! if it must be so, and these rash slaves 
Will not be ruled with less, I '11 use the sword 
Till they shall wish it turn'd into a distaff. 

SALEMENES. 
They say, thy sceptre 's turn'd to that already. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

That's false! but let them say so : the old Greeks, 

Of whom our captives often sing, related 

The same of their chief hero, Hercules, 

Because he loved a Lvdian queen : thou seest 

The populace of all the nations seize 

Each calumny they can to sink their sovereigns. 

SA I.F.MENES. 

They did not speak thus of thy fathers. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No; 
They dared not. They were kept to toil and combat, 
And never changed their chains but for their armour: 
Now thev have peace and pastime, and the license 
To revel and to rail ; it irks me not. 
l would not give the smile of one fair girl 
For all the popular breath that e'er divided 
A name from nothing. What ! are the rank tongues 
Of this vile herd grown insolent with feeding, 



SARDANAPALUS. 



205 



That I should prize their noisy praise, or dread 
Their noisome clamour ? 

SALEMENES. 

You have said they are men : 
As such their hearts are something. 

SARDANAPALUS 

So my dogs' are ; 
And better, as more faithful : — but, proceed ; 
Thou hast my signet : — since they are tumultuous, 
Let thorn be temper'd ; yet not roughly, till 
Necessity enforce it. I hate all pain, 
Given or received; we have enough within us, 
The meanest vassal as the loftiest monarch, 
Not to add to each other's natural burthen 
Of mortal misery, but rather lessen, 
By mild reciprocal alleviation, 
The fatal penalties imposed on life ; 
But this they know not, or they will not know. 
I have, by Baal ! done all I could to soothe them: 
I made no wars, I added no new imposts, 
I interfered not with their civic lives, 
I let them pass their days as best might suit them, 
Passing my own as suited me. 

SALEMENES. 

Thou stopp'st 
Short of the duties of a king ; and therefore 
They say thou art unfit to be a monarch. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

They lie. — Unhappily, I am unfit 

To be aught save a monarch ; else for me, 

The meanest Mede might be the king instead. 

SALEMENES. 

There is one Mede, at least, who seeks to be so. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What mean'st thou? — 'tis thy secret; thou desirest 
Few questions, and I 'm not of curious nature. 
Take the fit steps, and since necessity 
Requires, I sanction and support thee. Ne'er 
Was man who more desired to rule in peace 
The peaceful only ; if they rouse me, better 
They had conjured up stern Nimrod from his ashes, 
" The mighty hunter." I will turn these realms 
To one wide desert chase of brutes, who were, 
But would no more, by their own choice, be human. 
JVhat they have found me, they belie ; that which 
They yet may find me — shall defy their wish 
To speak it worse ; and let them thank themselves. 

SALEMENES. 

Then thou at last canst feel ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Feel ! who feels not 
Ingratitude? 

SALEMENES. 

I will not pause to answer 
With words, but deeds. Keep thou awake that energy 
Which sleeps at times, but is not dead within thee, 
And thou mayst yet be glorious in thy reign, 
As powerful in thy realm. Farewell ! 

[Exit Salemenes. 

SARDANAPALUS {solux). 

Farewell ! 
He 's gone ; and on his finger bears my signet, 
Which is to him a sceptre. He is stern 
As I am heedless ; and the slaves deserve 
To feel a master. What may be the danger, 
I know not: — he hath found it, let him quell it. 



Must I consume my life — this little life — 

In guarding against all may make it less ? 

It is not worth so much ' It were to die 

Before my hour, t live in dread of death, 

Tracing revolts : suspecting all about me, 

Because they are near ; and all who are remote, 

Because they are afar. But if it should be so — 

If they should sweep me off" from earth and empire 

Why, what is earth or empire of the earth ! 

I have loved, and lived, and multiplied my image ; 

To die is no less natural than those 

Acts of this clay ! 'T is true I have not shed 
Blood, as I might have done, in oceans, till 

My name became the synonyme of death 

A terror and a trophy. But for this 

I feel no penitence ; my life is love: 

If I must shed blood, it shall be by force. 

Till now no drop from an Assyrian vein 

Hath flowed for me, nor hath the smallest com 

Of Nineveh's vast treasures e'er been lavished 

On objects which could cost her sons a tear : 

If then they hate me, 't is because I hate not ; 

If they rebel, it is because I oppress not. 

Oh, men ! ye must be ruled with scythes, not sceptres, 

And mow'd down like grass, else all we reap 

Is rank abundance, and a rotten harvest 

Of discontents infecting the fair soil, 

Making a desert of fertility. — 

I'll think no more. Within there, ho! 

Enter an Attendant. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Slave, teC 
The Ionian Myrrha we would crave her presence. 

ATTENDANT. 

King, she is here. 

Mvrrha enters. 
sardanapalus (apart to Attendant). 
Away ! 
(Addressing Mvrrha.) Beautiful being ! 
Thou dost almost anticipate my heart; 
It throbb'd for thee, and here thou comest ; let me 
Deem that some unknown influence, some sweet oraclOj 
Communicates between us, though unseen, 
In absence, and attracts us to each other. 

mvrrha. 
There doth. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I know there doth ; but not its name ; 
What is it? 

MVRRHA. 

In my native land a god, 
And in my heart a feeling like a god's, 
Exalted ; yet I own 'tis only mortal, 
For what I feel is humble, and yet happy — ' 

That is, it would he happy : but 

[Mvrrha pause$ 

SARDANAPALUS. 

There come* 
For ever something between us and what 
We deem our happiness j) let me remove 
The barrier which that hesitating accent 
Proclaims to thine, ana mine is seal'd. 

MVRRHA. 

My lord !- 

SARDANAPALUS. 

My lord — my king — sire — sovereign ! thus it «t 



29G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



For ever thus, address'd with awe. I ne'er 

Can see a smile, unless in some broad banquet's 

Intoxicating glare, when the buffoons 

Have gorged themselves up to equality, 

Or I have quaff'd me down to their abasement. 

Myrrha, I can hear all these things, these names, 

Lord — king — sire — monarch — nay, time was I prized 

them, 
That is, I suffer'd them — from slaves and nobles ; 
But when they falter from the lips I love, 
The lips which have been press'd to mine, a chill 
Comes o'er my heart, a cold sense of the falsehood 
Of this my station, which represses feeling 
In those for whom I have full most, and makes me 
Wish that I could lay down the dull tiara, 
And share a coltage on the Caucasus 
With thee, and wear no crowns but those of flowers. 

MYRRHA. 

Would that we could ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And dost tiiou feel this ? — Why ? 

MVRKH A. 

Then thou wouldst know what thou canst never know. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And that is 

MYRRHA. 

The true value of a heart j 
At least a woman's. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

1 have proved a thousand— 
A thousand, and a thousand. 

MYRRKA. 

Hearts ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I think so. 

MYRRHA. 

Not one ! the time may come thou may'st. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

it win. 

Hear, Myrrha ; Salemenes has declared — 

Or why or how he hath divined it, Belus, 

Who founded our great realm, knows more than I — 

But Salemenes hath declared my throne 

In peril. 

MYRRHA. 

He did well. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And say'st thou so ? 
Thou .vhom he spurn'd so harshly, and now dared 
Drive from our presence with his savage jeers, 
And made thee weep and blush ? 

MYHHIIA. 

I should do both 
Moie frequently, and he did well to call me 
Back to my duty. But thou speak'st of peril — 
Peril to thee 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Ay, from dark plots and snares 
From Mcdes — and discontented troops and nations. 
1 know not what — a labyrinth of things — 
A maze of mntter'd threats and mysteries: 
Thou Kiiow'st the man — it is his usual custom. 
But he is honest. Come, we'll think no more on't — 
Rut of the midnight festival. 

MYRRHA. 

'Tis time 



To think of aught save festivals. Thou hasi not 
Spurn'd his sage cautions? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What !— and dost thou fear? 

MYRKHA. 

Fear! — I'm a Greek, and how should I fear death? 
A slave, and wherefore should I dread my freedom? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Then wherefore dost thou turn so pale '.' 

MYRRHA. 

I love. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And do not I ? I love thee far — far more 
Than either the brief life or the wide realm, 
Which, it may be, are menaced : — yet I blench not. 

MYRRHA. 

That means thou lovest nor thyself nor me ; 
For he who loves another loves himself, 
Even for that other's sake.jThis is too rash : 
Kingdoms and lives are not to be so lost. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Lost! — why, who is the aspiring chief who dared 
Assume to win them ? 

MYRRHA. 

Who is he should dread 
To try so much ? When he who is their ruler 
Forgets himself, will they remember him ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Myrrha ! 

. MYRRHA. 

Frown not upon me : you have smiled 
Too often on me not to make those frowns 
Bitterer to bear than any punishment 
Which they may augur.r<— King, I am your subject I 
Master, I am your slave ! Man, I have loved vou!— 
Loved you, I know not by what fatal weakness, 
Although a Greek, and born a foe to monarchs — 
A slave, and hating fetters — an Ionian, 
And, therefore, when I love a stranger, more 
Degraded by that passion than by chains ! 
Still I have loved you. If that love were strong 
Enough to overcome all former nature, 
Shall it not claim the privilege to save you ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Save me, my beauty ! Thou art very fair, 
And what I seek of thee is love — not safety. 

MYRRHA. 

And without love where dwells security ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I speak of woman's love. 

MYRRHA. 

The very first 
Of human life must spring from woman's breast, 
Your first small words are taught you from her lips, 
Your first tears quench'd by her, and your last sighs 
Too often breathed out in a woman's hearing, 
When men have shrunk from the ignoble care 
Of watching the last hour of him who led them. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

My eloquent Ionian ! thou speak'st music, 

The very chorus of the tragic song 

I have heard thee talk of as the favourite pastime 

Of thy far father-land. Nay, weep not — calm thee. 

MTRRHA. 

I weep not. — But I pray thee, do not speak 
About my fathers or their land. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



297 



SARDANAPALUS. 

Yet oft 
Thou speakest of them. 

MYRRHA. 

True — true : — constant thought 
Will overflow in words unconsciously : 
But when another speaks of Greece, it wounds me. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Well, then, how wouldst thou save me, as thou saidst ? 

MYRRHA. 

By teaching thee to rave thyself, and not 
Thyself alone, but these vast realms, from all 
The rage of the worst war — the war of brethren. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Why, child, I loathe all war, and warriors : 
I live in peace and pleasure : what can man 
Do more ? 

MYRRHA. 

Alas ! my lord, with common men 
There needs too oft the show of war to keep 
The substance of sweet peace ; and for a king, 
'T is sometimes better to be fear'd than loved. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And I have never sought but for the last. 

MYRRHA. 

And now art neither. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Dost thou say so, Myrrha? 

MYRRHA. 

I speak of civic popular love, se//-love, 

Which means that men are kept in awe and law, 

Yet not oppress'd — at least they must not think so ; 

Or if they think so, deem it necessary 

To ward off worse oppression, their own passions. 

A king of feasts, and flowers, and wine, and revel, 

And love, and mirth, was never king of glory. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Glory : what 's that ? 

MYRRHA. 

Ask of the gods thy fathers. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

They cannot answer ; when the priests speak for them, 
'T is for some small addition to the temple. 

MYRRHA. 

Look to the annals of thine empire's founders. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

They are so blotted o'er with blood, I cannot. 

But what wouldst have? the empire hus been founded, 

I cannot go on multiplying empires. 

MYRRHA. 

Preserve thine own. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

At least I will enjoy it. 
Come, Myrrha, let us on to the Euphrates ; 
The hour invites, the galley is prepared, 
And the pavilion, deck'd for our return, 
In fit adornment for the evening banquet, 
Shall blaze with beauty and with light, until 
It seems unto the stars which are above us 
Itself an opposite star ; and we will sit 
Crown'd with fresh flowers like 

MYRRHA. 

Victims. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, like sovereigns, 
The shepherd kings of patriarchal times, 
2D -JkJ 



Who knew no brighter gems than summer wreaths, 
And none but tearless triumphs. Let us on. 

Enter Pania. 

PANIA. 

May the king live for ever! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

. Not an hour 
Longer than he can love. How my soul hates 
This language, which makes life itself a lie, 
Flattering dust with eternity. Well, Pania ! 
Be brief. 

PANIA . 

I am charged by Salemenes to 
Reiterate his prayer unto the king, 
That for this day, at least, he will not quit 
The palace: when the general returns, 
He will adduce such reasons as will warrant 
His daring, and perhaps obtain the pardon 
Of his presumption. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What! am I then coop'd? 
Already captive? can I not even breathe 
The breath of heaven ? Tell prince Salemenes, 
Were all Assyria raging round the walls 
In mutinous myriads, I would still go forth. 

PANIA. 

I must obey, and yet 

MYRRHA. 

Oh, monarch, listen.— 
How many a day and moon thou hast reclined 
Within these palace walls in silken dalliance, 
And never shown thee to thy people's longing ; 
Leaving thy subjects' eyes ungratified, 
The satraps uncontroll'd, the gods unworshipp'a, 
And all things in the anarchy of sloth, 
Till all, save evil, slumber'd through the realm ! 
And wilt thou not now tarry for a day, 
A day which may redeem thee? Wilt thou not 
Yield to the few still faithful a few hours, 
For them, for thee, for thy past fathers' race, 
And for thy sons' inheritance ? 

PANIA. 

'T is true ! 
From the deep urgency with which the prince 
Despatch'd me to your sacred presence, I 
Must dare to add my feeble voice to that 
Which now has spoken. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, it must not be. 

MYRRHA. 

For the sake of thy realm? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Away! 

PANIA. 

For that 
Of all thy faithful subjects, who will rally 
Round thee and thine. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

These arc mere phantasies. 
There is no peril : — 't is a sullen scheme 
Of Salemenes, to approve his zeal, 
And show himself more necessary to us. 

MYRRHA. 

By all that 's good and glorious, take this counsoi 



2'JS 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



SARDAKiPALUS. 

Business to-morrow. 

MVRRHA. 

Ay, or death to-night. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Why, let it come, tnen, unexpectedly, 
'Midst joy and gentleness, and mirth and love ; 
So let me fall like the pluck'd rose .' — far better 
Thus than be vvither'd. 

MVRRHA. 

Then thou wilt not yield, 
Even for the sake of all that ever stirr'd 
A monarch into action, to forego 
A trifling revel. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No. 

MVRRHA. 

Then yield for mine ; 
For my sake ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Thine, my Myrrha ? 

MVRRHA. 

'T is the first 
Boon which I e'er ask'd Assyria's king. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

That 's true ; and, wer 't my kingdom, must be granted, 
Well, for thy sake, I yield me. Pania, hence ! 
Thou hear'st me. 

PANIA. 

And obey. [Exit Pania. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I marvel at thee. 
What is thy motive, Myrrha, thus to urge me ? 

MVRRHA. 

Thy safety ; and the certainty that nought 
Could urge the prince, thy kinsman, to require 
Thus much from theu, but some impending danger. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And if I do not dread it, why shouldst thou? 

MVRRHA. 

] because thou dost not fear, I fear for thee. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

To-morrow thou wilt smile at these vain fancies. 

MVRRHA. 

If the worst come, I shall be where none weep, 
And that is better than the power to smile. 
And thou ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

1 shall be king, as heretofore. 

MVRRHA. 

Wnere ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

With Baal, Nimrod, and Semiramis, 
Sme in Assyria, or with them elsewhere. 
Fate made me what I am — may make me nothing — 
But either that or nothing must I be : 
I h ill not live degraded. 

MVRRHA. 

Hadst thou felt 
Tims always, none would ever dare degrade thee. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

A no who will do so now ? 

MVRRHA. 

Dost thou suspect none ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Suspect ! — that 's a spy's office. Oh ! we lose 



Ten thousand precious moments in vain words, 

And vainer fears. Within there ! — Ye slave3, deck 

The hall of Nimrod for the evening revel : 

If I must make a prison of our palace, 

At least we '11 wear our fitters jocundly : 

If the Euphrates be forbid us, and 

The summer dwelling on its beauteous border, 

Here we are still unmenaced. Ho! within there! 

[Exit SARDANAPALUS. 
MVRRHA (solus). 

Why do I love this man ? My country's daughters 

Love none but heroes. But I have no country ! 

The slave hath lost all save her bonds. I love him ; 

And that 's the heaviest link of the long chain — 

To love whom we esteem not. Be it so : 

The hour is coming when he'll need all love, 

And find none. To fall from him now were baser 

Than to have stabb'd him on his throne when highest 

Would have been noble in my country's creed ; 

I was not made for either. Could I save him, 

I should not love him better, but myself; 

And I have need of the last, for I have fallen 

In my own thoughts, by loving this soft stranger : 

And yet methinks I love him more, perceiving 

That he is hated of his own barbarians, 

The natural foes of all the blood of Greece. 

Could I but wake a single thought like those 

Which even the Phrygians felt, when battling long 

'Twixt Ilion and the sea, within his heart, 

He would tread down the barbarous crowds, and triumph. 

He loves me, and I love him ; the slave loves 

Her master, and would free him from his vices. 

If not, I have a means of freedom still, 

And if I cannot teach him how to reign, 

May show him how alone a king can leave 

His throne. I must not lose him from my sight. 

[Exit 



ACT II. 

SCENE I. 

ITie Portal of the same Hall of the Palace. 

BELESES (solus). 

The sun goes down ; methinks he sets more slowly, 

Taking his last look of Assyria's empire. 

How red he glares amongst those deepening clouds, 

Like the blood he predicts. If not in vain, 

Thou sun that sinkest, and ye stars which rise, 

I have outwalch'd ye, reading ray by ray 

The edicts of your orbs, which make Time tremble 

For what he brings the nations, 't is the furthest 

Hour of Assyria's years. And yet how calm ! 

An earthquake should announce so great a fall — 

A summer's sun discloses it. Yon disk, 

To the star-read Chaldean, bears upon 

Its everlasting page the end of what 

Seem'd everlasting ; but oh ! thou true sun ! 

The burning oracle of all that live, 

As fountain of all life, and symbol of 

Him who bestows it, wherefore dost thou limit 

Thy lore unto calamity? Why not 

Unfold the rise of days more worthy thine 

All-glorious burst from ocean ? why not dart 

A beam of hope athwart the future's years, 



SARDANAPALUS. 



299 



As of wrath to its days ? Hear me ! oh ! hear me ! 
I am thy worshipper, thy priest, thy servant — 
I have gazed on thee at thy rise and fall, 
And bow'd my head beneath thy mid-day beams, 
When my eye dared not meet thee. I have watch'd 
For thee, and after thee, and pray'd to thee, 
And sacrificed to thee, and read, and fear'd thee, 
And ask'd of thee, and thou hast answer'd — but 
Only to thus much : while I speak, he sinks- 
Is gone — and leaves his beauty, not his knowledge, 
To the delighted west, which revels in 
Its hues of dying glory. Yet what is 
Death, so it be but glorious ? *T is a sunset ; 
And mortals may be happy to resemble 
The gods but in decay. 

Enter Arbaces, by an inner door. 

ARBACES. 

Beleses, why 
So wrapt in thy devotions ? Dost thou stand 
Gazing to trace thy disappearing god 
Into some realm of undiscover'd day ? 
Our business is with night — 't is come. 



But not 



Gone. 



ARBACES. 

Let it roll on — we are ready. 

BELESES. 

Yes. 
Would it were over ! 

ARBACES. 

* Does the prophet doubt, 
To whom the very stars shine victory ? 

BELESES. 

I do not doubt of victory — but the victor. 

ARBACES. 

Well, let thy science settle that. Meantime, 
I have prepared as many glittering spears 
As will out-sparkle our allies — your planets. 
There is no more to thwart us. The she-king, 
That less than woman, is even now upon 
The waters with his female mates. The order 
Is issued for the feast in the pavilion. 
The first cup which he drains will be the last 
QuafF'd by the line of Nimrod. 

BELESES. 

'T was a brave one. 

ARBACES. 

And is a weak one — 't is worn out — we '11 mend it. 

BELESES. 

Art sure of that? 

ARBACES. 

Its founder was a hunter— 
[ am a soldier — what is there to fear ? 

BELESES. 

The soldier. 

ARBACES. 

And the priest, it may be ; but 
If you thought thus, or think, why not retain 
Your king of concubines ? why stir me up ? 
Why spur me to this enterprise ? your own 
No les? than mine? 

BELESES. 

Look to the sky 1 

ARBACES. 

Hook. 



What seest thou ? 



A R LACKS. 



A fair summer's twilight, and 
The gathering of the stars. 

BELESES. 

And midst them mark 
Yon earliest, and the brightest, which so quivers, 
As it would quit its place in the blue ether. 

ARBACES. 

Well! 

BELESES. 

'T is thy natal ruler — thy birth planet. 
arbaces (touching his scabbard). 
My star is in this scabbard : when it shines, 
It shall out-dazzle comets. Let us think 
Of what is to be done to justify 
Thy planets and their portents. When we conquer, 
They shall have temples — ay, and priests — and thou 
Shalt be the pontiff" of— what gods thou wilt ; 
For I observe that they are ever just, 
And own the bravest for the most devout. 

BELESES. 

Ay, and the most devout for brave — thou hast not 
Seen me turn back from battle. 

ARBACES. 

No ; I own thee 
As firm in fight as Babylonia's captain, 
As skilful in Chaldea's worship ; now, 
Will it but please thee to forget the priest, 
And be the warrior ? 

BELESES. 

Why not both? 

ARBACES. 

The better; 
And yet it almost shames me, we shall have 
So little to effect. This woman's warfare 
Degrades the very conqueror. To have pluck'd 
A bold and bloody despot from his throne, 
And grappled with him, clashing steel with steel, 
That were heroic or to win or fall ; 
But to upraise my sword against this silkworm, 
And hear him whine, it may be 

BELESES. 

Do not deem it . 
He has that in him which may make you strife yet • 
And, were he all you think, his guards are hardy, 
And headed by the cool, stem Salemenes. 

ARBACES. 

They '11 not resist. 

BELESES. 

Why not ? they are soldiers. 

ARBACES. 

Tru«, 
And therefore need a soldier to command them. 

BELESES. 

That Salemenes is. 

ARBACES. 

But not their king. 
Besides, he hates the effeminate thing that govern* 
For the queen's sake, his sister. Mark you not 
He keeps aloof from all the revels 1 

BELESES. 

But 
Not from the council — there he is ever constant. 



300 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



ARBACES. 

And ever thwarted ; what would you have more 
To make a rebel out of? A fool reigning, 
His blood dishonour'd, and himself disdain'd ; 
Why, it is his revenge we work for. 

BELESES. 

Could 
He but be brought to think so : this I doubt of. 

ARBACES. 

What if we sound him ? 

BELESES. 

Yes — if the time served. 
Enter Bale a. 

BALEA. 

Satraps ! the king commands your presence at 
The feast to-night. 

BELESES. 

To hear is to obey. 
In the pavilion? 

BALEA. 

No ; here in the palace. 

ARBACES. 

How ! in the palace ? it was not thus order'd. 

BALEA. 

It is so order'd now. 

ARBACES. 

And why ? 

BALEA. 

I know not. 
May I retire ? 

ARBACES. 

Stay. 
beleses (to Arbaces aside). 

Hush ! let him go his way. 
(Alternately to Bale a.) 
Yes, Balea, thank the monarch, kiss the hem 
Of his imperial robe, and say, his slaves 
Will take the crumbs he deigns to scatter from 
His royal table at the hour — was 't midnight ? 

EAI.EA. 

It was ; the place, the Hall of Nimrod. Lords, 

I humble me before you, and depart. [Exit Balea. 

arbaces. 
I like not this same sudden change of place — 
There is some mystery ; wherefore should he change it ? 

BELESES. 

Dots he not change a thousand times a-day ? 

Sloth is of all things the most fanciful — 

And moves more parasangs in its intents 

Than generals in their marches, when they seek 

To leave their foe at fault. — Why dost thou muse? 

arbaces. 
He loved that gay pavilion — it was ever 
His summer dotage. 

BELESES. 

And he loved his queen — 
And thrice a thousand harlotry besides — 
A nd he has loved all things by turns, except 
Wisdom and glory. 

ARBACES. 

Still— I like it not. 
If tic has changed — why so must we ! the attack 
W ere easy in the isolated bovver, 
Beset with drowsy guards and drunken courtiers ; 
Ho« in the Hill of Nimrod 

BELESES. 

IS it 60? 



Mcthought the haughty soldier fear'd to mount 
A throne too easily : does it disappoint thee 
To find there is a slipperier step or two 
Than what was counted on ? 

ARBACES. 

When the hour conies, 
Thou shall perceive how far I fear or no. 
Thou hast seen my life at stake — and gaily play'd for . 
But here is more upon the die — a kingdom. 

BELESES. 

I have foretold already — thou wilt win it: 
Then on, and prosper. 

ARBACES. 

Now, were I a soothsayer, 
I would have boded so much to myself. 
But be the stars obey'd — I cannot quarrel 
With them, nor their interpreter. Who 's here ? 
Enter Salemenes. 

SALEMENES. 

Satraps ! 

BELESES. 

My prince ! 

SALEMENES. 

Well met — I sought ye both, 
But elsewhere than the palace. 

ARBACES. 

Wherefore so ? 

SALEMENES. 

'T is not the hour. 

ARBACES. 

The hour — what hour ? 

SALEMENES. 

Of midnight. 

BELESES. 

Midnight, my lord ! 

SALEMENES. 

What, are you not invited ? 

BELESES. 

Oh ! yes — wc had forgotten. 

SALEMENES, 

Is it usual 
Thus to forget a sovereign's invitation ? 

ARBACES. 

Way — we but now received it. 

SALEMENES. 

Then why here ? 

ARBACES. 

On duty. 

8ALEMENES. 

On what duty ? 

BELESES. 

On the state's. 
We have the privilege to approach the presence, 
But found the monarch absent. 

SALEMENES. 

And I too 
Am upon duty. 

ARBACES. 

May we crave its purport ? 

SALEMENES. 

To arrest two traitors. Guards ! within there ! 
Enter Gvards. 

salemenes (continuing). 

Satraps 
Your swords. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



301 



beleses (delivering his). 
My lord, behold my scimitar. 
arbaces (drawing his sword). 
Take mine. 

salemenes (advancing). 
I will. 

ARBACES. 

But in your heart the blade — 
The hilt quits not this hand. 

salemenes (drawing). 

How ! dost thou brave me ? 
•T is well — this saves a trial and false mercy. 
Solaiers, hew down the rebel ! 

ARBACES. 

Soldiers! Ay — 
Alone you dare not. 

SALEMENES. 

Alone ! foolish slave— 
What is there in thee that a prince should shrink from 
Of open force ? We dread thy treason, not 
Thy strength : thy tooth is nought without its venom — 
The serpent's not the lion's. Cut him down. 

beleses (interposing). 
Arbaces ! are you mad ? Have I not render'd 
My sword ? Then trust like me our sovereign's justice. 

ARBACES. 

No — I will sooner trust the stars thou prat'st of, 
And this slight arm, and die a king at least 
Of my own breath and body— so far that 
None else shall chain them. 

salemenes (to the Guards). 

You hear him, and me. 
Take him not — kill. 

[The Guards attack Arbaces, who defends him- 
self valiantly and dexterously till they waver. 
salemenes. 
Is it even so ; and must 
I do the hangman's office ? Recreants ! see 
How ycu should fell a traitor. 

[Salemenes attacks Areaces. 
Enter Sardanapalus and Train. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Hold your hands— 
Upon your lives, 1 say. What, deaf or drunken? 
My sword ! oh fool, I wear no sword : here, fellow, 
Give me thy weapon. [To a Guard. 

[Sardanapalus snatrhes a sword from one of the 
soldiers, and makes between tlie combatants — they 
separate. 

sardanapalus. 
In my very palace ! 
What hinders me from cleaving you in twain, 
Audacious brawlers ? 

beleses. 
Sire, your justice. 
salemenes. 

Or— 
Your weakness. 

sardanapalus (raising the sword). 
How? 

SALEMENES. 

Strike ! so the blow 's repeated 
Upon yon traitor — whom you spare a moment, 
I trust, for torture — I 'm content. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What— him ! 
Who dares as>sai. Arbaces ? 
2 d 2 



SALEMENES. 

I! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Indeed ! 
Prince, you forget yourself. Upon what warrant? 

salemenes (showing the signet). 
Thine. 

arbaces (confused). 
The king's ! 

SALEMENES, 

Yes ! and let the king confirm it. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I parted not from this for such a purpose. 

SALEMENES. 

You parted with it for your safety — I 
Employ'd it for the best. Pronounce in person. 
Here I am but your slave — a moment past 
I was your representative. 

6ARDANAPALUS. 

Then sheathe 
Your swords. 

[Arbaces and Salemenes return their swords to 
the scabbards. 

SALEMENES. 

Mine's sheath'd : I pray you sheathe not yours ; 
'Tis the sole sceptre left you now with safety. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

A heavy one ; the hilt, too, hurts my hand. 

( To a Guard. ) Here, fellow, take thy weapon back. 

Well, sirs, 
What doth this mean ? 

BELESES. 

The prince must answer that. 

SALEMENES. 

Truth upon my part, treason upon theirs. 

6ARDANAPALUS. 

Treason — Arbaces ! treachery and Beleses ! 
That were an union I will not believe. 

BELESES. 

Where is the proof? 

SALEMENES. 

I'll answer that, if once 
The king demands your fellow traitor's sword. 

arbaces (to Salemenes). 
A sword which hath been drawn as oft as thine 
Against his foes. 

SALEMENES. 

And now against his brother, 
And in an hour or so against himself. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

That is not possible : he dared not ; no — 
No — I'll not hear of such things. These vain bicKennj* 
Are spawn'd in courts by base intrigues ami baser 
Hirelings, who live by lies on good men's lives. 
You must have been deceived, my brother. 

SALEMENES. 

First 
Let him deliver up his weapon, and 
Proclaim himself your subject by that duty. 
And I will answer all. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Why, if I thought so — 
But no, it cannot be ; the Mede Arbaces — 
The trusty, rough, true soldier — the best captain 

Of all who discipline our nations No, 

I 'A not insult him thus, to bid him render 



302 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The scimitar to me he never yielded 

Unto our enemies. Chief, keep your weapon. 

salemenes [delivering back tlie signet). 
Monarch, take back your signet. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, retain it ; 
But use it with more moderation. 

SALEMENES. 

Sire, 
I used it for your honour, and restore it 
Because I cannot keep it with my own. 
Bestow it on Arbaces. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

So I should : 
He never ask'd it. 

SALEMENES. 

Doubt not, he will have it 
Without that hollow semblance of respect. 

BELESES. 

I know not what hath prejudiced the prince 

So strongly 'gainst two subjects, than whom none 

Have been more zealous for Assyria's weaL 

SALEMENES. 

Peace, factious priest and faithless soldier ! thou 
Unit'st in thy own person the worst vices 
Of the most dangerous orders of mankind. 
Keep thy smooth words and juggling homilies 
Tor those who know thee not. Thy fellow's sin 
Is, at the least, a bold one, and not temper'd 
By the tricks taught thee in Chaldea. 

BELESES. 

Hear him, 
My liege— the son of Belus! he blasphemes 
The worship of the land which bows the knee 
Before your fathers. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Oh ! for that I pray you 
Let him have absolution. I dispense with 
The worship of dead men ; feeling that I 
Am mortal, and believing that the race 
From whence I sprung are — what I see them — ashes. 

BELESES. 

King ! do not deem so : they are with the stars, 
And 

SARDANAPALUS. 

You shall join them there ere they will rise, 
It you preach further. — Why, this is rank treason. 

SALEMENES. 

My lord ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

To school me in the worship of 
Assyria's idols ! Let him be released — 
Give him his sword. 

SALEMENES. 

My lord, and king, and brother, 
I pray ye, pause. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes, and be sermonized, 
And dinn'd, and deafen'd with dead men and Baal, 
And all Chaldea's starry mysteries. 

BELESES. 

Monarch ! respect them. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Oh ! for that— I love them ; 
I love to watch them in the deep blue vault, 
Ana to compare them with my Myrrha's eyes : 



1 love to see their rays redoubled in 

The tremulous silver of Euphrates' wave, 

As the light breeze of midnight crisps the broad 

And rolling water, sighing through the sedges 

Which fringe his banks: but whether they may be 

Gods, as some say, or the abodes of gods, 

As others hold, or simply lamps of night, 

Worlds or the lights of worlds, I know nor care not. 

There 's something sweet in my uncertainty 

I would not change for your Chaldean lore ; 

Besides, I know of these all clay can know 

Of aught above it or below it — nothing. 

I see their brilliancy and feel their beauty — 

When they shine on my grave, I shall know neither 

BELESES. 

For neither, sire, say better. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I will wait, 
If it so please you, pontiff, for that knowledge. 
In the meantime receive your sword, and know 
That I prefer your service militant 
Unto your ministry — not loving either. 
salemenes [aside). 
His lusts have made him mad. Then must I save hi» 
Spite of himself. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Please you to hear me, Satraps ! 
And chiefly thou, my priest, because I doubt thee 
More than the soldier, and woulu doubt thee all 
Wert thou not half a warrior : let us part 
In peace — I '11 not say pardon — which must be 
Earn'd by the guilty ; this I '11 not pronounce ye, 
Although upon this breath of mine depends 
Your own ; and, deadlier for ye, on my fears. 
But fear not — for that I am soft, not fearful — 
And so live on. Were I the thing some think me, 
Your heads would now be dripping the last drops 
Of their attainted gore from the high gates 
Of this our palace into the dry dust, 
Their only portion of the coveted kingdom 
They would be crown'd to reign o'er— let that pass. 
As I have said, I will not deem ye guilty, 
Nor doom ye guiltless. Albeit, better men 
Than ye or I stand ready to arraign you ; 
And should I leave your fate to sterner judges, 
And proofs of all kinds, I might sacrifice 
Two men, whe, whatsoe'er they now are, were 
Once honest. Ye are free, sirs. 

ARBACES. 

Sire, this clemency 

BEleses [interrupting him). 
Is worthy of yourself ; and, although innocent, 
We thank 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Priest ! keep your thanksgiving for Belus •, 
His offspring needs none. 

BELESES. 

But, being innocent 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Be silent— Guilt is loud. If ye are loyal, 

Ye are injured men, and should be sad, not grateful. 

BELESES. 

So we should be, were justice always done 
By earthly power omnipotent ; but innocence 
Must oft receive her right as a-mere favour 



SARDANAPALUS. 



303 



SARDANAPALUS. 

That 's a good sentence for a homily, 
Though not for this occasion. Prithee keep it 
To plead thy sovereign's cause before his people. 

BELESES. 

I trust there is no cause. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No cause, perhaps ; 
But many causers: — If ye meet with such 
In the exercise of your inquisitive function 
On earth, or should you read of it in heaven 
In some mysterious twinkle of the stars, 
Which are your chronicles, I pray you note, 
That there are worse things betwixt earth and heaven 
That him who ruletli many and slays none; 
And, hating nut himself, yet loves his fellows 
Enough to spare even those who would not spare him, 
Were ihey once masters — but that's doubtful. Satraps ! 
Your swords and persons are at liberty 
To use them as ye will — but from this hour 
I have no call for either. Salemenes ! 
Follow me. 

[Exeunt Sardanapalus, Salemenes, and Oie 
Train, etc., Leaving Arbaces and Beleses 

ARBACES. 

Beleses ! 

BELESES. 

Now, what think you ? 

AKBACES. 

That we are lost. 

BELESES. 

That we have won the kingdom. 

ARBACES. 

Whit ! thus suspected — with the sword slung o'er us 
But hy a single hair, and that still wavering 
To be blown down by his imperious breath, 
Which spared us — why, I know not. 

BELESES. 

Seek not why; 
But let us profit by the interval. 
1 ne hour is still our own — our power the same — 
The night the same we destined. He hath changed 
Nothing, except our ignorance of all 
Suspicion into such a certainty 
As must make madness of delay. 

ARBACES. 

And yet 

BELESES. 

What, doubting still ! 

ARBACES. 

He spared our lives — nay, more, 
Saved them from Salemenes. 

BELESES. 

And how long 
Will he so spare? till the first drunken minute. 

ARBACES. 

Or sober, rather. Yet he did it nobly ; 
Gave royally what we had forfeited 
Basely 

BELESES. 

Say, bravely. 

ARBACES. 

Somewhat of both, perhaps. 
But it has touch'd me, and, whate'er betide, 
I will no further on. 



BELESES. 

And lose the world? 

ARBACES. 

Lose any thing, except my own esteem. 

BELESES. 

I blush that we should owe our lives to such 
A king of distaffs ! 

ARBACES. 

But no less we owe them ; 
And I should blush far more to take the grantor's ! 

BELESES. 

Thou may'st endure whate'er thou wilt, the stars 
Have written otherwise. 

ARBACES. 

Though they came down, 
And marshall'd me the way in all their brightness, 
I would not follow. 

BELESES. 

This is weakness — worse 
Than a scared beldam's dreaming of the dead, 
And waking in the dark. — Go to — go to. 

ARBACES. 

Methought he look'd like Nimrod as he spoke, 
Even as the proud imperial statue stands, 
Looking the monarch of the kings around it, 
And sways, while they but ornament, the templa. 

BELESES. 

I told you that you had too much despised him, 
And that there was some royalty within him. 
What then ? he is the nobler foe. 

ARBACES. 

But we 

The meaner: — would he had not spared us! 

EELESES. 

So— 

Wouldst thou be sacrificed thus readily ? 

ARBACES. 

No— but it had been better to have died 
Than live ungrateful. 

BELESES. 

Oh, the souls of some men . 
Thou wouldst digest what some call treason, and 
Fools treachery — and, behold, upon the sudden, 
Because, for something or for nothing, this 
Rash reveller steps, ostentatiously, 
'T wixt thee and Salemenes, thou art tum'd 
Into — what shall I say ? — Sardanapalus ! 
I know no name more ignominious. 

ARBACES. 

But 

An hour ago, who dared to term me such 
Had held his life but lightly — as it is, 
I must forgive you, even as he forgave us— 
Semiramis herself would not have done it. 

BELESES. 

No — the queen liked no sharers of the kingdom, 
Not even a husband. 

ARBACES. 

I must serve him truly 

BELESES. 

And humbly ? 

ARBACES. 

No, sir, proudly — heing honest. 
I shall be nearer thrones than you to heaves ; 
And if not quite so haughty, yet more lofty. 



304 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


i'ou may do your own deeming — you have codes, 


PANIA. 


And nivsteries, and corollaries of 


My order is unto the satraps and 


Right and wrong, which I lack for my direction, 


Their household train. 


And must pursue but what a plain heart teaches. 


ARBACES. 


And now you know me. 


But 


BELESES. 


BELESES. 


Have you finish'd? 


It must be obey'd ; 


ARBACES. 


Say, we depart. 


Yes — 


PANIA. 


With you. 

BELESES. 


My order is to see you 


Depart, and not to bear your answer. 


And would, perhaps, betray as well 


beleses [aside). 


As quit me? 


Ay! 


ARBACES. 


Y\ ell, sir, we will accompany you hence. 


That 's a sacerdotal thought, 


PANIA. 


And not a soldier's. 


I will retire to marshal forth the guard 


BELESES. 


Of honour which befits your rank, and wait 


Be it what you will — 


Your leisure, so that it the hour exceeds not. 


Truce with these wranglings, and but hear mo. 


[Ej.it Pania. 




BELESES. • 


ARBACES. 

No- 


Now then obey ! 


There is more peril in your subtle spirit 
Than in a phalanx. 


ARBACES. 

Doubtless. 




BELESES. 


BELESES. 




If it must be so— 


Yes, to the gates 


I '11 on alone. 


That grate the palace, which is now our prison, 




No further. 


ARBACES. 




Alone ! 


ARBACES. 


BELESES. 


Thou hast harp'd the truth indeed ! 


Thrones hold but one. 


The realm itself, in all its wide extension, 
Yawns dungeons at caWi step for thee and me. 




ARBACES. 


But [his is fill'd. 


BELESES. 

Graves ! 


BELESES. 


ARBACES. 


With worse than vacancy — 


If I thought so, this good sword should dig 


A despised monarch. Look to it, Arbaces : 


One more than mine. 


I have still aided, cherish'd, loved, and urged you ; 


BELESES. 


Was willing even to serve you, in the hope 


It shall have work enough : 
Let me hope better than thou augurest : 
At present let us hence as best we may. 


To serve and save Assyria. Heaven itself 


Seem'd to consent, and all events were friendly, 


Even to the last, till that your spirit shrunk 


Thou dost agree with me in understanding 


Into a shallow softness; but now, rather 


This order as a sentence ? 


Than see my country languish, I will be 


ARBACES. 


Her saviour or the victim of her tyrant, 


Why, what other 


Of one or both, for sometimes both are one : 


Interpretation should it bear ? it is 


And if I win, Arbaces is my servant. 


The very policy of orient monarchs — 


ARBACES. 


Pardon and poison — favours and a sword — 


Your servant ! 


A distant voyage, and an eternal sleep. 


BELESES. 


How many satraps in his father's time — 


Why not ? better than be slave, 


For he I own is, or at least was, bloodless— 


The pardon' d slave of she Sardanapalus. 


BELESES. 


Enter Pa. ma. 


But will not, can not be so now. 




ARBACES. 


PANIA. 


I doubt it. 


My lords, I bear an order from the king. 


How many satraps have I seen set out 


ARBACES. 


In his sire's day for mighty vice-royalties, 


It is obey'd ere spoken. 


Whose tombs are on their path ! I know not how 


BELESES. 


But they all sicken'd by the way, it was 


Notwithstanding, 


So long and heavy. 


Let 's hear it. 


BELESES. 


PANIA. 


Let us but regain 


Forthwith, on this very night, 


The free air of the city, and we '11 shorten 


Repair to your respective satrapies 


The journey. 


Of Baby'on and Media. 


ARBACES. 


BELESES. 


'T will be shorten'd at the gates. 


With our trooos? 


It mav be. 



SARDANAPALUS 



505 



BELESES. 

No: they hardly will risk that. 
They mean us to die privately, but not 
Within the palace or the city walls, 
Where we are known and may have partisans : 
If they had meant to slay us here, we were 
No longer with the living. Let us hence. 

ARBACES. 

If I but thought he did not mean my life 

BELESES. 

Fool ! hence — what else should despotism alarm'd 
Mean ? Let us but rejoin our troops, and march. 

ARBACES. 

Towards our provinces ? 

BELESES. 

No ; towards your kingdom. 
There 's time, there 's heart and hope, and power, and 

means 
Which their half measures leave us in full scope. — 
Away ! 

ARBACES. 

And I, even yet repenting, must 
Relapse to guilt ! 

BELESES 

Self-defence is a virtue, 
Sole bulwark of all right. Away! I say ! 
Let 's leave this place, the air grows thick and choking, 
And the walls have a scent of night-shade — hence ! 
Let us not leave them time for further council. 
Our quick departure proves our civic zeal ; 
Our quick departure hinders our good escort, 
The worthy Pania, from anticipating 
The orders of some parasangs from hence ; 

Nay, there 's no other choice but hence, I say. 

[Exit with Arbaces, who follows reluctantly. 
Enter Sardanapalus and Salemenes. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Well, all is remedied, and without bloodshed, 
That worst of mockeries of a remedy ; 
We are now secure by lhese men's exile. 

S .LEMENES. 

Yes, 

As he who treads on flowers is from the adder 
Twined round their roots. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Why, what wouldst have me do ? 

SALEMENES. 

Undo what you have done. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Revoke my pardon ? 

SALEMENES. 

Replace the crown, now tottering on your temples. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

That were tyrannical. 

SALEMENES. 

But sure. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

We are so. 

What danger can they work upon the frontier ? 

SALEMENES. 

They are not there yet — never should they be so, 
Were I well linten'd to. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Nay , I have listen' d 
Imperially to thee — why not to I hem? 
44 



SALEMENES. 

You may know that hereafter ; as it is, 
I take my leave, to order forth the guard 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And you will join us at the banquet ? 

SALEMENES. 

Sire, 

Dispense with me — I am no wassailcr : 
Command me in all service save the Bacchant's. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Nay, but ''. .s fit to revel now and then. 

SALEMENES. 

And fit that some should watch for those who revel 
Too oft. Am I permitted to depart ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes stay a moment, my good Salemenes, 

My brother, my best subject, better prince 

Than I am king. You should have been the monarcn 

And I — I know not what, and care not ; but 

Think not I am insensible to all 

Thine honest wisdom, and thy rough, yet kind, 

Though oft-reproving, sufferance of my follies. 

If I have spared these men against thy counsel, 

That is, their lives — it is not that I doubt 

The advice was sound ; but, let them live : we will not 

Cavil about their lives — so let them mend them. 

Their banishment will leave me still sound sleep, 

Which their death had not left me. 

SALEMENES. 

Thus you run 
The risk to sleep for ever, to save traitors — 
A moment's pang now changed for years of crime. 
Still let them be made quiet. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Tempt me not : 
My word is past. 

SALEMENES. 

But it may be recall'd. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is royal. 

SALEMENES. 

And should therefore be decisive. 
This half indulgence of an exile serves 
But to provoke — a pardon should be full, 
Or it is none. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And who persuaded me 
After I had repeal'd them, or at least 
Only dismiss'd them from our presence, who 
llrged me to send them to their satrapies ? 

SALEMENES. 

True ; that I had forgotten ; that is, sire, 
If they e'er reach their satrapies — why, then, 
Reprove me more for my advice. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And if 
They do not reach them — look to it ! — in safety. 
In safety, mark me — and security — 
Look to thine own. 

SALEMENES. 

Permit me to depart ; 
Their safety shall be cared for. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Get thee hence, then < 
And, prithee, think more gently of thy brother. 



306 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



SALEMENES. 

Sire, I shall ever duly serve my sovereign. 

[Exit Salemenes. 

SARDANAPALUS (solus). 

That man is of a temper too severe : 
Hard but as lofty as the rock, and free 
From all the taints of common earth — while I 
Am softer clay, impregnated with flowers. 
But as our mould is, must the produce be. 
If I have err'd this time, 't is on the side 
Where error sits most lightly on that sense, 
I know not what to call it ; but it reckons 
With me oft-times for pain, and sometimes pleasure ; 
A spirit which seems placed about tny heart 
To court its throbs, not quicken them, and ask 
Questions which mortal never dared to ask me, 
Nor Bial, though an oracular deity — 
Albeit his marble face majestical 
Frowns as the shadows of the evening dim 
His brows to changed expression, till at times 
I think the statue looks in act to speak. 
Away with these vain thoughts, I will be joyous— 
And here comes Joy's true herald. 
Enter Mvrrha. 

MYRRHA. 

King ! the sky 
Is overcast, and musters muttering thunder, 
In clouds that seem approaching fast, and show 
In forked flashes a commanding tempest. 
Will you then quit the palace? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Tempest, say'st thou? 

MYRRHA. 

Ay, my good lord. 

SARDANAP VLUS. 

For my own part, I should be 
Hot ill content to vary the smooth scene, 
And watch the warring elements ; but this 
Would little suit the silken garments and 
Smooth faces of our festive friends. Say, Myrrha, 
Art thou of those who dread the roar of clouds ? 

MYRRHA. 

In my own country we respect their voices 
As auguries of Jove. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Jove — ay, your Baal — 
Ours also has a property in thunder, 
And ever and anon some falling bolt 
Proves his divinity, and yet sometimes 
Strikes his own altars. 

MYRRHA. 

That were a dread omen. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes — for the priests. Well, we will not go forth 
Beyond the palace walls to-night, but make 
Our feast within. 

MYRRHA. 

Now, Jove be praised ! that he 
Hath heard the prayer thou wouldst not hear. The gods 
Are kinder to thee than thou to thyself, 
And flash this storm between thee and thy foes, 
To shieid thee from them. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Child, if there be peril, 
M ethinks it is the same within these walls 
As on the river's brink. 



MYRRHA. 

Not so; these walls 
Are high and strong, and guarded. Tieason has 
To penetrate through many a winding way, 
And massy portal ! but in the pavilion 
There is no bulwark. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, nor in the palace, 
Nor in the fortress, nor upon the top 
Of cloud-fenced Caucasus, where the eagle sits 
Nested in pathless clefts, if treachery be : 
Even as the arrow finds the airy kins, 
The steel will reach the earthly. But be calm: 
The men, or innocent or guilt}', are 
Banish'd, and far upon their way. 

MYRRHA. 

They live, then 7 

SARDANAPALUS. 

So sanguinary ? Tliou ! 

MYRRHA. 

I would not shrink 
From just infliction of due punishment 
On those who seek your life : wer 't otherwise 
I should not merit mine. Besides, you heard 
The princely Salemenes. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

This is strange ; 
The gentle and the austere are both against me, 
And urge me to revenge. 

MYRRHA. 

'T is a Greek virtue. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

But not a kingly one — I '11 none on't ; or, 
If ever I indulge in't, it shall be 
With kings — my equals. • 

MYRRHA. 

These men sought to be so 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Myrrha, this is too feminine, and springs 
From fear 

MYRRHA. 

For you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No matter — still 't is fear. 
I have observed your sex, once roused to wrath, 
Are timidly vindictive to a pitch 
Of perseverance, which I would not copy. 
I thought you were exempt from this, as from 
The childish helplessness of Asian women. 

MYRRHA. 

My lord, I am no boaster of my love, 

Nor of my attributes ; I have shared your splendour, 

And will partake your fortunes. You may live 

To find one slave more true than subject myriads ; 

But this the gods avert ! I am content 

To be beloved on trust for what I feci, 

Rather than prove it to you in your griefs, 

Which might not yield to any cares of mine. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Griefs cannot come where perfect love exists, 
Except to heighten it, and vanish from 
That which it could not scare away. Let 's in — 
The hour approaches, and we must prepare 
To meet the invited guests, who grace our feast. 

[Exeunt 



SARDANAPALUS. 307 




ALTADA. 


ACT III. 


Both- 


SCENE I. 


Botli you must ev^er be by all true subjects. 


The Hall of the Palace illuminated.— Sardanapalus 


SARDANAPALUS. 


and his Guests at Table. — A storm without, and 


Melhinks the thunders still increase : it is 


TJiunder occasionally heard during tlie Banquet. 


An awful night 


SARDANAPALUS. 


MVRRHA. 


Fill fill' ! Why this is as it should be : here 


Oh yes, for those who have 


Is my true realm, amidst bright eyes and faces 


No palace to protect their worshippers. 


Happy as fair ! Here sorrow cannot reach. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


ZAMES. 


That 's true, my Myrrlra ; and could I convert 


Nor elsewhere — where the king is, pleasure sparkles. 


My realm to one wide shelter for the wretched, 


SARDANAPALUS. 


I 'd do it. 


Is not this better now than Nimrod's huntings, 


MVRRHA. 


Or my wild grandam's chase in search of kingdoms 


Thou 'rt no god, then, not to be 


She could not keep when conquer' d ? 


Able to work a will so good and general, 


ALTADA. 


As thy wish would imply. 


Mighty though 


SARDANAPALUS. 


They were, as all thy royal line have been, 


And your gods, then, 


Yet none of those who went before have reach'd 


Who can, and do not ? 


The acme of Sardanapalus, who 


MVRRHA. 


Has placed his joy in peace — the sole true glory. 


Do not speak of that, 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Lest we provoke them. 


And pleasure, good Altada, to which glory 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Is but the path. What is it that we seek ? 


True, they love not censuro 


Enjoyment! We have cut the way short to it, 


Better than mortals. Friends, a thought has struck me 


And not gone tracking it through human ashes, 


Were there no temples, would there, think ye, be 


Making a grave with every footstep. 


Air-worshippers — that is, when it is angry, 


ZAMES. 


And pelting as even now ? 


No; 


MVRRHA. 


All hearts are happy, and all voices bless 


The Persian prays 


The king of peace, who holds a world in jubilee. 


Upon his mountain. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Art sure of that? 1 have heard otherwise ; 


Yes, when the sun shines. 


Some say that there be traitors. 


MVRRHA. 


ZAMES. 


And I would ask if this your palace were 


Traitors they 


Unroof 'd and desolate, how many flatterers 


Who dare to say so ! — 'Tis impossible. 


Would lick the dust in which the king lay low ? 


What cause ? 


ALTADA. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


The fair Ionian is too sarcastic 


What cause ? true, — fill the goblet up ; 


Upon a nation whom she knows not well ; 


We will not think of them : there are none such, 


The Assyrians know no pleasure but their king's, 


Or if there be, they are gone. 


And homage is their pride. 


ALTADA. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Guests, to my pledge ! 


Nay, pardon, guests, 


Down on your knees, and drink a measure to 


The fair Greek's readiness of speech. 


The safety of the king — the monarch, say I ! 


ALTADA. 


The god Sardanapalus ! 


Pardon! sire 


[Zames and the Guests kneel, and exclaim — 


We honour her of all things next to thee. 


Mightier than 


Hark ! what was that? 


His father Baal, the god Sardanapalus ! 


ZAMES. 


[It thunders as they kneel; seme start up in 


That ? nothing but the jat 


confusion. 


Of distant portals shaken by the wind. 


ZAMES. 


ALTADA. 


Why do ye rise, my friends ? In that strong peal 


It sounded like the clash of — hark again ! 


His father gods consented. 


ZAMES. 


MVRRHA. 


The big rain pattering on the roof. 


Menaced, rather. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


King, wilt thou bear this mad impiety ? 


No more. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Myrrha,- my love, hast thou thy shell in orotr ! 


Impiety ! — nay, if the sires who reign'd 


Sing me a song of Sappho, her, thou know'st, 


Before me can be gods, I '11 not disgrace 


W ho in thy country threw 


Their lineage. But arise, my pious friends, 




Hoard your devotion for the thunderer there : 


Enter Pania, with his Sword and Garments bloo^i, , vne 


I seek but to be loved, not worshipp'd. 

1 


disordered. The guests rise m confusion. 



303 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


Pania (to the guar/!*). 


PANIA. 


Look to the portals ; 


Scarce a furlong's length 


And with your best speed to the wall without. 


From the outward wall, the fiercest conflict rages. 


Ifour arms! To arms! The king's in danger. Monarch! 


8ARDANAPALUS. 


Excuse this haste, — 't is faith. 


Then I may charge on horseback. Sfero, ho ! 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Order my horse out — There is space enough 


Speak on. 


Even in our courts, and by the outer gate, 


PANIA. 


To marshal half the horsemen of Arabia. 


It is 


[Exit SFEiiofor the armour. 


As Salemenes fear'd : the faithless satraps 


MYRRHA. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


How I do love thee ! 


You are wounded — give some wine. Take breath, good 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Paiiia. 


I ne'er doubled it. 


PANIA. 


MYRRHA. 


'T is nothing — a mere flesh wound. I am worn 


But now I know thee. 


More with my speed to warn my sovereign, 


sardanapalus (to his attendant). 


Than hurt in his defence. 


Bring down my spear, too.— 


MVRRHA. 


Where 's Salemenes ? 


Well, sir, the rebels ? 


PANIA. 


PANIA. 


Where a soldier should be, 


Soon as Arbaces and Beleses reach'd 


In the thick of the fight. 


Their stations in the city, they refused 


SARDANAPALUS. 


To march : and on my attempv to use the power 


Then hasten to him Is 


Which I was delegated with, they call'd 


The path still open, and communication 


Upon their troops, who rose in fierce defiance. 


Left 'twixt the palace and the phalanx ? 


MVRRHA. 


PANIA. 


AU 


'T was 


PANIA. 

Too many. 

SARDANAPALUS. 


When I late left him, and I have no fear : 


Our troops were steady, and the phalanx form'd. 


Spare not of thy free speech 


SARDANAPALUS. 


To spare mine ears the truth. 


Tell him to spare his person for the present, 


PANIA. 


And that I will not spare my own — and say, 


My own slight guard 


I come. 


Were faithful — and what 's left of it is still so. 


PANIA. 


MYRRHA. 


There 's victory in the very word. 


And arc these all the force still faithful ? 


[Exit Pani*. 




SARDANAPALUS. 


PANIA. 

No— 
The Baetnans, now led on by Salemenes, 


Altada — Zames — forth and arm ye ! There 

Is all in readiness >n the armory. 

See that the women are bestow'd in safety 


Who even then was on his way, still urged 
By strong suspicion of the Median chiefs, 




In the remote apartments : let a guard 

Be set before them, with strict charge to quit 


Arc numerous, and make strong head against 


The rebels, fighting inch by inch, and forming 
An orb around the palace, where they mean 


The post but with their lives — command it, Zames. 
Altada, arm yourself, and return here ; 


To centre all their force, and save the king. 


Your post is near our person. 


(He hesitates). I am charged to 


[Exeunt Zames, Altada, and all save Myrrha. 


MYRRHA. 


Enter Sfero and others, with the ATng-'s arms, etc 


'T is no time for hesitation. 


SFERO. 


PANIA. 


King ! your armour. 


Pnnce Salamcnes doth implore the king 


sardanapalus (ar7>iing himself). 


1 o arm himself, although but for a moment, 


Give me the cuirass — so : my baldric ; now 


And show himself unto the soldiers : his 


My sword : I had forgot the helm, where is it ? 


Sole presence in this instant might do more 


That's well — no, 'tis too heavy: you mistake, too— 


Than hosts can do in his behalf. 


It was not this I meant, but that which bears 


SARDANAPALUS. 


A diadem around it. 


What, ho! 


SFERO. 


My armour there. 


Sire, I deem'd 


MYRRHA. 


That too conspicuous from the precious stones 


And wilt thou? 


To risk your sacred brow beneath — and, trust me, 


SARDANAPALUS. 


This is of better metal, though less rich. 


Will I not? 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Mo, theie' — But seek not for the buckler; 'tis 


You deemM ! Are you too turn'd a rebel ? Fellow ! 


Too hfc«vy : — a light cuirass and my sword. 


Your part is to obey : return, and — no — 


IV here are the rebels? 


It is too late — I will go forth without it. 



SARDANAPALUrf. 



309 



SFERO. 

At least wear this. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Wear Caucasus ! why, 't is 
A mountain on my temples. 

SFERO. 

Sire, the leanest 
Soldier goes not forth thus exposed to ualtle. 
All men will recognise you — for the storm 
Has ceased, and the moon breaks forth in her brightness. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I go forth to be recognised, and thus 

Shall be so sooner. Now — my spear ! I 'm arm'd. 

[In going stops short, and turns to Sfero. 
gfero — I had forgotten — bring the mirror. 1 

8FERO. 

The mirror, sire ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes, sir, of polish'd brass, 
Brought from the spoils of India — but be speedy. 

[Exit Sfero. 
Myrrha, retire unto a place of safety. 
Why went you not forth with the other damsels? 

1IVRRHA. 

Because my place is here. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And when I am gone 

MYRRHA. 

1 follow. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

You! to battle? 

MYRRHA. 

If it were so, 
'T were not the first Greek girl had trod the path. 
I will await here your return. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The place 
Is spacious, and the first to be sought out, 
If they prevail ; and, if it should be so, 
And I return not 

MYRRHA. 

Still, we meet again. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

How? 

MYRRHA. 

In the spot where all must meet at last — 
In Hades ! if there be, as I believe, 
A shore beyond the Styx ; and if there be not, 
In ashes. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Dar'st thou so much ? 

MYRRHA. 

I dare all things, 
Except survive what I have loved, to be 
A rebel's booty : forth, and do yosr bravest. 

Re-enter Sfero with the mirror. 

Sardanapalus (looking at himself). 
This cuirass fits me well, the baldric better, 
And the helm not at all. Methinks, I seem 

[Flings away the helmet, after trying it again. 
Passing well in these toys ; and now to prove them. 
Altada ! Where 's Altada ? 



1 " Such the mirror Otlio held 
'n the Illynao field." — See Juvenal. 

2E 



SFERO. 

Waiting, sire, 
Without : he has your shield in readiness. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

True • I forgot he is my shield-bearer 
By right of blood, derived from age to age. 
Myrrha, embrace me ; yet once more — once more- 
Love me, whate'er betide. My chiefest glory 
Shall be to make me worthier of your love. 

MYRRHA. 

Go forth, and conquer ! 

[Eiit SARDANAPALUS Una SFERO. 

Now, I am alone. 
All are gone forth, and of that all how few 
Perhaps return. Let him but vanquish, and 
Me perish ! If he vanquish not, I perish ; 
For I will not outlive him. He has wound 
About my heart, I know not how nor why. 
Not for that he is king ; for now his kingdom 
Rocks underneath his throne, and the earth yawns 
To yield him no more of it than a grave ; 
And yet I love him more. Oh, mighty Jove ! 
Forgive this monstrous love for a barbarian, 
Who knows not of Olympus : yes, I love him 

Now, now, far more than Hark — to the war shout ! 

Methinks it nears me. If it should be so, 

[She draws forth a small iial. 
This cunning Colchian poison, which my father 
Learn'd to compound on Euxine shores, and taught ma 
How to preserve, shall free me ! It had freed me 
Long ere this hour, but that I loved, until 
I half forgot I was a slave : — where all 
Are slaves save one, and proud of servitude, 
So they are served in turn by something lower 
In the degree of bondage, we forget 
That shackles worn like ornaments no less 
Are chains. Again that shout ! and now the clash 
Of arms — and now — and now — 

Enter Altada. 

ALTADA. 

Ho, Sfero, ho! 

MYRRHA. 

He is not here ; what wouldst thou with him ? H ow 
Goes on the conflict ? 

ALTADA. 

Dubiously and fiercely. 

MYRRHA. 

And the king ? 

ALTADA. 

Like a king. I must find Sfero, 
And bring him a new spear and his own helmet, 
He fights till now bareheaded, and by far 
Too much exposed. The soldiers knew his face, 
And the foe too ; and in the moon's broad light, 
His silk tiara and his flowing hair 
Make him a mark too royal. Every arrow 
Is pointed at the fair hair and fair featnre>, 
And the broad fillet which crowns both. 

MYRRHA. 

Ye gods, 
Who fulmine o'er my fathers' land, protect him ! 
Were you sent by the km:; ? 

ALTADA. 

By Salemencs, 
Who sent me privily upon this charge, 



310 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Without the knowledge of the careless sovereign. 
The king! the king fights as he revels! ho! 
What, Sfuro ! I will seek the armory — 
He must be there. [Exit Altada. 

MVRRIIA. 

'T is no dishonour — no— 
'T is no dishonour to have loved this man. 
I almost wish now, what I never wish'd 
Before, that he were Grecian. If Alcides 
Were shamed in wearing Lydian Omphale's 
She-garb, and wielding her vile distaff; surely 
He, who springs up a Hercules at once, 
Nursed in effeminate arts from youth to manhood, 
And rushes from the banquet to the battle, 
As though it were a bed of love, deserves 
That a Greek girl should be his paramour, 
And a Greek hard his minstrel, a Greek tomb 
His monument. How goes the strife, sir? 

Enter an Officer, 
officer. 

Lost, 
Lost almost past recovery. Zames ! Where 
Is Zames? 

MYRRHA. 

Posted with the guard, appointed 
To watch before the apartment of the women. 

[Exit Officer, 
myrrha {solus). 
Tie 's gone ; and told no more than that all 's lost ! 
What need have I to know more? In those words, 
Those little words, a kingdom and a king, 
A line of thirteen ages, and the lives 
Of thousands, and the fortune of all left 
With life, all merged : and I, too, with the great, 
Like a sm;ill bubble breaking with the wave 
Which bore it, shall be nothing. At the least 
My fate is in my keeping : no proud victor 
Shall count me with his spoils. 

Enter Pania. 

PANIA. 

Away with me, 
Myrrha, without delay ; we must not lose 
A moment — all that 's left us now. 

MYRRHA. 

The king ? 

PANIA. 

Sent me here to conduct you hence, beyond 
The river, by a secret passage. 

MYRRHA. 

Then 
He lives ■• 

PANIA. 

And charged me to secure your life, 
And beg you to live on for his sake, till 
He can rejoin you. 

MYRRHA. 

Will he then give way? 

PANIA. 

Not till the last. Still, still he does whate'er 
Despair can do ; and step by step disputes 
The very palace. 

MYRRHA. 

They are here, then : — ay, 
Then shouts come ringing through the ancient halls, 



Never profaned by rebel echoes till 
This fatal night. Farewell, Assyria's line ! 
Farewell to all of Nimrod ! Even the name 
Is now no more. 

PANIA. 

Away with me — away . 

MYRRHA. 

No ; I 'II die here ! — Away, and tell your king 
I loved him to the last. 

[Enter Sardanapalus and Salemenes, itttn 
Soldiers. Pania quits Myrrha, and ranges 
himself with them. 

sardanapalus. 
Since it is thus, 
We '11 die where we were born — in our own halls. 
Serry your ranks — stand firm. I have despatch'd 
A trustry satrap for the guard of Zames, 
All fresh and faithful ; they '11 be here anon. 
All is not over. — Pania, look to Myrrha. 

[Pania returns towards Myrrha. 

SALEMENES. 

We have breathing time: yet one more charge, my 

friends — 
One for Assyria ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Rather say, for Bactria ! 
My faithful Bactrians, I will henceforth be 
King of your nation, and we '11 hold together 
This realm as province. 

SALEMENES. 

Hark ! they come — they come. 
Enter Beleses and Arbaces with the Rebels. 

ARBACES. 

Set. on, we have them in the toil. Charge ! Charge ! 

BELESES. 

On ! on ! — Heaven fights for us and with us — On ! 

[They charge the King and Salemenes with 
their Troops, who defend themselves till the 
Arrival of Zames with the Guard before 
mentioned. The Rebels are then driven off, 
and pursued by Salemenes, etc. As the 
King is going to join the pursuit, Bklf./es 
crosses him. 

BELE9ES. 

Ho ! tyrant — / will end this war. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Even so, 

My warlike priest, and precious prophet, and 
Grateful and trusty subject: — yield, I pray thee. 
I would reserve thee for a fitter doom, 
Rather than dip my hands in holy blood. 

BELESES. 

Thine hour is come. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, thine. — I 've lately read, 
Though but a young astrologer, the stars ; 
And ranging round the zodiac, found thy fate 
In the sign of the Scorpion, which proclaims 
That thou wilt now be crush'd, 

BELESES. 

But not by thee. 
[They fight: Beleses is wounded end di»~ 
armed. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



311 



Sardanapalus (raining his sword to despatch him, 

exclaims) — 
Now call upon thy planets ; will they shoot 
From the sky, to preserve their seer and credit? 

[A party of Rebels enter and rescue Beleses. 
They assail the King, who, in turn, is 
rescued by a party of his Soldiers, who 
drive the Rebels off. 
The villain was a prophet after all. 
Upon them — ho ! there — victory is ours. 

[Exit in pursuit. 

MVRRHA (ioPANIA). 

Pursue ! Why stand'st thou here, and leav'st the ranks 
Of fellow-soldiers conquering without thee ? 

PANIA. 

The king's command was not to quit thee. 

MVRRHA. 

Me! 

Think not of me — a single soldier's arm 
Must not be wanting now. I ask no guard, 
I need no guard : what, with a world at stake, 
Keep watch upon a woman ? Hence, I say, 
Or thou art shamed ! Nay, then, / will go forth, 
A feeble female, 'midst their desperate strife, 
And bid thee guard me there — where thou shouldst shield 
Thy sovereign. [Exit Myrrha. 

pania. 
Yet stay, damsel ! She is gone. 
If aught of ill betide her, better I 
Had lost my life. Sardanapalus holds her 
Far dearer than his kingdom, yet he fights 
For that too ; and can I do less than him, 
Who never flash'd a scimetar till now ? 
Myrrha, return, and I obey you, though 
In disobedience 10 the monarch. [Exit Pania. 

Enter Altada and Sfero, by an opposite door. 

ALTADA 

Myrrha ! 
What, gone ! yet she was here when the fight raged, 
And Pania also. Can aught have befallen them? 

SFERO. 

I saw both safe, when late the rebels fled : 
They probably are but retired to make 
Their way back to the harem. 

ALTADA. 

If the king 
Prove victor, as it seems even now he must, 
And miss his own Ionian, we are doom'd 
To worse than captive rebels. 

SFERO. 

Let us trace them ; 
She cannot be fled far ; and, found, she makes 
A richer prize to our soft sovereign 
Than his recover'd kingdom. 

ALTADA. 

Baal himself 
Ne'er fought more fiercely to win empire, than 
His silken son to save it : he defies 
All augury of foes or friends ; and like 
The close and sultry summer's day, which bodes 
A twilight tempest, bursts forth in such thunder 
As sweeps the air and deluges the earth. 
The man 's inscrutable. 

SFERO. 

Not more than others. 



All are the sons of circumstance : away — 
Let 's seek the slave out, or prepare to be 
Tortured for his infatuation, and 

Condemn'd without a crime. [Exeunt. 

Enter Salemenes and Soldiers, etc. 

SALEMFJES. 

The triumph is 
Flattering : they are beaten backward from the palaco 
And wt have open'd regular access 
To the troops station'd on the other side 
Euphrates, who may still be true ; nay, must be, 
When they hear of our victory. But where 
Is the chief victor ? where 's the king ? 
Enter Sardanapalus, cumsuis, etc. emdMvRRHA 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Here, brother. 

SALEMENES. 

Unhurt, I hope. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Not quite ; but let it pass. 
We 've clear'd the palace 

SALEMENES. 

And, I trust, the city. 
Our numbers gather ; and I have order'd onward 
A cloud of Parthians, hitherto reserved, 
All fresh and fiery, to be pour'd upon them 
In their retreat, which soon will be a flight. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

It is already, or at least they march'd 

Faster than I could follow with my Bactrians, 

Who spared no speed. I am spent ; give me a seal. 

SALEMENES. 

There stands the throne, sire. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'Tis no place to rest on, 
For mind nor body : let me have a couch, 

[ They place a seat. 
A peasant's stool, I care not what: — so — now 
I breathe more freely. 

SALEMENES. 

This great hour has proved 
The brightest and most glorious of your life. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And the most tiresome. Where's my cup-bearer 7 
Bring me some water. 

salemenes (smiling). 

'T is the first time he 
Ever had such an order: even I, 
Your most austere of counsellors, would now 
Suggest a purpler beverage. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Blood — doubtless. 
But there 's enough of that shed ; as for wine, 
I have learn'd to-night the price of the pure elemenl 
Thrice have I drank of it, and thrice renew'd, 
With greater strength than the grape ever gave m»», 
My charge upon the rebels. Where 's the soldier 
Who gave me water in his hemlet ? 

ONE OF THE GUARDS. 

Slain, sire • 
An arrow pierced his brain, while, scattering 
The last drops from his helm, he stood in act 
To place it on his brows. 



1. — — ^ — 

312 BYRON'S WORKS. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Her seem unto the troops a prophetess 


Slain! unrewarded! 


Of victory, or Victory herself, 


And slain to serve my thirst: that's hard, poor slave! 


Come down to hail us hers. 


Had he but lived, I would have gorged him with 


SALEMENES {aside). 


Gold : all the gold of earth could ne'er repay 


This is too much ; 


The pleasure of that draught ; for I was parch'd 


Again the love-fit's on him, and all's lost, 


As I am now. [ Tliey bring water — he drinks, 


Unless we turn his thoughts. 


I Five again — from henceforth 


(Aloud) But, pray thee, sire 


The goblet I reserve for hours of love, 


Think of your wound — you said even now 'l was painful 


But war on water. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


SALEMENES. 


That 's true, too ; but I must not think of it. 


And that bandage, sire, 


SALEMENES. 


Which girds your arm ? 


I have look'd to all things needful, and will now 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Receive reports of progress made in such 


A scratch from brave Beleses. 


Orders as I had given, and then return 


MVKR1IA. 


To hear your further pleasure. 


Oh ! he is wounded ! 


SARDANAPALUS 


SARDANAPALUS 


Be it so. 


Not too much of that ; 


salemenes {in retiring). 


And yet it feels a little stiff and painful. 


Myrrha ! 


Now 1 am cooler. 


MVRRHA. 


MVRRHA. 


Prince. 


You have bound it with 


SALEMENES. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


You have shown a soul to-night, 


The fillet of my diadem : the first time 


Which, were he not my sister's lord But now 


That ornament was ever aught to me 


I have no time: thou lov'st the king? 


Save an encumbrance. 


MVRRHA. 


myrrha (to the attendants). 


I love 


Summon speedily 


Sardananalus. 


A leech of the most skilful : pray, retire ; 


SALEMENES. 


I will unbind your wound and tend it. 


But wouldst have him king still? 


SARDANAPALUS. 


MVRRHA. 


Do so, 


I would not have him less than what he should tv». 


For now it throbs sufficiently: but what 


SALEMENES. 


Know'st thou of wounds ! yet wherefore do I ask ? 


Well, then, to have him king, and yours, ard all 


Know'st thou, my brother, where I lighted on 


He should, or should not be ; to have him liv* t 


Th.3 minion ? 


Let him not sink back into luxury. 


SALEMENES. 


You have more power upon his spirit than 


Herding with the other females, 


Wisdom wi'#in these walls, or fierce rebellion 


hike trighten'd antelopes. 


Raging without : look well that he relapse not, 


SARDANAPALUS. 


MVRRHA. 


No : like the dam 


There needed not the voice of Salemenes 


Of the young lion, femininely raging 


To urge n»e on to this ; 1 w ill not fail. 


(And femininely meaneth furiously, 


All that a woman's weakness can 


Because all passions in excess are female) 


SALEMENES. 


Against the hunter flying with her cub, 


Is power 


She urged on with her voice and gesture, and 


Omnipotent o'er such a heart as his ; 


Her floating hair and flashing eyes, the soldiers 


Exert it wisely. [Exit Salemenej 


In the pursuit. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


SALEMENES. 


Myrrha ! what, at whispers 


Indeed ! 


With my stern brother ? I shall soon be jealous. 


SARDANAPALUS. 


mvrkha (smiling). 


You see, this night 


You have cause, sire ; for on the earth there breathes no 


Made warriors of more than me. I paused 


A man more worthy of a woman's love — 


To look upon her, and her kindled cheek ; 


A soldier's trust — a subject's reverence— 


Her large black eyes, that flash'd through her long hair 


A king's esteem — the whole world's admiration ! 


As it stream'd o'er her ; her blue veins that rose 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Along her most transparent brow ; her nostril 


Praise him, but not so warmly. I must not 


Dilated from its symmetry ; her lips 


Hear those sweet lips grow eloquent in aught 


Apart ; her voice that clove through all the din, 


That throws me into shade ; yet you speak truth. 


As a lute's pierceth through the cymbal's clash, 


MVRRHA. 


Jarr'd but not drown'd by the loud brattling ; her 


And now retire, to have your wound look'd to. 


Waved .inns, more dazzling with their own born white- 


Pray lean on me. 


ness 


SARDANAPALUS. 


Than the steel her hand held, which she caught up 


Yes, love ! but not from pain. 


From a dead soldier's grasp ; all these things made 


\Exiunt umnr- 






SARDANAPALUS. 



313 



ACT IV. 

SCENE I. 
Sardanafalcs discovered sleeping upon a couch, and 

occasionally disturbed in his slu77ibers, with Mvrrha 

watching. 

mvrrha {sola, gazing). 
I have stolen upon his rest, if rest it be, 
Which thus convulses slumber: shall I wake him? 
No, he seems calmer. Oh, thou God of Quiet ! 
Whose reign is o'er sealM eyelids and soft dreams, 
Or deep, deep sleep, so as to be unfathomM, 
Look like thy brother, Death — so still — so stirless— 
For then we are happiest, as it may be, we 
Are happiest of all within the realm 
Of thy stern, silent, and unawakening twin. 
Again he moves — again the play of pain 
Shoots o'er his features, as the sudden gust 
Crisps the reluctant lake that lay so calm 
Beneath the mountain shadow ; or the blast 
Ruffles the autumn leaves, that drooping cling 
Fa ; ntly and motionless to their loved boughs. 
I must awake him — yet not yet : who knows 
From what I rouse him ? It seems pain ; but if 
I quicken him to heavier pain ? The fever 
Of this tumultuous night, the grief too of 
His wound, though slight, may cause all this, and shake 
Me more to see than him to suffer. No : 
Let Nature use her own maternal means, — 
And I await to second not disturb her. 

sardanapalus (awakening). 
Not so— although ye multiplied the stars, 
And gave them to me as a realm to share 
From you and with you ! I would not so purchase 
The empire of eternity. — Hence — hence — 
Old hunter of the earliest brutes! and ye, 
Who hunted fellow-creatures as if brutes, 
Once bloody mortals — and now bloodier idols, 
If your priests lie not ! And thou, ghastly beldame ! 
Dripping with dusky gore, and trampling on 
The carcasses of Inde — away ! away ! 
Where am I ? Where the spectres ? Where — No — that 
Is no false phantom : I should know it 'midst 
All that the dead dare gloomily raise up 
From their black gulf to daunt the living. Myrrha i 

MVRRHA. 

Alas ! thou art pale, and on thy brow the drops 
Gather like night-dew. My beloved, hush — 
Calm thee. Thy speech seems of another world, 
And thou art loved of this. Be of good cheer ; 
All will go well. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Thy hand — so — 'tis thy hand ; 
*T is flesh ; grasp — clasp — vet closer, till I feel 
Myself that which I was, 

MVRRHA. 

At least know me 
For what I am, and ever must be — thine. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I know it now. I know this life again. 

Ah, Myrrha ! I have been where we shall be. 

MVRRHA. 

My lord ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I've been i' the grave — where worms are lords, 
2 e 2 45 



And kings are But I did not deem it so; 

I thought 'twas nothing. 

MVRRHA. 

So it is ; except 
Unto the timid, who anticipate 
That which may never be. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Oh, Myrrha! if 
Sleep shows such things, what may not death disclose? 

myrrh \. 
I know no evil death can show, which life 
Has not already shown to those who live 
Embodied longest. If there be indeed 
A shore, where mind survives, 'twill be as mind, 
All unincoiporate: or if there flits 
A shadow of this cumbrous clog of clay, 
Which stalks, methinks, between our souls and heaven. 
And fetters us to earth — at least the phantom, 
Whate'er it have to fear, will not fear death. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I fear it not ; but I have felt — have seen — 
A legion of the dead. 

MVRRH> 

And so have I. 
The dust we tread upon was once alive, 
And wretched. But proceed: what hast thou seen ? 
Speak it, 'twill lighten thy dimm'd mind. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Methought 

MVRRHA. 

Yet pause, thou art tired — in pain — exhausted ; all 
Which can impair both strength and spirit: seek 
Rather to sleep again. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Not now — I would not 
Dream ; though I know it now to be a dream 
What I have dreamt : — and canst thou bear to hear it 7 

MVRRHA. 

I can bear all things, dreams of life or death, 
Which I participate with you, in semblance 
Or full reality. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And this look'd real, 
I tell you : after that these eyes were open, 
I saw them in their flight — for then they fled. 

MYRRHA. 

Say on. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I saw, that is, I dream'd myself 
Here — here — even where we are, guests as we were, 
Myself a host that dceni'd himself but guest, 
Willing to equal all in social freedom ; 
But, on my right hand and my left, instead 
Of thee and Zames, and our accustom'd meeting, 
Was ranged on my left hand a haughtv, dark, 
And deadly face — I could not recognise it, 
Yet I had seen it, though I knew not where ; 
The features were a giant's, and the eye 
Was still, yet lighted ; his long locks curl'd down 
On his vast bust, whence a huge quiver rose 
With shaft-heads feather'd from the eagle's wing, 
That peep'd up bristling through his serpent hair, 
I invited him to fill the cup which stood 
Between us, but he answer'd not — 1 fill'd n — 
He took it not — but stared upon me, till 
I trembled at the fix'd glare o r his eye ; 



314 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



[ frown' d upon liim as a king should frown — 
Ho iT'iv.n'il not in his turn, but look'd upon me 
With the same aspect, which appall'd me more, 
Because it changed not, and I turn'd for refuge 
To milder guests, and sought them on the right, 
Where thou werl wont to be. But 



MVRRHA. 



[He pausei. 
What instead .' 



SARDANAPALUS. 

[n thy own chair — thy own place in the banquet — 
[ sought thy sweet face in the circle — but 
Instead — a gray-hair'd, wither'd, bloody-eyed, 
And bloody-handed, ghastly, ghostly thing, 
Female in garb, and crown'd upon the brow, 
Furrow'd wiih years, yet sneering with the passion 
Of vengeance, leering too with that of lust, 
fcate ; — my veins curdled. 

MVKKHA. 

Is this all ? 



SARDANAPALUS. 



Upon 



Her right hand — her lank, bird-like right hand — stood 

A goblet, bubbling o'er with blood ; and on 

Her left another, fill'd with — what I saw not, 

But turn'd from it and her. But all along 

The table sate a range of crowned wretches, 

Of various aspects, but of one expression. 

MVRRHA. 

And felt you not this a mere vision ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No; 
It was so palpable, I could have touch'd them. 
I turn'd from one face to another, in 
The hope to find at last one which I knew 
Ere I saw theirs ; but no — all turn'd upon me, 
And stared, but neither ate nor drank, but stared, 
Til! I grew stone, as they seem'd half to be, 
Yet breathing stone, for I felt life in them, 
And life in me : there was a horrid kind 
Of sympathy between us, as if they 
Had lost a part of death to come to me, 
And I the half of life to sit by them. 
We were in an existence all apart 

From heaven or earth And rather let me see 

Death all than such a being ! 

MVRRHA. 

And the end? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

At last I sate marble as they, when rose 
The hunter and the crew ; and smiling on me— 
Yes, the enlarged but noble aspect of 
The hunter smiled upon me — I should say, 
His lips, for his eyes moved not — and the woman's 
Thin lips relax'd to something like a smile. 
Both rose, and the crown'd figures on each hand 
Rose also, as if aping their chief shades — 
Mere mimics even in death — but I sate still: 
A desperate courage crept through every limb, 
And at the last I fear'd them not, but laugh'd 
Full in their phantom faces. But then — then 
The hunter laid his hand on mine : I took it, 
And grasp'd it — but it melted from my own, 
While he too vanish'd, and left nothing but 
The memory of a hero, for he look'd so. 



MY Kit HA 

And was ; the ancestors of heroes, too, 
And thine no less. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Ay, Myrrha, but the woman, 
The female who retnain'd, she Hew upon me, 
And burnt my lips up with her noisome kisses, 
And, Hinging down the goblets on each hand, 
Methought their poisons flow'd around us, till 
Each form'd a hideous river. Stiil she clung: 
The other phantoms, like a row of statues, 
Stood dull as in our temples, but she still 
Embraced me, while I shrunk from her, as if, 
[n lieu of her remote descendant, I 
II?d been the son who slew her for her incest. 
Then — :hen — a chaos of all loathsome things 
Throng'd thick and shapeless : I was dead, yet feeling- 
Buried, and raised again — consumed by worms, 
Purged by the Carres, and wither'd in the hU: 
I can fix nothing further of my thoughts. 
Save that I long'd for thee, and sought for thee, 
In all these agonies, and woke and found thee. 

MYRRH A. 

So shalt thou find mc ever at thy side, 

Here and hereafter, if the last ma> bo. 

But think not of these things — the m"re c-eatia* 

Of late events acting upon a frame 

Unused to toil, yet overwrought by toi', 

Such as might try the sternest. 

SARDANAPALU3. 

Now that I see thee once more, what was seen 
Seems nothing. 

Enter Salemenes. ■ 

SALEMENES. 

Is the king so soon awake ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes, brother, and I would I had not slept ; 
For all the predecessors of our line 
Rose up, methought, to drag me down to them 
My father was amongst them, too ; but he, 
I know not why, kept from me, leaving me 
Between the hunter founder of our race 
And her, the homicide and husband-killer, 
Whom you call glorious. 

SALEMENES. 

So I term you also, 
Now you have shown a spirit like to hers. 
By day-break I propose that we set forth, 
And charge once more the rebel crew, who still 
Keep gathering head, repulsed, but not quite quell'd. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

How wears the night ? 

SALEMENES. 

There yet remain some hours 
Of darkness : use them for your further rest. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, not to-night, if 'tis not gone: methought 
I pass'd hours in that vision. 

MYRRHA. 

Scarcely one ; 
I watch'd by you : it was a heavy hour, 
But an hour only. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Let us then hold council ; 
To-morrow we set forth. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



31. 



SALEMENES. 

But ere that time, 
I had a grace to seek. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is granted. 

SALEMENES. 

Hear it, 
Ere you reply too readily ; and 't is 
For your ear only. 

MVRRHA. 

Prince, I take my leave. 

[Exit Mvrrha. 

SALEMENES. 

That slave deserves her freedom. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Freedom only ! 
That slave deserves to share a throne. 

SALEMENES. 

Your patience — 
'T is not yet vacant, and 'tis of its partner 
I come to speak with you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

How! of the queen? 

SALEMENES. 

Even so. I judged it fitting for their safety, 
That, ere the dawn, she sets forth with her children 
For Paphlagonia, where our kinsman Cotta 
Governs ; and there at all events secure 
My nephews and your sons their lives, and with them 
Their just pretensions to the crown, in case 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I perish — as is probable : well thought- 
Let them set forth with a sure escort. 



SALEMENES. 



That 



Is all provided, and the galley ready 

To drop down the Euphrates ; but ere they 

Depart, will you not see 

SARDANAPALUS. 

My sons ? It may 
Unman my heart, and the poor boys will weep ; 
And what can I reply to comfort them, 
Save with some hollow hopes, and ill-worn smiles 7 
You know I cannot feign. 

SALEMENES. 

But you can feel ; 
At least, I trust so : in a word, the queen 
Requests to see you ere you part — for ever. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Unto what end ? what purpose ? I will grant 
Aught — all that she can ask — but such a meeting. 

SALEMENES. 

You know, or ought to know, enough of women, 
Since you have studied them so steadily, 
That what they ask in aught that touches on 
The heart, is dearer to their feelings or 
Their fancy than the whole external world. 
I think as you do of my sister's wish ; 
But 't was her wish — she is my sister — you 
Her husband — will you grant it ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T will be useless : 
But let her come. 

SALEMENES. 

I go. [Exit Salemxnes. 



SARDANAPALUS. 

We have lived asunder 
Too long to meet again — and now to meet ! 
Have I not cares enow, and pangs enow, 
To bear alone, that we must mingle sorrows, 
VVho have ceased to mingle love ? 

Re-enter Salemenes and Zarina. 

SALEMENES. 

My sister ! courage ■ 
Shame not our blood with trembling, but remember 
From whence we sprung. The queen is present, sire. 

ZARINA. 

I pray thee, brother, leave me. 

SALEMENES. 

Since you ask it. 
[Exit Salemenes. 
zarina. 
Alone with him ! How many a year has past, 
Though we are still so young, since we have met, 
Which I have worn in widowhood of heart. 
He loved me not : yet he seems little changed — 
Changed to me only — would the change were mutual . 
He speaks not — scarce regards me — not a word — 
Nor look — yet he was soft of voice and aspect, 
Indifferent, not austere. My lord ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Zarina ' 

ZARINA. 

No, not Zarina — do not say Zarina, 

That tone — that word — annihilate long years, 

And things which make them longer. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is too late 
To think of these past dreams. Let 's not reproach- - 
That is, reproach me not — for the last time 

ZARINA. 

And Jirst. I ne'er reproach'd you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is most true ; 
And that reproof comes heavier on my heart 
Than But our hearts are not in our own power. 

ZARINA. 

Nor hands ; but I gave both. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Your brother said. 
It was your will to see me, ere you went 
From Nineveh with {He hesitates). 

ZARINA. 

Our children : it is Iran. 
I wish'd to thank you that you have not divided 
My heart from all that 's left it now to love — 
Those who are yours and mine, who look like you, 
And look upon me as you look'd upon me 
Once But they have not changed. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Nor ever wiB. 
I fain would have them dutiful. 

ZARINA. 

I cherish 
Those infants, not alone from the blind love 
Of a fond mother, but as a fond woman. 
They are now the only tie between us. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Deem nut 
I have not done you justice : rather mane them 



31G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Resemble your own line, than their own sire. 
I trust them with you — to you : fit them for 

A throne, or, if that be denied You have heard 

Of this night's tumults? 

ZARINA. 

I had half forgotten, 
And could have welcomed any grief, save yours, 
Which gave me to behold your face again. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The throne — I say it not in fear — but 't is 
In peril ; they perhaps may never mount it : 
Rut let them not for this lose sight of it. 
I will dare all things to bequeath it them ; 
But if I fail, then they must win it back 
Bravely — and, won, wear it wisely, not as I 
Have wasted down my royalty. 

ZARINA. 

They ne'er 
Shall know from me of aught but what may honour 
Their father's memory. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Rather let them hear 
The truth from you than from a trampling world. 
If they be in adversity, they '11 learn 
Too soon the scorn of crowds for crownless princes, 
And find that all their father's sins are theirs. 
My boys ! — I could have borne it were I childless. 

ZARINA. 

Oh ! do not say so — do not poison all 
My peace left, by unwishing that thou wert 
A father. If thou conquerest, they shall reign, 
And honour him who saved the realm for them, 
So little cared for as his own ; and if 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T -s lost, all earth will cry out, thank your father ! 
And they will swell the echo with a curse. 

ZARINA. 

That they shall never do ; but rather honour 
The name of him, who, dying like a king, 
In his last hours did more for his own memory, 
Than many monarchs in a length of days, 
Which date the flight of time, but make no annals. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Our annals draw perchance unto their close ; 
But at the least, whate'er the past, their end 
Shall be like their beginning — memorable. 

ZARINA. 

Yet, be not rash— be careful of your life, 
J-i/e but for those who love. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And who are they? 
A slave, who loves from passion— I '11 not say 
Ambition — she has seen thrones shake, and loves; 
A few friends, who have rcvell'd till we are 
As one, for they are nothing if I fall ; 
A brother I have injured — children whom 
I have neglected, and a spouse 

ZARINA. 

Who loves. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And pardons? 

ZARINA. 

I have never thought of this, 
And cannot pardon till I have condemnM. 

SARDANAPALUS. 
Mv wile. 



ZARINA. 

Now blessings on thee for that word • 
I never thought to hear it more — from thee. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Oh ! thou wilt hear it from my subjects. Ye* — 
The slaves, whom I have nurtureu, pamper'd, fed, 
And swoln with peace, and gorged with plenty, till 
They reign themselves — all monarchs in their man- 
sions — 
Now swarm forth in rebellion, and demand 
His death, who made their lives a jubilee : 
While the few upon whom I have no claim 
Are faithful. This is true, yet monstrous. 

ZARINA. 

'Tis 

Perhaps too natural ; for benefits 
Turn poison in bad minds. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And good ones make 
Good out of evil. Happier than the bee, 
Which hives not but from wholesome flowers. 

ZARINA. 

Then reap 
The honey, nor inquire whence 't is derived. 
Be satisfied — you are not all abandon'd. 

RDANAPALUS. 

My life insures me tnaU How long, bethink you, 

Were not I yet a king, should I be mortal ? 

That is, where mortals we, not where they must be 7 

7.AIUXA. 

I know not. But yet live for my — that is, 
Your children's sake ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Mv gentle, wrong'd Zarinal 
I am the very slave of circumstance 
And impulse — borne away with every breath ! 
Misplaced upon the throne — misplaced in life. 
I know not what I could have been, but feel 
I am not what I should be — let it end. 
But take this with thee : if I was not form'd 
To prize a love like thine, a mind like thine, 
Nor dote even on thy beauty — as I 've doted 
On lesser charms, for no cause srve that such 
Devotion was a duty, and I hated 
All that look'd like a chain for me or others 
(This even rebellion must avouch); yet hear 
These words, perhaps among my last — that none 
Ere valued more thy virtues, though he knew not 
To profit by them — as the miner lights 
Upon a vein of virgin ore, discovering 
That which avails him nothing ; he hath found it, 
But 't is not his — but some superior's, who 
Placed him to dig, but not divide the wealth 
Which sparkles at his feet ; nor dare he lift 
Nor poise it, but must grovel on upturning 
The sullen earth. 

ZARINA. 

Oh ! if thou hast at lengti 
Discover'd that my love is worth esteem, 
I ask no more — but let us hence together, 
And / — let me say we — shall yet be happy. 
Assyria is not all the earth — we 'II find 
A world out of our own — and be more blest 
Than I have ever been, or thou, with all 
An empire to indulge thee. 



SARDANAPALUS. 



317 



Enter Salemenes. 

SALEMENES. 

I must part ye — 
The moments, which must not be lost, are passing. 

ZARINA. 

Inhuman brother ! wilt thou thus weigh out 
Instants so high and blest ? 

SALEMENES. 

Hi est ! 

ZARINA. 

He ha'b Y«en 
So gentle with me, that I cannot think 
Of quitting. 

SALEMENES. 

So — this feminine farewell 
Ends as such partings end, in no departure. 
I thought as much, and yielded against all 
My better bodings. But it must not be. 

ZARINA. 

Not be 7 

SALEMEM S. 

Remain, and perish 

ZARINA. 

With my husband — 

SALr.MENES. 

\nd children. 

ZARINA. 

Alas! 

SALEMENES. 

Ilear me, sister, like 
Vy sister ;— all 's prepared to make your safety 
Certain, ard of the boys too, our last hopes. 
T is not a single question of mere feeling, 
Though that were much — but 't is a point of state : 
The rebels would do more to seize upon 
The offspring of their sovereign, and so crush 

ZARINA. 

Ah ! do not name it. 

SALEMENES. 

Well, then, mark me : when 
They are safe beyond the Median's grasp, the rebels 
Have miss'd their chief aim — the extinction of 
The line of Nimrod. Though the present king 
Fall, his sons live for victory and vengeance. 

ZARINA. 

But could not I remain, alone ? 

SALEMENES. 

What ! leave 
Four children, with two parents and yet orphans— 
In a strange land — so young, so distai.t ? 

ZARINA. 

No— 
My heart will break. 

SALEMENES. 

Now you know all — decide. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Zarina, he hath spoken well, and we 
Must yield awhile to this necessity. 
Remaining here, you may lose all ; departing, 
You save the better part of what is left 
To both of us, and to such loyal hearts 
As yet beat in these kingdoms. 

SALEMENES. 

The time presses. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Go, then. If e'er we meet again, perhaps 



I may be worthier of you — and, if not, 
Remember that my faults, though not atoned for, 
Are ended. Yet, I dread thy nature will 
Grieve more above the blighted name and ashes 

Which once were mightiest in Assyria — than ■ 

But I grow womanish again, and must not; 
I must learn sternness now. My sins have all 
Been of the softer order — hide thy tears — 
I do not bid thee not to shed them — 't were 
Easier to stop Euphrates at its source 
Than one tear of a true and tender heart — 
But let me not behold them ; they unman me 
Here when I had remann'd myself. My brother, 
Lead her away. 

ZARINA. 

Oh, God ! I never shall 
Behold him more ! 

SALEMENES (striving & conduct her). 

Nay, sister, I must be obey'd. 

ZARINA. 

I must remain — away ! you shall not hold me. 
What, shall he die alone ? — / live alone ? 

SALEMENES. 

He shall not die alone ; but lonely you 
Have lived for years. 

ZARINA. 

That's false ! I knew he lived. 
And lived upon his image — let me go ! 

SALEMENES (conducting her ojf the stage). 
Nay, then, I must use some fraternal force, 
Which you will pardon. 

ZARINA. 

Never. Help n\e ! Oh ! 
Sardanapalus, wilt thou thus behold me 
Torn from thee ? 

SALEMENES. 

Nay — then all is lost again, 
If that this moment is not gain'd. 

ZARINA. 

My brain turns — 
My eyes fail — where is he ? [ShefainA. 

sardanapalus (advancing). 

No — set her down — 
She 's dead — and you have slain her. 

SALEMENES. 

'T is the mere 
Faintness of o'er-wrought passion : in the air 
She will recover. Pray, keep back. — [Aside.] I mus» 
Avail myself of this sole moment to 
Bear her to where her children are embark'd, 
I' the royal galley on the river. 

[Salemenes bears her off. 

SARDANAPALUS (»obu). 

This too— 
And this too must I suffer — I, who never 
Inflicted purposely on human hearts 
A voluntary pang! Hut that is tiiUe — 
She loved mc, and I loved her. Fatal passion ' 
Why dost thou not expire at once in hearts 
Which thou hast lighted up at once ? Zarina ! 
I must pay dearly for the desolation 
Now brought upon thee. Had I never loved 
But thee, I should have been an unopposed 
Monarch of honouring nations. /T"ow!T5t gulfs 
A single deviation from the track 
Of human duties, leads even those who claim 



313 



BYRON'S WORKS 



The homage of mankind as their born due, 
And find it, till they forfeit it themselves ! I 
Enter Myrrha. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

You here ! Who call'd j'ou ? 

MYRRHA. 

No one — but I heard 
Far off a voice of wail and lamentation, 
And thought 

SARDANAPALUS. 

It forms no portion of your duties 
To enter here till sought for. 

MYRRHA. 

Though I might, 
Perhaps, recall some softer words of yours 
(Although they too were chiding), which reproved me, 
Because I ever dreaded to intrude ; 
Resisting my own wish and your injunction 
To heed no time nor presence, but approach you 
Uncall'd for : I retire. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Yet, stay — being here. 
I pray you pardon me: events have sour'd me 
Till I wax peevish — heed it not : I shall 
Soon be myself again. 

MYRRHA. 

I wait with patience, 
What I shall see with pleasure. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Scarce a moment 
Before your entrance in this haf., Zarina, 
Queen of Assyria, departed hence. 

MYRRHA. 

Ah! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Wherefore do you start? 

MYRRHA. 

Did I do so? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T was well you enter'd by another portal, 

Else you had met. That pang at least is spared her! 

MYRRHA. 

I know to feel for her. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

That is too much, 
And beyond nature — 't is nor mutual, 
Nor possible. You cannot pity her, 
Nor she aught but 

MYRRHA. 

Despise the favourite slave? 
Not more than I have ever scorn'd myself. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Scorn'd ! what, to be the envy of your sex, 
And lord it o'er the heart of the world's lord 7 

MYRRHA. 

Were you the lord of twice ten thousand worlds — 
As you are like to lose the one you sway'd — 
I did abase myself as much in being 
Your paramour, as though you were a peasant — 
Nay, more, if that the peasant were a Greek. 

SA3.DANAPALUS. 

You talk it well 

MYRRHA. 

And truly. 



SARDANAPALns. 

In the hour 
Of man's adversity, all things grow daring 
Against the falling ; but as I am not 
Quite fallen, nor now disposed to bear repro?che» 
Perhaps because I merit them too often, 
Let us then part while peace is still between u? 

MYRRHA. 

Part! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Have not all past human beings parted, 
And must not all the present one day part ? 

MYRRHA. 

Why? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

For your safety, which I will have look'd .0, 
With a strong escort to your native land ; 
And such gifts as, if you have not been all 
A queen, shall make your dowry worth a kingdoiu 

MYRRHA. 

1 pray you talk not thus. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The queen is gone 
You need not shame to follow. I would faL 
Alone — I eeek no partners but in pleasure. 

MYRRHA. 

And I no pleasure but in parting not. 
You shall not force me from you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Think well of it— 
It soon may be too late. 

MYRRHA. 

So let it be ; 
For then you cannot separate me from you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And will not; but I thought you wish'd it. 

MYRRHA. 

I? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

You spoke of your abasement. 

MYRRHA. 

And I feel it 
Deeply — more deeply than all things but love. 

SARDANAPALJS. 

Then fly from it. 

MYRRHA. 

'T will not recall the past — 
'T will not restore my honour, nor my heart. 
No — here I stand or fall. If that you conquer, 
I live to joy in your great triumph ; should 
Your lot be different, I 'II not weep, but share it. 
You did not doubt rue a few hours ago. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Your courage never — nor your love till now ; 
And none could make me doubt it, save yourself. 
Those words 

MYRRHA. 

Were words. I pray you, let the proofs 
Be in the past acts you were pleased to praise 
This very night, and in my further bearing, 
Beside, wherever you are borne by fate. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I am content ; and, trusting in my cause, 
Think we may yet be victors, and return 
To peace — the only victory I covet. 
To me war is no glory — conquest no 



SARDANAPALUS. 



119 



Renown. To be forced thus to uphold my right, 

Sits heavier on my heart than all the wrongs 

These men would bow me down with. Never, never 

Can I forget this night, even should I live 

To add it to the memory of others. 

I thought to have made mine inoffensive rule 

An era of sweet peace 'midst bloody annals, 

A green spot amidst desert centuries, 

On which the future would turn back and smile, 

And cultivate, or sigh when it could not 

Recall Sardanapalus' golden reign. 

I thought to have made my realm a paradise, 

And every moon an epoch of new pleasures. 

I took the rabble's shouts for love — the breath 

Of friends for truth — the lips of woman for 

My only guerdon — so they are, my Myrrha: 

[He kisses her. 
Kiss me. Now let them take my realm and life ! 
They shall have both, but never thee ! 

MVRRUA. 

No, never ! 
Man inny despoil his brother man of all 
That s great or glittering : kingdoms fall — hosts yield — 
Friends fail — slaves fly — and all betray — and, more 
Than all, the most indebted — but a heart 
That loves without self-love ! 'T is here — now prove it. 

Enter Salemenes. 

SALEMENES. 

I sought you. — How ! she here again ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Return not 
J\'ow to reproof: methinks your aspect speaks 
Of higher matter than a woman's presence. 

SALEMENES. 

The only woman whom it much imports me 
At such a moment now is safe in absence — 
The queen 's embark'd. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And well ? say that much. 

SALEMENES. 

Yes. 
Her transient weakness has past o'er; at least, 
It settled into tearless silence: her 
Pale face and glittering eye, after a glance 
Upon her sleeping children, were still fix'd 
Upon the palace towers, as the swift galley 
Stole down the hurrying stream beneath the starlight; 
But she said nothing. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Would I felt no more 
Than she has said. 

SALEMENES. 

'T is now too late to feel! 
Your feelings cannot cancel a sole pang : 
To change them, my advices bring sure tidings 
That the rebellious Medea and Chaldees, marshall'd 
By their two leaders, are already up 
In arms again ; and, serrying their ranks, 
Prepare to attack : they have apparently 
Been join'd by other satraps. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What! more rebels 7 
Let us be first, then. 



SALEMENES. 

That were hardly pruden 
Now, though it was our first intention. If 
By noon to-morrow we are join'd by those 
I 've sent for by sure messengers, we shall be 
In strength enough to venture an attack, 
Ay, and pursuit too : but, till then, my voice 
Is to await the onset. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I delest 
That waiting ; though it seems so safe to fight 
Behind high walls, and hurl down foes into 
Deep fosses, or behold them sprawl on spikes 
Strew'd to receive them, still I like it not — 
My soul seems lukewarm ; but when I set on them, 
Though they v. ere piled on mountains, I would have 
A pluck at them, or perish in hot blood ! — 
Let me then charge ! 

SALEMENES. 

You talk like a young soldier. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I am no soldier, but a man : speak not 
Of soldiership — I loathe the word, and those 
Who pride themselves upon it ; but direct me 
Where I may pour upon them. 

SALEMENES. 

You must spare 
To expose your life too hastily ; 't is not 
Like mine or any other subject's breath : 
The whole war turns upon it — with it ; this 
Alone creates it, kindles, and may quench it — 
Prolong it — end it, 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Then let us en<i both ! 
'T were better thus, perhaps, than prolong either; 
I 'm sick of one, perchance of both. 

[A trumpet sounds without, 

SALEMENES. 

Hark ! 

SARDANAPALUS 

Let us 
Reply, not listen. 

SALEMENES. 

And your wound ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is bound- 
'T is heal'd — I had forgotten it. Away ! 
A leech's lancet would have scratch'd me deeper 
The slave that gave it might be well ashamed 
To have struck so weakly. 

SALEMENES. 

Now may none this hour 
Strike with a better aim ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Ay, if wo conquer; 
But if not, they will only leave to me 
A task they might have spared their king. Upon them 
[ Trumpet sounds again 

SALEMENES. 

I am with you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Ho, my arms ! again, my arms 

I Exeunt. 









320 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 






BALEA. 




ACT V. 


Surely he is a god ! 




SCENE I. 


MTRRHA. 

So we Greeks deem too ; 




The same Hull of llie Palace. 


And yet I sometimes think that gorgeous orb 




Mvkkiia and Bai.ea. 


Must rather be the abode of gods than one 




MVRRHA (at a window). 


Of the immortal sovereigns. Now he breaks 




The day at last lias broken. What a night 


Through all the clouds, and fills my eyes with light 




Hath usher'd it ! How beautiful in heaven! 


Thai shuts the world out. I can look no more. 




Though varied with a transitory storm, 


EALEA. 




More beautiful in that variety ! 


Hark ! heard you not a sound ? 




How hideous upon earth ! where peace and hope, 


MVRRHA. 




And love and revel, in an hour were trampled 


No, 't was mere fancy, 




By human passions to a human chaos, 


They battle it beyond the wall, and not 




Not yet resolved to separate elements. — 


As in late midnight conflict in the very 




'Tis warring still! And can the sun so rise, 


Chambers ; the palace has become a fortress 




So bright, so rolling back the clouds into 


Since that insidious hour ; and here within 




Vapours more lovely than the unclouded sky, 


The. very centre, girded by vast courts 




With golden pinnacles, and snowy mountains, 


And regal halls of pyramid proportions, 




And billows purpler than the ocean's, making 


Which must be carried one by one before 




In heaven a glorious mockery of the earth, 


They penetrate to where they then arrived, 




So like, we almost deem it permanent ; 


We are as much shut in even from the sound 




So fleeting, we can scarcely call it aught 


Of peril as from glory. 




Beyond a vision, 't is so transiently 


BALEA. 




Scatter'd along the eternal vault : and yet 


But they reach'd 




It dwells upon the soul, and soothes the soul, 


Thus far before. 




And blends itself into the soul, until 


MVRRHA. 




Sunrise and sunset form the haunted epoch 


Yes, by surprise, and were 




Of sorrow and of love ; which they who mark not 


Beat back by valour ; now at once we have 




Know not the realms where those twin genii 


Courage and vigilance to guard us. 




(Who chasten and who purify our hearts, 


BALEA. 




So that we would not change their sweet rebukes 


May they 




For all the boisterous joys that ever shook 


Prosper! 




The air with clamour) build the palaces 


MVRRHA. 




Where their fond votaries repose and breathe 


That is the prayer of many, and 




Hi lefly ; — but in that brief cool calm inhale 


The dread of more : it is an anxious hour ; 




Enough of heaven to enable them to bear 


I strive to keep it from my thoughts. Alas! 




The rest of common, heavy, human hours, 


How vainly ! 




And dream them through in placid sufferance; 


BALEA. 




Though seemingly employ'd like all the rest 


It is said the king's demeanour 




Of toiling breathers in allotted tasks 


In the late action scarcely more appall'd 




Of pain or pleasure, two names for one feeling. 


The rebels than astonish'd his true subjects. 




Which our internal, restless agony 


MVRRHA. 




Would vary in the sound, although the sense 


'Tis easy to astonish or appal 




Escapes our highest efforts to be happy. 


The vulgar mass which moulds a horde of slaves 




BALEA. 


But he did bravely. 




Ifou muse right calmly : and can you so watch 


BAI.EA. 




The sunrise which may be our last ? 


Slew he not Beleses? 




MYRRHA. 


I heard the soldiers say he struck him down. 




It is 


MVRRHA. 




Therefore that I so watch it, and reproach 


The wretch was overthrown, but rescued to 




Those eyes, which never may behold it more, 


Triumph, perhaps, o'er one who vanquish'd him 




For having look'd upon it oft, too oft, 


In fight, as he had spared him in his peril, 




Without the reverence and the rapture due . 


And by that heedless pity risk'd a crown. 




To that which keeps all earth from being as fragile 


BALEA. 




As I am in this form. Come, look upon it, 


Hark! 




The Chaldee's god, which, when I gaze upon, 


MVRRHA. 




I grow almost a convert to your Baal. 


You are right ; some steps approach, but sk ly. 




BALEA. 


Enter soldiers, bearing in Salemenes wounded, ~iith 




\» now ne reigns in heaven, so once on earth 


a broken Javelin in las Side : tf ey seat 1dm upoi on* 




He sway'd. 


of tlie Couches which furnish the Apartment. 




MVRRHA. 


MYRRHA. 




He sways it now far more, then ; never 


Oh, Jove ! 




Had crthly monarch half the peace and glory 


BALEA. 




'Vhicii centres in a single ray of his. 


Then all is over. 





SARDANAPALUS. 



3 C 21 



SILEMtSES. 

That is false. 
Hew aown the slave who says so, if a soldier. 

MVRKIIA. 

Spare him — he 's none : a mere court butterfly, 
That flutters in the pageant of a monarch. 

SALEMENES. 

Let him live on, then. 

MVRRHA. 

So wilt thou, I trust. 

SALEMENES. 

I fain would live this hour out, and the event, 
But doubt it. Wherefore did ye bear me here? 

SOLDIER. 

By the king's order. When the javelin struck you, 
You fell and fainted ; 't was his strict command 
To bear you to this lull. 

SALEMENES. 

'T was not ill done : 
For, seeming slain in that cold dizzy trance, 
The sight might shake our soldiers — but — 'tis vain. 
I feel it ebbing ! 

MVRRHA. 

Let me see the wound ; 
I am not quite skilless : in my native land 
'Tis part of our instruction. War being constant, 
We are nerved to look on such tilings. 

SOLDIER. 

Best extract 
The javelin. 

MVRRHA. 

Hold ! n->, no, it cannot be. 

SALEMENES. 

I am sped, then ! 

MVRRHA. 

With the blood that fast must follow 
The extracted weapon, I do fear thy life. 

SALEMENES. 

And I not death. Where was the king when you 
Convey'd me from the spot where I was stricken? 

SOLDIER. 

Upon the same ground, and encouraging 
With voice and gesture the dispirited troops 
Who had seen you fall, and fultcr'd back. 

SALEMENES. 

Whom heard ye 
Named next to the command? 

SOLDIER. 

I did not hear. 

SALEMENES. 

Fly, then, and tell him, 't was my last request 
That Zames take my post until the junction, 
So hoped for, yet delay'd, of Ofratanes, 
Satrap of S'isa. Leave me here: our troops 
Are not so numerous as to spare your absence. 

SOLDIER. 

But, prince 

SAr.F.MENES. 

Hence, I say ! Here 's a courtier and 
A woman, the best chamber company. 
As you would not permit me to expire 
Upon the field, 1 'II have no idle soldiers 
About my sick couch. Hence ! and do my bidding ! 

[Exeunt the Sotiliers. 

MVRRHA. 

Gallant and glorious spirit ! must the earth 
2 F 46 



So soon resign thee ? 

SALEMENES. 

Gentle Myrrha, 't is 
The end I would have chosen, had I saved 
The monarch or the monarchy by this ; 
As 'lis, I have not outlived them. 

MVRRHA. 

You wax paler. 

SALEMENES. 

Your hand ; this broken weapon but prolongs 
My pangs, without sustaining life enough 
To make me useful: I would draw ii forth, 
And my life with it, could 1 but hear how 
The fight goes. 

Enter Sardanapalus and Soldiers. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

My best brother ! 



SALEMENES. 



Is lost? 



And the battlo 



Sardanapalus (despondingly). 
You see me here. 

SALEMENES. 

I 'd rather see you thus ! 
[He draws out the weapon from the wound, and diet 

SARDANAPAIUS. 

And thus I will be soon, unless the succour, 
The last frail reed of our bcleaguer'd hopes, 
Arrive with Ofratanes. 

MVRRHA. 

Did you not 
Receive a token from your dying brother, 
Appointing Zames chief? 

SARDANAPALUS. 
I did. 
MVKKHA. 

Where 's Zames f 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Dead. 

MVRRHA. 

And Altada? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Dying. 

MVKKHA. 

Pania? Sfero? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Pania yet lives ; but Sfero 's fled, or captive. 
I am alone. 

MVRRHA. 

And is all lost ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Our walls, 
Though thinly mann'd, may still hold out against 
Their present force, or aught save treachery : 
But i' the field 

MVRRHA. 

I thought 't was the intent 
Of Salemenes not to risk a sally 
Till ye were strengthen'd by the expected succour* 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I overruled him. 

MVRRHA. 

Well, the fault 's a brsvo on«), 

SARDANAPALUS. 

But fatal. Oh, my brother ! 1 wouid givu 



322 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



These realms, of which thou wert the ornament, 
The sword and shield, the sole redeeming honour, 

To call back But I will not weep for thee ; 

Thou shalt be mourn'd for as thou wouldst be mourn'd. 

It grieves me most that thou couldst quit this life 

Believing that I could survive what thou 

Hast died for — our long royalty of race. 

If I redeem it, I will give thee blood 

Of thousands, tears of millions, for atonement 

(The tears of all the good are thine already). 

If not, we meet again soon, if the spirit 

Within us lives beyond: — thou readest mine, 

And dost me justice now. Let me once clasp 

That yet warm hand, and fold that throbless heart 

[Embraces the body. 
To this which beats so bitterly. Now, bear 
The body hence. 

SOLDIER. 

Where ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

To my proper chamber. 
Place it beneath my canopy, as though 
The king lay there : when this is done, we will 
Speak further of the rites due to such ashes. 

[Exeunt Soldiers with the body of Salemeses, 
Enter Pania. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Well, Pania ! you have placed the guards, and issued 
The orders fix'd on ? 

PANIA. 

Sire, I have obcy'd. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And do the solJiers keep their hearts up? 

PANIA. 

Sire '/ 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I 'm ansvver'd ! When a king asks twice, and has 

A question as an answer to his question, 

It is a portent. What, they are dishearten'd ? 

PANIA. 

The death of Salemenes, and the shouts 
Of the exulting rebels on his fall, 
Have made them 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Rage — not droop — it should have been. 
We '11 find the means to rouse them. 

PANIA. 

Such a loss 
Might sadden even a victory. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Alas ! 
Who can so feel it as I feel? but yet, 
Though coop'd within these walls, they are strong, and we 
Have those without will break their way through hosts, 
To make their sovereign's dwelling what it was — 
A palace — not a prison nor a fortress. 
Enter an officer hastily. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Thv face seems ominous. Speak ! 

OFFICER. 

I dare not. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Dare rot 7 
Wh ; 'c millions dare revolt with sword in hand ! 



That 's strange. I pray thee break that loyal silence 
Which loathes to shock its soverei"n : we can hear 
\A orse than thou hast to tell. 

PANIA. 

Proceed, thou hearosL 

OFFICER. 

The wall which skirted near the river's brink 
Is thrown down by the sudden inundation 
Of the Euphrates, which now rolling, swoln 
From the enormous mountains where it rises, 
By the late rains of that tempestuous region, 
O'erlloods its banks, and hath destroy'd the bulwark 

PANIA. 

That 's a black augury ! It has been said 
Fur ages, "That the city ne'er should yield 
To man, until the river grew its foe." 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I can forgive the omen, not the ravage. 
How much is swept down of the wall ? 

OFTICER. 

About 
Some twenty stadii. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And all this is left 
Pervious to the assailants ? 

OFFICER. 

For the present 
The river's fury must impede the. assault ; 
But when he shrinks into his wonted channel, 
And may be cross'd by the accustom'd barks, 
The palace is their own. 

SARDANAPALUS. . 

That shall be never. 
Though men, and gods, and elements, and omens, 
Have risen up 'gainst one who ne'er provoked them, 
My fathers' house shall never be a cave 
For wolves to hoard and howl in. 

PANIA. 

With your sanction 
I will proceed to the spot, and take such measures 
For the assurance of the vacant space 
As time and means permit. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

About it straight, 
And bring me back, as speedily as furl 
And fair investigation may permit, 
Report of the true state of this irruption 
Of waters. [Exeunt Pania und the Office 

MYRRHA. 

Thus the very waves rise up 
Against you. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

They are not my subjects, girl, 
And may be pardou'd, since they can't be punish'd. 

MYRRHA. 
I joy to see this portent shakes you not. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I am past the fear of portents : they can tell niO 
Nothing I have not told myself since midnight . 
Despair anticipates such things. 

MVRKI1A. 

Despair . 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, not despair precisely. When we know 
All that can come, and how to meet it, our 
Resolves, if firm, may merit a more noble 



SARDANAPALUS. 



323 



Word than this is to give it utterance. 

But what are words to us ? we have well nigh done 

With them and all things. 

MYRRHA. 

Save one deed — the last 
And gieatest to all mortals ; crowning act 
Of all that was — or is — or is to be — 
The only thing common to all mankind, 
So different in their births, tongues, sexes, natures, 
Hues, features, climes, times, feelings, intellects, 
Without one point of union, save in tliis, 
To which we tend, for which we 're born, and thread 
The labyrinth of mystery call'd life. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Our clew being well nigh wound out, let 's be cheerful. 
They who have nothing more to fear may well 
Indulge a smile at that which once appall'd ; 
As children at discover'd bugbears. 

Re-enter Pania. 

PANIA. 

'Tis 

As was reported : I have order'd there 
A double guard, withdrawing from the wall 
Where it was strongest the required addition 
To watch the breach occasion'd by the waters. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Vou have done your duty faithfully, and as 
My worthy Pania! further ties between us 
Draw near a close. I pray you take this key : 

[Gives a key. 
It opens to a secret chamber, placed 
Behind the couch in my own chamber. (Now 
^ress'd by a nobler weight than e'er it bore — 
Though a long line of sovereigns have lain down 
klong its golden frame — as bearing for 
A time what late was Salemenes). Search 
The secret covert to which this will lead you ; 
T is full of treasure ; take it for yourself 
And your companions : there's enough to load ye, 
Though ye be many. Let the slaves be freed, too ; 
And all the inmates of the palace, of 
Whatever sex, now quit it in an hour. 
Thence launch the regal barks, once form'd for pleasure. 
And now to serve for safety, and embark. 
The river 's broad and swoln, and uncommanded 
(More potent than a king) by these besiegers. 
Fly ! and be happy ! 

PANIA. 

Under your protection ! 
So you accompany your faithful guard. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

No, Pania ! that.must not be ; get thee hence, 
And leave me to my fate. 

PANIA. 

'T is the first timo 
I ever disobey'd : but now 

SARDANAPALUS. 

So all men 
Dare beard me now, and Insolence within 
Apes Treason from without. Question no further; 
'T is my command, my last command. W r ill thou 
Oppose it 1 thou ! 

PANIA. 

But vet — not vet. 



SARDANAPALUS. 

Well, then, 
Swear that you will obey when I shall give 
The signal. 

PANIA. 

With a heavy but true heart, 
I promise. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

'T is enough. Now order here 
Fagots, pine-nuts, and wither'd leaves, and such 
Things as catch lire and blaze with one sole spark; 
Bring cedar, too, and precious drugs, and spices, 
And mighty planks, to nourish a tall pile; 
Bring frankincense and myrrh, too, for it is 
For a great sacrifice 1 build the pyre; 
And heap them round yon throne. 

PANIA. 

My lord ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

I have said it. 
And you have sworn. 

PANIA. 

Anil could keep niv faith 
Without a vow. [Exit Pania 

MYRRHA. 

What mean you ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

You shall know 
Anon — what the whole earth shall ne'er forget. 

Pania, returning with a Herald. 

PANIA. 

My king, in going forth upon my duty, 

This herald has been brought before me, craving 

An audience. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Let him speak. 

HERALD. 

The King Arbaces 

SARDANAPALUS. 

What, crown'd already? — But, proceed. 

HERALD. 

Beleses, 
The anointed high priest 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Of what god, or demon? 
With new kings rise new altars. But, proceed ; 
You are sent to prate your master's will, and not 
Reply to mine. 

HERALD. 

And Satrap Ofratanes ■ 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Why, he is ours. 

HERALD {showing a ring). 
Be sure that he is now 
In the camp of the conquerors ; behold 
His signet ring. 

SARDANAPALUS 

'Tis his. A worthy triad ! 
Poor Salemenes! thou hast died in time 
To see one treachery the less: this man 
Was thy true friend and my most trusted subject. 
Proceed. 

HERALD. 

They offer thee thy life, and freedom 
Of choice to single out a residence 



324 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



In any of the further provinces, 
Guarded and watch'd, but not confined in person, 
Where thou shalt pass thy days in peace ; but on 
Condition that the three young princes are 
Given up as hostages. 

bardanapalus {ironically). 

The generous victors t 

HERALD. 

I wait the answer. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Answer, slave ! How long 
Have slaves decided on the doom of kings ? 

HERALD. 

Since they were free. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Mouth-piece of mutiny ! 
Thou at the least shalt learn the penalty 
Of treason, though its proxy only. Pania ! 
Let his head be thrown from our walls within 
The rebels' lines, his carcass down the river. 
Away with him ! 

[Pania and the Guards seizing him. 

PANIA. 

I never yet obey'd 
Tour orders with more pleasure than the present. 
Hence with him, soldiers ! do not soil this hall 
Of royalty with treasonable gore ; 
Put hkn to rest without. 

HERALD. 

A single word : 
My office, king, is sacred. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And what 's mine ? 
That thou shouldst come and dare to ask of me 
To lay it down ? 

HERALD. 

I but obey'd my orders, 
At the same peril, if refused, as now 
Incurr'd by my obedience. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

So, there are 
New monarchs of an hour's growth as despotic 
As sovereigns swathed in purple, and enthroned 
From birth to manhood ! 

HERALD. 

My life waits your breath. 
Yours (I speak humbly) — but it may be— yours 
May also be in danger scarce less imminent: 
Would it then suit the last hours of a line 
Such as is that of Nimrod, to destroy 
A peaceful herald, unarm'd, in his office; 
And violate not only all that man 
Holds sacred between man and man — but that 
More holy tie which links us with the gods ? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

He 's right. — Let him go free. — My life's last act 
Shall no°t be one of wrath. Here, fellow, take 

[Gires him a golden cup from a table near 
This golden goblet ; let it hold your wine, 
And think of me ; or melt it into ingots, 
And think of nothing but their weight and value. 

HERALD. 

I thank you doubly for my life, and this 

Most gorgeous gift, which renders it more precious. 

But must I bear no answer? 



SARDANAPALUS. 

Yes, — I ask 
An hour's truce to consider. 

HERALD. 

But an hour's' 

SARDANAPALUS. 

An hour's : if at the expiration of 
That time your masters hear no further from me, 
They are to deem that I reject their terms, 
And act befittingly. 

HERALD. 

I shall not fail 
To be a faithful legate of your pleasure. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And, hark ! a word more. 

HERALD. 

I shall not forget it, 
Whate'er it be. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Commend me to Beleses ; 
And tell him, ere a year expire, I summon 
Him hence to meet me. 

HERALD. 

Where? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

At Babylon. 
At least from thence he will depart to meet me. 

HERALD. 

I shall obey you to the letter. [Exit HcraliL 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Pania! — 
Now, my good Pania! — quick ! with what I order'd. 

PANIA. 

My lord, — the soldiers are already charged. 
And, see ! they enter. 

[Soldiers enter, and form a Pile about the 
Throne, etc. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Higher, my good soldiers, 
And thicker yet ; and see that the foundation 
Be such as will not speedily exhaust 
Its own too subtle flame ; nor yet be quench'd 
With aught officious aid would bring to quell it. 
Let the throne form the core of it ; I would not 
Leave that, save fraught with fire unquenchable, 
To the new comers. Frame the whole as if 
'T were to enkindle the strong tower of our 
Inveterate enemies. Now it bears an aspect ! 
How say you, Pania, will this pile suffice 
For a king's obsequies ? 

PANIA. 

Ay, for a kingdom's. 
I understand you now. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And blame me ? 

PANIA. 

No— 
Let me but fire the pile and share it with you. 

MYRRH v. 

That duty 's mine. 

PANIA. 

A woman's ! 

MVURHA. 

'T is the soldier's 
Part to die for his sovereign, and why not 
The woman's with her lo\ er 7 



SARDANAPALUS. 



325 



'T is most strange ! 

MVRRHA. 

But not so rare, my Pania, as thou think'st it. 
In the meantime, live thou. — Farewell ! the pile 
Is ready. 

PANIA. 

I should shame to leave my sctereign 
With but a single female to partake 
His death. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Too many far have heralded 
Me to the dust already. Get thee hence 
Enrich thee. 

PANIA. 

And live wretched ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Think upon 
Thy vow ; — 't is sacred and irrevocable. 

PANIA. 

Since it is so, farewell. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Search well my chamber, 
Feel no remorse at bearing off the gold ; 
Remember, what you leave you leave the slaves 
Who slew me : and when you have borne away 
All safe off to your boats, blow one long blast 
Upon the trumpet as you quit the palace. 
The river's brink is too remote, its stream 
Too loud at present to permit the echo 
To reach distinctly from its banks. Then fly, — 
And as you sail, turn back ; but still keep on 
Your way along the Euphrates: if you reach 
The land of Paphlagonia, where the queen 
Is safe with my three sons in Cotta's court, 
Say what you saw at parting, and request 
That she remember what I said at one 
Parting more mournful still. 

PANIA. 

That royal hana ! 
Let me then once more press it to my lips ; 
And these poor soldiers who throng round you, and 
Would fain die with you ? 

[The Soldiers and Pania throng round him, 
hissing his hand and the hem of his robe. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

My best ! my last friends ! 
Let's not unman each other — part at once : 
All farewells should be sudden, when for ever, 
Else they make an eternity of moments, 
And clog the last sad sands of life with tears. 
Hence, and be happy : trust me, I am not 
JVow to be pitied, or far more for what 
Is past than present ; — for the future, 't is 
In the hands of the deities, if such 
There be : I shall know soon. Farewell — farewell. 
[Exeunt Pania and the Soldiers. 

MVRRHA. 

These men were honest : it is comfort still 
That our last looks shall be on loving faces. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And lovely ones, my beautiful ! — but hear me! 
If at this moment, for we now arc on 
The brink, thou feel'st an inward shrinking from 
This leap through flame into the future, say it: 
I shall not love thee less ; nay, perhaps more, 
2 f 2 



For yielding to thy nature : and there 's time 
Yet for thee to escape hence. 

MVRRHA. 

Shall I light 
One of the torches which lie heap'd beneath 
The ever-burning lamp that burns without, 
Before Baal's ihrine, ir. the adjoining hall '! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Do so. Is that thy answer ? 

MYKKUA. 

Thou shalt see. 

[Exit Mvrrha. 

SARDANAPALUS (solus). 

She 's firm. My fathers! whom I will rejoin, 

It may be, purified by death from some 

Of the gross stains of too material being, 

I would not leave your ancient first abode 

To the defilement of usurping bondmen; 

If I have not kept your inheritance 

As ye bequeath'd it, this bright part of it, 

Your treasure, your abode, your sacred relics 

Of arms, and records, monuments, and spoils, 

In which they would have rcvell'd, I bear with me 

To you in that absorbing element, 

Which most personifies the soul, as leaving 

The least of matter unconsumed before 

Its fiery working : — and the light of this 

Most royal of funereal pyres shall be 

Not a mere pillar form'd of cloud and flame, 

A beacon in the horizon for a day, 

And then a mount of ashes, but a light 

To lesson ages, rebel nations, and 

Voluptuous princes. Time shall quench full many 

A people's records, and a hero's acts ; 

Sweep empire after empire, like this first 

Of empires, into nothing ; but even then 

Shall spare this deed of mine, and hold it up 

A problem few dare imitate, and none 

Despise — but, it may be, avoid the life 

Which led to such a consummation. 

Mvrrha returns with a lighted Torch in one Hani, 
and a Cup in the other. 

MYRRHA. 

Lo! 

I 've lit the lamp which lights us to the stars. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And the cup 7 

MYRRHA. 

'T is my country's custom to 
Make a libation to the gods. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And mine 
To make libations amongst men. I 'vc not 
Forgot the custom; and, although alone, 
Will drain one draught in memory of many 
A joyous banquet past. 

[Sardanap vr.rs takes the nip, and after drinK 
ing and tinkling llie reversed cup, as a drof 
falls, exclaims — 

And this libation 
Is for the excellent Belescs. 

MYRRHA. 

Why 
Dwells thy mind rather upon ' hat man's name 
Than on his mate's in villany 7 



326 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



SARDANAPALUS. 

The one 
Is a mere soldier, a mere tool, a kind 
Of human sword in a fiend's hand ; the other 
Is master-mover of his warlike puppet ; 
But I dismiss them from my mind. — Yet pause, 
My Myrrha ! dost thou truly follow me, 
Freely and fearlessly ? 

MVRRHA. 

And dost thou think 
A Greek girl dare not do for love that which 
An Indian widow braves for custom? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Then 
We but await the signal. 

MVRRHA. 

It is long 
In sounding. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Now, farewell ; one last embrace ! 

MYRRHA. 

Embrace, but not the last ; there is one more. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

True, the commingling fire will mix our ashes. 

MVRRHA. 

And pure as is my love to thee, shall they, 

Purged from the dross of earth, and earthly passion, 

Mix pale with thine. A single thought yet irks me. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Say it. 

MVRRHA. 

It is that no kind hand will gather 
The dust of both into one urn. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

The better ! 
Rather let them be borne abroad upon 
The winds of heaven, and scatter'd into air, 
Than be polluted more by human hands 
Of slaves and traitors ; in this blazing palace, 
And its enormous walls of reeking ruin, 
We leave a nobler monument than Egypt 
Hath piled in her brick mountains o'er dead kings, 
Or hue, for none know whether those proud piles 
Be for their monarch, or their ox-god Apis: 
So much for monuments that have forgotten 
Their very record ! 

MVRRHA. 

Then farewell, thou earth ! 
And loveliest spot of earth ! farewell, Ionia ! 
Be thou still free and beautiful, and far 
Aloof from desolation ! My last prayer 
Was for thee, my last thoughts, save one, were of thee ! 

SARDANAPALUS. 

And that? 

MVRRHA. 

Is yours. 

[The trumpet of Pania sounds vjithout. 

SARDANAPALUS. 

Hark! 

MVRRHA. 

IVuw ! 

tARDANAPALUS. 

Adieu, Assyria I 
I loved thee well, my own, my father's land, 
And better as my country than my kingdom. 



I satiated thee with peace and joys ; and this 
Is my reward ! and now I owe thec nothing, 
Not even a grave. [He mounts the pile 

Now, Myrrha ! 

MVRRHA. 

Art thou ready? 

SARDANAPALUS. 

As the torch in thy grasp. 

[M vrrha Jires the pile. 

MVRRHA. 

'T is fired ! I come. 
[As Mvrrha springs forward to throw herself 
into the flames, tlie Curtain falls. 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 291, line 19. 
And thou, my own Ionian Myrrha. 
" The Ionian name had been still more comprehen- 
sive, having included the Achaians and the Boeotians, 
who, together with those to whom it was afterwards 
confined, would make nearly the whole of the Greek 
nation, and among the orientals it was always the gen- 
eral name for the Greeks." — MitforiTs Greece, vol. i. 
p. 199. 

Note 2. Page 294, line I. 
-"Sardanapalus, 



The kins, and sun of Anacyndaraxes, 

In one day built Anrhmlus and Tarsus! 

Eat, drink and love ; the rest 's not worth a fillip." 

" For this expedition, he took not only a small chosen 
body of the phalanr, but all his light troops. In the 
first day's march he reached Anchialus, a town said to 
have been founded by the king of Assyria, Sardanapalus. 
The fortifications, in their magnitude and extent, still 
in Arrian's time, bore the character of greatness, which 
the Assyrians appear singularly to have affected in works 
of the kind. A monument, representing Sardanapalus, 
was found there, warranted by an inscription in Assyrian 
characters, of course in the old Assyrian language, which 
the Greeks, whether well or ill, interpreted thus : " Sar- 
danapalus, son of Anacyndaraxes, in one day founded 
Anchialus and Tarsus. Eat, drink, play : all other 
human joys are not worth a fillip." Supposing this 
version nearly exact (for Arrian says it was net quite so) 
whether the purpose has not been to invite to civil order 
a people disposed to turbulence, rather than to recom 
mend immoderate luxury, may perhaps reasonably be 
questioned. What, indeed, could be the object of \ 
king of Assyria in founding such towns in a country so 
distant from his capital, and so divided from it by an 
immense extent of sandy deserts and lofty mountains, 
and, still more, how the inhabitants could be at once io 
circumstances to abandon themselves to the intemperate 
joys which their prince has been supposed to have recom- 
mended, is not obvious ; but it may deserve observation 
that, in that line of coast, the southern of Lesser Asia, 
ruins of cities, evidently of an age after Alexander, yet 
barely named in history, at this day astonish the adven- 
turous traveller by their magnificence and elegance. 
Amid the desolation which, under a singularly barbarian 
government, has, for so many centuries, been daily 
spreading in the finest countries of the globe, wheihei 



THE TWO FOSCAR1. 



327 



more from soil and climate, or from opportunities for by a revolution, obloquy on his memory would follow 
commerce, extraordinary means must have been found of course from the policy of his successors and their 
for communities to flourish there, whence it may seem | partisans. 

that the measures ofSardanapalus were directed by juster I "The inconsistency of traditions concerning Sarda- 
views than have been commonly ascribed to him ; but napalus is striking in Diodorus's account of him."— 
that monarch having been the last of a dynasty, ended 1 MilforaVs Greece, vol. be. pp. 311, 312, and 313. 



A HISTORICAL TRAGEDY. 



The father softens, but the governor's resolved. 

CRITIC. 



DRAMATIS PERSONiE. 



MEN. 
Francis Foscari, Doge of Venice. 
Jacopo Foscari, Son of the Doge. 
James Loredako, a Patrician. 
Marco Memmo, a Chief of the Forty. 
Barbarigo, a Senator. 

Other Senators, the Council of Ten, Guards, Attend- 
ants, etc., etc. 

WOMAN. 
Marina, Wife of young Foscari. 



Scene — The Ducal Palace, Venice. 



THE TWO FOSCARI 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. 

A Hall in the Ducal Palace. 

Enter Loredano and Barbarigo, meeting. 

LOREDANO. 

Where is the prisoner? 

BARBARIGO. 

Reposing from 
The Question. 

LOREDANO. 

The hour 's past — fix'd yesterday 
For the resumption of his trial. — Let us 
Rejoin our colleagues in the council, and 
Urge his recall. 

BARBARIGO. 

Nay, let him profit by 
A few brief minutes for his tortured limbs ; 
He was o'ersvrought by the Question yesterday, 
And may die under it if now repeated. 

LOREDANO. 

Well ! 

BARBARIGO. 

I yield not to you in love of justice, 
Or hate of the ambitious Foscari, 
Father and son, and all their noxious race j 



But the poor wretch has suffered beyond nature's 
Most stoical endurance. 

LOREDANO. 

Without owning 
His crime. 

BARBARIGO. 

Perhaps without committing any, 
But he avow'd the letter to the Duke 
Of Milan, and his sufferings half atone for 
Such weakness. 

LOREDANO. 

We shall see. 

BARBARIGO. 

You, Loredano 
Pursue hereditary hate too far. 



LOREDANO. 



How far ? 



BARBARIGO. 

To extermination. 

LOREDANO. 

When they are 
Extinct, you may say this. — Let 's into council. 

BARBARIGO. 

Vet pause — tne number of our colleagues is not 
Complete yet ; two are wanting ere we can 
Proceed. 

LOREDANO. 

And the chief judge, the Doge? 

BARBARIGO. 



With more than Roman fortitude, is ever 
First at the board in this unhappy process 
Against his last and only son. 



No — he. 



LOREDANO. 

True — true — 



His last. 



BARBARIGO. 

Will nothing move you ? 

LOREDANO. 

Feels he, think vou 

BARBARIGO. 

He shows it not. 

LOREDANO. 

I have mark'd that — the wretch ' 

BARBARIGO. 

But yesterday, I hear, on his return 



328 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



To llie ducal chambers, as he pass'd the threshold, 
The old man fainted. 

LOREDANO. 

It begins to work, then. 

BARBARIGO. 

The work is half your own. 

LOREDANO. 

And should be all mine — 
My father and my uncle are no more. 

BARBARIGO. 

I have read their epitaph, which says they died 
By poison. 

LOREDANO. 

When the Doge declared that he 
Should never deem himself a sovereign till 
The death of Peter Loredano, both 
The brothers sicken'd shortly : — he is sovereign. 

babsa'rigo. 
A wretched one. 

LOREDANO. 

What should they be who make 
Orphans ? 

BARBARIGO. 

But did the Doge make you so ? 

LOREDANO. 

Yes. 

BARBARIGO. 

What solid proofs ? 

LOREDANO 

When princes set themselves 
To work in secret, proofs and process are 
Alike made difficult; but I have such 
Of the first, as shall make the second needless. 

BARBARIGO. 

But you will move by law? 

LOREDANO. 

By all the laws 
Which he would leave us. 

BARBARIGO. 

They are such in this 
Our state as render retribution easier 
Than 'mongst remoter nations. Is it true 
That you have written in your books of commerce 
(The wealthy practice of our highest nobles), 
" Doge Foscari, my debtor for the deaths 
Of Marco and Pietro Loredano, 
My sii e and uncle ?" 

LOREDANO. 

It is written thus. 

BARBARIGO. 

Ana will you leave it unerased ? 

LOREDANO. 

Till balanced. 

BARBARIGO. 

And how? 

( Two Senators pass over the Stage, as in their way to 
the Hall of the Council of Ten). 

LOREDANO. 

You see the number is complete, 
follow me. [Exit Loredano. 

BARBARIGO (solus). 

Follow thee ! I have follow'd long 
Thy path of desolation, as the wave 
Sweeps after that before it, alike whelming 
The wreck that creaks to the wild winds, and wretch 
<Vho shrieks within its riven ribs, as gush 



The waters through them ; but this son and sire 
Might move the elements to pause, and yet 
Must I on hardily like them — Oh ! would 
I could as blindly and remorselessly ! — 
Lo, where he comes ! — Be still, my heart ! they are 
Thy foes, must be thy victims : wilt thou beat 
For those who almost broke thee ? 
Enter Guards, with young Foscari as prisoner, etc, 

GUARD. 

Let him rest. 

Signor, take time. 

JACOFO FOSCARI. 

I thank thee, friend, I 'm feeble ; 
But thou may'st stand reproved. 

GUARD. 

I '11 stand the hazard. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

That 's kind : — I meet some pity, but no mercy ; 
This is the first. 

GUARD. 

And might be the last, did they 
Who rule beheld us. 

barbarigo (advancing to the guard). 
There is one who does : 
Yet fear not ; I will neither be thy judge 
Nor thy accuser; though the hour is past, 
Wait their last summons — I am of " the Ten," 
And waiting for that summons, sanction you 
Even by my presence : when the last call sounds 
We '11 in together. — Look well to the prisoner ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

What voice is that? — 'tis Barharigo's ! Ah ! 
Our house's foe, and one of my few judges. 

BARBARIGO. 

To balance such a foe, if such there be, 
Thy father sits amongst thy judges. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

True, 
He judges. 

BARBARIGO. 

Then deem not the laws too harsh 
Which yield so much indulgence to a sire 
As to allow his voice in such high matter 
As the state's safety 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And his son's. I'm faint a 
Let me approach, I pray you, for a breath 
Of air, yon window which o'erlooks the waters. 
Enter an Officer, who whispers Barbarigo. 
barbarigo (to the guard). 
Let him approach. I must not speak with him 
Further than thus ; I have transgress'd my duty 
In this brief parley, and must now redeem it 
Within the Council Chamber. 

[Exit Barbaric* 

[Guard conducting Jacopo Foscari to the window. 

GUARD. 

There, sir, 't is 
Open — How feel you ? 

•IACOPO FOSCARI. 

Like a boy — Oh Venice ! 

GUARD. 

And your limbs ? 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



52 f J 



JACOPO FOSCAKI. 

Limbs ! how often have they borne me 
Bounding o er yon blue tide, as I have skinmi'd 
The gondola along in childish race, 
And, masqued as a young gondolier, amidst 
My gay competitors, noble as I, 
Raced lor our pleasure in the pride of strength, 
While tne fair populace of crowding beauties, 
Plebeian as patrician, cheer'd us on 
With dazzling smiles, and wishes audible, 
And waving kerchiefs, and applauding hands, 
Even to the goal ! — How many a time have 1 
Cloven, with arm still lustier, breast more daring, 
The wave all roughen'd ; with a swimmer's stroke 
Flinging the billows back from my drench'd hair, 
And laughing from my lip the audacious brine, 
Which kiss'd it like a wine-cup, rising o'er 
The waves as they arose, and prouder still 
The loftier they uplifted me ; and oft, 
In wantonness of spirit, plunging down 
Into their green and glassy gulfs, and making 
My way to shells and sea-weed, all unseen 
Bv those above, till they wax'd fearful; then 
Returning with my grasp full of such tokens 
As show'd that I had search'd the deep ; exulting, 
With a far-dashing stroke, and drawing deep 
The long-suspended breath, again I spurn'd 
The foam which broke around me, and pursued 
My track like a sea-bird. — I was a boy then. 

GUARD. 

Be a man now ; there never was more need 
Of manhood's strength. 

jacopo foscaki (looking from the lattice). 
My beautiful, my own, 
My only Venice — this is breath ! Thy breeze, 
Thine Adrian sea-breeze, how it fans my face ! 
The very winds feel native to mv veins, 
And cool them into calmness ! How unlike 
The hot gales of the horrid Cyclades, 
Which howl'd about my Candiole dungeon, and 
Made my heart sick. 

GUARD. 

I see the colour comes 
Back to your cheek : Heaven send you strength to bear 
What more may be imposed ! — I dread to think on't. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

They will not banish me again ? — No — no, 
Let them wring on ; lam strong yet. 

GUAHD. 

Confess, 
And the rack will be spared you. 

JACOPO FOSCARI 

I confess'd 
Once — twice before : both times they exiled me. 

GUARD. 

And the third time will slay you. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Let them do so, 
So I be buried in my birth-place : better 
Be ashes here than aught that lives elsewhere. 

GUARD. 

And can you so much love the soil which hates you 7 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

The soil ! — Oh no, it is the seed of the soil 
Which persecutes me ; but mv native earth 
Will take me as a mother to her arms. I 

41 



I ask no more than a Venetian grave — 
A dungeon, what they will, so it be here. 

Enter an Officer. 

OFFICER. 

Bring in the prisoner ! 

GUARD. 

Signor, you hear the order. 
. ACOI'O FOBqARI. 
Ay, I am used to such a summons ; 't is 
The third time they have tortured me: — then lend me 
Thine arm. [y<„ t ;, c (ju«>J 

0» FICER. 

Take mine, sir ; 't is my duty to 
Be nearest to your person. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

You ! — you are he 
Who yesterday presided o'er my pangs — 
Away ! — I '11 walk alone. 

OFFICER. 

As you please, signor; 
The sentence was not of my signing, but 
I dared not disobey the Council, when 
They 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Bade thee stretch me on their horrid engine. 
I pray thee touch me not— that is, just now ; 
The time will come they will renew that order, 
But keep off from me till 't is issuea. As 
I look upon thy hands, my curdling limbs 
Quiver with the anticipated wrenching, 

And the cold drops strain th-ough my brow as if 

But onward — I have borne it — I can bear it. — 
How looks my father ? 

OFFICER. 

With his wonted aspect. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

So doth the earth, and sky, the blue of ocean, 

The brightness of our city, and her domes, 

The mirth of her Piazza, even now 

Its merry hum of nations pierces here, 

Even here, into these chambers of the unknown 

Who govern, and the unknown and the unnurnber'd 

Judged and destroy'd in silence — all thirds wear 

The self-same aspect, to my very sire ! 

Nothing can sympathize with Foscan, 

Not even a Foscari. — Sir, I attend you. 

[Exeunt Jacopo Foscari, Officer, eu 

Enter Memmo and another Senator. 
memmo. 
He's gone — we are too late: — think you "the Ten' 
Will sit for any length of time to-day ? 

SENATOR. 

They say the prisoner is most obdurate, 
Persisting in his first avowal ; but 
More I know not. 

! 

And that is much ; the secrets 
Of yon terrific chamb r are as hidden 
From us, the premier nobles of the state, 
As from the people. 

SENATOR. 

Save the wonted rumours, 
Which ^like the tales of spectres that are rite 
Near ruin'd buildings) never have been proved. 



330 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Nor wholly disbelieved : men know as little 
Of the state's real acts as of the grave's 
Unfathom'd mysteries. 

MEMMO. 

But with length of time 
We gain a step in knowledge, and I look 
Forward to be one day of the decemvirs. 

SENATOR. 

Or Doge ? 

MEMMO. 

Why, no, not if I can avoid it. 

SENATOR. 

'Tis the first station of the state, and may 
Be lawfully desired, and lawfully 
Attain'd by noble aspirants. 

MEMMO. 

To such 
I leave it ; though born noble, my ambition 
Is limited : I 'd rather be an unit 
Of an united and imperial " Ten," 
Than shine a lonely, though a gilded cipher. — 
Whom have we here ? the wife of Foscari ? 

Enter Marina, with a female attendant. 
MARINA. 

What, no one ? — I am wrong, there still are two ; 
But they are senators. 

MEMMO. 

Most noble lady, 
Command us. 

marina. 
J command ! Alts ! my life 
Has been one long entreaty, and a vain one. 

MEMMO. 

I understand thee, but I must not answer. 

marina (fiercely). 
True — none dare answer here save on the rack, 

Or question save those 

memmo (interrupting her). 

High-born dame ! bethink thee 
Where thou now art. 

marina. 
Where I now am ! — It was 
My husband's father's palace. 

MEMMO. 

The Duke's palace. 

MARINA. 

And his son's prison ;— true, I have not forgot it ; 
And if there were no other nearer, bitterer 
Remembrances, would thank the illustrious Memmo 
For pointing out the pleasures of the place. 

MEMMO. 

Be calm. 

marina (looking up towards heaven). 
I am ; but oh, thou eternal God ! 
Canst thou continue so, with such a world? 

MEMMO. 

Thy husband yet may be absolved. 

MARINA. 

He is, 
In heaven. I pray yea, signor senator, 
Speak not of that, you are a man of office, 
So is the Doge , he has a son at stake, 
Now, at this moment, and I have a husband, 
Or had : they are there within, or were at least 
An hour since, face to face, as judge and culprit : 
Will he condemn him ? 



MEMMO. 

1 trust not. 

MARINA. 

But if 
He does not, there are those will sentence boto. 

MEMMO. 

They can. 

MARINA. 

And with them power and will are one 
In wickedness : — my husband 's lost ! 

MEMMO. 

Not so j 
Justice is judge in Venice. 

MARINA. 

If it were so 
There now would be no Venice. But let it 
Live on, so the good die not, till the hour 
Of nature's summons; but "the Ten's " is quicker, 
And we must wait on 't. Ah ! a voice of wail ! 

[A faint cry within. 

SENATOR. 

Hark ! 

MEMMO. 

'T was a cry of 

MARINA. 

No, no ; not my husband's— 
Not Foscari's. 

MEMMO. 

The voice was 

MARINA. 

Not his; no. 
He shriek ! No ; that should be his father's part. 
Not his — not his — he '11 die in silence. 

[A faint groan again uiUin. 

MEMMO. 

What ! 
Again? 

MARINA. 

His voice ! it seeni'd so : I will not 
Believe it. Should he shrink, I cannot cease 
To love ; but — no — no — no — it must have been 
A fearful pang which wrung a groan from him. 

SENATOR. 

And feeling for thy husband's wrongs, wouldst thou 
Have him bear more than mortal pain in silence ? 

MARINA. 

We all must bear our tortures. I have not 

Left barren the great house of Foscari, 

Though they sweep both the Doge and son from (ifej, 

I have endured as much in giving life 

To those who will succeed them, as they can 

In leaving it : but mine were joyful pangs ; 

And yet they wrung me till I could have shriek'd, 

But did not, for my hope was to bring forth 

Heroes, and would not welcome them with tears 

MEMMO. 

All 's silent now. 

MARINA. 

Perhaps all 's over ; but 
I will not deem it : he hath nerved himself, 
And now defies them. 

Enter an Officer hastily. 

MEMMO. 

How now, friend, what seek yon / 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



331 



OFFICER. 

A leech. The prisoner has fainted. 



[Exit Officer. 

MEMMO. 

Lady, 
'T were better to retire. 

senator {offering to assist her). 
I pray thee do so. 

MARINA. 

Off) / will tend him. 

MEMMO. 

You ! Remember, lady ! 
[ngress is given to none within those chambers, 
Except "the Ten," and their familiars. 

MARINA. 

Well, 
I know that none who enter there return 
As they have enter'd — many never ; but 
They shall not balk my entrance. 

MEMMO. 

Alas! this 
Is but to expose yourself to harsh repulse, 
And worse suspense. 

MARINA. 

Who shall oppose me ? 

MEMMO. 

They 
Whose duty 't is to do so. 

MARINA. 

'Tis their duty 
To trample on all human feelings, all 
Ties which bind man to man, to emulate 
The fiends, who will one day requite them in 
Variety of tort'.iring ! Yet I 'II pass. 

MEMMO. 

(t is impossible. 

MARINA. 

That shall be tried. 
Despair defies even despotism : there is 
That in my heart would make its way through hosts 
With levell'd spears ; and think you a few jailors 
Shall put me from my path ? Give me, then, way ; 
This is the Doge's palace ; I am wife 
Of the Duke's son, the innocent Duke's son, 
And they shall hear this ! 

MEMMO. 

It will only serve 
More to exasperate his judges. 

MARINA. 

What 
Are judges who give way to anger ? they 
Who do so are assassins. Give me way. 

[Exit Marina- 
senator. 
Poor lady ! 

MEMMO. 

'T is mere desperation ; she 
Will not be admitted o'er the threshold. 

SENATOR. 

And 
Even if 6he be so, cannot save her husband. 
But, see, the officer returns. 

[The officer passes over the stage with another person. 

MEMMO. 

I hardly 



Thought that " the Ten" had even this touch of pity. 
Or would permit assistance to the sufferer. 

SENATOR. 

Pity ! Is 't pity to recall to feeling 

The wretch too happy to escape to death 

By the compassionate trance, poor nature's last 

Resource against the tyranny of pain ? 

MEMMO." 

I marvel they condemn him not at once. 

SENATOR. 

That 's not their policy : they 'd have him live, 
Because he fears not death ; and banish him, 
Because all earth, except his native land, 
To him is one wide prison, and each breath 
Of foreign air he draws seems a slow poison, 
Consuming but not killing. 

MEMMO. 

Circumstance 
Confirms his crimes, but he avows them not. 

SENATOR. 

None, save the letter, which he says was written, 
Address'd to Milan's duke, in the full knowledge 
That it would fall into the senate's hands, 
And thus he should be re-convey'd to Venice. 

MEMMO. 

But as a culprit. 

SENATOR. 

Yes, but to his country : 
And that was all he sought, so he avouches. 

MEMMO. 

The accusation of the bribes was proved. 

SENATOR. 

Not clearly, and the charge of homicide 
Has been annull'd by the death-bed confession 
Of Nicholas Erizzo, who slew the late 
Chief of " the Ten." 

MEMMO. 

Then why not clear him 7 

SENATOR. 

Thai 
They ought to answer ; for it is well known 
That Almoro Donato, as I said, 
Was slain by Erizzo for private vengeance. 

MEMMO. 

There must be more in this strange process than 
The apparent crimes of the accused disclose — 
But here come two of " the Ten ;" let us retire. 

[Exeunt Memmo and Senator. 
Enter Loredano and Barbarigo. 
barbarigo (addressing loredano). 
That were too much : believe me, 't was not meet 
The trial should go further at this moment. 

LOREDANO. 

And so the Council must break up, and Justice 
Pause in her full career, because a woman 
Breaks in on our deliberations ? 

BARBARIGO. 

No, 
That 's not the cause ; you saw the prisoner's s»ie. 

loredano. 
And had he not recover'd ? 

BARBARIGO. 

To relapse 
Upon the least renewal. 



332 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LOREDANO. 

'T was not tried. 

BARliARIGO. 

T is vain to murmur ; the majority 
In council were against you. 

LOREDANO. 

Thanks to you, sir, 
And the old ducal dotard, who combined 
The worthy voices which o'erruled my own. 

BARBARIGO. 

I am a judge ; but must confess that part 
Of our stern duty, which prescribes the Question, 
And bids us sit and see its sharp infliction, 
Makes me wish 

LOREDANO. 

What? 

BARBARIGO. 

That you would sometimes feel, 
As I do always. 

LOREDANO. 

Go to, you 're a child, 
Infirm of feeling as of purpose, blown 
About by every breath, shook by a sigh, 
And melted by a tear — a precious judge 
For Venice ! and a worthy statesman to 
Be partner in my policy ! 

BARBARIGO. 

He shed 
No tears. 

LOREDANO. 

He cried out twice. 

BARBARIGO. 

A saint had done so, 
Kven with the crown of glory in his eye, 
At such inhuman artifice of pain 
As was forced on him : but he did not cry 
For pity ; not a word nor groan escaped him, 
And those two shrieks were not in supplication, 
But wrung from pangs, and followed by no prayers. 

LOREDANO. 

He mutter'd many times between his teeth, 
But inarticulately. 

BARBARIGO. 

That I heard not ; 
Vou stood more near him. 

LOREDANO. 

I did so. 

BARBARIGO. 

Methought, 
To my surprise too, you were touch'd with mercy, 
And were the first to call out for assistance 
When he was failing. 

LOREDANO. 

I believed that swoon 
His last. 

BARBARIGO. 

And have I not oft heard thee name 

His and his father's death your nearest wish? 

LOREDANO. 

II lie dies innocent, that is to say, 

With his guilt unavow'd, he '11 be lamented. 

BARBARIGO. 

Whai, wouldst thou slay his memory? 

LOREDANO. 

Wouldst thou have 



His state descend to his children, as it must, 
If he die unattainted ? 

BARBARIGO. 

War with them too? 

LOREDANO. 

With all their house, till theirs or mine are nothing. 

BARBARIGO. 

And the deep agony of his pale wife, 
And the repress'd convulsion of the high 
And princely brow of his old father, which 
Broke forth in a slight shuddering, though rarely, 
Or in some clammy drops, soon wiped away 
In stem serenity ; these moved you not ? 

[E.lit LOREDANO 

He 's silent in his hate, as Foseari 

Was in his suffering ; and the poor wretch moved me 

More by his silence than a thousand outcries 

Could have effected. 'T was a dreadful sight 

When his distracted wife broke through into 

The hall of our tribunal, and beheld 

What we could scarcely look upon, long used 

To such sights. I must think no more of this, 

Lest I forget in this compassion for 

Our foes their former injuries, and lose 

The hold of vengeance Loredano plans 

For him and me ; but mine would be content 

With lesser retribution than he thirsts for, 

And I would mitigate his deeper hatred 

To milder thoughts ; but, for the present, Foseari 

Has a short hourly respite, granted at 

The instance of the elders of the Council, 

Moved doubtless by his wife's appearance in 

The hall, and his own sufferings. — Lo ! they come: 

How feeble and forlorn ! I cannot bear 

To look on them again in this extremity : 

I '11 hence, and try to soften Loredano. 

[Exit Barbarigo. 



ACT II. 

SCENE I. 

A Hall in the Doge's Palace. 
The Doge and a Senator. 

SENATOR. 

Is it your pleasure to sign the report 
Now, or postpone it till to-morrow? 
doge. 

Now ; 
I overlook'd it yesterday : it wants 
Merely the signature. Give me the pen — 

[The Doge sits down and signs the paper. 
There, signor. 

senator {looking at the paper). 
You have forgot ; it is not sign'd. 
doge. 
Not sign'd ? Ah, I perceive my eyes begin 
To wax more weak with age. I did not see 
That I had dipp'd the pen without effect. 
senator (dipping the pen into the ink, and placing thi 
paper before the Doge. 

Your hand, too, shakes, my lord : allow me, thus 

doge. 
'T is done, I thank you 



THE TWO FOSCAR1. 



333 



SENATOR. 

Thus the act confirm'd 
By you and by "the Ten," gives peace to Venice. 

DOCE. 

'T is long since she enjoy'd it : may it be 
As long ere she resume her arms ! 

SENATOR. 

'Tis almost 
Thirty-four years of nearly ceaseless warfare 
With the Turk, or the powers of Italy ; 
The state had need of some repose. 

DOGE. 

No doubt : 
I found her queen of ocean, and I leave her 
Lady of Lombardy: it is a comfort 
That I have added to her diadem 
The gems of Brescia and Ravenna ; Crema 
And Bergamo no less are hers ; her realm 
By land has grown by thus much in my reign, 
While her sea-sway has not shrunk. 

SENATOR. 

'T is most true, 
And merits all our country's gratitude. 

DOGE. 

Perhaps so. 

SENATOR. 

Which should be made manifest. 

DOGE. 

I have not complain'd, sir. 

SENATOR. 

My good lord, forgive me. 

DOGE. 

For what? 

SENATOR. 

My heart bleeds for you. 

DOGE. 

For me, signor ? 

SENATOR. 

And for your 

DOGE. 

Stop! 

SENATOR. 

It must have way, my lord : 
I have too many duties towards you 
And all your house, for present kindness, 
Not to feel deeply for your son. 

DOGE. 

Was this 
In your commission 7 

SENATOR. 

What, my lord? 

DOGE. 

This prattle 
Of things you know not : but the treaty 's sign'd : 
Return with it to them who sent you. 

6ENATOR. 

I 

Obey. I had in charge, too, from the Council 
That you would fix an hour for their reunion. 

DOGE. 

Say, when they will — now, even at this moment, 
If it so please them : I am the state's servant. 

SENATOR. 

They would accord some time for your repose. 

DOGE. 

I have no repose, that is, none which shall cause 
2G 



The loss of an hour's time unto the state. 
Let them meet when they will, I shall be found 
IVhere I should be, and what I have been ever. 

[Exit Senator. 
[The Doge remains in silence. 
Enter an attendant. 

ATTENDANT. 

Prince! 

DOGE. 

Say on. 

ATTENDANT. 

The illustrious lady Foscari 
Requests an audience. 

DOGE. 

Bid her enter. Poor 
Marina ! [Exit Attendant. 

[The Doge remains in silence as before. 
Enter Marina, 
marina. 
I have ventured, father, on 
Your privacy. 

doge. 
I have none from you, my child. 
Command my time, when not commanded by 
The state 

marina. 
I wish'd to speak to you of him. 
doge. 
Your husband ? 

MARINA. 

And your son. 

DOGE. 

Proceed, my daughter l 

MARINA. 

I had obtain'd permission from "the Ten" 
To attend my husband for a limited number 
Of hours. 

DOGE. 

You had so. 

MARINA. 

'T is revoked. 

DOGE. 

By whom? 

MARINA. 

"The Ten." — When we had reach'd " the Bridge oi 

Sighs," 
Which I prepared to pass with Foscari, 
The gloomy guardian of that passage first 
Demurr'd ; a messenger was sent back to 
" The Ten ;" but as the court no longer sate, 
And no permission had been given in writing, 
I was thrust back, with the assurance that 
Until that high tribunal re-assembled, 
The dungeon walls must still divide us. 

DOGE. 

True. 

The form has been omitted in the haste 
With which the court adjourn'd, and till it meets 
T is dubious. 

MARINA. 

Till it meets ! and when it meets 
They'll torture him again ; and he and I 
Must purchase by renewal of the rack 
The interview of husband and of wife. 



334 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


The holiest tie beneath the heavens? — Oh God! 


And scanty hairs, and shaking hands, and heads 


Dost thou see this? 


As palsied as their hearts are hard, they council, 


DOGE. 


Cabal, and put men's lives out, as if life 


Child— child 


Were no more than the feelings long extinguish' d 


marina {abruptly). 


In their accursed bosoms. 


Call me not "child !" 


DOGE. 


You soon will have no children — you deserve none — 


You know not 


You, who can talk thus calmly of a son 


MARINA. 


Jn circumstances which would call forth tears 


I do — I do— an<{ so should you, methinks — 


Of blood from Spartans ! Though these did not weep 


That these are demons ; could it be else that 


Their boys who died in battle, is it written 


Men, who have been of women born and suckled — 


That they beheld them perish piecemeal, nor 


Who have loved, or talk'd at least of love — have given 


Strech'd forth a hand to save them ? 


Their hands in sacred vows — have danced their babes 


DOGE. 


Upon their knees, perhaps have mourn* d above them 


You behold me : 


In pain, in peril, or in death — who are, 
Or were at least in seeming human, could 


I cannot weep — I would I could ; but if 


Each white hair on this head were a young life, 


Do as they have done by yours, and you yourself, 


This ducal cap the diadem of earth, 


You, who abet them ? 


This ducal ring with which I wed the waves 


DOGE. 


A talisman to still them — 1 'd give all 


I forgive this, for 


For him. 


You know not what you say. 


MARINA. 




With less he surely might be saved. 


MARINA. 

You know it well, 


DOGE. 


And feel it nothing. 


That answer only shows you know not Venice. 


DOGE. 


Alas ! how should you ? she knows not herself, 


I have borne so much, 


In all her mystery. Hear me — they who aim 


That words have ceased to shake me. 


At Foscari, aim no less at his lather ; 


MARINA. 


The sire's destruction would not save the son ; 


Oh, no doubt ! 


They work by different means to the same end, 


You have seen your son's blood flow, and your flesh 


And that is but they have not conquer'd yet. 


shook not; 


MARINA. 


And, after that, what are a woman's words ? 


But tTiey have crush'd. 


No more than woman's tears, that they should shake 


DOGE. 


you. 


Nor crush'd as yet — I live. 


DOGE. 


MARINA. 


Woman, this clamorous grief of thine, I tell thee, 


And your son, — how long will he live ? 


Is no more in the balance weigh'd with that 


DOGE. 


Which but I pity thee, my poor Marina ! 


I trust, 


MARINA. 


For all that yet is past, as many years 


Pity my husband, or I cast it from me ; 


And happier than his father. The rash boy, 


Pity thy son ! Thou pity ! — 't is a word 


With womanish impatience to return, 


Strange to thy heart — how came it on thy lips ? 


Hath ruin'd all by that detected letter ; 


DOGE. 


A high crime, which I neither can deny 


I must bear these reproaches, though they wrong me. 


Nor palliate, as parent or as duke : 


Couldst thou but read 


Had he but borne a little, little longer 


MARINA. 


His Candiote exile, I had hopes he has quench'd 


'Tis not upon thy brow 


them — 


Nor in thine eyes, nor in thine acts, — where then 


He must return. 


Should I behold this sympathy ? or shall ? 


MARINA. 


doge (pointing downwards). 


To exile ? 


There ! 


DOGE. 


MARINA. 


I have said it 


In the earth ? 


MARINA. 


DOGE. 


And can I not go with him ? 


To which I am tending : when 


DOGE. 


It lies upon this heart, far lightlier, though 


You well know 


Loaded with marble, than the thoughts which press it 


This prayer of yours was twice denied before 


Now, you will know me better. 


By the assembled "Ten," and hardly now 


MARINA. 


Will be accorded to a third request, 


Are you, then, 


Since aggravated errors on the part 


Indeed, thus to be pitied ? 


Of your lord renders them still more austere. 

MARINA. 


DOGE. 


Pitied ! None 


Austere ? Atrocious ! The old hdman fiends, 


Shall ever use that base word, with which men 


With one foot in the grave, with dim eyes, strange 


Cloke their soul's hoarded triumph, as a fit or.e 


To tears, save crops of dotage, with long white 


To mingle with my name ; that name shall be, 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



335 



As far as / have borne it, what it was 
When I received it. 

MARINA. 

But for the poor children 
Of him thou canst not, or thou wilt not save : 
You were the last to bear it. 

DOGE. 

Would it were so ! 
Better for him he never had been born, 
Better for me. — I have seen our house dishonour'd. 

MARINA. 

That 's false ! A truer, nobler, trustier heart, 
More loving, or more loyal, never beat 
Within a human breast. I would not change 
My exiled, persecuted, mangled husband, 
Oppressed, but not disgraced, crush'd, o'erwhelm'd, 
Alive, or dead, for prince or paladin 
In story or in fable, with a world 
To back his suit. Dishonour'd ! — he dishonour'd ! 
I tell thee, Doge, 't is Venice is dishonour'd ; 
His name shall be her foulest, worst reproach, 
For w hat he suffers, not for what he did. 
'T is \i' who are all traitors, tyrant ! — ye ! 
Did you but love your country like this victim, 
Who totters back in chains to tortures, and 
Submits to all things rather than to exile, 
You 'd fling yourselves before him, and implore 
His grace for your enormous guilt. 

DOGE. 

He was 

Indeed all you have said. I better bore 

The deaths of the two sons Heaven took from me 

Than Jacopo's disgrace. 

MARINA. 

That word again ? 

DOGE. 

Has he not been condetnn'd ? 

MARINA. 

Is none but guilt so ? 

DOGE. 

Time may restore his memory — I would hope so. 

He was my pride, my but 't is useless now — 

I am not given to tears, but wept for joy 
When he was born : those drops were ominous. 

MARINA. 

I say he 's innocent : and, were he not so, 
Is our own blood and kin to shrink from us 
In fatal moments? 

DOGE. 

I shrank not from him : 
But I have other duties than a father's ; 
The state would not dispense me from those duties ; 
Twice I demanded it, but was refused ; 
The) must then be fulfill'd. 

Enter an Attendant. 



« The Ten." 



ATTENDANT. 

A message from 



DOGE. 

Who bears it? 

ATTENDANT. 

Noble Lorcdano. 

DOGE. 

He ' — but admit him. [Exit Attendant. 



MARINA. 

Must I then retire? 

DOGE. 

Perhaps it is not requisite, if this 

Concerns your husband, and if not Well, signot, 

Your pleasure! [To Loredano, entering. 

LOREDANO. 

I bear that of "the Ten." 

DOGE. 

They 
Have chosen well their envoy. 

LOREDANO. 

'T is their choice 
Which leads me here. 

DOGE. 

It does their wiaiiom honour, 
And no less to their courtesy. — Proceed. 

LOREDANO. 

We have decided. 

DOGE. 

We? 

LOREDANO. 

"The Ten" in council. 

DOGE. 

What! have they met again, and met without 
Apprizing me ? 

LOREDANO. 

They wish'd to spare your feelings, 
No less than age. 

DOGE. 

That's new — when spared they either? 
I thank them, notwithstanding. 

LOREDANO. 

You know well 
That they have power to act at their discretion, 
With or without the presence of the Doge. 

DOGE. 

'T is some years since I learn'd this, long before 
I became Doge, or dream'd of such advancement. 
You need not school me, signor : I sate in 
That council when you were a young patrician, 

LOREDANO. 

True, in my father's time ; I have heard him and 
The admiral, his brother, say as much. 
Your highness may remember them : they both 
Died suddenly. 

DOGE. 

And if they did so, better 
So die, than live on lingering'y in pain. 

LOREDANO. 

No doubt ! yet most men like to live their days out 

DOGE. 

And did not they ? 

LOREDANO. 

The grave knows best : they died. 
As I said, suddenly. 

DOGE. 

Is that so strange, 
That you repeat the word emphatically ? 

LOREDANO. 

So far from strange, that never was lucre dealt* 
In my mind half so natural as theirs. 
Think ycu not so ? 

DOGE. 

What should 1 think of mortam , 



33G 



BYRON'S YVORKS. 



LOREDANO. 
That they have mortal hes. 

DOGE. 

1 understand you ; 
Your sires were mine, and you are heir in all things. 

LOREDANO. 

Yon uest know if I should be so. 

DOGE. 

I do. 

Your fathers were my foes, and I have heard 
Foul rumours were abroad ; I have also read 
Their epitaph, attributing their deaths 
To poison. 'T is perhaps as true as most 
Inscriptions upon tombs, and yet no less 
A fable. 

LOREDANO. 

Who dares say so? 

DOGE. 

I !— 'T is true 
Your fathers were mine enemies, as bitter 
As their son e'er can be, and I no less 
Was theirs ; but I was openly their foe: 
I never work'd by plot in council, nor 
Cabal in commonwealth, nor secret means 
Of practise against life, by steel or drug. 
The proof is, your existence. 

LOREDANO. 

I fear not. 

DOGE. 

You have no cause, being what I am ; but were I 
That you would have me thought, you long ere now 
S\ ere past the sense of fear. Hate on ; I care not. 

" LOREDANO. 

I never yet knew that a noble's life 

In Venice had to dread a Doge's frown, 

That is, by open means. 

DOGE. 

But I, good signor, 
Am, or at least was, more than a mere duke, 
In blood, in mind, in means ; and that they know 
Who dreaded to elect me, and have since 
Striven all they dare to weigh me down : be sure, 
Before or since that period, had I held you 
At so much price as to require your absence, 
A word of mine had set such spirits to work 
As would have made you nothing. But in all things 
I have observed the strictest reverence ; 
Nor for the laws alone, for those you have strain'd 
( I do not speak of you but as a single 
Voice of the many) somewhat beyond what 
I could enforce for my authority, 
Were I disposed to brawl ; but, as I said, 
I have observed with veneration, like 
A priest's for the high altar, even unto 
The sacrifice of my own blood and quiet, 
Satety, and all save honour, the decrees, 
The health, the pride, and welfare of the state. 
And now, sir, to your business. 

LOREDANO. 

'T is decreed, 
That, without farther repetition of 
The Question, or continuance of the trial, 
Which only tends to show how stuoborn guilt is, 
(" The Ten," dispensing with the stricter law 
Which still prescribes the Question, till a full 
Confession, and the prisoner partly having 



Avow'd his crime, in not denying thai 

The letter to the Duke of Milan 's his), 

James Foscari return to banishment, 

And sail in the same galley which convey 'd him. 

MARINA. 

Thank God ! At least they will not drag him more 
Before that horrible tribunal. Would he 
But think so, to my mind the happiest doom, 
Not he alone, but all who dwell here, could 
Desire, were to escape from such a land. 

DOGE. 

That is not a Venetian thought, my daughter. 

MARINA. 

No, 't was too human. May I share his exile 7 

LOREDAXO. 

Of this " the Ten" said nothing. 

MARINA. 

So I thought j 
That were too human, also. But it was not 
Inhibited? 

LOREDANO. 

It was not named. 

marina {to the Doge). 

Then, father, 
Surely you can obtain or grant me thus much : 

\To Loredano. 
And you, sir, not oppose my prayer to be 
Permitted to accompany my husband. 

DOGE. 

I will endeavour. 

marina. 
And you, signor? 

LOREDANO. 

Lady ! 
'T is not for me to anticipate the pleasure 
Of the tribunal. 

MARINA. 

Pleasure ! what a word 
To use for the decrees of 

DOGE. 

Daughter, know you 
In what a presence you pronounce these things ? 

MARINA. 

A prince's and his subject's. 

LOREDANO. 

Subject? 

MARINA. 

Oh! 

It galls you : — well, you are his equal, as 
You think, but that you are not, nor would be, 
Were he a peasant : — well, then, you 're a prince, 
A princely noble; and what then am I? 

LOREDANO. 

The offspring of a noble house. 

MARINA. 

And wedded 
To one as noble. What or whose, then, is 
The presence that should silence my free thoughts? 

LOREDANO. 

The presence of your husband's judges. 

DOGE. 

And 
The deference due even to the lightest word 
That falls from those who rule in Venice. 

MARINA. 

Keep 



THE TWO FOSCAR1. 



337 



Those maxims for your mass of sccred mechanics, 

Your merchants, your Dalmatian and Greek slaves, 

Vour tributaries, your dumb citizens, 

And mask'd nobility, vour sbirri, and 

Vour spies, your galley and your other slaves, 

1*0 whom your midnight carry ings-ofT and drownings, 

Vour dungeons next the palace roofs, or under 

The water's level ; your mysterious meetings, 

And unknown dooms, and sudden executions, 

Vour " Bridge of Sighs," your strangling chamber, and 

Your torturing instruments, have made ye seem 

The beings of another and worse world ! 

Keep such for them : I fear ye not. I know ye ; 

Have known and proved your worst, in the infernal 

Process of my poor husband ! Treat me as 

Ye treated him: — you did so, in so dealing 

With him. Then what have I to fear/mm you, 

Even if I were of fearful nature, which 

I trust lam not ? 

DOGE. 

You hear, she speaks wildly. 

MARINA. 

Wot wisely, yet not wildly. 

LOREDANO. 

Lady ! words 
Utter'd within these walls, I bear no further 
Than to the threshold, saving such as pass 
Between the Duke and me on the state's service. 
Doge ! have you aught in answer ? 

DOGE. 

Something from 
The Doge ; it may be also from a parent. 

loreda.no. 
My mission here is to the .Doge. 

DOGE. 

Then say 
The Doge will choose his own ambassador. 
Or state in person what is meet; and for 
The father 

LOEEDAMO. 

I remember mine. — Farewell ! 
I kiss tne hands of the illustrious lady, 
And bow me to the Duke. 

[Exit Lokedano. 

MARINA. 

Are you content? 

DOGE. 

I am what you behold. 

MARINA. 
And that 's a mystery. 

DOGE. 

All things are so to mortals: who can read them 
Save he who made ? or, if they can, the few 
And gifted spirits, who have studied long 
That loathsome volume — man, and pored upon 
Those black and bloody leaves his heart and brain 
But learn a magic which recoils upon 
The adept who pursues it : all the sins 
We find in others, nature made our own ; 
All our advantages are those of fortune ; 
Birth, wealth, health, beauty, are her accidents, 
And when we cry out against fate, 't were well 
We should remember fortune can take nought 
Save what she gave — the rest was nakedness, 
And lusts, and appetites, an.) vanities, 
The universal heritage, to battle 
•J .. 'J 41! 



YV iih as we may, and least in humblest stations, 

W here hunger swallows all in one low want, 

And the original ordinance, that man 

Must sweat for his poor pittance, keeps all passions 

Aloof, save fear of famine ! All is lo»v, 

And false, and hollow — clay from first to last, 

The prince's nrn no less than potter's vessel. 

Our fame is in men's breath, our lives upon 

Less than their breath ; our durance upon days, 

Our days on seasons ; our whole being un 

Something which is not vx ! — So, we are slaves, 

The greatest as the meanest — nothing rests 

Upon our will ; the will itself no less 

Depends upon a straw than on a storm ; 

And when we think we lead, we arc: most led, 

And still towards death, a thing which comes as much. 

Without our act or choice, as birth ; so that 

Methinks we must have sinn'd in some old world, 

And this is hell : the best is, that it is not 

Eternal. 

MARINA. 

These are things we cannot judge 
On earth. 

DOGE. 

And how then shall we judge each other, 
Who are all earth, and I, who arn call'd upon 
To judge my son ? I have administer'd 
My country faithfully — victoriously — 
I dare them to the proof— the chart of what 
She was and is: my reign has doubled realms; 
And, in reward, the gratitude of Venice 
Has left, or is about to leave, me single. 

MARINA. 

And Foscari ? I do not think of such things, 
So I be left with him. 

DOGE. 

You shall be so ; 
Thus much they cannot well deny. 

MARINA. 

And if 
They should, I will fly with him. 

DOGE. 

That can ne'er be. 
And whither would you fly ? 

MARINA. 

I know not, reck nol- 
To Syria, Egypt, to the Ottoman — 
Any where, where we might respire unfetter'd, 
And live, nor girt by spies, nor liable 
To edicts of inquisitors of state. 

DOGE. 

What, wouldst thou have a renegade for husband, 
And turn him into traitor? 

MARINA. 

He is none : 
The country is the traitress, which thrusts forth 
Her best and bravest from her. Tyranny 
Is far the worst of treasons. Dost thou deem 
None rebels except subjects ? The ptince who 
Neglects or violates his trust is more 
A brigand than the robber-chief. 

DOGE. 

i cannot 
Charge me with such a breach of faith. 

MARINA. 

No; thou 



333 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Observ's', obey'st, such laws as make old Draco' 
A code of mercy by comparison. 

DOGE. 

I found the law ; I did not make it. Were I 

A subject, still I might find parts and portions 

Fit for amendment ; but, as prince, I never 

Would change, fur the sake of my house, the charter 

Left by our fathers. 

MARINA. 

Did they make it for 
The ruin of their children ? 

DOGF. 

Under such laws, Venice 
Has risen to what she is — a state to rival 
Iri deeds, and days, and sway, and, let me add, 
In glory (for we have had Roman spirits 
Amongst us), all that history has bequeathed 
Of Rome and Carthage in their best times, when 
The people sway'd by senates. 

MARINA. 

Rather say, 
Groan'ii under the stern oligarchs. 

DOGE. 

Perhaps so; 
But yet subi'ucd the world : ia such a state 
An individual, be he richest of 
Such rank as is permitted, or the meanest, 
Without a name, is alike nothing, when 
The policy, irrevocably tending 
To one great end, must be maintain'd in vigour. 

MARINA. 

This means that you are more a Doge than father. 

DOGE. 

It means I am more citizen than either. 
If we had not for many centuries 
Had thousands of such citizens, and shall, 
I trust, have still such, Venice were no city. 

MARINA. 

Accuised be the city where the laws 
Would stifle nature's ! 

DOGE. 

Had I as many sons 
As I have years, I would have given them all, 
Not without feeling, but I would have given them 
Tc Jie state's service, to fulfil her wishes 
On the flood, in the field, or, if it must be, 
As it, alas ! has been, to ostracism, 
Exile, or chains, or whatsoever worse 
She might decree. 

MARINA. 

And this is patriotism ! 
To me it seems the worst barbarity. 
Let me seek out my husband : the sage " Ten," 
With all its jealousy, will hardly war 
So far with a weak woman as deny mo 
A moment's access to his dungeon. 

DOGE. 

I'll 

So far take on myself, as order that 
You may be admitted. 

MARINA. 

And what shall I say 
To toscari from his father? 

DOGE. 

That he obey 
The 'awa 



MARINA. 

And nothing more? Will you not see him 
Ere he depart? It may be the last time. 

DOGE. 

The last ! — my boy ! — The last time I shall see 
My last of children ! Tell him I will come. 

[Exettni. 



ACT III. 

SCENE I. 

The Prison of Jacopo Foscari. 

JACOPO FOSCARI (solltt). 

No light, save yon faint gleam, which shows me walls 

Which never echo'd but to sorrow's sounds, 

The sigh of long imprisonment, the step 

Of feet on which the iron clank'd, the groan 

Of death, the imprecation of despair ! 

And yet for this I have return'd to Venice, 

With some faint hope, 'tis true, that time, which wears 

The marble down, had worn away the hute 

Of men's hearts: but 1 knew them not, and here 

Must I consume my own, which never beat 

For Venice but with such a yearning as 

The dove has for her distant nest, when wheeling 

High in the air on her return to greet 

Her callow brood. What letters are these which 

[Approaching the wall. 
Are scrawl'd along the inexorable wall? 
Will the gleam let me trace them? Ah ! the names 
Of my sad predecessors in this place, 
The dates of theii despair, the brief words of 
A grief too great for many. This stone page 
Holds like an epitaph their history, 
And the poor captive's tale is graven on 
His dungeon barrier, like the lover's record 
Upon the bark of some tall tree, which bears 
His own and his beloved's name. Alas ! 
I recognise some names familiar to me, 
And blighted like to mine, which I will add, 
Fittest for such a chronicle as tnis, 
Which only can be read, as writ, by wretches. 

[He engraves his namr. 

Enter a Familiar of " the Ten." 

FAMILIAR. 

I bring you food. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I pray you set it down ; 
I am past hunger: but my lips are parch'd — 
The water ! 

FAMILIAR. 

There. 
jacopo foscari {nfler thinking). 
I thank you : I am belter. 

FAMILIAR. 

I am commanded to inform you that 
Your further trial is postponed. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Till when ? 

FAMILIAR. 

I know not. — It is also in my orders 
That your illustrious lady be admitted. 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



33<4 



JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Ah ! they relent then — I had ceased to hope it: 
'T was time. 

Enter Marina. 

MARINA. 

My best beloved ! 
jacopo foscari (embracing her). 
My true wife, 
And only friend ! What happiness ! 

MARINA. 

We 'il part 



No more. 



JACOPO FOSCARI. 

How ! wouldst thou share a dungeon ? 

MARINA. 

Ay, 

The rack, the grave, all — any thing with thee, 

But the tomb last of all, for there we shall 

Pe ignorant of each other : yet I will 

Share that — all things except new separation ; 

It is too much to have survived tho first. 

How dost thou ? How are those worn limbs ? Alas ! 

Why do I ask? Thy paleness 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

'T is the joy 
Of seeing thee again so soon, and so 
Without expectancy, has sent the blood 
Back to my heart, and left my cheeks like thine, 
For thou art pale too, my Marina ! 

MARINA. 

'Tis 
The gloom of this eternal cell, which never 
Knew sunbeam, and the sallow sullen glare 
Of the familiar's torch, which seems akin 
To darkness more than light, by lending to 
The dungeon vapours its bituminous smoke, 
Which cloud whate'er we gaze on, even thine eyes — 
No, not thine eyes — they sparkle — how they sparkle ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And thine ! — but I am blinded by the torch. 

MARINA. 

As I had been without it. Couldst thou see here? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Nothing at first ; but use and time had taught me 
Familiarity with what was darkness ; 
And the grav twilight of such glimmerings as 
Glide through the crevices, made by the winds, 
Was kinder to mine eyes than the full sun, 
When gorgeously o'ergilding any towers, 
Save those of Venice : but a moment ere 
Thou earnest hither, I was busy writing. 

MARINA. 

What? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

My name : look, 't is there — recorded next 
The name of him who here preceded me, 
If dungeon dates say true. 

MARINA. 

And what of him? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

These walls are silent of men's ends ; they only 
Seem to hint shrewdly of them. Such stern walls 
Were never piled on high save o'er the dead, 
Or those who soon must be so. — What of him ? 
Thou askest — What of me? may soon be ask'd, 



With the like answer — doubt and dreadful surmise- 
Unless thou tell'st my tale. 

MARINA. 

J trptak of thee ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And wherefore not? All then shall speak of me: 

The tyranny of silence is not lasting, 

And, though events be hidden, just men's groans 

Will burst all cerement, even a living grave's ! 

I do not doubt my memory, but mv lift; ; 

And neither do I fear. 

MARINA. 

Thy life is safe. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And liberty? 

MARINA. 

The mind should make its own. 

JACOPO FO-( \ El I. 

That has a noble sound ; but 't is a sound, 
A music most impressive, but too transient : 
The mind is much, but is not all. The mind 
Hath nerved me to endure the risk of death, 
And torture positive, far worse t linn de-ith 
(If death be a deep sleep), without a groan, 
Or with a cry which rather shamed my judges 
Than me ; but 't is not all, for there are things 
More woful — such as this small dungeon, where 
I may breathe many years. 

M A r i n \ . 

Alas ! and this 
Small dungeon is all that belongs to thee 
Of this wide realm, of which thy sire is prince. 

JACOPO FOSCAKI. 

That thought would scarcely aid me to endure it. 
My doom is common, many are in dungeons, 
But none like mine, so near their father's pah.ee: 
But then my heart is sometimes high, and hope 
Will stream along those moted ravs of light 
Peopled with dusty atoms, which afford 
Our only day ; for, save the jailor's torch, 
And a strange fire-fly, which was quickly caught 
Last night in yon enormous spider's net, 
I ne'er saw aught here like a ray. Alas ! 
I know if mind may bear us up, or no, 
For I have such, and shown it before men; 
It sinks in solitude : my soul is social. 

MARINA. 

I will be with thee. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Ah ! if it were so ! 
But that they never gi anted — nor will grant, 
And I shall be alone : no men — no books — 
Those Iving likenesses of lying men. 
I ask'd for even thoso outlines of their kind, 
Which they term annals, history, what you will, 
Which men bequeath as portraits, and they were 
Refused me ; so these walls have been my study, 
More faithful pictures of Venetian story, 
With all their blank, or dismal stains, than is 
The hall not far from hence, which bears on high 
Hundreds of doges, and their deeds and dates. 

MARINA. 

I come to tell thee the result of thoir 
Last council on thy doom. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I know it — look ' 



f He points to his limbs, as referring to the 
tortures which he had undergone. 

MARINA. 

No — no— no more of that : even they relent 
From that atrocity. 

JACoro FOSCARI. 

What then? 

MARINA. 

That you 
Return to Candia. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Then my last hope 's gone. 
I could endure my dungeon, for 't was Venice ; 
I could support the torture, there was something 
In my native air that buoy'd my spirits up, 
Like a ship on the ocean toss'd by storms, 
But proudly still bestriding the high waves, 
And holding on its course ; but there, afar, 
In that accursed isle of slaves, and captives, 
And unbelievers, like a stranded wreck, 
My very soul seem'd mouldering in my bosom, 
And piecemeal I shall perish, if remanded. 

MARINA. 

And here ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

At once — by better means, as briefer. 
What ! would they even deny me my sires' sepulchre, 
As well as home and heritage ? 

MARINA. 

My husband ! 
I have sued to accompany thee hence, 
AnJ not so hopelessly. This love of thine 
For an ungrateful and tyrannic soil, 
Is passion, and not patriotism ; for me, 
So I could see thee with a quiet aspect, 
And the sweet freedom of the earth and air, 
I would not cavil about climes or regions. 
This crowd of palaces and prisons is not 
A paradise ; its first inhabitants 
Were wretched exiles. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Well I know how wretched ! 

MARINA. 

And yet you see how from their banishment 
Before the Tartar into these salt isles, 
Their antique energy of mind, all that 
Remain'd of Rome for their inheritance, 
Created by degrees an ocean-Rome ; 
And shall an evil, which so often leads 
To good, depress thee thus ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Had I gone forth 
Fiom my own land, like the old patriarchs, seeking 
Another region, with their flocks and herds ; 
Had I been cast out like the Jews from Zion, 
Or like our fathers, driven by Attila 
From fertile Italy to barren islets, 
I would have given some tears to my late country, 
And'many thoughts ; but afterwards addrcss'd 
Myself, with those about me, to create 
A new home and fresh state : perhaps I could 
Have borne this — though I know not. 

MARINA. 

Wherefore not ? 
It was the lot of millions, and must be 
The fate of myriads more. 



JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Ay — we but hear 
Of the survivors' toil in their new lands, 
Their numbers and success ; but who can number 
The hearts which broke in silence of that parting, 
Or after their departure ; of that malady ' 
Which calls up green and native fields to view 
From the rough deep, with such identity 
To the poor exile's fever'd eye, that he 
Can scarcely be restrain'd from treading them? 
That melody, 2 which out of tones and tunes, 
Collects such pasture for the longing sorrow 
Of the sad mountaineer, when far away 
From his snow canopy of cliffs and clouds, 
That he feeds on the sweet, but poisonous thought, 
And dies. You call this weahuss ! It is strength, 
I say, — the parent of all honest feeling. 
He who loves not his country, can love nothing. 

MARINA. 

Obey her, then ; 't is she that puts thee forth. 

JACOTO FOSCARI. 

Ay, there it is : 't is like a mother's curse 
Upon my soul — the mark is set upon me. 
The exiles you speak of went forth by nations, 
Their hands upheld each other by the way, 
Their tents were pitched together — I 'in alone. 

MARINA. 

You shall be so no more — I will go with thee. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

My best Marina ! — and our children ? 

MARINA. 

They 
I fear, by the prevention of the state's 
Abhorrent policy (which holds all ties 
As threads, which may be broken at her pleasure), 
Will not be sufFer'd to proceed with us. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And canst thou leave them ? 

MARINA. 

Yes. With many a pang 
But — I can leave them, children as they are, 
To teach you to be less a child. From this 
Learn you to sway your feelings, when exacted 
By duties paramount ; and 't is our first 
On earth to bear. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Have I not borne ? 

MARINA. 

Too much 
From tyrannous injustice, and enough 
To teach you not to shrink now from a lot 
Which, as compared with what you have undergone 
Of late, is mercy. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Ah ! you never yet 
Were far away from Venice, never saw 
Her beautiful towers in the receding distance, 
While every furrow of the vessel's track 
Seem'd ploughing deep into your heart ; you never 
Saw day go down upon your native spires 
So calmly with its gold and crimson glory, 
And after dreaming a disturbed vision 
Of them and theirs, awoke and found them not. 



1 The caJcnturo. 

2 Alluding to the Swiss air, and its effects. 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



341 



MARr:u. 
I will divide this with you. Let us think 
Of our departure from this much-loved city 
(Since you must love it, as it seems), and this 
Chamber of slate her gratitude alkts you. 
Our children will be cared for by the Doge, 
And by my uncles : we must sail ere night. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

That 's suddci. Shall I not behold my father ? 

MARINA. 

You will. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Where ? 

MARINA. 

Here or in the ducal chamber — 
He said not which. I would that you could bear 
Your exile as he bears it. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Blame him not. 
I sometimes murmur for a moment ; but 
He could not now act otherwise. A show 
Of feeling or compassion on his part 
Would have but drawn upon his aged head 
Suspicion from " the Ten," and upon mine 
Accumulated ills. 

MARINA. 

Accumulated ! 
fVhai pangs are those they have spared you ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

That of leaving 
Venice without beholding him or you, 
Which might have been forbidden now. as 't was 
Upon my former exile. 

MARINA. 

That is true, 
And thus far I am also the state's debtor, 
And shall be more so wnen I see us boih 
Floating on the free waves — away — away— 
Be it to the earth's end, from this abhorr'd, 
Unjust, and 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Curse it not. If I am silent, 
Who dares accuse my country? 

MARINA. 

Men and angels! 
The blood of myriads reeking up to heaven, 
The groans of slaves in chains, and men in dungeons, 
Mothers, and wives, and sons, and sires, and subjects, 
Held in the bondage of ten bald-heads ; and 
Though last, not least, thy silence. Couldst thou say 
Au<dit in its favour, who would praise like thee ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Let us address us then, since so it must be, 
To our departure. Who conies here ? 

Enter Loredano, attended by Familiars. 
LOREDANO (to the Familiars). 

Retire, 
But leave the torch. [Exeunt the two Familiars. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Most welcome, noble signor. 

I did not deem this poor place could have drawn 

Such presence hither. 

LOREDANO. 

'T is not the first time 
1 nave visited these places. 



MARINA. 

Nor would be 
The last, were all men's merits well rewarded. 
Came you here to insult us, or remain 
As spy upon us, or as hostage for us ? 

LOREDANO. 

Neither are of my office, noble lady ! 
I am sent hither to your husband, to 
Announce "the Ten's" decree. 

MARINA. 

That tenderness 
Has been anticipated : it is known. 

LOREDANO. 

As how? 

MARINA. 

I have inform'd him, not so gently, 
Doubtless, as your nice feelings would prescribe, 
The indulgence of your colleagues ; but he knew it 
If you come for our thanks, take mem, and hence ' 
The dungeon gloom is deep enough without you, 
And full of reptiles, not less loathsome, though 
Their sting is honester. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I pray you, calm you : 
What can avail such words '! 

MARINA. 

To let him know 
That he is known. 

LOREDANO. 

Let the fair dame preserve 
Her sex's privilege. 

MARINA. 

I have some sops, sir, 
Will one day thank you better. 

LOREDANO. 

You do well 
To nurse them wisely. Foscari — you know 
Your sentence, then ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Return to Candia! 

LOREDANO. 

True— 
For life. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Not long. 

LOREDANO. 

I said — for life. 

JACOPO FOSCAPI. 

And I 
Repeat — not long. 

LOREDANO. 

A year's imprisonment 
In Canea — afterwards the freedom of 
The whole isle. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Both the same to me : the aflw 
Freedom as is the first imprisonment. 
Is't true my wife accompanies me? 

LORF.DVNO. 

Yes, 

If she so wills it. 

MARINA. 

Who obtain'd that justice 7 

LOREDANO. 

One who wars not with women. 



342 BYRON'S WORKS. 


MARINA. 


LOREDANO. 


But oppresses 


Let her go on ; it irks not me. 


Men : howsoever, let him have my thanks 


MARINA. 


For the only boon I would have ask'd or taken 


That 's false ! 


From him or such as he is. 


You came here to enjoy a heartless triumph 


LOREDANO. 


Of cold looks upon manifold griefs ! You came 


lie receives them 


To be sued to in vain — to mark our tears, 


As they are oiTer'd. 


And hoard our groans — to gaze upon the wreck 


MARINA. 


Which you have made a prince's son — my nusband ; 


May they thrive with him 


In short, to trample on the fallen — an office 


So much ! — no more. 


The hangman shrinks from, as all men from him ! 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


How have you sped ? We are wretched, signor, as 


Is this, sir, your whole mission ? 


Your plots could make, and vengeance could desire us— 


Because we have brief time for preparation, 


And how feel you ? 


And you perceive your presence doth disquiet 


LOREDANO. 


Tlus lady, of a house noble as yours. 


As rocks. 


MARINA. 


MARINA. 


Nobler! 


By thunder blasted: 


LOREDANO. 


They feel not, out no less are shiver'd. Come, 


How nobler ? 


Foscari ; now let us go, and leave this felon, 


MARINA. 


The sole fit habitant of such a cell, 


As more generous ! 


Which he has peopled often, but ne'er fitly 


We say the " generous steed" to express the purity 


Till he himself shall brood in it alone. 


Of his high blood. Thus much I 've learnt, although 


Enter the Doge. 


Venetian (who see few steeds save of bronze), 
From those Venetians who have skimm'd the coasts 




JACOPO FOSCARI. 

My father ! 

doge (embracing him). 


Of Egypt, and her neighbour Araby : 


And why not say as soon " the generous man ?" 


Jacopo ! my son — my son ! 


If race be aught, it is in qualities 

More than in years ; and mine, which is as old 




JACOPO FOSCARI. 


My father still ! How long it is since I 


As yours, is better in its product ; nay- 
Look not so stern — but get you back, and pore 
Upon your genealogic trees most green 


Have heard thee name my name — our name ! 

DOGE. 

My boy ! 
Couldst thou but know 


Of leaves and most mature of fruits, and there 


Blush to find ancestors, who would have blush'd 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


For such a son — thou cold inveterate hater ! 


I rarely, sir, have murmur'd. 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


DOGE. 


Again, Marina! 


I feel too much thou hast not. 


MARINA. 


MARINA. 


Again! still, Marina. 


Doge, look there ! 


See you not, he comes here to glut his hate 


[She points to Loredano 


With a last look upon our misery ? 


DOGE. 


Let him partake it ! 


I see the man — what mean'st thou ? 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


MARINA. 


That were difficult. 


Caution! 




LOREDANO. 


MARINA. 


Being 


Nothing more easy. He partakes it now — 


The virtue which this noble lady most 


Ay, he may veil beneath a marble brow 


May practise, she doth well to recommend it. 


And sneering lip the pang, but he partakes it. 


MARINA. 


A few brief words of truth shame the devil's servants 


Wretch ! 'tis no- virtue, but the policy 


No less than master : I have probed his soul 


Of those who fain must deal perforce with vice : 


A moment, as the eternal fire, ere long, 


As such I recommend it, as I would 


Will reach it always. See how he shrinks from me ! 


To one whose foot was on an adder's path. 


With death, and chains, and exile in his hand, 


DOGE. 


To scatter o'er his kind as he thinks fit : 


Daughter, it is superfluous ; I have long 


They are his weapons, not his armour, for 


Known Loredano. 


1 have piercea him to the core of his cold heart. 


LOREDANO. 


1 care not for his frowns ! We can but die, 


You may know him better. 


And he out five, for him the very worst 


MARINA. 


» "f destinies : each day secures him more 


Yes ; worse he could not. 


)'<k tempter's. 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


Father, let not these 


This is mere insanity. 


Our parting hours be lost in listening to 


MARINA. 


Reproaches, which boot nothing. Is it — is it, 


'l may De so , and uho hath made us mad ? 


Indeed, our last of meetings ? 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



343 



DOGE. 

You behold 
These white hairs ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And I feel, besides, lhat mine 
Will never be so while. Embrace me, father! 
I loved you ever — never more than now. 
Look to my children — to your last child's children : 
Let them be all to you which he was once, 
And never be to you what I am now. 
May I not see them also ? 

MARINA. 

No — not here. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

ITiey might behold their parent any where. 

MARINA. 

I would that they beheld their father in 

A place which would not mingle lear with love, 

To freeze their young blood in its natural current. 

They have fed well, slept soft, and knew not that 

Their sire was a mere hunted outlaw. Well 

I know his fate may one day be their heritage, 

But let it only be their heritage, 

And not their present fee. Their senses, though 

Alive to love, are yet awake to terror ; 

And these vile damps, too, and yon thick green wave 

Which floats above the place where we now stand — 

A cell so far below the water's level, 

Sending its pestilence through every crevice, 

Might strike them : Uiis is not their atmosphere, 

However you — and you — and, most of all, 

As worthiest — you, sir, noble Loredano ! 

May breathe it without prejudice. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I had not 
Reflected upon this, but acquiesce. 
1 shall depart, then, without meeting them ? 

DOCK. 

Not so : they shall await you in my chamber. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And must I leave them all ? 

LOREDANO. 

You must. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Not one ? 

LOREDANO. 

They are the state's. 

MARINA. 

I thought they had been mine. 

LOREDANO. 

They are, in all maternal things. 

MARINA. 

That is, 
In all things painful. If they 're sick, they will 
Be left to me to tend them ; should they die, 
To me to bury and to mourn : but if 
They live, they '11 make you soldiers, senators, 
Slaves, exiles — what you will ; or if they are 
Females with portions, brides and bribes for nobles! 
Behold the state's care for its sons and mothers ! 

LOREDANO. 

The hour approaches, and the wind is fair. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

How know you that here, where the genial wind 
fce'er blows in all its blustering freedom 7 



LCREDANO. 

'T was so 
When I came here. The galley floats within 
A bow-shot of the "Riva di Schiavoni." 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Father ! I pray you to precede me, and 
Prepare my children to behold their father. 

DOGE. 

Be firm, my son ! 

JACOPO FOSCART. 

I will do my endeavour. 

MARINA. 

Farewell ! at least to this detested dungeon, 
And him to whose good offices you owe 
In part your past imprisonment. 

LOREDANO. 

Ar.d present 
Liberation. 

DOGE. 

He speaks truth. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

No doubt: but 'tis 
Exchange of chains for heavier chains I owe him. 
He knows this, or he had not sought to change them. 
But I reproach not. 

LOREDANO. 

The time narrows, signor 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Alas ! I little thought so lingeringly 
To leave abodes like this : but when I feel 
That every step I take, even from this cell, 
Is one away from Venice, I look back 
Even on these dull damp walls, and 

DOGE. 

Boy ! no teats 

MARINA. 

Let them flow on : he wept not on the rack 

To shame him, and they cannot shame him now. 

They will relieve his heart — that too kind heart — 

And I will find an hour to wipe away 

Those tears, or add my own. I could weep now, 

But would not gratify yon wretch so far. 

Let us proceed. Doge, lead the way. 

loredano {to the Familiar). 

The torch, theio 

MARINA. 

Yes, light us on, as to a funeral pyre, 
With Loredano mourning like an heir. 

DOGE. 

My son, you are feeble : take this hand. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Alas' 
Mus* youth support itself on age, and I, 
Who ought to be the prop of yours 1 

LOREDANO. 

Take nnne. 

MARINA. 

Touch it not, Foscari ; 't will sting you. Signor, 
Stand off! be sure that if a grasp of yours 
Would raise us from the gulf wherein we are plunged 
No hand of ours would stretch itself to meet iL 
Come, Foscari, take the hand the altar gave you. 
It could not save, but will support you ever. 

\Ereu7U. 



341 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



ACT IV. 

SCENE I. 

A Hull in the Ducal Palace. 
Enter Lcreda.no and Barbarigo. 

BARBARIGO. 

And have you confidence in such a project? 

LOREDANO. 

I have. 

BARBARIGO. 

'Tis hard upon his years. 

LOREDANO. 

Say ralher 
Kind, to relieve him from the cares of state. 

BARBARIGO. 

'1 will hreak his heart. 

LOREDANO. 

Age has no heart to break. 
He has seen his son's half broken, and, except 
A start of feeling in his dungeon, never 
Swerved. 

BARBARIGO. 

In his countenance, I gran', you, never; 
But I have seen him sometimes in a calm 
So desolate, that the most clamorous grief 
Had nought to envy him within. Where is he? 

LOREDANO. 

In his own portion of the palace, with 
His son, and the whole race of Foscaris. 

BARBARIGO. 

Bidding farewell. 

LOREDANO. 

A last. As soon he shall 
Bid to his dukedom. 

BARBARIGO. 

When embarks the son ? 

LOREDANO. 

Forthwith — when this long leave is taken. 'T is 
Time to admonish tnem again. 

BARBARIGO. 

Forbear ; 
Retrench not from their moments. 

LOREDANO. 

Not I, now 
We have higher business for our own. This day 
Shall be the lust of the old Doge's reign, 
As the firs' of his son's last banishment — 
And that is vengeance. 

BARBARIGO. 

In my mind, too deep. 

LOREDANO. 

Tis moderate — not even life for life, the rule 
Denounced of retribution from all time: 
They owe me still my father's and my uncle's. 

BARBARIGO. 

Pid not the Doge deny this strongly? 

LOREDANO. 



Doubtless. 



BARBARICO. 

And did not this shake your suspicion? 

LOREDANO. 
BARBARIGO. 

Km il 'his deposition should take place 



No. 



Bv our united influence in the council, 
It must be done with all the deference 
Due to his years, his station, and his deeds. 

LOREDANO. 

As much of ceremony as you will, 
So that the thing be done. You may, for aught 
I care, depute the council on their knees 
(Like Barbarossa to the Pope) to beg him 
To have the courtesy to abdicate. 

BARBARIGO. 

What, if he will not? 

LOREDANO. 

We '11 elect another, 
And make him null. 

BARB/ RIGO. 

But will the laws uphold us? 

LOREDANO. 

What laws? — "The Ten" are laws; and if they were not, 
I will be legislator in this business. 

BARBARIGO. 

At your own peril? 

LOREDANO. 

There is none, I tell you, 
Our powers are such. 

BARBARIGO. 

But he has twice already 
Solicited permission to retire, 
And twice it was refusea. 

LOREDAITO. 

The better reason 
To grant it the third time. 

BARBARIGO. 

Un:isk'd? 
LOREDANO. 

It shows 
The impression of his former instances : 
If they were from his heart, he may be thankful : 
If not, 't will punish his hypocrisy. 
Come, they are met by this time ; let us join them, 
And be thou fix'd in purpose for this once. 
I have prepared such arguments as will not 
Fail to move them, and remove him : since 
Their thoughts, their objects, have been sounded, don* 
You, with your wonted scruples, toach us pause, 
And all will prosper. 

BARBARIGO. 

Could I but be certain 
This is no prelude to such persecution 
Of the sire as has fallen upon the son, 
I would support you. 

LOREDANO. 

He is safe, I tell you ; 
His fourscore years and five may linger on 
As long as he can drag them : 't is his throne 
Alone is aim'd at. 

BARBARlGO. 

But discarded princes 
Are seldom long of life. 

LOREDANO. 

And men of eighty 
More seldom still. 

BARBARIGO. 

And why not wait these few veuii 

LOREDANO. 

Because we have waited long enough, and ho 



THE TWO 


FOSCARI. 345 


Lived longer than enough. Hence ! In to council ! 


In earnest councils — we will not be least so. 


[Exeunt Loredano and Barbaeigo. 


[Ejieunt. 


Enter Memmo and a Senator. 


Enter the Doge, Jacopo Foscari, and Marina. 


SENATOR. 


JACOPO FOSCAltl. 


A summons to " the Ten !" Why so? 


Ah, father! though I must and will depart, 


11KMMI). 


Yet — yet — I pray you to obtain for me 


"The Ten" 


That I once more return unto my home, 


Alone can answer ; thev are rarelv wont 


Howe'er remote the period. Let there be 


To let their thoughts anticipate their purpose 


A point of time as beacon to my heart, 


By previous proclamation. We are summon'd— 


With any penalty aiinox'd they pli 


That is enough. 


But let me still return. 


SENATOR. 


DOGE. 


For them, but not for us ; 


Son Jacopo, 


I would know why. 


Go and obey our country's will, 'tis not 


MEMMO. 


For us to look beyond. 


You will know why anon, 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


If you obey ; and, if not, you no less 


But still I must 


Will know why you should have obey'd. 


Look back. I pray you think of me. 


SENATOR. 


DOGE. 


I mean not 


Alas ! 


To oppose them, but — 


You ever were my dearest offspring, when 


MEJ1.MO. 


They were more numerous, nor can be less so 


In Venice " But " 's a traitor. 


Now you are last ; but did the state demand 


But me no " buts," unless you would pass o'er 


The exile of the disinterred ashes 


The Bridge which few repass. 


Of your three goodly brothers, now in earth, 


SENATOR. 


And their desponding shades came flitting round 


I am silent. 


To impede the act, I must no less obey 


MEMMO. 

Why 


A duty paramount to every duty. 


MARINA. 


Thus hesitate ? — " The Ten " have call'd in aid 


My husband ! let us on : this but prolongs 
Our sorrow. 


Of their deliberation five-and-twenty 


Patricians of the senate — you are one, 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


And I another ; ami it seems to me 


But we are not summon'd yet: 


Both honour'd by the choice or chance which leads us 


The galley's sails arc not unfurl'd : — who knows? 


To mingle with a body so august. 


The wind may change. 


SENATOR. 


MARINA. 


Most true. I say no more. 


And if it do, it will not 


MEMMO. 


Change their hearts, or your lot ; the galley's oars 


As we hope, signor, 


Will quickly clear the harbour. 


And all may honestly (that is, all those 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


Of noble blood may), one day hope to be 


Oh, ye elements ! 


Decemvir, it is surely for the senate's 


Where are your storms ? 


Chosen delegates a school of wisdom, to 


MARINA. 


Be thus admitted, though as novices, 


In human breasts. Alas : 


To view the mysteries. 


Will nothing calm you. 


SENATOR. 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


Let us view them ; they, 


Never yet did mariner 


No doubt, are worth it. 


Put up to patron saint such prayers for prosperous 


MEMMO. 


And pleasant breezes, as 1 call upon you, 


Being worth our lives 


Ye tutelar saints of my own city ! wh'.oh 


If we divulge them, doubtless they are worth 


Ye love not with more holy love than I, 


Something, at least, to you or me. 


To lash up from the deep the Adrian waves, 


SENATOR. 


And waken Auster, sovereign of the tempest ! 


I sought not 


Till the sea dash me back on my own shore 


A place within the sanctuary ; but being 


A broken corse upon the barren Lido, 


Chosen, however reluctantly so chosen, 


Where I may mingle with the sands which skirt 


I shall fulfil my office. 


The land I love, and never shall sec more ! 


MEMMO. 


MAK1NO. 


Let us not 


And wish you this with me be side von? 


Be latest in obeying " the Ten's " summons. 


JACOPO FOSCARI. 


SENATOR. 


No- 


All are not met, but I am of your thought 


No — not for thee, too good, too kind ! May'st tiion 


So far — let 's in. 


Live long to be a mother to those children 


MEMMO. 


Thy fond fidelity for a time deprives 


The earliest are most welcome 


Of such support ! But for myself aione. 


2 H 49 





3-lG 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



May all the winds of heaven howl down the gulf, 

Ami tear the V( BSel, till th« nuiriners, 

Attp&U'd, turn their doepairing eyes on me, 

As the Phenicians did on Jonah) then 

Cast me out from amongst them, as an offering 

To appease the waves. The billow which destroys mc 

Will be more merciful than man, and bear mc, 

Dead, but stiil bear me to a native grave, 

From fisher's hands upon the desolate strand, 

Which, °f > ,s thousand wrecks, hath ne'er received 

One lacerated like the heart which then 

Will be Hut wherefore breaks it not? why live I? 

MARINA. 

To man thyself, I trust, with time, to master 

Such useless passion. Until now thou wert 

A sufTerer, but not a loud one : why, 

What is this to the things thou hast borne in .icncc — 

Imprisonment and actual torture ? 

JACOI'O FOSCARI. 

E ,u*.lc, 
Triple, and tenfo.d torture ! B-k vot. are right, 
It must be borne. Father, yc #r plessing. 

DOG*; 

Would 
It could avail thet ! but no lo.s thou hast it. 

JACOPO Fti^CAKI. 

Forgive 

DOGE. 

What ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

My poor mother for my birth 
And me for having lived, and you yourself 
(A* I forgive you), for the gift of life, 
Which you bestow'd upon me as my sire. 

MARINA. 

^hat hast thou done ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Nothing. I cannot charge 
My memory with much save sorrow : but 
I have been so beyond the common lot 
Chasten'd and visited, I needs must think 
That I was wicked. If it be so, may 
What I have undergone here keep me from 
A 'ike hereafter. 

MARINA. 

Fear not : that 's reserved 
For your oppressors. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Let me hope not. 

MARINA. 

Hope not ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I cannot wish them ail tjiey have inflicted. 

MARINA. 

All ! the consummate fiends ! A thousand fold ! 
May the worm which ne'er dieth feed upon them ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Tney may repent. 

MARINA. 

And if they do, Heaven will not 
Accept the tardy penitence of demons. 

Enter an Officer and Guards. 

OFFICER. 

Signor ! the boat is at the shore — the wind 
Is rising — we are ready to attend you. 



JACOPO FOSCARI. 

And I to be attended. Once more, father, 
Your hand ! 

DOGE. 

Take it. Alas! how thine own trcr.bles* 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

No — ynu mistake; 'tis youre l'na'. ihak.*, nij father. 
Farewell ! 

DOGE. 

Far' »el! ! Is .here aught else? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

No — nothing 
[Tollie Officer. 
T m' .ne your arm, good signer. 

OFFICER. 

You turn pale — 
Let me support you — paler — ho ! some aid there ! 
Some water ! 

MARINA. 

Ah, he is dying ! 

JACOPO FOSC* nr. 

Now, I 'm ready — 
My eyes swim strangely — where 's the door ? 

MARINA. 

Away . 
Let me support him — my best love ! Oh God ! 
How faintly betas this heart — this pulse ! 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

The light ! 
Is it the light ? — I am faint. 

[ Officer presents him uilh wai* 

OFFICER. 

lie will be better, 
Perhaps, in the air. 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

I doubt not. Fatner — wife — 
Your hands ! 

MARINA. 

There 's death in that damp clammy grasp. 
Oh God ! — My Foscari, how fare you ? 

JACOPO FOSCARI. 

Well ! 

[He dies. 



He 's gone. 



OFFICER. 
DOGE. 



He 's free. 

MARINA. 

No — no, he is not dead ; 
There must be life yet in that heart — he could not 
Thus leave me. 

DOGE. 

Daughter ! 

MARINA. 

Hold thy peace, old man ' 
I am no daughter now — thou hast no son. 
Oh Foscari ! 

OFFICER. 

We must remove the body. 

MARINA. 

Touch it not, dungeon miscreants ! your base office 
Ends with his life, and goes not beyond murder, 
Even by your murderous laws. Leave his remains 
To those who know to honour them. 

OFFICER. 

I niu»t 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



347 



Inform the signory. and learn their pleasure. 

DOGE. 

Inform the signory from me, the Doge, 
They have no further power upon those ashes : 
While he lived, he was theirs, as fits a subject — 
Now he is mine — my broken-hearted boy ! 

[Exit Officer. 

MARINA. 

And I must live ! 

DOGE. 

Your children live, Marina. 

MARINA. 

My children ! true — they live, and I must live 
To bring them up to serve the state, and die 
As died their father. Oh ! what best of blessings 
Were Darrenness in Venice ! Would my mother 
Had been so ! 

DOGE. 

My unhappy children ! 

MARINA. 

What! 
You feel it then at last — you '. — Where is now 
The stoic of the state ? 

doge {throwing himself down by the body). 
Here! 

MARINA. 

Ay, weep on ! 
1 thought you had no tears — you hoarded them 
Until they are useless ; but weep on ! he never 
Shall weep more — never, never more. 

Enter Loredano and Barbarigo. 

LOREDANO. 

What 's here ? 

MARINA. 

Ah ! the devil come to insult the dead ! Avaunt ! 
Incarnate Lucifer ! 'tis holy ground. 
A martyr's ashes now lie there, which make it 
A shrine. Get thee back to thy place of torment ! 

BARBARIGO. 

Lady, we knew not of this sad event, 

But pass'd here merely on our path from council. 

MARINA. 

Pass on. 

LOREDANO. 

We sought the Doge. 
marina {pointing to the Doge, who isstill on the ground 
by his son's body). 

He 's busy, look, 
About the business you provided for him. 
Are ye content ? 

BARBARIGO. 

We will not interrupt 
A parent's sorrows. 

MARINA. 

No, ye only make them, 
Then leave them. 

doge (rising-). 
Sirs, I am ready. 

BARBARIGO. 

No— not now. 

LOREDANO. 

Yet 't was important. 

DOGE. 

If 't was so, I can 

On!) leneat — I am ready. 



BARBARIGO. 

It shall not be 
Just now, though Venice totter'd o'er the deep 
Like a frail vessel. I respect your griefs. 

DOGE. 

I thank you. If the tidings which you bring 
Are evil, you may say them ; nothing further 
Can touch me more than him thou look'st on there : 
If they be good, say on ; you need not fear 
That they can comfort me. 

BARBARIGO. 

I would they could ! 

DOGE. 

I spoke \.oi to you, but to Loredano. 
He understands me. 

MARINA. 

Ah ! I thought it would be so. 

DOGE. 

What mean you ? 

MARINA. 

Lo ! there is the blood beginning 
To flow through the dead lips of Foscari — 
The body bleeds in presence of the assassin. 

[7b Loredano. 
Thou cowardly murderer by law, behold 
How death itself bears witness to thy deeds ! 

DOGE. 

My child ! this is a phantasy of grief. 

Bear hence the body. ] To his attendants], Signors, il 

It please you, 
Within an hour I '11 hear you. 

[Exeunt Doge, Marina, and attendants, with 
the body.] 

Manent Loredano and Barbarigo 

BARBARIGO. 

He must not 
Be troubled now. 

loredano. 
He said himself that nought 
Could give him trouble farther. 

BARBARIGO. 

These are words j 
But grief is lonely, and the breaking in 
Upon it barbarous. 

LOREDANO. 

Sorrow preys upon 
Its solitude, and nothing more diverts it 
From its sad visions of the other world 
Than calling it at moments back to this. 
The busy have no time for tears. 

BARBARIGO. 

And therefore 
You would deprive this old man of all business ? 

LOREDANO. 

The thing 's decreed. The Giunta and " the Ten t 
Have made it law : who shall oppose that law ? 

BARBARIGO. 

Humanity ! 

LOREDANO. 

Because his son is dead ? 

BARBARIGO. 

And yet unburied. 

LOREDANO. 

Had wc known this when 
The act was passing, it might have suspended 
Its passage, but impedes it not — once past. 



348 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



BARBARIGO. 

I '11 not consent. 

LOREDANO. 

You have consented to 
All that 's essential — leave the rest to me. 

BARBARIGO. 

Why press his abdication now? 

LOREDANO. 

The feelings 
Of private passion may not interrupt 
The public benefit ; and what the state 
Decides to-day must not give way before 
To-morrow for a natural accident. 

BARBARIGO. 

You have a son. 

LOREDANO. 

I have — and had a father. 

BARBARIGO. 

Still so inexorable ? 

LOREDANO. 

Still. 

BARBARIGO. 

But let him 
Inter his son before we press upon him 
This edict. 

LOREDANO. 

Let him call up into life 
My sire and uncle — I consent. Men may, 
Even aged men, be, or appear to be, 
Sires of «. hundred sons, but cannot kindle 
An atom of their ancestors from earth. 
The victims are not equal : he has seen 
His sons expire by natural deaths, and I 
My sires by violent and mysterious maladies. 
I used no poison, bribed no subtle master 
Of the destructive art of healing, to 
Shorten the path to the eternal cure. 
His sons, and he had four, are dead, without 
My dabbling in vile drugs. 

BARBARIGO. 

And art thou sure 
He dealt in such? 

LOREDANO. 

Most sure. 

BARBARIGO. 

And yet he seems 
All openness. 

LOREDANO. 

And so he seem'd not long 
Ago to Carmagnuola. 

BARBARIGO. 

The attainted 
And foreign traitor? 

LOREDANO. 

Even so : when he., 
After the very night in which " the Ten" 
(Jom'd with the Doge) decided his destruction, 
Met the great Duke at day-break with a jest, 
Demanding whether he should augur him 
" The good day or good night?" his Doge-ship answer'd, 
*' That he In truth had pass'd a night of vigil, 
In which (he added with a gracious smile) 
There often has been question about you." 1 
'T was true ; the question was the death resolved 
Of Carmagnuola, eight months ere he died ; 

J A historical fact. 



And the old Doge, who knew him doom'd, smiled on him 
With deadly cozenage, eight long months beforehand — 
Eight months of such hypocrisy as is 
Learnt but in eighty years. Brave Carmagnuola 
Is dead ; so are young Foscari and his brethren — 
I never smiled on tin m. 

BARBARIGO. 

Was Carmagnuola 
Your friend ? 

LOREDANO. 

He was the safeguard of the city. 
In early life its foe, but, in his manhood, 
Its saviour first, then victim. 

BARBARIGO. 

Ah ! that seems 
The penalty of saving cities. He 
Whom we now act against not only saved 
Our own, but added others to her sway. 

LOREDANO. 

The Romans (and we ape them) gave a crown 

To him who took a city ; and they gave 

A crown to him who saved a citizen 

In battle- the rewards are equal. Now, 

If we should measure forth the cities taken 

By the Doge Foscari, with citizens 

Destroy'd by him, or through him, the account 

Were fearfully against him, although narrow'd 

To private havoc, such as between him 

And my dead father. 

BARBARIGO. 

Are you then thus fLx'd? 

LOREDANO. 

Why, what should change me? 

BARBARIGO. 

That which changes me 
But you, I know, are marble to retain 
A feud. But when all is accomplish'd, when 
The old man is deposed, his name degraded, 
His sons are dead, his family depress'd, 
And you and yours triumphant, shall you sleep? 

LOREDANO. 

More soundly. 

BARBARIGO. 

That 's an error, and you '11 find it 
Ere you sleep with your fathers. 

LOREDANO. 

They sleep not 
In their accelerated graves, nor will 
Till Foscari fills his. Each night I see them 
Stalk frowning round my couch, and, pointing towards 
The ducal palace, marshal me to vengeance 

BARBARIGO. 

Fancy's distemperature ! There is no passion 
More spectral or fantastical than hate ; 
Not even its opposite, love, so peoples air 
With phantoms, as this madness of the heart. 
Enter an Officer. 

LOREDANO. 

Where go you, sirrah ? 

OFFICER. 

By the ducal order 
To forward the preparatory rites 
For the late Foscari's interment. 

BARBARIGO- 

Their 



THE TWO FOSCARI. S49 


Vault has been often open'd of late years. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


LORED ANO. 


In the first place, the Council doth condole 


T will be full soon, and may be closed for ever. 


With the Doge, on his late and private grief. 


OFFICER. 


DOGE. 


May I pass on? 


No more — no more of that. 


tOREDANO. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


You may. 


Will not the Duke 


BARBARIGO. 


Accept the homage of respect ? 


How bears the Doge 


DOCE. 


This last calamity? 


I do 


OFFICER. 


Accept it as 't is given — proceed. 


With desperate firmness. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


In presence of another he says little, 


"The Ten," 


But I perceive his lips move now and then ; 


Willi a selected giunta from the senate 


And once or twice I heard him, from the adjoining 


Of twenty-five of the best born patricians, 


Apartment, mutter forth the words — "My son!" 


Having deliberated on the state 


Scarce audibly. I must proceed. 


Of the republic, and the o'erwhelming cares 


[Exit Officer. 


Which, at this moment, doubly must oppress 


BARBARIGO. 


Your years, so long devoted to your country, 


This stroke 


Have judged it fitting, with all reverence, 


Will move all Venice in his favour. 


Now to solicit from your wisdom (which 


lOREDASO. 


Upon reflection must accord in this), 


Right ! 


The resignation of the ducal ring, 


We must be speedy : let us call together 


Which you have worn so long and venerably ; 


The delegates appointed to convey 


And, to prove that they are not ungrateful, nor 


The Council's resolution. 


Cold to your years and services, they add 


BARBARIGO. 


An appanage of twenty hundred golden 


I protest 


Ducats, to make retirement not less splendid 


Against it at this moment. 


Than should become a sovereign's retreat. 


LOREDANO. 


DOGE. 


As you please — 


Did I hear rightly? 


I '11 tane their voices on it ne'ertheless, 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


And see whose most may sway them, yours or mine. 


Need I say again ? 


[Exeunt Barbarigo and Loredano. 


DOGE. 




No. — Have you done ? 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 




ACT V. 


I have spoken. Twenty :om 


SCENE I. 


Hours are accorded you to give an answer. 

DOGE. 


Tlie Doge's Apartment. 


I shall not need so many seconds. 


The Doge and Attendant. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

We 

Will now retire. 


ATTENDANT. 


My lord, the deputation is in waiting ; 


DOGE. 


But add, that if another hour would better 


Stay ! Four and twenty hours 


Accord with your will, they will make it theirs. 


Will alter nothing which I have to sav. 


DOGE. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


To me all hours are like. Let them approach. 


Speak ! 


[Exit Attendant. 


DOGE. 


AN OFFICER. 


When I twice before reiterated 


Prince ! I have done your bidding. 


My wish to abdicate, it was refused me : 


DOGE. 


And not alone refused, but ye exacted 


What command ? 


An oath from me that I would never more 


OFFICER. 


Renew this instance. I have sworn to die 


A melanchc'y one — to call the attendance 


In full exertion of the functions which 


Of 


My country call'd me here to exorcise, 


DOGE. 


According to my honour and my conscience— 


True — true — true ; I crave your pardon. I 


I cannot break my oath. 


Begin to fail in apprehension, and 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


Wax very old — old almost as my years. 


Reduce us not 


Till now I fought them off, but they begin 


To the alternative of a decree, 


To overtake me. 


Instead of your compliance. 


[Enter the Deputation, consisting of six of the Signory, 


BOGE. 

Providence 


and the Chief of the Ten.] 


Prolongs my days, to prove and chasten me : 


Noble men, your pleasure ! 
2 a 2 

1 


But ye have no right to reproach my length 



350 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Of days, since every hour has been the country's. 

I am ready to lay down my life for her, 

As I have laid down drarcr things than life; 

But for my dignity — I ho.il it of 

The whole republic ; when the general will 

Is manifest, then you shall be answer'd. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

We grieve for such an answer ; but it cannot 
Avail you aught. 

DOGE. 

I can submit to all things, 
But nothing will advance ; no, not a moment. 
What you decree — decree. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

With this, then, must we 
Return to those who sent us ? 

DOGE. 

You have heard me. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

With all due reverence we retire. 

[Exeunt the Deputation, etc. 

Enter an Attendant. 

ATTENDANT. 

My lord, 
The noble dame Marina craves an audience. 

DOGE. 

My time is hers. 

Enter Marina. 

MARINA. 

My lord, if I intrude- 
Perhaps you fain would be alone '/ 

DOGE. 

Alone ! 
Alone, come all the world around me, I 
Am now and evermore. But we will bear it. 

MARINA. 

We will ; and for the sake of those who are, 
Endeavour Oh my husband ! 

DOGE. 

Give it way ! 
I cannot comfort thee. 

MARINA. 

He might have lived, 
So form'd for gentle privacy of life, 
So loving, so beloved, the native of 
Another land, and who so blest and blessing 
As my poor Foscari ? Nothing was wanting 
Unto his happiness and mine, save not 
To be Venetian. 

DOGE. 

Or a prince's son. 

MARINA. 

Yes ; all things which conduce to other men's 
Imperfect happiness or high ambition, 
By some strange destiny, to him proved deadly. 
The country and the people whom he loved, 
The prince of whom he was the elder born, 
ArJ- 

DOGE. 

Soon may be a pris>~3 no longer. 

MARINA. 

How, 

T)OGE. 

*liey have taken my son from me, and now aim 



At my too long worn diadem and ring. 
Let them resume the gewgaws ! 

MARINA. 

Oh the tyrants ! 
In such an hour too ! 

DOGE. 

'T is the fittest time : 
An hour ago I should have felt it. 

MARINA. 

And 
Will you not now resent it ? — Oh for vengeance ! 
But he, who, had he been enough protected, 
Might have repaid protection in this moment, 
Cannot assist his father. 

DOGE. 

Nor should do so 
Against his country, had he a thousand lives 
Instead of that 

MARINA. 

They tortured from him. This 
May be pure patriotism. I am a woman : 
To me my husband and my children were 
Country and home. I loved him — how I loved him ! 
I have seen him pass through such an ordeal, as 
The old martyrs would have shrunk from : he is goiie, 
And I, who would have given mv blood for him, 
Have nought to give but tears! But could I compass 
The retribution of his wrongs ! — Well, well ; 
I have sons who shall be men. 

DOGE. 

Your grief distracts you 

MARINA. 

I thought I could have borne it, when I saw him 
Bow'd down by such oppression ; yes, I thought 
That I would rather look upon his corse 
Than his prolcng'd captivity : — I am punish'd 
For that thought now. Would I were in his grave ! 

DOGE. 

I must look on him once more. 

MARINA. 

Come with me ! 

DOGE. 

Is he 

MARINA. 

Our bridal bed is now liis bier. 

DOGE. 

And he is in his shroud ? 

MARINA. 

Come, come, old man ! 
[Exeunt the Doge and Marina 

Enter Barbarigo and Loredano. 
barbarigo (to an Attendant). 
Where is the Doge ? 

attendant. 
This instant retired hence 
With the illustrious lady, his son's widow. 

loredano. 
Where? 

attendant. 
To the chamber where the body lie*. 
barbarigo. 
Let us return then. 

loredano. 
You forget, you cannot. 
We have the implicit order of tne giunta 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



351 



To await their coming here, and join them in 
Their office : they '11 be here soon after us. 

BARBARIGO. 

An I will they press their answer on the Doge? 

LOREDA1TO. 
Twas his own wish thai nil should be done promptly. 
He answer'd quickly) and must so be answer'd ; 
His dignity is look'd to, his estate 
Cared for — what would he more? 

BARBARIGO. 

Die in his robes. 
He could not have lived long ; but I have done 
My best to save his honours ( and opposed 
Tins proposition to the last, though vainly. 
Why would the general vote compel me hither? 

LOREDANO. 

'T was lit that some one of such different thoughts 
From ours should be a witness, lest false tongues 
Should whisper that a harsh majority 
Dreaded to have its acts beheld by others. 

BARBARIGO. 

And not less, I must needs think, for the sake 

Of humbling me lor my vain opposition. 

Von are ingenious, Loredano, in 

Your mollis of vengeance, nay, poetical, 

A very Ovid in the art of hating; 

'T is thus (although a secondary object, 

Vet hate has microscopic eyes) to you 

I owe, by way of foil to the more zealous, 

This undesired association in 

Your gumta's duties. 

LOREDANO. 

How ! — my giunta ! 

BARBARIGO. 

Yours ! 
They speak your language, watch your nod, approve 
Your plans, and do your work. Are they not yuurs ? 

LOREDANO. 

You talk unwarily. 'T were best they hear not 
This from you. 

BARBARIGO. 

Oh ! they '11 hear as much one day 
From louder tongues than mine : they have gone beyond 
Even their exorbitance of power; and when 
This happens in the most contemn'd and abject 
States, stung humanity will rise to check it. 

LOREDANO. 

You talk but idly. 

BARBARIGO. 

That remains for proof. 
Here come our colleagues. 

Enter the Deputation as before. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Is the Duke aware 
We seek his presence ? 

ATTENDANT. 

He shall be inform'd. 

[Exit Attendant. 

BARBARIGO. 

The Duke is with his son. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

If it 08 so, 
We will remit him till the rites are over. 
Li t us return. 'Tis time enough to-morrow. 



LOREDANO (asi'le to BARBARIGO). 

Now the rich man's hell-fire upon your tongue, 
Unnuench'd, unquenchable ! I '11 have it torn 
From its vile babbling roots, till you shall utter 
Nothing but sobs through blood, lor this ! Sage signors, 
I pray ye be not hasty. \ Aloud io the other*. 

BARBARIGO. 

But be human ! 

LOREDANO. 

See, the Dulse comes ! 

Enter the Doge, 
doge. 
I have obey'd your summons. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

We come once more to urge our past request. 

DOGE. 

And I to answer. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

What? 

DOGE. 

My only answer. 
You have heard it. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Hear you then the last decree, 
Definitive and absolute ! 

DOGE. 

To the point — 
To the point ! I know of old the forms of office, 
And gentle preludes to strong acts — Go on ! 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

You are no longer Doge ; you are released 
From your imperial oath as sovereign ; 
Your ducal robes must be put off; but for 
Your services, the state allots the appanage 
Already mention'd in our former congress. 
Three days arc left you to remove from hence, 
Under the penalty to sec confiscated 
All your own private fortune. 

DOGE. 

That last clause, 
I am proud to say, woidd not enrich the treasury. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Your answer, Duke ? 

LOREDANO. 

Y r our answer, Francis Foscari 7 

DOGE. 

If I could have foreseen that my old age 
Was prejudicial to the state, the chief 
Of the republic never would have shown 
Himself so far ungrateful as to place 
His own high dignity before his countrv ; 
But this life having been so many years 
]\'ot useless to that country, I would fain 
Have consecrated my last moments to her. 
But the decree being render'd, 1 obey. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

If you would hove the three days named extended, 
We willingly will lengthen them to eight, 
As sign of our esteem. 

DOGE. 

Not eight hours signor, 
Nor even eight minutes. — There 's the ducal ring, 

[Taking off his r.ng and sat> 
And there tbe ducal diadem. And so 
The Adriatic's tree to wed another. 



352 HURON'S WORKS. 


CHIEF OK THE TEN. 


DOGE. 


Vet go not forth so quickly. 


Not till I pass the threshold of these doors. 


DOGE. 


LOREDANO. 


I am old, sir, 


Sainl Mark's great bell is soon about to toll 


AnJ even to move but slowly must begin 


For bis inauguration. 


To move betimes. Mothinks I see amongst you 


DOGE. 


A face I know not — Senator ! your name, 


Earth and heaven ! 


Vou, by your garb, Cliief of the Forty. 


Vc will reverberate this peal ; and I 


MEMMO. 


Live to hear this ! — the first doge who e'er heard 


Signor, 


Such sound for his successor ! Happier he, 


t am the son of Marco Memmo. 


My attainted predecessor, stern Fahero— 


DOGE. 


This insult at the least was spared him. 


Ah! 


LOREDANO. 


Vour father was my friend. — But sons and fathers ! 


What ! 


What, ho ! my servants there ! 


Do you regret a traitor ? 


ATTENDANT. 


DOf.r.. 


JMy prince ! 


No— I merely 


DOGE. 


Envy the dead. 


No prince — 


CHIF.r Or TH-i TEN. 


There are die princes of the prince ! 


My lord, if you indeed 


[Pointing to the Ten's Deputation. 


Are bent upon this ra.«h abandonment 


Prepare 


Of the state's palace, at the least retire 


To part from hence upon the instant. 


I5y the private staircase, which conduct? you to've '» 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


The landing-place of the canal. 


Why 


DOGE. 


So rashly ? 't will give scandal. 


No. I 


DOGE. 


Will now descend the stairs by which I mounted 


Answer that ; 


To sovereignly — the Giant's Stairs, on whose 


[Jo the Ten. 


Broad eminence I was invested duke. 


It is your province. — Sirs, bestir yourselves ; 


My services have call'd me up those steps, 


[ To Oie Servants. 


The malice of my foes will drive me down them. 


There is one burthen which I beg you bear 


Tliere five and thirty years ago was I 


With care, although 't is past all further harm — 


Install'd, and traversed these same halls from whici 


But I will look to that myself. 


I never thought to be divorced except 


BARBARIOO. 


A corse — a corse, it might be, fighting for them— 


He means 


Hut not push'd hence by fellow-citizens. 


The body of his son. 


But, come; my son and I will so together — 


DOGE. 


He to his grave, and I to pray for mine. 


And call Marina, 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


My daughter ! 


What, thus in public ? 




DOGE. 


Enter Marina. 


I was publicly 


doge. 


Elected, and so will I be deposed. 


Get thee ready ; we must mourn 


Manna ! art thou willing ? 


Elsewhere. 


MARINA. 


MARINA. 


Here 's my arm ! 


And every where. 


DOGE. 


DOGE. 


And here my staff: thus propp'd will I go forth. 


True ; but in freedom, 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


Without these jealous spies upon the great. 


It must not be— the people will perceive it. 


Signors, you may depart : what would you more ? 


DOGE. 


We are going : do you fear that we shall bear 


The people ! — There 's no people, you well know it, 


The palace with us ? Its old walls, ten times 


Else you dare not deal thus by them or me. 


As old as I am, and I 'm very old, 


There is a populace, perhaps, whose looks 


Have served you, so have I, and I and they 


May shame you ; but they dare not groan nor curse you, 


Could tell a tale ; but I invoke them not 


Save with their hearts and eyes. 


1 o fall upon you ! else they would, as erst 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


The pillprs of stone Dagon's temple on 


You speak in passion, 


Tne Israelite and his Philistine foes. 


Else 


Such power I do believe there might exist 


DOGE. 


In such a curse as mine, provoked by such 


You have reason. I have spoken much 


As you ; but I curse not. Adieu, good signors ! 


More than my wont ; it is a foible which 


May the next duke be better than the present' 


Was not of mine, but more excuses you, 


LOREDANO. 


Inasmuch as it shows that I approach 


'Vhp, prestnt duke is Pascal Malipicro. 


A dotage which may justify this deed 



""' ' '■ "' 

THE TWO 


FOSCARI. 353 


Of yours, although the law Joes not, nor will. 


LOREDANO. 


Farewell, sirs. 


Well, sir! 


BARF>ARTGO. 


DOGE, 


You shall not depart without 


Then it is false, or you are true. 


An escort fitting past and present rank. 


For my own part, I credit neither; 'tis 


We will accompany, with due respect, 


An idle legend. 


The Doge unto his private palace. Say! 
My brethren, will we not ? 


M w;in'a. 


You talk wildly, and 




Had better now be seated, nor as vet 


DIFFERENT VOICES. 




Ay !— Ay ! 


Depart. Ah! now you look as look'd my husband ! 


DOGE. 

You shall not 


B tRBARIOO. 


He sinks! — support him! — quick — a chair — support him' 


Stir — in my train, at least. I cnter'd here 


DOGE. 


As sovereign — I go out as citizen 


The bell tolls on ! — let 's hence — my brain 's on fire ' 


By the same portals ; but as citizen, 


BARBARIGO. 


All these vain ceremonies are base insults, 


I do beseech you, lean upon us ! 


Which only ulcerate the heart the more, 


doge; 

No! 


Applying poisons there as antidotes. 

Pomp is for princes — I am now ! — That 's false, 

I am, but only to these gates. — Ah! 


A sovereign should die standing. My poor boy! 


Otf with your amis ! — That /» !! ! 


[The Doge drops down, and dies. 


LOKEDANO. 


Hark ! 
[The great bell of Saint Mark's tolls. 


MARIN A. 


My God! my God 1 

BARBARIGO (to LoREDANO). 


BARBARIGO. 

The bell ! 


Behold! your work 's completed-! 


CHIEF OF TriE TEX. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


Saint Mark's, which tolls for the election 


Is there then 


Of Malipiero. 


No aid ? Call in assistance ! 


POCE. 


ATTENDANT. 


Well I recognise 


'Tis all over. 


The sound ! I heard it once, but once before, 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


And that is five and thirty years ago ; 


If it he so, at least his obsequies 


Even then I was not young. 


Shall be such as befits his name and nation, 


BARBARIGO. 


His rank and his devotion to the duties 


Sit down, my lord ! 


Of the realm, while his age permitted him 


You tremble. 


To do himself and them full justice. Brethren, 


DOGE. 


Say, shall it not be so ? 


'T is the knell of my poor boy ! 


BARBARIGO. 


My heart aches bitterly. 


He has not had 


BARBARIGO. 


The misery to die a subject where 


I [iray you sit. 


He reign'd : then let his funeral rites be princely. 


DOGE. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


No ; my seat here has been a throne till now. 


We are agreed, then ? 


Marina! let us go. 


All, except Loredano, answer. 


MARINA. 


Yes. 


Most readily. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


nor.E (walks a few steps, then stops). 


Heaven's peace be with lun^ 


I feel a thirst — will no one bring me here 


MARINA. 


A cup of water ? 


Sisnors, your pardon : this is mockery. 


BARBARIGO. 


Juggle no more with that poor remnant, which, 


I — 


A moment since, while yet it had a soul 


MARINA. 


(A soul by whom you have increased your empire. 


And I 


And made your power as proud as was his glory) 


LOREDANO. 


You bamsh'd from his palace, and tore down 


And I 


From his high place with such relentless coldness: 


[Tlie Doge takes a goblet from the hand of Lore da no. 


And now, when he can neither know these honours. 


doge. 


Nor would accept them if he could, you, signors, 


I take yours, Loredano, from the hand 


Purpose, with idle and superfluous pomp. 


Most fit for such an hour as this. 


To make a pageant over what you trampled. 


LOREDANO. 


A princely funeral will be your reproach, 


Why so? 


And not his honour. 


DOGE. 


CHIEF OF THE TEN. 


'Tis said that our Venetian crystal has 


Lady, we revoke not 


Such pure antipatny to poisons, as 


Our purposes so readily. 


To burst if aught of venom touches it. 


MARINA. 


You bore this goblet, and it is not broken. 


I know it. 


50 





351 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



As fir as touches torturing the living. 

1 lead had been beyond even you, 

Though (some, no doubt ),consign'tl to powers which may 

K mble that you exercise on earth. 

Leave him to me ; you would have done so for 

His dregs of life, which you have kindly shorten'd: 

It is ray last of duties, and may prove 

A dr< ary comfort in my desolation. 

i fantastical, and loves the. dead, 
And the apparel of the grave. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Do you 

Pretend still to this office? 

MARINA. 

I do, sijjnor. 
Though his possessions have been all consumed 
In the state's service, I have still my dowry, 
Which shall be consecrated to his rites, 
And those of [She Klips with agitation. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Best retain it for your children. 

MA KIN A. 

Ay, they are fatherless, I thank you. 

dllEl' OF THE TEN. 

We 
Cannot comply with your request. His relics 
Shall be exposed with wonted pomp, and follow'd 
Unto their home by the new Doge, not clad 
As Doge, but simply as a senator. 

MARINA. 

I have !h ;<n! of murderers, who have interr'd 

Their victims ; but ne'er heard, until this hour, 

Of so much splendour in hypocrisy 

O'er those they slew. I've heard of widows' tears — 

Alas ! I have shed some — always thanks to you ! 

I 've heard of heirs in sables — you have left none 

To the deceased, so you would act the part 

Of such, Wei!, sirs, your will be done ! as one day, 

I trust, Heaven's will be done too ! 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

Know you, lady, 
To whom ye speak, and perils of such speech ? 

MARINA. 

I know the former better than yourselves ; 
The latter — like yourselves ; and can face both. 
Wish you more funerals ? 

BARBARIGO. 

Heed not her rash words ! 
Her circumstances must excuse her bearing. 

CHIEF OF THE TEN. 

W e will not note them down. 

Bakbarigo {turning iyiLoredano, who is writing vpon 
his tablets). 

What art thou writing, 
With such an earnest brow, upon thy tablets '! 

i.oredano (pointing to the Doge's body). 
That he has paid me !' 

CHIEF of the ten. 

What debt did he owe you ? 

LOKEDANO. 

A long and just one ; nature's debt and mine. 

[ Curtain falls. 



I " L'lia valuta." A historical fact. See the History of 
Venice by P I laru page 4il, vol. ii. 



APPENDIX. 



Exlrait de FHistoire de la Rtpubhque de Venise, par 
P. Daru, de C Academie francuise. Tom. 2. 

Depuis trcnte ans, la republique n'avait pas depose 
les amies. Elle avait acquis les provinces <!e Brescia, 
de Bergame, de Crime, ct la principaute de Ravenne. 

Mais ces guerres continuellcs faisaient beaucoup do 
malhcureux ct de mecontents. Le doge Francois Fos- 
cari, a qui on ne pouvait pardonner d'en avoir etc le pro- 
moteur, manifesta vine seconde fois, en 1443, ct probable 
naenl av< c plus de sinccritc que la premiere, ["intention 
d'abdiqucr sa dignite. Le conseil s'y refusa encore. On 
avail exige' de lui le stehnent de ne plus quitter le dogat. 
II itiit deja avance dans la vieillcsse, conservant cepen- 
dant beaucoup de force de tite ct de caraett're, et jouis- 
sant de la gloire d'nvoirvula republique etendre an loin 
les limites de ses domaines pendant son administration. 

Au milieu de ces prosperites, de gvands chagrins vin- 
rent mettre a l'epreuvc la fermete de son ame. 

Son iiis, Jacques Foscari,fut accuse, en 1445, d'avoir 
rrcu des presents dequelqnea princes Ou seigneurs <i ran- 
ters, DOtamment, disait-on, du due de Milan, Philippe 
Visronti. C'etait non seulement line bassesse, mais line 
infraction des lois positives de la rcpublique. 

Le conseil des dix traita cette affaire comme s'il se fut 
agi d'un debt commis par tin particuUer obscur. L'ac- 
euse fut amene devant ses juges, devant le doge, qui ne 
cnit pas pouvoir s'abstenir de prcsider le tribunal. LA, 
il fut interroge, applique Ma question,' declare coupablc, 
et il entendit, de la bouche de son pere, farret qui le 
condamnait a un banissement perpeHueL, et le releguait 
a Naples de Romanic, pour y fmir ses jours. 

Eiubarque sur line galere pourse rendre au lieu deson 
evil, il tomba malade a Trieste. Les solicitations du 
doge obtinrenl, non sans difficult e, qu'on lui assign!) une 
autre residence. Enfin le conseil des dix lui permit de 
se retirer ii Trevise, en lui imposant l'obligation d'y Tes- 
ter sous peine de mort, et de se presenter tous les jours 
devant le gouverneur. 

II y etait depuis cinq ans, lorsqu'un des chefs du conseil 
des dix fut assassine. Les soupcons se port (Tent sur lui : 
un de ses domestiques qu'on avait vu a Venisc fut arrete' 
et subit la torture. Les bourreaux ne parent lui arracher 
adcun aveu. Ce terrible tribunal se fit amener le m litre, 
le soumit aux mimes epreuves ; il n'sista a tous les tour- 
ments, ne cessant d'attcstcr son innocence ; a mais on ne 



1 E datagli la enrda per avare da lui la verita; chiamau) il 
conaiglio de' diecj eolla giunta, ml quale Cii meaner In doge, fu 
m ■iitcii/.iii'.D. — (Marin Sanuto Vire de' Duchi, F. FQsca'ri.) 

■J E in lormentato ni mai eonfcasb cosa alcuna, pun; parve 
nl conaiglio de' died di confinatlo in vita nlla Gjanea, (Iljid.) 
Voici le texte du jugemenl ; " ( 'inn Jacobus Foacari per oo- 
casroooiti percuaaipnia el mortis Harmota,! Donati fuit retenujs 
ct examinatua, et propter Bigni/icanones, testificatiooea, ct 
Bcripturna qua habeotui contra cum, clam apparel ipaum esse 
n ii i ii crimiuiaprtedicti.sed propter incantutiones, el verba ipuo 
mIh reperto sum, de qmbua exiaht indicia pnsaifeata, videtui 
propter bbsl inatam menteoa tuara, non esse posaibUe eztr&here 
ali ipso ilium veritatem, quid clara est per icriptorai al pet 
tesiificntioitcs, quoniard in runs aliquant nee vocem, nee ami 
turn*, Bed solum intra denli s voces ipse videlur el audit ur intra 
sn loquii etc. . . . Tamen non osi atandtrai in istia Ii 
propter honorsm atatui noatrjj et i>ro multia respecubusj praj- 
tertim quod regimen ooatrum occupator in bac ra el quia ii. 
Urdictum est ampliua progredefe: vadil para quod dictua ,'.i- 
oohus Foacari, propter ci qua habtttur da iilo, miltalur in 
confinium in civitate C'auuu;," etc Notice sur le piguca de 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



3a 



vit dans cette Constance que de l'obstination ; de ce 
qu'il taisait le fait, on conclut que ce fait existait : on 
attribua sa fcrmete a la magie, et on le relegua a la 
Canee. De cette terre loiiitaino, le banni, digne alors 
de quelque pitie, ne cessait d'ecrire a sou pere, :i sea 
amis, pour obtenir quelque adoueissement a sa depor- 
tation. N'obtenant ricn, et sachant que la terreur qu'in- 
spirait le conseil des dix ne lui perniettait pas d'esperer 
de trouver dans Venise line Settle voix qui s'elcvat en 
sa faveur, il fit une lettre pour le nouveau due de Milan, 
par laquelle, au nom des bona offices que Sforce avait 
rectis du chef de la rcpublique, il implorait son inter- 
vention en faveur d'un innocent, du fils du doge. 

Cette lettre, selon quelques historiens, fut confiee a 
un marchand qui avait promis de la fairc parvenir au 
due, mais qui, trop averti de ce qu'il y avait a craindre 
en se rendant l'intermediaire d'unc pareille correspon- 
dance, se hita, en debarquant-a Venise, de la remettpe 
au chef du tribunal. Une autre version, qui parait plus 
sure, rapporte que la lettre fut surprise par un espion, 
attache aux pas de l 1 exile. ' 

Ce fut un nouveau debt dont on eut a punir Jacques 
Foscari. Reclamer la protection d'un prince etranger 
etait un crime, dans un sujet de la rcpublique. Une ga- 
lere partit sur-le-champ pour I'amcncr dans les prisons 
de Venise. A son arrivee, il fut sounds a I'cstrapade. 2 
C'etait une singuiiere destinee pourle citoyen d'une re- 
publique et pour le fils d'un prince, d'etre trois fois dans 
sa vie applique a la question. Cette fois la torture etait 
d'autant plus odieuse, qu'elle n'avait point d'objet, le 
fait qu'on avait a lui reprocher etant incontestable. 

Quand on demanda a l'aceuse, dans les intervallcs que 
les bourreaux lui accordaient, pourquoi il avait ecrit la 
lettre qu'on lui produisait, il repondit que e'etait preeise- 
ment parcequ'il ne doutait pas qu'elle ne tombat entre 
les mains du tribunal, que toute autre voie lui avait ete 
fcrmee pour faire parvenir ses reclamations, qu'il s'at- 
tendait bien qu'on le ferait amener a Venise, mais qu'il 
avait tout risque pour avoir la consolation de voir sa 
femme, son pere, et sa mere, encore une fois. 

Sur cette naive declaration, on confirma sa sentence 
d'exil ; mais on l'aggrava, en y ajoutant qu'il scrait re- 
tenu en prison pendant un an. Cette rigueur, dont on 
usait envers un malheureux etait sans doute odieuse ; 
mais cette politique, qui defendait a tous les citovens de 
faire intervenir les etrangers dans les affaires interieures 
de la t<»publique, etait sage. Elle elait chez eux une 
maxime de gouvemement et une maxime inflexible. 
L'historien Paul Morosini 3 a conte que I'empereur 
Frederic III. pendant qu'il etait l'hiitc des Venitiens, de- 
manda comme une faveur particulii N re, l'admission d'un 
citoyen dans le grand conseil, et la grace d'un ancien 
gouverneur de Candie, gendre du doge, et banni pour 
6a mauvaisc administration, sans pouvoir obtenir ni 
['une ni l'autre. 

Cependant on ne put refuser au condamne la permis- 
sion de voir sa femme, ses enfants, ses parents, qu'il 
allait quitter pour toujours. Cette derniere entrevue 



Jacques Foscari, dans un volume intitule, Raccolta di mem- 
orie storiche e annedote, per Ibrmnr la Btoria delP eccellen- 
tissimo consiglio di X, dalla sua prima instituzione sino a' 
pinrui nnsln, con le diverse variazioni e rildrmo nullo varie 
epoche successe. (Archives de Venise.) 

1 La notice citoe ci-dessus qui rapporte les actes de cette 
procedure. 

2 Kobe prima per snpere la verity trenta squassi di corda. 
(Marin Sanuto, Vite de' Duchi. F. Foscari.) 

3 llistoriadi Venezia, lib. -Zi. 



nn'me fut accompagnee de cruaut/', par la severe cir- 
conspection,qui retcnait lesepanchementsde la douleur 
palemellc et conjugalc. Ce ne fut point dans I'mteneilf 
de leur appartemont,ce fut dans une (tea grandessaltea 
'In palais, qu'une femme, accompagnee de ses quatre 
fils, vint faire les denriers adieux h son mari,qu'un pere 
tire et la dogaresse aocablee d'mlirmites, jonir- 
ent un moment de la triste consolation de meler ieurs 
larmcs a eelles de leur exile. II se jeta a Ieurs genoux, 
en leur tendant des mains disloquecs par la torture, pour 
les supplier de sollieiter quelque adoueissement a la 
sentence qui venait d'etre prononeee contre lui. Son 
pere eut lo courage de lui rcpondre: "Non, mon fils, 
respeclez votre arret, et obt . cez satas murmure a la 
seigneurie." ' A ces mots il se se'para de rinl'urtune, 
qui fut sur-le-champ cmhurqtic pour Candie. 

L'antiquite vit avec aulanl d'horreur que d'admiration 
un pere condaninant ses tils evidemment eoupables. 
Elle hesita pour qualifier de verlu sublime ou du ferocite 
cet effort qui pur.rit nu-dcssiis de la nature liunriine ; 2 
mais ici, oil la premiere faille nVtait qu'une faiblesse, ou 
la seconde n'etait pas prouvee, ou la troisieme n'avait 
rien de eriminei, comment coneevoir la Constance d'un 
pere, qui voit torturer trois fois son tils unique, qui IYn- 
tend condamner sans preuves, et qui n relate pas en 
plaintes ; qui ne l'aborde que pour lui montrer un visage 
plus austere qu'attendri, et qui, au moment de s'en se- 
parer pour jamais, lui mterdit les murmures et jnsqu'a 
l'esperance? Comment exptiqiior une si cruelle circon- 
spection, si ce n'est en avouant, a notre honte, que la 
tyrannie peut obtenir de l'cspecc humaine les mtSmes 
efforts que la vertu ? La servitude aurait-elle son he- 
roisme comme la liberie ? 

Quelque temps apres ce jugement, on derouvrit le ve- 
ritable auteur de 1'assassinat, dont Jacques Foscari por- 
tait la peine ; mais il n'elait plus temps do reparer cette 
atroce injustice, le malheureux etait mort dans sa prison. 

11 me reste a raeonter la suite des malheurs du pere. 
L'histoire les altnbue a l'impatienec qu'avaient ses 
ennemis et ses rivaux de voir vaquer sa place. Elle 
accuse formellement Jacques Loredan, l'un des chefs 
du conseil des dix, de s'etre livre contre ce vieillard aux 
conseils d'une haine hereditaire et qui depuis long-temps 
divisait Ieurs maisons. 3 

Francois Foscari avait essaye de la faire cesser, en 
offrant sa fille a l'lllustre amiral Pierre Loredan, pour ua 
de ses fils. L'alliance avait etc rejetee, et l'uiimitie des 



1 Marin Sanutd, dans sa chroniquc, Vite oe' Ducbi, se scrt 
ici. sans en avoir eu 1'inlention, d'une expression asseS chit- 
gique; "II doge eia vecchio in decrepka ota e camminava 
con una mazzetta. E quando cli audi) parlogli molto con- 
siMiteaiente chu parca ebe non fosse suo fiuliulo, licel fosse 
fmliulo unico, e Jaeopo digge, ' Biesspr padre, vi prcgo cho 
procuriate per mo, BCCiocche io torni a CBB8 mia. II doge 
disse: '.lacopo, va a oliljudisei a qucllo cbe vuole la terra, e 
non cercar piu ollre.' " 

2 Cela fut un aele que Pen ne scauroit ny snffissamment 
loner, ny assez hliisiiier: car. on c'eetsil DOC exMienCfl de 
vertu, qui tendoit ainai son coaor impassible, on one violence 
de passion qui le rendoil insensible, donl ne I'une ne I'aotte 
n'eit chose [i.-nie. ainsi Bnrpananl I'ordi mire d'humaine na 
lure, et tenant ou ae la diviaite on de la bestialite, Mais il est 
pins Nusoimabte bus la jugement des homines B'aceordc h fix 
L'loirc, que !a faialowo dee jugesna fasse deacreite sn \eriu 
Mais pour lors quaad il »a ful retire, tout la monde demoura 
sur la place, comme trans) d'horreur et de firayeor, par nn 

hong temps sans mot dire, pour avoir veu ce qui uvoit ete full, 

(Plutarque, Valerius Ffabficola.) 

3 Je puis principalcment daDs ce recit une relation mann 
scrite do Ir deposition Je Francois Foscari qui c-t lans In 
volume intitule: Itaccolta di uiemoric storiclie a annedoto, 
per lorinar la Storia dell' cccelleutisBimo conjigho di i 
(Archives de VeuiseJ 



356 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



deux families s'cn «'tait accrue. Dans tous les conseils, 
dans toutcs les affaires, le doge trouvait toujoura les 
Loredan prtHs a combattre ses propositions ou ses in- 
tercuts. II lui echappa un jour de dire qu'il ne se croi- 
rait rcellement prince que lorsquc Pierre Lorddan au- 
rait cesse de vivre. Cet amiral inourut quelque temps 
apres d'une incommodite assez promptc qu'on ne put 
expliquer. II n'en fallut pas davantage aux malvrillants 
pour installer que Francois Foscari, ayant desire cette 
mort, pouvait bien l'avoir hatee. 

Ces bruits s'accreditercnt encore lorsqu'on vit aussi 
perir subitement Marc Lorcdan, frcre de Pierre, ct cela 
dans le moment oil, en sa qualite d'avogador, il instrui- 
sait un proces contre Andre Donato, gendre du doge, 
accuse de peculat. On ecrivit sur la tomhe de l'amiral 
qu'il avait ete enleve a la patrie par le poison. 

II n'y avait aucune preuve, aucun indice contre Fran- 
cois Foscari, aucune raison meme de le soupconner. 
Quand sa vie entiere n'aurait pas dementi une imputa- 
tion aussi odieuse, il savait que son rang ne lui promet- 
tait ni 1'impunite ni me'me l'indulgence. La mort tra- 
gique de l'un de ses predecesseurs l'en avcrtissait, el 
il n'avait que trop d'exemples domestiques du soin que 
ie ccnseil des dix prenait d'humilier le chef de la re- 
publique. 

Cependant, Jacques Loredan, fils de Pierre, croyait ou 
feignait de croire avoir a venger les pertes de sa famille. ' 
Dans ses livrcs de comptes (car il faisait le commerce, 
comme a cette epoque presque tous les patriciens), il 
avait inscrit de sa propre main le doge au nombre de ses 
debiteurs, pour la mort, y etait-il dit, de mon pere et de 
mon oncle. 2 De l'autre cute du rcgistre, il avait laisse 
une page en blanc, pour y faire mention du recouvre- 
ment de cette dette, et en erfet, apres la perte du doge, il 
ecrivit sur son registre : il me l'a payee, Cha pagata. 

Jacques Lorcdan fut elu membre du conseil des dix, 
en devint un des trois chefs, et se promit bien de prori- 
ter de cette occasion pour accomplir la vengeance qu'il 
meditait. 

Le doge, en sortant de la terrible epreuve qu'il venait 
de subir, pendant le proces de son fils, s'etait retire au 
fond de son palais : incapable de se livrer aux atfaires, 
consume de chagrins, accable de vieillesse, il ne se mon- 
trait plus en public, ni memo dans les conseils. Cette 
»etraite, si facile a expliquer dans un vieillard octoge- 
naire si malheureux, deplut aux decemvirs, qui voulu- 
rent y voir un murmure contre leurs arrets. 

Loredan commer.ca par se plaindre devant ses col- 
Jesues du tort que les infirmites du doge, son absence 
des conseils, apportaient a l'expedition des affaires ; il 
finit par hasarder et reussit a faire agreer la proposition 
dc le deposer. Ce n'etait pas la premiere fois que Ven- 
ise avait pour prince un homme dans la caducite : l'u- 
sa«e ct les lois y avaient pourvu : dans ces circonstan- 
ces le doge etait supplee par le plus ancien du conseil. 
Ici, cela ne suffisait pas aux ennemis de Foscari. Pour 
Jonner plus de solennite h la deliberation, le conseil des 
vlix demanda une adjonction de vingt-cinq senateurs ; 
mais comme on n'en enoneait pas 1'objet, et que In grand 
conseil etait loin de le soupconner, il se trouva que Marc 
Foscari, frere du doge, leur fut donne pour l'un des ad- 
joints. Au lieu de l'admettre a la deliberation, ou de 



1 Haace taniin injurias quamvis hnaginariaa non tarn ad 
Pn.iiiun revdeaventi JaeobUI Lauimlanua iluliinctdrmn ne 

fos puam in abecedarium vindittam opportuna. (Palazzi 
'asti ducolea.) 
a Ibid ct riltntoiru Vinitieone de Vianolo. 



reclamor contre ce choLx, on enferma ce senateur dang 
une chambre separec, et on lui fit jurer de ne jamais 
parler de cette exclusion qu'il eprouvait, en lui decla- 
rant qu'il y allait de sa vie ; ce qui n'empecha pas qu'on 
inscrivit son nom au bas du decret, comme s'il y eut 
pris part. 1 

Quand on en vint a la deliberation, Loredan la provo- 
qua en ces termes. 2 " Si l'utilite publiquc doit imposer 
silence a tous les interets prives, je ne doute pas que 
nous ne prenions aujourd'hui une mesure que la patrie 
reclame, que nous lui devons. Les elats ne pcuvent 
se maintenir dans un ordre dc choses immuable: vous 
n'avez qu'a voir comme le notre est change, et combien 
il le serait davantage s'il n'y avait une autorite assez 
ferine pour y porter remede. J'ai honte de vous faire 
remarquer la confusion qui regne dans les conseils, le 
desordre des deliberations, l'encombrement des atfaires, 
et la legtrete avec laquelle les plus importantes sont 
decidees ; la licence de notre jeunesse, le peu d'assi- 
duite des magistrats, l'introduction de nouveautes dan- 
gereuses. Quel est l'effet de ces desordrcs ? de com- 
promettre notre consideration. Quelle en est la cause? 
l'absence d'un chef capable dc moderer les uns, de di- 
nger les autres, de dormer l'exemple h tous, et de main- 
tenir la force des lois. 

"Oil est le temps ou nosdecrets etaient aussitot ex- 
ecutes que rendus ? oil Francois Carrare se trouvait 
investi dans Padoue, avant de pouvoir Ctre sculement 
informe que nous voulions lui faire la guerre ? Nous 
avons vu tout le contraire dans la derniere guerre con- 
tre le due de Milan. Malheureuse la republique qui 
est sans chef! 

"Je ne vous rappellc pas tous ces inconvenients et 
leurs suites deplorables, pour vous affliger, pour vous 
effraver, mais pour vous faire souvenir que vous eHes 
les maitres, les conservateurs de cet etat fonde par vos 
peres, et de la liberie que nous devons a leurs travaux, 
a leurs institutions. Ici, le mal indique le remede. 
Nous n'avons point de chef, il nous en faut un. Notre 
prince est notre ouvrage, nous avons done le droit de 
j"ger son merite quand il s'agit de l'elire, et son inca- 
pacity quand elle se manifeste. J'ajouterai que le 
peuple, encore bien qu'il n'ait pas le droit de pronon- 
cer sur les actions de ses maitres, apprendra ce chan- 
gement avec transport. C 'est la Providence, je n'en 
doute pas, qui lui inspire ellc-meme ces dispositions, 
pour vous avertir que la republique reclame cette reso- 
lution, et que le sort de l'etat est en vos mains." 

Ce discours n'eprouva que de timides contradictions ; 
cependant, la deliberation dura huit jours. L'assemblee, 
ne se jugeant pas aussi sure de l'approbation univer- 
selle que l'orateur voulait le lui faire croire, desirait que 
le doge donniit lui-mOme sa demission. II l'avait deja 
proposee deux fois, et on n'avait pas voulu l'accepter. 

Aucune loi ne portait que le prince flit revocable : il 
etait au contraire a vie, et les exemples qu'on pouvait 
citer de plusieurs doges deposes, prouvaient que de 
telles revolutions avaient toujours ete le resultat d'un 
mouvement populaire. 

Mais d'ailleurs, si le doge pouvait^tre depose, cen'etait 
pas assurement par un tribunal composed d'un petit nom- 
bre de membres, institue pour punir les crimes, ct nulle- 



1 II faut cependant remarquer que dans la notice on l'un 
racoDte co Rant, la deliberation est rapportee, one let vingt- 
(ii i adjointa y eont nonunes, et quo le nom de Marc Foscari 
ne t 1 ? troiive pas. 

2 Cette harangue se lit dans la notice citee ci-desaus 



THE TWO FOSCART. 



357 



ment investi du droit de rcvoquer ce que le corps souve- 
rain de l'etat avait fait. 

Cependant le tribunal arreta que les six conseillers de 
la seigneurie, et les chefs du conseil des dix, se trans- 
porteraient aupres du doge, pour lui signifier que l'ex- 
cellentissime conseil avait juge convenable qu'il abdiqua t 
une dignity dont son age no lui permettait plusde rem- 
plir les fonctions. On lui donna 1500 J-icats d'or pour 
son < ntivticn, et vingt-quatre hcures pour se decider. 1 
Foscari ropondit sur-le-champ avec beaucoup de gra- 
vitc, quo deux fois il avait voulu se demettrede sa charge; 
qu'au lieu de le lui permettre, on avait exige de lui le 
Berment dene plus reiterer cette demande; que la Pro- 
vidence avait prolonge ses jours pour I'eprouver et pour 
l'affliger ; que cependant on n'etait pas en droit de re- 
procher sa longue vie a un homme qui avait employe 
quatre-vingt-quatre ans au service de la republique ; 
qu'il etait prtt encore a lui sarritier sa vie ; mais que, 
pour sa dignite, il la tenait de la republique entire, et 
qu'il se reservait de repondro sur ce sujet, quand la 
volonte generate se serait legalement manifcstee. 

Le lcndemain, a l'heure indiquee, les conseillers et les 
chefs des dix se presenterent. II ne voulut pas lour don- 
ner d'autre reponse. Le conseil s'asseinbla sur-le- 
champ, lui envoya demander encore une fois sa resolu- 
tion, seance tenante, et, la reponse ayant ete la memo, 
on prononea que le doge etait releve de son serment et 
depose de sa dignite: on lui assigna une pension de 
1500 ducats d'or, en lui enjoignant de sortir du palais 
dans huit jours, sous peine de voir tous ses biens con- 
fisques. 2 

Le lendemain, ce dccret fut porte au doge, et ce fut 
Jacques Loredan qui eut la cruelle joie de le lui presen- 
ter. II ropondit : " Si j'avais pu prevoirque ma vieil- 
lesse fut prejudiciable a l'etat, le chef de la republique 
ne se serait pas montre assez injrat, pour preferor sa 
disnite a la patrie ; mais cette vie lui avant ete utile 
pendant tant d'annees, je voulais lui en consacrcr jus- 
qu'au demier moment. Le deeret est rendu, je m'y 
conformerai." Apres avoir parle ainsi, il se depouilla 
des marques de sa dignite, remit I'anneau ducal qui fut 
briseen sa presence, et des le jour suivant il quittace pa- 
lais, qu'il avait habite pendant trcnte-cinq ans, accom- 
pagne de son frere, de ses parents, et de ses amis. Un 
secretaire, qui se trouva sur le perron, l'invita a des- 
cendre par un escalier derobe, afin d'eviter la foule du 
peuple, qui s'etait rassemhle dans les cours, mais il s'y 
refusa, disant qu'il voulait descendre par oil il etait 
monte ; et quand il fut au bas de l'escalier des grants, il 
se retourua, appuye sur sa bequille, vers le palais, en 
proferant res paroles: " Mes services m'y avaient ap- 
pele, la malice de mes ennemis m'en fait sortir." 

La foule qui s'ouvrait sur son passage, et qui avait 
peut-etre desire sa mort, etait, emue de respect et d'at- 
tendrissement.- 1 Rentre dans sa maison, il rccommanda 
a sa famille d'oublier les injures de ses ennemis. Pcr- 
sonne dans les divers corps de l'etat ne se crut en droit 
or s'i -i.i in iit, qu'nn prince inamovible eut etc depose sans 
qu'on lui reprochat rien ; que l'etat rut perdu son chef, 
a I'insu du senat, et du corps souvorain lui-meme. Le 
peuple seul laissa echappcr quelques resrrcts : une pro- 



1 CV dicret est rapportd textupllement dans la notice. 

2 1,8 notice rapporte aussi re ddCMt, 

■i On lit dana la notice res propre mots ; "Se fosse stato in 
uro poteru voli-ntii-ri lo avrebbero rcstituito " 

21 



clamation du conseil des dix prescrivit le silence le plus 
absolu sur cette affaire, sous peine de mort. 

Avant de donner un successeur a Francois Foscan, 
une nouvel'.e loi fut rendue, qui dcfendait au done 
d'ouvrir et de lire, autrement qu'en presence de ses con- 
seillers, les depeches des atnbasbadeurJ de la repub- 
hque, et les lettres des princes etrang* rs. 1 

Les elccteurs entrorent au conclave, et DOtntnereflt au 
dogat Paschal Malipier, le 30 octobre 1457. La cloche 
de Saint-Marc, qui annnneait a Venise son rmuvrau 
prince, vint frapper l'oreille de Francois Fesc&ri ; cette 
fois sa fermete 1'abandonna, il eprouva un tel saisisse- 
ment, qu'il monrut le lendemain. 2 

La republique arreta qu'on lui rendrait Irs memos hon- 
neurs funebrcs que s'il fut mort dans I'exCrcice de sa 
dignite ; mais lorsqu'on se presenta pour enlcver ses 
restes, sa veuve, qui de son nom etait Marine Nani, de- 
clara qu'elle ne le soufTrirait poir.t ; qu'on ne devait pas 
traitor en prince apres sa mort celui que vivant on avait 
depouille de la couronne, et que, puisqu'il avait consum6 
ses biens au service de l'etat, elle saurait consacrcr sa 
dot a lui faire rendre les derniers honneurs. 3 On ne tint 
aucun compte de cette resistance, et malgre les protes- 
tations de l'ancienne dogaresse, le corps fut cnlevc, rc- 
vetu des ornemens ducaux, expose en public, et les ob- 
seques furent celebroes avec la pompe accoiitumee. Le 
nouveau doge assista au convoi en robe de senatour. 

La pitie qu'avait inspiree le malheur de ce vieillard, 
ne fut pas tout-a-fait sterile. Un an apres, on osa dire 
que le conseil des dix avait outrepasse ses pouvoirs, et 
il lui fut defendu par une loi du grand conseil de s'in- 
«erer a l'avenir de juger le prince, a moins que ce ne 
fut pour cause de felonie.* 

Un aete d'autorite tel que la deposition d'un doge in- 
amovible de sa nature, auroit pu exciter un souleve- 
ment general, ou au moins occasioner une division 
dans une republique autrement constitute que Venise. 
Mais de puis trois ans, il existait dans celle-ci une 
magisfrature, ou plutdt une autorite, devant laquelle 
tout devait se taire. 

Ertrait de rHixtoire des Re"pvhlhpies Ttaliamcs du rnnyen 
Age, par J. C. L. Simonde de Sismondi, tom'. x. 
Le doge de Venise, qui avait prevenu par ce traite une 
guerre non moins dangereuse que celle qu'il avait ter- 
min£e presque en meme temps par le traite de Lodi, 
etait alors parvenu \ une extreme vieillcsse. Francois 
Fosaari occupait cette premiere dignite de l'etat des le 
15 avril 1423. Quoiqu'il fut deja age de plus de cin- 
quantc-un ans a l'epoquc de son election, il ('tail cepen- 
dant le plus jeunc des quarante-un electeurs. II avait 
eu beaucoup de peine ;i parvenir an rang qu'2 convoi- 
tait, et son election avait etc conduite avec beaucoup 
d'adrcsse. Pendant plusicurs tours de srnitin ses an-.is 
les plus zeles s'etaienl abstenus de lui donner lour suf- 
frage, pour que les autresneleconsiderassent pascomme 
un concurrent redoutable. 5 Le conseil des dix craignait 
son credit parmi la noblesse pauvre, parcequ'il avail 
clierelii'- ii se la rendre favorable, tandis qu'il etait pro 
eurateur de Saint-Marc, en faisant employer plus <le 
(rente mille ducats h doter des jeuncs till(^s do bonne 



1 Hist, di \ eniiiii, di Paolo Moroeini, lib. l Zt. 

2 Hist, di Pietro Justiniadi, lib. 8. 
:t Hist. d'Egnario, lib. ti. cap. 7. 

4 ('(! diMTit est duSS Octobre, 1458. La notice In rapport*. 

5 Marin Sunulo, Yite do' Duchi di Venczia, p. !lfi" 



358 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



maison, on a etahlir des jeunes gcntilshommcs. On 
Craignait encore sa nombreuse famille, car alors il etait 
pere de quatre i-iif.uis, et marie de nouveau ; enfin on 
pedoutait son ambition ct son gout pour la guerre. L'opi- 
nion que ses adversaires s'etaientformee de lui fut veri- 
fier par lea evenemens ; pendant trcnte-quatre ansquc 
Foscari fut a la tote de la republique, elle ne cessa point 
de combattre. Si les hostilites etaient suspendues du- 
rant quclquca mois, e'etait pour recommencer bientot 
avec plus de vigueur. Ce fut Pepoque ou Vonise etendit 
son empire BUT Brescia, Bergame, Ravenne, et Cremc, 
ou elle fonda sa domination de Lombardie, ct parut 
sans cesse sur le point d'asservir toute cette province. 
Profond, courageux, inebranlable, Foscari onmmnniqua 
aux conseils son propre caractere, et ses talens lui fircnt 
obtenir plus d'inftuence sur la republique, que n'avaient 
excrce la plupart de ses predecesscurs. Mais si son am- 
bition avait cu pour but Pagrandissement do sa famille, 
elle fut cruellement trompee : trois de ses fils moururenl 
dans les huit annees qui suivirent son election : le qua- 
trieine, Jacob, par lequel la maison Foscari s'est per- 
petuee, fut victime de la jalousie du conseil des dix, et 
empoisonna par ses malheurs les jours de son pere. ' 

En effet, le conseil des dix, redoublant de defiance 
envers le chef de Petat, lorsqu'il le voyait plus fort par 
ses talens et sa popularity, veillait sans cesse sur Fos- 
cari, pour le punir de son credit et de sa gloire. Au 
mois de fevricr 1445, Michel Bevilacqua, Florentin, 
exile a Venise, accusa en secret Jacques Foscari aupres 
des inquisiteurs d'etat, d'avoir reeu du due Philippe 
Visconti, des presens d'argent et de joyaux, par les 
mains de3 gens de sa maison. Telle etait l'odieuse 
procedure adoptee a Venise, que sur cette accusation 
secrete, le fils du doge, du reprcsentant de la majeste 
de la republique, fut mise a la torture. On lui arracha 
par l'estrapade l'aveu des charges portees contre lui ; 
il fut relegue pour le reste de ses jours a Napoli de Ro- 
manic, avec obligation de se presenter chaque matin au 
commandant de la place. 2 Cependant, le vaisseau qui 
le portait ayant touche a Trieste, Jacob, grievement 
malade des suites de la torture, et plus encore de ['hu- 
miliation qu'il avait eprouvee, demanda en grace au 
conseil des dix de n'etre pas envoye plus loin. II obtint 
cette faveur, par une deliberation du28 deccnibre 1446 ; 
a fut rappele h Trevise, et i! eut la liberie d'habiter tout 
le Trevisan inditferemment. 3 

II vivail en pais h Trevise ; etla fil'~ de Leonard Con- 
tarini, qu'il avait epousee le 10 fevricr 1441, etait venue 
e joindre dans son exil, lorsquc, le 5 novembre 1450, 
Almoro Uonato, chef du conseil des dix, fut assassine. 
Les deux autres inquisiteurs d'etat, Triadano Gritti et 
Antonio Venieri, porterent leur soupcons sur Jacob 
Foscari, parcequ'un domestique a lui, nomme Olivier, 
avait etc vu cc soir-la meme a Venise, et avait des pre- 
miers (lonne la nouvelle de cet assassinat. Olivier fut 
mis a la torture, mais il nia jusqu'a la fin, avec un cour- 
age inebranlable, le crime dont on l'accusait, quoique 
BUS jugeseuasent la barbaric de lui faire donner jusqu'a 
quatre-vingt tours d'estrapade. Cependant, comine 
Jacob Foscari avait de puissans motifs d'inimitie contre 
.; conseil des dix qui Tavait condamne, et qui temoignait 
<\p. la haine au doge son pere, on cssaya de mettre a son 
.our Jacob a la torture, el l'on prolongea contre lui ces 



atlreux tourmens, sans reussir a en tirer aucune con 
fession. Malgre sa denegation, le conseil <les dix le 
condamna a etre transporte a la Canee, et accorda une 
recom[)eiise a son delateur. Mais les horribles douleurs 
)ue Jacob Foscari avait eprouvees, avaient trouble sa 
raison ; ses pcrsecuteurs, touches dece dernier nialh'Mir, 
[lennirent (jii'on le ramenat a Venise le 26 mai 1451. 
II embrassa son pere, il puisa dans ses exhortations 
quelque courage et quelque calme, et il fut reconauit 
imine.liatement it la Canee. 1 Sur ces entrefaites, Nico- 
las Eriz/.o, homme deja note pour un precedent crime, 
confessa, en mourant, que e'etait lui qui avoit tue Al- 
moro Donato. 2 

Le malhcureux doge, Francois Foscari, avait deja 
chcrche, a plusicurs reprises, a abdiquer une dignite si 
funeste a lui-m(?me et a sa famille. II lui scml'lait 
que, redescendu au rang de simple citoyen, comma il 
n'inspirerait plus de crainte ou de jalousie, on n'acca- 
blerait plus son fils par ces effroyablcs persecutions. 
Abattu par la mort de ses premiers enfans, il avoit vou- 
lu, dea le 26 juin, 1433, deposer une dignite, durant 
I'exercicc de laquelle sa patrie avait etc tourment.ee par 
la guerre, par la peste, ct par des malheurs de tout 
genre. 3 II renouvela cette proposition apres les jugc- 
mens rendus contre son fils ; mais le conseil des dix le 
retenait forcement sur le trone, comine il retenait son 
fils dans les fers. 

En vain Jacob Foscari, oblige de se presenter chaque 
jour au gouverneur de la Canee, reclamait contre ['in- 
justice de sa dcrniere sentence, sur laquelle la confession 
d'Erizzo ne laissait plus de doutes. En vain il deman- 
dait grace au farouche conseil des dix ; il ne pouvait 
obtenir aucune reponse. Le desir de revoir son pere et 
sa mere, arrives tousdeux au dernier tennc de la vieil- 
lesse, le desir de revoir une patrie dont la cruaute ne 
meritait pas un si tendre amour, se changerent en lui 
en une vraie fureur. Ne pouvant retourner a Venise 
pour y vivre libre, il voulut du moins y aller chercher 
un supplice. II ecrivit au due de Milan J> la fin de mai 
1456, pour implorer sa protection aupres dusenat: et 
sachant qu'une telle lettre serait considerec comme un 
crime, il l'exposa lui-m6me dans un lieu ou il etait sur 
qu'elle serait saisie par ics espions qui l'entouraient. 
En efTet, la lettre etant deferee au conseil des dix, on 
Penvoya chercher aussitot, et il fut reconduit a Veniso 
Iel9juilletl456.* 

Jacob Foscari ne nia point sa. lettre, il raconta en 
m£me temps dans quel but il Pavait ecritc, et comment 
il Pavait fait tomber cntre les mains de son delateur. 
Malu're ces aveux, Foscari fut remis a la torture, et on 
lui donna trente tours d'estrapade, pour voir s'il confir- 
merait ensuite ses depositions. Quand on le detacha 
de la corde, on le trouva dechire par ces horribles se- 
cousses. Les juges permirent alors a son pore, a sa 
nurc, ii sa femme, et a ses fils, d'aller le voir dans sa 
prison. Le vieux Foscari, appuye sur son baton, nc se 
traina ipi'avec peine dans la chambre ou son fils unique 
etait panse de ses blessures. Ce fils demandait encore 
la jrace de mourir dans sa maison. — " Retourne h ton 
exil, mon fils, puisquc ta patrie Pordonne," lui dit le 
doge, "et sounicts-toi a sa volonte." Mais en rentrant 



1 Marin Sanuto, p. 968. 

2 find „. <Jfi8. 

i liiid. Vite, p. 1123. 



1 Marin Sanuto. p. 1138.— M. AaL S»l»ellico Dtca III. 
L. IV. f. 187. 

2 Ibid. :i:i9. 

3 Ibid. p. 1032. 

4 Ibid. p. 1102. 



THE TWO FOSCARI. 



353 



dans son palais, ce malhcureux vieillard s'evanouit, 
epuise par la violence qu'il s'etait faite. Jacob devait 
encore passer une armee en prison a la Canee, avant 
Qu'on lui rendit la meme liberte limitee a laquelle il 
e"tait reduit avant cet evencmcnt ; mais a peine fut-i! 
deharque sur cctte terre d'exil, quil y mourut de dou- 
leur. ' 

Des-lors, et pendant quinze mois, le vieux doge acca- 
ble d'annees ct de chagrins, ne recouvra plus la force 
de son corps ou celle de son anie ; il n'assistait plus ii 
aucun di3s conscils, et il ne pouvait plus remplir aucuno 
des fonctions de sa dignite. II etait entre dans sa 
quatre-vingt-sixieme annee, et si le conseil des dix avail 
ete susceptible de quclque pitie, il aurait attendu en 
silence la tin, sans doute prochaine, d'une carriere mar- 
quee part tant de gloire et tant de malheurs. Mais lc 
chef du conseil des dix etait alors Jacques Lore.lano, 
fils de Ware, et neveu de Pierre, le grand aniiral, qui 
toute leur vie avaicnt ete les ennemis acharnes du vieux 
doge. lis avaient transmis leur haine a leurs enfants, 
et cette vieille rancune n'etait pas encore satisfaite. 2 A 
l'instigation de Loredano, Jerdme Barbarigo, inquisi- 
leur d'etat, proposa au conseil des dix, au mois d'oc- 
tobre 1457, de soumettre Foscari a une nouvelle humi- 
liation. Des que ce magistrat ne pouvait plus remplir 
ses fonctions, Barbarigo demanda qu'on nommat un 
aulre doge. Le conseil, qui avait refuse par deux fois 
l'abdication de Foscari, parceque la constitution ne 
pouvait la permettre, hesita avant de se mettre en con- 
tradiction avec ses propres decrets. Les discussions 
dans le conseil et la junte se prolongerent pendant huit 
jours, jusque fort avant dans la nuit. Cependant, on 
fit cntrer dans l'assemblee Marco Foscari, procurateur 
dt Saint-Marc, et frere du do^e, pour qu'il fut lie par 
le redoutable serment du secret, et qu'il ne put arretcr 
les mesures de ses ennemis. Enfin, le conseil se rendit 
aupres du doge, et lui demanda d'abdiquer volontaire- 
ment un emploi qu'il ne pouvait plus exercer. " J'ai 
jure" repondit le vieillard, "de remplir jusqu'h ma 
mort, selon mon honneur et ma conscience, les fonc- 
tions auxquelles ma patrie m'a appele. Je ne puis me 
delier moi-meme de mon serment ; qu'un ordre des con- 
seils dispose de moi, je m'y soumettrai, mais je ne le 
devancerai pas." Alors une nouvelle deliberation du 
conseil delia Franoois Foscari de son serment ducal, lui 
assura une pension de deux mille ducats pour le reste 
de sa vie, et lui ordonna d'evacuer en trois jours le 
palais, et de deposer les ornemens de sa dignite. Le 
doge avant remarque parmi les conseillers qui lui por- 
te'rent cet ordre, un chef de la quarantie qu'il ne con- 
naissait pas, demanda son nom : " Je suis le fils de Marco 
Memmo," lui dit le consciller — " Ah ! ton pere etait 
mon ami," lui dit le vieux doge, en soupirant. 11 donna 
BUSsitot des ordres pour qu'on transportat ses effets 
dans une maison a lui ; et le lcndemain, 23 octobre, on 
le vit, se soutenant a peine, et appuye sur son vieux 
frere, rcdescendre ces mftmes escaliers sur lesquels, 
Irente-quatre .ins auparavant, on l'avait vu installe avec 
tant de pompe, ct traverser ces memes sallesou larepu- 
iS1i(]ik avait neu ses sermens. Le peuplc entier parol 
indigne de tant de durete exercee contre un vieillard 
qu'il respectait et qu'il aimait ; mais le conseil des dix 



1 Marin Sanuto, p. 1103. — Navagiero Ptor. Venez. p. 1118. 
l i Vcttnr Saudi Storia civile di Vencziana, P. II. L. VIII. p. 
715. p. Ill 



fit publier une defense de parler de cette revolution, 
sous peine d'etre tradujt devant les inquisitcurs d'etat 
Le 20 octobre, Pasqual Malipieri, procurateur de Saint- 
Marc, fut elu pour succcsseur de Foscari ; celui-ci n'eut 
pas neanmoins l'humiliation de vivre sujel, la ou il 
avait regiie. En entendant le son des cloches, qui son- 
naient en actions do grace pour cette election, il mourut 
subitement d'une hemorragie causee par une veine qui 
s'eclata dans sa poitrine. ' 



" Le doge, blesse de trouver constamment un contra- 
dicteur et un censeur si amer dans son frere, lui dit un 
jour en plein conseil: 'Messire Augustin, vous faites 
tout votre possible pour hater ma mort ; vous vous rlat- 
tez de me succeder ; mais si les autres vous connaissent 
aussi bien que je vous connais, ils n'auront garde de 
vous elire.' La dessus il se leva, emu de colore, rentra 
dans son appartement, et mourut quelqucs jours apri's. 
Ce frere contre lequel il s'etait emporte fut precisement 
le successcur qu'on lui donna. C'etait un nitrite dont 
on aimait a tenircompte, surtout a un parent, de s'clrc 
mis en opposition avec le chef de la republique." 2 Daru, 
Histuire de Venisc, vol. ii. sec. xi. p. 533. 

In Lady Morgan's fearless and excellent work upon 
" Italy," I perceive the expression of " Rome of the 
Ocean " applied to Venice. The same phrase occurs in 
the " Two Foscari." My publisher can vouch for me 
that the tragedy was written and sent to England some 
time before I had seen Lady Morgan's work, which I 
only received on the 16th of August. I hasten, however, 
to notice the coincidence, and to yield the ori<nnalitv of 
the phrase to her who first placed it before the public. 
I am the more anxious to do this, as I am informed (for 
I have seen but few of the specimens, and those accident- 
ally) that there have been lately brought against me 
charges of plagiarism. I have also had an anonymous 
sort of threatening intimation of the same kind, appa- 
rently with the intent of extorting money. To such 
charges I have no answer to make. One of them is lu- 
dicrous enough. I am reproached for having formed 
the description of a shipwreck in verse from the narra- 
tives of many actual shipwrecks in prose, selecting such 
materials as were most striking. Gibbon makes it a 
merit in Tasso " to have copied the minutest details of the 
siege of Jerusalem from the Chronicles." In me it may 
be a demerit, I presume ; let it remain so. Whilst I have 
been occupied in defending Pope's character, the lower 
orders of Grub-street appear to have been assailing witne; 
this is as it should be, both in them and in me. One of 
the accusations in the nameless epistle alluded to is still 
more laughable : it states seriously that I " received live 
hundred pounds for writing advertisements for Day 
and Martin's patent blacking!" This is the highest 
compliment to my literary powers which I ever received. 
It states also " that a person has been trying to make 

1 Murin Sanuto, Vite de' Duclii di Venezia, p. 1164 — 
Cbronicum Eugubinum, T. XXI. p. O'.U. — Chrisioforo da 
Soldo Istoria BreBciaiui, T. XXI. p. 8111. — Navigero Storia 
Veneziana, T. XXIII. p. ll'JO.— M. A. Sabellico. Doca :il. 
L. VIII, f". Ml 

2 The Venetians appear to have had a particular tarn mx 
breaking the hearts of their Duces; the above is another in- 
stance of the kind in the Doge Marco Barbarigo ; he was suc- 
ceeded by his brother Agoslino Barbarigo, whose chief mort 
is above-mentioned. 



3G0 



BYROrs S WORKS. 



acquaintance with Mr. Townsend, a gentleman of the 
law, who was with me on business in Venice three 
ago, for the purpose of obtaining any defama- 
tory particulars of my life from this occasional visitor." 
Mr. Townsand is welcome to say what he knows. Imen- 
tion these |iarticnlars merely to show the world in gen- 
eral what the literary lower world contains, and their 
way of setting to work. Another charge made, I am 
told, in the " Literary Gazette" is, that I wrote the notes 
to " Queen Mab ;" a work which I never saw till some 
time after its publication, and which I recollect showing 
to Mr. Sothcby as a poem of great power and imagi- 
nation. I never wrote a line of the notes, nor ever saw 
them except in their published form. No one knows 
better than their real author, that his opinions and 
mine differ materially upon the metaphysical portion 
of that work ; though, in common with all who are not 
blinded by baseness and bigotry, 1 highly admire the 
poetry of that and his other publications. 

Mr. Southey, too, m his pious preface to a poem whose 
blasphemy is as harmless as the sedition of Wat Tyler, 
because it is equally absurd with that sincere production, 
calls upon the "legislature to look to it," as the tolera- 
tion of sueli writings led to the French Revolution: not 
such writings as Wat Tyler, but as those of the " Satanic 
School." Thisisnottrue,andMr. Southey knows it to be 
not true. Every French writer of any freedom was perse- 
cuted ; Voltaire and Rousseau were exiles, Marmontel 
and Diderot were sent to the Bastile, and a perpetual war 
was waged with the whole class by the existing despotism. 
In the next place, the French Revolution was not occa- 
ski 1 by any writings whatsoever, but must have occur- 
red had no such writers ever existed. It is the fashion to 
attribute every thing to the French Revolution, and the 
French Revolution to every thing but its real cause. 
That cause is obvious — the government exacted too 
much, and the people could neither give nor bear more. 
Without this, the Encyclopedists might have written 
their fingers oir without the occurrence of a single alter- 
ation. And the English Revolution — (the first, 1 mean) 
what was it occasioned by? The Puritans were surely 
as pious and moral as Wesley or his biographer '! Acts — 
acts on the part of government, and not writings against 
them, have caused the past convulsions, and are tending 
to the future. 

I look upon such as inevitable, though no revolu- 
tionist : I wish to see the English constitution restored, 
and not destroyed. Born an aristocrat, and naturally 
one by temper, with the greater part of my present prop- 
erty in thi> funds, what have / to gain by a revolution ? 
Perhaps I have more to lose in every way than Mr. Sou- 
they, with till his places and presents for panegyrics and 
abuse into the bargain, But that a revolution is inevi- 
table, 1 repeat. The government may exult over the 
repression of petty tumults ; these are but the receding 
waves repulsed and broken fir a moment on the shore, 
while the great tide is still rolling on and gaining ground 
with every breaker. Mr. Southey accuses us of attacking 
the religion of the country ; and is he abetting it by writ- 
ifig fives of ll'tslei/? One mode of worship is merely de- 
stroyed by another. There never was, nor ever will be, a 
country without a religion. We shall be told of France 
again ; but it was only Paris and a frantic party, which 



foramoment upheld their dogmatic nonsense of theo phi- 
lanthropy. The church of England, if overthrown, will 
be swept away by the sectarians, and not by the sceptics. 
People are too wise, too well-informed, too certain of 
their own immense importance in the realms of space, 
ever to submit to the impiety of doubt. There may be a 
few such diffident speculators, like water in the pt.e sun- 
beam of human reason, but they are very few ; and their 
opinions, without enthusiasm or appeal to th . passions, 
can never gain proselytes — unless, indeed, they are 
persecuted : that, to be sure, will increase any thing. 

Mr. S., with a cowardly ferocity, exults over the an- 
ticipated "deathbed repentance" of the objects of his 
dislike ; and indulges himself in a pleasant " Vision of 
Judgment," in prose as well as verse, full of impious 
impudence. What Mr. S.'s sensations or ours may be 
in the awful moment of leaving this state of existence, 
neither he nor we can pretend to decide. In common, 
I presumei with most men of any reflection, / have not 
waited for a " death-bed " to repent of many of my 
actions, notwithstanding the " diabolical pride " which 
this pitiful renegade in his rancour would impute to 
those who scorn him. Whether, upon the whole, the 
good or evil of my deeds may preponderate, is not for 
me to ascertain ; but, as my means and opportunities 
have been greater, I shall limit my present defence to an 
assertion (easily proved, if necessary) that I, " inmyde 
gree," have done more real good in anv one given year, 
since I was twenty, than Mr. Southey in the whole 
course of his shifting and turncoat existence. There are 
several actions to which I can look back with an hones) 
pride, not to be damped by the calumnies of a hireling. 
There are others to which I recur with sorrow and re- 
pontance ; but the only act of my life of which Mr. 
Southey can have any real knowledge, as it was one 
which brought me in contact with a near connexion ot 
his own, did no dishonour to that connexion nor to me. 

I am not ignorant of Mr. Southey's calumnies on a dif- 
ferent occasion, knowing them to be such, which he 
scattered abroad, on his return from Switzerland, against 
me and others : they have done him no good in this 
world ; and, if his creed be the right one, they will do 
him less in the next. What his " death-bed " may be, 
it is not my province to predicate : let him settle it with 
his Maker, as I must do with mine. There is something 
at once ludicrous and blasphemous in this arrogant scrib- 
bler of all works sitting down to deal damnation and de- 
struction upon his fellow-creatures, with Wat Tyler, the 
Apotheosis of George the Third, and the Elegy on Mar- 
tin the regicide, all shuttled together in his writing-desk. 
Oneofhisconsolations appears to be a Latin note from 
a work of a Mr. Landor, the author of" Gebir," whose 
friendship for Robert Southey will, it seems, " be an 
honour to him when the ephemeral disputes and ephe- 
meral reputations of the day are forgotten." I for one 
neither envy him "the friendship," nor the glory in 
reversion which is to accrue from it, like Mr. Thclus- 
son's fortune in the third and fourth generation. — 
This friendship will probably be as memorable as his 
own epics, which (as I quoted to him ten or twelve years 
ago in English Bards) Porson said " would be remem- 
bered when Homer and Virgil are forgotten, and not tL 
then." For the present, I leave him. 



( 361 ) 

Cain; 

A MYSTERY. 

Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. Gen. iii. 1. 



TO SIR WALTER SCOTT, BART. 

THIS "MYSTERY OF CAIN" IS INSCRIBED, 
BY HIS OBLIGED FRIEND, AND FAITHFUL SERVANT, 

THE AUTHOf.. 



PREFACE. 



The following scenes are intitled "a Mystery," in con- 
formity with die ancient title annexed to dramas upon 
similar subjects, which were styled " Mysteries," or 
"Moralities." The author has by no means taken the 
same liberties with his subject which were common for- 
merly, as may be seen by any reader curious enough to 
refer to those very profane productions, whether in 
English, French, Italian, or Spanish. The author has 
endeavoured to preserve the language adapted to Ins 
characters ; and where it is (and this is but rarely) taken 
from actual Scripture, he has made as little alteration, 
even of words, as the rhythm would permit. The 
reader will recollect that the book of Genesis does not 
state that Eve was tempted by a demon, but by " the 
Serpent ;" and that only because he was " the most 
subtil of all the beasts of the field." Whatever interpre- 
tation the Rabbins and the Fathers may have put upon 
Ihis, I must take the words as I find them, and reply 
with Bishop Watson upon similar occasions, when the 
Fathers were quoted to him, as Moderator in the Schools 
of Cambridge, "Behold the Book!" — holding up the 
Scripture. It is to be recollected that my present sub- 
ject has nothing to do with the JVew Testament, to 
which no reference can be here made without ana- 
chronism. With the poems upon similar topics I have 
not been recently familiar. Since I was twenty, I have 
never read Milton ; but I had read him so frequently 
before, that this may make little difference. Gesner's 
"Death of Abel" I have never read since I was eight 
years of age, at Aberdeen. The general impression of 
my recollection is delight; but of the contents, I remem- 
ber only that Cain's wife was called Mahala, and Abel's 
Thirza. — In the following pages I have called them 
" Adah" and " Zillah," the earliest female names which 
occur in Genesis ; they were those of Lamcch's wives : 
those of Cain and Abxl are not called by their names. 
Whether, then, a cdmcidence of subject may have 
caused the same m expression, I know nothing, and 
care as little. 

The reader will please to bear in mind (what few 

choose to recollect) that there is no allusion to a future 

state in any of the books of Moses, nor indeed in the 

2 I 2 51 



Old Testament. For a reason for this ex raordinary 
omission, he may consult " WarUirton's Divine Lega- 
tion ;" whether satisfactory or not, no better has yet 
been assigned. I have therefore supposed it new to 
Cain, without, I hope, any perversion of Holy Writ. 

With regard to the language of Lucifer, it was diffi- 
cult for me to make him talk like a clergyman upon the 
same subjects ; but I have done what I could to restrain 
him within the bounds of spiritual politeness. 

If he disclaims having tempted Eve in the shape of 
the Serpent, it is only because the book of Genesis has 
not the most distant allusion to any thing of the kind, 
but merely to the Serpent in his serpentine capacity. 

Note. — The reader will perceive that the author has 
partly adopted in this poem the notion of Cuvier, that 
the world had been destroyed several times before the 
creation of man. This speculation, derived from the 
different strata and the bones of enormous and un- 
known animals found in them, is not contriiry to the 
Mosaic account, but rather confirms it ; as no human 
bones have yet been discovered in those strata, al- 
though those of many known animals are found near 
the remains of the unknown. The assertion of Lucifer, 
that the Pre- Adamite world was also peopled by rational 
beings much more intelligent than man, and propc* - - 
tionably powerful to the mammoth, etc., etc., is, of 
course, a poetical fiction, to help him to make out his 
case. 

I ought to add, that there is a " Tramelogedia" of 
Allien, called " Abel." — I have never read that nor any 
other of the posthumous works of the -vriter, except 
his life. 



DRAMATIS 


PERSOXiE. 


MEN. 






WOME.V 


Adam. 






Eve. 


Cain. 






An ah. 


Abel. 






Zillah. 




SPIRITS. 




Angel of 


THE 


Loki> 


Lucifer. 







362 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAIN. 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. 

The Ijand without Paradise. — Time, Sunrise. 

Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, Adah, Zillaii, offering 
a Sacrifice. 

ADAM. 

God, the Eternal! Infinite! All-Wise! — 
Who out of darkness on the deep didst make 
Light on the waters with a word — all hail ! 
Jehovah, with returning light, all hail ! 

EVE. 

God ! who didst name the day, and separate 
Morning from night, till then divided never — 
Who didst divide the wave from wave, and call 
Part of thy work the firmament — all hail ! 

ABEL. 

God ! who didst call the elements into 

Earth — ocean — air — and fire, and with the day 

And night, and worlds which these illuminate 

Or shadow, madest beings to enjoy thern, 

And love both them and thee — all hail ! all hail ! 

ADAH. 

God, the Eternal ! Parent of all things ! 

Who didst create these best and beauteous beings, 

To be beloved, more than all, save thee — 

Let me love thee and them : — All hail ! all hail ! 

ZILLAH. 

Oh, God! who loving, making, blessing all, 
Yet didst permit the serpent to creep in, 
And drive my father forth from Paradise, 
Keep us from further evil : — Hail ! all hail ! 

ADAM. 

Son Cain, my first-born, wherefore art thou silent? 

CAIN. 

Why should I speak ? 

ADAM. 

To pray. 

CAIN. 

Have ye not pray'd ? 

ADAM. 

We have, most fervently. 

CAIN. 

And loudly : I 
Have heard you. 

ADAM. 

So will God, I trust. 

ABEL. 

Amen! 

ADAM. 

Hut thou, my eldest-born, art silent still. 

CAIN. 

*T is nctte' I should be so. 

ADAM. 

Whcrefo.e so? 

CAIN. 

I have nought to ask. 

ADAM. 

Nor aught to thank for ? 
ciin. 

No. 



Dost thou not live ? 

CAIN. 

Must I not die? 

EVE. 

Alas! 
The fruit of our forbidden tree begins 
To fall. 

ADAM. 

And we must gather it again. 
Oh, God ! why didst thou plant the tree of knowledge 

CAIN. 

And wherefore pluck'd ye not the tree of life? 
Ye might have then defied him. 

ADAM. 

Oh ! my son, 
Blaspheme not : thesa are serpents' words. 

CAIN. 

Why not? 
The snake spoke truth : it was the tree of knowledge ; 
It was the tree of life : — knowledge is good, 
And life is good ; and how can both be evil ? 

EVE. 

My boy ! thou speakest as I spoke in sin, 
Before thy birth : let me not see renew M 
My misery in thine. I have repented. 
Let me not see my offspring fall into 
The snares beyond the walls of Paradise, 
Which e'en in Paradise destroy'd his parents. 
Content thee with what is. Had we been so, 
Thou now hadst been contented. — Oh, my son ! 

ADAM. 

Our orisons completed, let us hence, 
Each to his task of toil — not heavy, though 
Needful : the earth is young, and yields us kindly 
Her fruits with little labour. 

EVE. 

Cam, my son, 
Behold thy father cheerful and resign'd, 
And do as he doth. 

[Exit Adam and Evs. 

7.ILLAH. 

Wilt thou not, my brother ? 

ABEL. 

Why wilt thou wear this gloom upon thy brow, 
Which can avail thee nothing, save to rouse 
The Eternal anger? 

ADAH. 

My beloved Cain, 
Wilt thou frown even on me ? 

CAIN. 

No, Adah ! no ; 
I fain would be alone a little while. 
Abel, I 'm sick at heart ; but it will pass : 
Precede me, brother — I will foUow shortly. 
And you, too, sisters, tarry not behind ; 
Your gentleness must not be harshly met : 
I '11 follow you anon. 

ADAH. 

If not, I will 
Return to seek you here. 

ABEL. 

The peace of God 
Be on your spirit, brother ! 

[Exit Abel, Zillah, and Adah 



CAIN (solus). 

And this is 
Life ! — Toil ! and wherefore should I toil ? — because 
My father could not keep his place in Eden. 
What had J done in this ? — I was unborn, 
I sought not to be born ; nor love the state 
To which that birth has brought me. Why did he 
Yield to the serpent and the woman ? or, 
Yielding, why suffer ? What was there in this ? 
The tree was planted, and why not for him ? 
If not, why place him near it, where it grew, 
The fairest in the centre ? They have but 
One answer to all questions, " 't was his will, 
And he is good." How know I that ? Because 
He is all-powerful, must all-good, too, follow ? 
I judge but by the fruits — and they are bitter — 
Which I must feed on for a fault not mine. 
Whom have we here? — A shape like to the angels, 
Yet of a sterner and a sadder aspect, 
Of spiritual essence : why do I quake ? 
Why should I fear him more than other spirits, 
Whom I see daily wave their fiery swords 
Before the gates round which I linger oft, 
In twilight's hour, to catch a glimpse of those 
Gardens which are my just inheritance, 
Ere the night closes o'er the inhibited walls, 
And the immortal trees which overtop 
The cherubim-defended battlements ? 
If I shrink not from these, the fire-arm'd angels, 
Why should I quail from him who now approaches ? 
Yet he seems mightier far than them, nor less 
Beauteous, and yet not all as beautiful 
As he hath been, and might be : sorrow seems 
Half of his immortality. And is it 
So ? and can aught grieve save humanity? 
He cometh. 

Enter Lucifer. 

LUCIFER. 

Mortal! 

CAIN. 

Spirit, who art thou ? 

LUCIFER. 

Master of spirits. 

CAIN. 

And being so, canst thou 
Leave them, and walk with dust? 

LUCIFER. 

I know the thoughts 
Of dust, and feel for it, and with you. 

CAIN. 

How! 

You know my thoughts ? 

LUCIFER. 

They are the thoughts of all 
Worthy of thought ; — 't is your immortal part 
Which speaks within you. 

CAIN. 

What immortal part ? 
This has not been reveal'd : the tree of life 
Was withheld from us by my father's folly, 
While that of knowledge, by my mother's haste, 
Was pluck'd too soon ; and all the fruit is death ! 

LUCIFER. 

They have deceived thee ; thou shalt live. 

CAIN. 

I live, 
But live to die : and, living, see no thing 



To make death hateful, save an innate clinging, 
A loathsome and yet all invincible 
Instinct of life, which I abhor, as I 
Despise myself, yet cannot overcome — 
And so I live. Would I had never lived ! 

LUCIFER. 

Thou livest, and must live for ever : think not 
The earth, which is thine outward covering, is 
Existence — it will cease, and thou wilt be 
No less than thou art now. 

CAIN. 

No less ! and why 
No more ? 

LUCIFER. 

It may be thou shalt be as we. 

CAIN. 

And ye? 

LUCIFER. 

Are everlasting. 

CAIN. 

Are ye happy ? 

LUCIFER. 

We are mighty. 

CAIN. 

Are ye happy ? 

LUCIFER. 

No : art thou ? 

CAIN. 

How should I be so ? Look on me ! 

LUCIFER. 

Poor clay ! 
And thou pretendest to be wretched ! Thou ! 

CAIN. 

I am : — and thou, with all thy might, what art thou f 

LUCIFER. 

One who aspired to be" what made thee, and 
Would not have made thee what thou art. 



CAIN. 



Ab» 



Thou look'st almost a god ; and — 

LUCIFER. 

I am none : 
And having fail'd to be one, would be nought 
Save what I am. He conquer'd ; let him reign i 

CAIN. 

Who? 

LUCIFER. 

Thy sire's Maker, and the earth's. 

CAIN. 

And heaven r, 
And all that in them is. So I have heard 
His seraphs sing ; and so my father saith. 

LUCIFER. 

They say — what they must sing and say, on pain 
Of being that which I am — and thou art — 
Of spirits and of men. 

CAIN. 

And what is that ? 

LUCIFER. 

Souls 'W.io dare use their immortality — 
Souls who dare look the Omnipotent tyrant in 
His everlasting face, and tell him, that 
His evil is not good ! If he has made, 
As he saith — which I know not, nor believe- 
But, if he made us — he cannot unmake , 
We are immortal ! — nay, he 'd have us so, 



3G4 



BYRON'S WORKS 



That he may torture :— let him ! He is great— 

But, in his greatness, is no happier than 

We in our conflict ! Goodness would not make 

Kvil ; and what else hath he made? But let him 

Sit on his vast and solitary throne, 

Creating worlds, to make eternity 

Less burthensome to his immense existence 

And unparticipated solitude ! 

Let him crowd orb on orb : he is alone, 

Indefinite, indissoluble tyrant! 

Could he but crush himself, 't were the best boon 

He ever granted : but let him reign on, 

And multiply himself in misery ! 

Spirits and men, at least we sympathize ; 

And, suffering in concert, make our pangs, 

Enumerable, more endurable, 

Bv the unbounded sympathy of all — 

With all! But He! so wretched in his height, 

So restless in his wretchedness, must still 

Create, and re-create 

CAIN. 

Thou speak'st to me of things which long have swum 
In visions through my thought: I never could 
Reconcile what I saw with what I heard. 
My father and my mother talk to me 
Of serpents, and of fruits and trees : I see 
The gates of what they call their Paradise 
Guarded by fiery-sworded cherubim, 
Which shut them out, and me : I feel the weight 
Of daily toil, and constant thought : I look 
Around a world where I seem nothing, with 
Thoughts which arise within me, as if they 
Could master all things :— but I thought alone 
This misery was mine. — My father is 
Tamed down ; my mother has forgot the mind 
Which made her thirst for knowledge at the risk 
Of an eternal curse ; my brother is 
A watching shepherd boy, who offers up 
The firstlings of the flock to him who bids 
The earth yield nothing to us without sweat ; 
My sister Zillah sings an earlier hymn 
Than the bird's matins ; and my Adah, my 
Own and beloved, she too understands not 
The mind which overwhelms me : never till 
Now met I aught to sympathize with me. 
p i s vve ll — I rather would consort with spirits. 

LUCIFER. 

And hadst thou not been fit by thine own soul 
For such companionship, I would not now 
Have stood before thee as I am : a serpent 
Had been enough to charm ye, as before. 

CAIN. 

Ah ! didst thou tempt my mother ? 

LUCIFER. 

I tempt none, 
Save with the truth : was not the tree, the tree 
Of knowledge? and was not the tree of life 
Still fruitful ? Did / bid her pluck them not ? 
Did 1 plant things prohibited within 
The reach of beings innocent, and curious 
By their own innocence? I would have maJe ye 
Gods ; and even He who thrust ye forth so thrust ye 
Because " ye should not eat the fruits of life, 
fad become gods as we." Were those his words ? 

CAIN. 

They wore, as I have heard from those who heard them 



In thunder. 

Ll'CIFER. 

Then who was the demon ? He 
Who would not let ye live, or he who would 
Have made ye live for ever in the joy 
And power of knowledge ? 

CAIN. 

Would they had snatch'd both 
The fruits, or neither ! 

LUCIFER. 

One is yours already, 
The other may be still. 

CAIN. 

How so , 



LUCIFER. 

By being 
Yourselves, in your resistance. Nothing can 
Quench the mind, if the mind will be itself 
And centre of surrounding things — 't is made 
To sway. 

CAIN. 

But didst thou tempt my parents ? 

LUCIFER. 

Poor clay ! what should I tempt them for, or how ? 

CAIN. 

They say the serpent was a spirit. 

LUCIFER. 

Who 
Saith that ? It is not written so on high : 
The proud One will not so far falsify, 
Though man's vast fears and little vanity 
Would make him cast upon the spiritual nature 
His own low failing. The snake was the snake — 
No more ; and yet not less than those he tempted, 
In nature beinj earth also — more in wisdom, 
Since he could overcome them, and foreknew 
The knowledge fatal to their narrow joys. 
Thmk'st thou I 'd take the shape of things that die ) 

CAIN. 

But the thing had a demon ? 

LUCIFER. 

He but woke one 
In those he spake to with his forky tongue. 
I tell thee that the serpent was no more 
Than a mere serpent : ask the cherubim 
Who guard the tempting tree. When thousand ages 
Have roll'd o'er your dead ashes and your seed's, 
The seed of the then world may thus array 
Their earliest fault in fable, and attribute 
To me a shape I scorn, as I scorn all 
That bows to him who made things but to bend 
Before his sullen sole eternity ; 
But we, who see the truth, must speak it. Thy 
Fond parents listen'd to a creeping thing, 
And fell. For what should spirits tempt them 1 What 
Was there to envy in the narrow bounds 
Of Paradise, that spirits who pervade 

Space but I speak to thee of what thou know'st not 

With all thy tree of knowledge. 

CAIN. 

But thou cans* not 
Speak aught of knowledge which 1 would not know. 
And do not thirst to know, and bear a mind 
To know. 



CAIN 



3Gb 



LUCIFER. 

And heart to look on ? 

CAIN. 

Be it proved. 

LUCIFER. 

Dar'st thou to look on Death ? 

CAIN. 

He has not yet 
Been seen. 

LUCIFER. 

But must be undergone. 

CAIN. 

My father 
Says he is something dreadful, and my mother 
Weeps when he 's named ; and Abel lifts his eyes 
To heaven, and Zillah casts hers to the earth, 
And sighs a prayer; and Adah looks on me, 
And speaks not. 

LUCIFER. 

And thou ? 

CAIN. 

Thoughts unspeakable 
Crowd in my breast to burning, when I hear 
Of this almighty Death, who is, it seems, 
Inevitable. Could I wrestle with him? 
I wrestled with a lion, when a boy, 
In play, till he ran roaring from my gripe. 

LUCIFER. 

It has no shape, but will absorb all things 
That bear the form of earth-born being. 



CAIN. 



Ah! 



[ thought it was a being : who could do 
Such evil things to beings save a being ? 

LUCIFER. 

Ask the Destroyer. 

CAIN. 

Who? 

LUCIFER. 

The Maker — call him 
Which name tnou wilt ; he makes but to destroy. 

CAIN. 

I knew not that, yet thought it, since I heard 

Of death : although I know not what it is, 

Yet it seems horrible. I have look'd out 

In the vast desolate night in search of him ; 

And, when I saw gigantic shadows in 

The umbrage of the walls of Eden, chequer'd 

By the far-flashing of the cherubs' swords, 

I watch'd for what I thought his coming ; for 

With fear rose longing in my heart to know 

What 't was which shook us all — but nothing came. 

And then I turn'd my weary eyes from off 

Our native and forbidden Paradise, 

Up to the lights above us, in the azure, 

Which are so beautiful : shall they, too, die ? 

LUCIFER. 

Perhaps — but long outlive both thine and thee. 

CAIN. 

I 'm glad of that ; I would not have them die, 

They are so lovely. What is death ? I fear, 

I feel, it is a dreadful thing ; but what, 

I cannot compass : 't is denounced against us, 

Both them who sinn'd and sinn'd not, as an ill— 

Whalill? 



LUCIFEH. 

To be resolved into the earth. 

CAIN. 

But shall I know it? 

LUCIFER. 

As I know not death, 
I cannot answer. 

CAIN. 

Were I quiet earth, 
That were no evil : would I ne'er had been 
Aught else but dust ! 

LUCIFER. 

That is a grov'ling wish, 
Less than thy father's, for he wish'd to know. 

CAIN. 

But not to live, or wherefore pluck'd he not 
The life-tree ? 

LUCIFER. 

He was hinder'd. 

CAIN. 

Deadly error 
Not to snatch first that fruit : but ere he pluck'a 
The knowledge, he was ignorant of death. 
Alas ! I scarcely now know what it is, 
And yet I fear it — fear I know not what ! 

LUCIFER. 

And I, who know all things, fear notliing : see 
What is true knowledge. 

CAIN. 

Wilt thou teach me all ? 

LUCIFER. 

Ay, upon one condition. 

CAIN. 

Name it. 

LUCIFER. 

That 
Thou dost fall down and worship me — thy Lord. 

CAIN. 

Thou art not the Lord my father worships. 

LUCIFER. 

No. 

CAIN. 

His equal ? 

LUCIFER. 

No ; — I have nought in common with hu 
Nor would : I would be aught above — beneath — 
Aught save a sharer or a servant of 
His power. I dwell apart ; but I am great : — 
Many there are who worship me, and more 
Who shall — be thou amongst the first. 

CAIN. 

I never 
As yet have bow'd unto my father's God, 
Although my brother Abel oft implores 
That I would join with him in sacrifice :- 
Why should I bow to thee ? 

LUCIFER. 

Hast thou ne'er bow o 
To him? 

CAIN. 

Havel not said it? — need I say it? 
Could not thy mighty knowledge teach thee that'/ 

LUCIFER. 

He who bows not to him has bow'd to me ! 

CAIN. 

But I will bend to neither 



366 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 




UCIFER. 


To be our guests — will he ? 


Ne'ertheless, 


CAIN [to Lucifer). 




Thou art my worshipper : not worshipping 


Wilt thou ? 




Him makes thee mine the same. 


LUCIFER. 




CAIN. 


I ask 




And what is that ? 


Thee to be mine. 




LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 




Thou 'It know here — and hereafter. 


I must away with him. 




CAIN. 


4SAH. 




Let tnc but 


And leave us ? 


1 


Be taught the mystery of my being. 


CAIN. 

Ay. 


t 


LUCIFER. 




Follow 


ADAH. 




Where I will lead thee. 


And me ? 




CAIN. 


CAIN. 




But I must retire 


Beloved Adah ! 




To till the earth — for I had promised 


ADAH. 




LUCIFER. 


Let me go with thee. 




What? 


LUCIFER. 




CAIN. 


No, she must not. 




To cull some first fruits. 


ADAH. 

Who 




LUCIFER. 






Why ? 


Art thou that steppest between heart and heart ? 




CAIN. 


CAIN. 




To offer up 


He is a god. 




With Abel on an altar. 


ADAH. 

How know'st thou ? 




LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 




Saidst tnou not 


He speaks like 




Thou ne'er hadst bent to him that made thee? 


A god. 




CAIN. 


ADAH. 




Yes — 


So did the serpent, and it lied. 




But Abel's earnest prayer has wrought upon me ; 


LUCIFER. 




The offering is more his than mine — and Adah 


Thou crrest, AdcJi ! — was not the tree that 




LUCIFER. 


Of knowledge ? 




Why dost thou hesitate ? 


ADAH. 




CAIN. 


Ay — to our eternal sorrow. 




She is my sister, 


LUCIFER. 




Born on the same day, of the same womb ; and 


And yet that grief is knowledge — so he lied not : 




She wrung from me, with tears, this promise, and 


And if he did betray you, 'twas with truth ; 




Rather than see her weep, I would, methinks, 


And truth in its own essence cannot be 




Bear all — and worship aught. 


But good. 




LUCIFER. 


ADAH. 




Then follow me ! 


But all we know of it has gather'd 




CAIN. 


Evil on evil: expulsion from our home, 




I will. 


And dread, and toil, and sweat, and heaviness ; 




Enter Adah. 


Remorse of that which was, and hope of that 




ADAH. 


Which cometh not. Cain ! walk not with this spirit, 




My brother, I have come for thee ; 


Bear with what we have borne, and love me — I 




It is our hour of rest and joy — and wo 


Love thee. 




Have less without thee. Thou hast labour'd not 


LUCIFER. 




This morn ; but I have done thy task : the fruits 


More than thy mother and thy sire ? 




Are ripe, and glowing as the light which ripens : 


ADAH. 




Come away. 


I do. Is that a sin, too ? 




CAIN. 


LUCIFER. 




See'st thou not ? 


No, not yet ; 




ADAH. 


It one day will be in your children. 




I see an angel ; 


ADAH. 




Wo have seen many : wi.i he share our hour 


What! 




Of rest ? — he is welcome. 


Must not my daughter love her brother Enoch? 




CAIN. 


LUCIFER. 




But he is not like 


Not as thou lovest Cain ! 




Tli" angels we have seen. 


ADAH. 




ADAH. 


Oh, my God ! 




Are there, then, others ? 


Shall they not love, and bring forth tilings that love 




Bui he is welcome, as they were : they deign'd 


Out of their love? have they not drawn their miik 






Out of this bosom ? was not he, their father, 
Born ol the same sole womb, in the same hour 
With me ? did we not love each other, and, 
fn multiplying our being, multiply 
Thiiigs which will love each other as we love 
Them'' — And, as I love thee, my Cain ! go not 
Forth with this spirit ; he is not of ours. 

LUCIFER. 

The sin I speak of is not of my making, 
And cannot be a sin in you — whate'er 
It seem in those who will replace ye in 
Mortality. 

ADAH. 

What is the sin which is not 
Sin in itself? Can circumstance make sin 
Or virtue ? — if it doth, we are the slaves 
Of 

LUCIFER. 

Higher things than ye are slaves: and higher 
Than them or ye would be so, did they not 
Prefer an independency of torture 
To the smooth agonies of adulation 
In hymns and harpings, and self-seeking prayers 
To that which is omnipotent, because 
It is omnipotent, and not from love, 
But terror and self-hope. 

ADAH. 



Must be all goodness. 



Omnipotence 

LUCIFER. 

Was it so in Eden ? 



ADAH. 

Fiend ! tempt me not with beauty ; thou art fairer 
Than was the serpent, and as false. 

LUCIFER. 

As true. 
Ask Eve, your mother; bears she not the knowledge 
Of good and evil '/ 

ADAH. 

Oh, my mother ! thou 
Hast pluck'd a fruit more fatal to thine offspring 
Than to thyself; thou at the least hast past 
Thy youth in Paradise, in innocent 
And happy intercourse with happy spirits ; 
But we, thy children, ignorant of Eden, 
Are girt about by demons, who assume 
The words of God, and tempt us with our own 
Dissatisfied and curious thoughts — as thou 
Wert work'd on by the snake, in thy most flush'd 
And heedless, harmless wantonness of bliss. 
I cannot answer this immortal thing 
Which stands before me : I cannot abhor him ; 
I look upon him with a pleasing fear, 
And yet I fly not from him : in his eye 
There is a fastening attraction, which 
Fixes my fluttering eyes on his ; my heart 
Beats quick ; he awes me, and yet draws me near, 
Nearer and nearer : Cam — Cain — save me from him ! 

CAIN. 

What dreads my Adah ? Tliis is no ill spirit. 

ADAH. 

He is not God — nor God's : I have beheld 
The cherubs and the seraphs : he looks not 
Like them. 

CAIN. 

But there are spirits loftier still — 
The archangels. 



LUCIFER. 

And still loftier than the archangels. 

ADAH. 

Ay — but not blessed. 

LUCIFER. 

If the blessedness 
Consists in slavery — no. 

ADAH. 

I have heard it said, 
The seraphs love wins?— cherubim know most — 
And this should be a cherub — since he loves not. 

LUCIFER. 

And if the higher knowledge quenches love, 
What must he be you cannot love when known ? 
Since the all-knowing cherubim love least, 
The seraphs' love can be but ignorance : 
That they are not compatible, the doom 
Of thy fond parents, for their daring, proves. 
Choose betwixt love and knowledge — since there u 
No other choice : your sire haih chosen already : 
His worship is but fear. 

ADAH. 

Oh, Cain ! choose love. 

CAIN. 

For thee, my Adah, I choose not — it was 
Born with me — but I love nought else. 

ADAH. 

Our parents ? 

CAIN. 

Did they love us when they snatch'd from the tree 
That which hath driven us all from Paradise ? 

ADAH. 

We were not born then — and if we had been, 
Should we not love them and our children, Cain? 

CAIN. 

My little Enoch ! and his lisping sister ! 
Could I but deem them happy, I would half 

Forget but it can never be forgotten 

Through thrice a thousand generations ! never 

Shall men love the remembrance of the man 

Who sow'd the seed of evil and mankind 

In the same hour ! They pluck'd the tree of science 

And sin — and, not content with their own sorrow, 

Begot me — thee — and all the few that are, 

And all the unnumber'd and innumerable 

Multitudes, millions, myriads, which may be, 

To inherit agonies accumulated 

By ages ! — And / must be sire of such things ! 

Thy beauty and thy love — my love and joy, 

The rapturous moment and the placid hour, 

All we love in our children and each other, 

But lead them and ourselves through many years 

Of sin and pain— or few, but still of sorrow, 

Intercheck'd with an instant of brief pleasure, 

To Death — the unknown ! Methinks the tree of know 

ledge 
Hath not fulfill'd its promise : — if they sinn'd, 
At least they ought to have known all things thai aia 
Of knowledge — and the mystery of death. 
What do they know ? — that they are miserable. 
What need of snakes and fruits to teach us that * 

ADAH. 

I am not wretched, Cain, and if thou 
Wert happy 

CAIN. 

Be thou happy then alone 



368 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



I will have nought to do with happiness, 
Which humbles me and mine. 

ADAH. 

Alone I could not, 
Nor would be happy : but with those around us, 
I think I could be so, despite of death, 
Which, as I know it not, I dread not, though 
It seems an awful shadow — if I may 
Judge from what I have heard. 

LUCIFER. 

And thou couldst not 
Alone, thou say'st, be happy 7 

ADAH. 

Alone ! Oh, my God ! 
Who could be happy and alone, or good? 
To me Bay solitude seems sin; unless 
When I think how soon I shall see tny brother, 
His brother, and our children, and our parents. 

LUCIFER. 

Yet thy God is alone ; and is he happy, 
Lonely and good ? 

ADAH. 

lie is not so; he hath 
The angels and the mortals to make happy, 
And thus becomes so in diffusing joy : 
What else can joy be but the spreading joy 7 

LUCIFER. 

Ask of your sire, the exile fresh from Eden ; 
Or of his first-born son ; ask your own heart ; 
It is not tranquil. 

ADAH. 

Alas ! no ; and you — 
Are you of heaven ? 

LUCIFER. 

If I am not, inquire 
The cause of this all-spreading happiness 
(Which you proclaim) of the all-great and good 
Maker of life and living things ; it is 
His secret, and he keeps it. We must bear, 
And some of us resist, and both in vain, 
His seraphs say ; but it is worth the trial, 
Since better may not be without : there is 
A wisdom in the spirit, which directs 
To right, as in the dim blue air the eye 
Of you, young mortals, lights at once upon 
The star which watches, welcoming the morn. 

ADAH. 

It is a beautiful star ; I love it for 
lis beauty. 

LUCIFER. 

And why not adore ? 

ADAH. 

Our father 
Adnrcs the Invisible only. 

LUCIFER. 

But the symbols 
f if the Invisible are the loveliest 
Of what is visible; and yon bright star 
Is leader of the host of heaven. 

ADAH. 

Our father 
Sailh that nc has beheld the God himself 
Wl o made him and our mother. 

LUCIFER. 

Hast thou seen him 7 



Yes — in his works. 



tUCIFER. 

But in his being 7 

ADAH. 

No- 
Save in mv father, who is God's own image; ' 
Or in his angels, who are like to thee — 
And brighter, yet less beautiful and powerful 
In seeming : as the silent sunny noon, 
All light, they look upon us ; but thou scem'st 
Like an ethereal night, where long white cloute 
Streak the deep purple, and unnumber'd starn 
Spangle the wonderful mysterious vault 
With things that look as if they would be funs ; 
So beautiful, unnumber'd, and endearing, 
Not dazzling, and yet drawing us to them, 
They fill my eyes with tears, and so dost thou. 
Thou scem'st unhappy ; do not make us so, 
And I will weep for thee. 

LUCIFER. 

Alas ! those tears ! 
Couldst thou but know what oceans will be shed- 

ADAH. 

By me? 

LUCIFER. 

By all ? 

ADAH. 

What all ? 

LUCIFER. 

The million n illions— 
The myriad myriads — the all-peopled ear Ji — 
The unpeopled earth — and the o'er-peopled hell, 
Of which thy bosom is the germ. 

ADAH. 

OhCaiii! 

This spirit curseth us. 

CAIN. 

Let him say on ; 
Him will I follow. 

ADAH. 

Whither? 

LUCIFER. 

To a place 
Whence he shall come back to thee in an hour; 
But in that hour see things of many days. 

ADAH. 

How can that be ? 

LUCIFER. 

Did not your Maker make 
Out of old worlds this new one in few day* ? 
And cannot I, who aided in this work, 
Show in an hour what he hath made in many, 
Or hath destroy'd in few 7 

CAIN. 

Lead on. 

ADAH. 

Will he 
In sooth return within an hour 7 

LUCIFER. 

He shall. 
With us acts are exempt from time, and we 
Can crowd eternity into an hour, 
Or stretch an hour into eternity : 
We bi eathe not by a mortal measurement— 
I But that 's a mystery. Cain, come on with rau 



Will he return ? 

LUCIFER. 

Ay, woman ! he alone 
Of mortals from that place (the first and last 
Who shall return, save One) — shall come back to thee, 
To make that silent and expectant world 
As populous as this : at present there 
Are few inhabitants. 

ADAH. 

Whore dwellest thou? 

LUCIFER. 

Throughout all space. Where should I dwell? Where are 
Thy God or Gods — there am I; all things are 
Divided with me ; life and death — and time — 
Eternity — and heaven and earth — and that 
Which is not heaven nor earth, but peopled with 
Those who once peopled or shall people both — 
These are my realms ! So that I do divide 
His, and possess a kingdom which is not 
His. If I were not that which I have said, 
Could I stand here? His angels are within 
Your vision. 

ADAH. 

So they were when the fair serpent 
Spoke with our mother first. 

LUCIFER. 

Cain ! thou hast heard. 
If thou dost long for knowledge, I can satiate 
That thirst: nor ask thee to partake of fruits 
Which shall deprive thee of a single good 
The conqueror has left thee. Follow me. 

CAIN. 

Spirit, I have said it. [Exeunt Lucifer and Cain 
adah (follows, exclaiming) 

Cain! my brother! Cain! 



ACT II. 

SCENE I. 

The Abyss of Space. 

CAIN. 

I tread on air, and sink not ; yet I fear 
To sink. 

LUCIFER. 

Have faith in me, and thou shalt be 
Borne on the air, of which I am the prince. 

CAIN. 

Can I do so without impiety? 

LUCIFER. 

Believe — and sink not ! doubt — and perish ! thus 
Would run the edict of the other God, 
Who names me demon to his angels ; they 
Echo the sound to miserable things, 
Which, knowing nougnt oeyond their shallow senses, 
Worship the word which strikes their ear, and deem 
Evil or good what is proclaim'd to them 
In their abasement. I will have none such : 
Worship or worship not, thou shalt behold 
The worlds beyond thy little world, nor be 
Amerced, for doubts beyond thy little life, 
With torture of my dooming. There will come 
An hour, when, toss'd upon some water-drops, 
A man shall say to a man, " Believe in me, 
And walk the waters ;" and the man shall walk 
2 K 52 



The billows and be safe. / will not say 
Believe in me, as a conditional creed 
To save thee ; but fly with me o'er the gulf 
Of space an equal flight, and I will show 
What thou dar'st not deny, the history 
Of past, and present, and of future worlds. 

CAIN. 

Oh, god, or demon, or whate'er thou art, 
Is yon our earth ? 

LUCIFER. 

Dost thou not recognise 
The dust which form'd your father ? 

CAIN. 

Can it be? 
Yon small blue circle, swinging in far ether, 
With an inferior circlet near it still, 
Which looks like that which lit our earthly night? 
Is this our Paradise ? Where are its walls, 
And they who guard them ? 

LUCIFER. 

Point me out the site 
Of Paradise. 

CAIN. 

How should I ? As we move 
Like sunbeams onward, it grows small and smallei 
And as it waxes little, and then less, 
Gathers a halo round it, like the light 
Which shone the roundest of the stars, when I 
Beheld them from the skirts of Paradise : 
Mcil.inks they both, as we recede from them, 
Appear to join the innumerable stars 
Which are around us ; and, as we move on, 
Increase their myriads. 

LUCIFER. 

And if there should be 
Worlds greater than thine own, inhabited 
By greater things, and they themselves far more 
In number than the dust of thy dull earth, 
Though multiplied to animated atoms, 
All living, and all doom'd to death, and wretched, 
What wouldst thou think ? 

CAIN. 

I should be proud of thought 
Which knew such things. 

LUCIFER. 

But if that high thought weie 
Link'd to a servile mass of matter, and, 
Knowing such things, aspiring to such things, 
And science still beyond them, were chain'd down 
To the most gross and petty paltry wants, 
All foul and fulsome, and the very best 
Of thine enjoyments a sweet degradation, 
A most enervating and filthy cheat, 
To lure thee on to the renewal of 
Fresh souls and bodies, all forcdoom'd to be 
As frail, and few so happy 

CAIN. 

Spirit! I 

Know nought of death, save as a dreadful thing. 
Of which I have heard my parents speak, as of 
A hideous heritage I owe to them 
No less than life ; a heritage not happy. 
If I may judge till now. But, spirit, if 
It be as thou hast said (and I within 
Ftee! the prophetic torture of its truth), 
Here let r.ie die: for to give birth to those 



370 BYRON'S WORKS. 


Who can but suffer many years, and die. 


Your works, or accidents, or whatsoe'er 


Methinks, is merely propagating death, 


They may be ! Let me die, as atoms die 


And multiplying murder. 


(If that thej die), or know ye in your might 


LUCIFER. 


And knowledge ! My thoughts ate not in this hour 


Thou canst not 


Unworthy what I see, though my dust is : 


All die — there is what must survive. 


Spirit ! let me expire, or see them nearer. 


CAIN. 


LUCIFER 


The Other 


Art thou not nearer ? look back to thine earth ! 


Spake not of this unto my father, when 


CAIN. 


He shut him forth from Paradise, with death 


Where is it ? I see nothing save a mass 


Writ! en upon his forehead. But at least 


Of most innumerable lights. 

LUCIFEK 


Let what is mortal of me perish, that 


I may be in the rest as angels are. 


Look there! 


LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 


{ am angelic : wouldst thou be as I am ? 


I cannot sec it. 


CAIN. 


LUCIFER. 


I know not what thou art : I see thy power, 


Yet it sparkles still. 


And sie thou show'st me things beyond my power, 


CAIN. 


Beyond all power of my bom faculties, 


What, yonder ? 


Although inferior still to my desires 


LUCIFER. 


And my conceptions. 


Yea. 


LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 


What are they, which dwell 


And wilt thou tell me so? 


So humbly in their pride, as to sojourn 


Why, I have seen the fire-flies and fire-worms 


With worms in clay? 


Sprinkle the dusky groves and the green banks 


CAIN. 


In the dim twilight, brighter than yon world 


And what art thou, who dwellest 


Which bears them. 


So haughtily in spirit, and canst range 


LUCIFER. 


Nature and immortality, and yet 


Thou hast seen both worms and worlds, 


Seem'st sorrowful ? 


Each bright and sparkling, — what dost think of them 7 


LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 


I seem that which I am ; 


That they are beautiful in their own sphere, 


And therefore do I ask of thee, if thou 


And that the night, which makes both beautiful, 


Wouldst be immortal ? 


The little shining fire-fly in its flight, 


CAIN. 


And the immortal star in its great course, 


Thou hast said, I must be 


Must both be guided. 


Immortal in despite of me. I knew not 


LUCIFER. 


This until lately — but, since it must be, 


But by whom, or what? 


Let me, or happy or unhappy, learn 


CAIN. 


To anticipate my immortality. 


Show me. 


LUCIFER. 


LUCIFER. 


ITiou didst before I came upon thee. 


Dar'st thou behold ? 


CAIN. 


CAIN. 


How? 


How know I what 


LUCIFER. 

Bv suffering. 

CAIN. 


I dare behold ? as yet, thou hast shown nought 
I dare not gaze on further. 


And must torture be immortal ? 


LUCIFER. 


LUCIFER. 


On, then, with me. 


We and thy sons will try. But now, behold! 


Wouldst thou behold things mortal or immortal ? 


Is it not glorious ? 


CAIN. 


CAIN. 


Why, what are things ? 


Oh, thou beautiful 


LUCIFER. 


And unimaginable ether ! and 


Both partly : but what doth 


Ye multiplying masses of increased 


Sit next thy heart? 


And still-increasing lights ! what are ye? what 


CAIN. 


Is this blue wilderness of interminable 


The things I see. 


Air, where ye roll along, as I have seen 


LUCIFER. 


The leaves a'ong the limpid streams of Eden ? 


But what 


Is your course measured for ye ? Or do ye 


Sale nearest it? 


Sweep on in your unbounoed revelry 


CAIN. 


Through an aerial universe of endless 


The things I have not seen, 


Expansion, at which my soul aches to think, 


Nor ever shall — the mysteries of death. 


Intoxicated with eternity? 


LUCIFER. 


Oh God ! Oh Gods ! or whatsoe'er ye are ! 


What if I show to thee things which have died, 


How beautiful ye are ' how beautiful 


As 1 have shown thee much which cannot die ? 



CAIN. 



371 



CAIN. 

Do so. 

LUCIFER. 

Away, then ! on our mighty wings, 

CAIN. 

Oh ! how wc cleave the blue ! The stars fade from us ! 
The earth ! where is my earth ? let me look on it, 
For I was made of it. 

LUCIFER. 

'T is now beyond thee, 
Less in the universe than thou in it : 
Yet deem not that thou canst escape it ; thou 
Shalt soon return to earth, and all its dust ; 
'T is part of thy eternity, and mine. 

CAIN. 

Where dost thou lead me ? 

LUCIFER. 

To what was before thee! 
The phantasm of the world ; of which thy world 
Is but the wreck. 

CAIN. 

What ! is it not then new ? 

LUCIFER. 

No more than life is : and that was ere thou 
Or / were, or the things which seem to us 
Greater than either : many things will have 
No end ; and some, which would pretend to have 
Had no beginning, have had one as mean 
As thou ; and mightier things have been extinct 
To make way for much meaner than we can 
Surmise ; for moments only and the space 
Have been and must be all unchangeable. 
But changes make not death, except to clay ; 
But thou art clay — and canst but comprehend 
That which was clay, and such thou shall behold. 

CAIN. 

Clay, spirit ! What thou wilt, I can survey. 

LUCIFER. 

Away, then ! 

CAIN. 

But the lights fade from me fast, 
And some till now grew larger as we approach'd, 
And wore the look of worlds. 

LUCIFER. 

And such they are. 

CAIN. 

And Edens in them 7 

LUCIFER. 

It may be. 

CAIN. 

And men 7 

LUCIFER. 

Yea, or things higher. 

CAIN. 

Ay ! and serpents too 7 

LUCIFER. 

Wouldst thou have men without them 7 must no reptile 
Breathe, save the erect ones 7 

CAIN. 

How the lights recede ! 
Where fly we 7 

LUCIFEP. 

To the world of phantoms, which 
Are bemgs past, and shadows still to come. 

CAIN. 

But it grows dark, and dark — the stars are gone ! 



LUCIFER. 

And yet thou Seest. 

c \IN. 

'Tis a fearful light! 
No sun, no moon, no lights innumerable. 
The very blue of the empurpled night 
Fades to a dreary twilight ; yet I see 
Huge dusky masses, but unlike the worlds 
We were approaching, which, begirt with light, 
Seom'd full of life even when their atmosphere 
Of light gave way, and show'd them taking shapes 
Unequal, of deep valleys and.vast mountains ; 
And some emitting sparks, and some displaying 
Enormous liquid plains, and some begirt 
With luminous belts, and floating moons, which tool 1 
Like them the features of fair earth : — instead, 
All here seems dark and dreadful. 

LUCIFER. 

But distinct. 
Thou seekest to behold death, and dead things ? 

CAIN. 

I seek it not ; but as I know there are 

Such, and that my sire's sin makes him and me, 

And all that we inherit, liable 

To such, I would behold at once what I 

Must one day sec perforce. 

LUCIFER. 

Behold ! 

CAIN. 

'T is darkness. 

LUCIFF.R. 

And so it shall be ever; but we will 
Unfold its gates! 

CAIN. 

Enormous vapours roll 
Apart — what 's this 7 

LUCIFER. 

Enter ! 

CAIN. 

Can I return? 

LUCIFER. 

Return! be sure: how else should death be peopled 7 
Its present realm is thin to what it will be, 
Through thee and thine. 

CAIN. 

The clouds still open wide 
And wider, and make widening circles round us. 

LUCIFER. 

Advance ! 

CAIN. 

And thou ! 

LUCIFER. 

Fear not — without me thou 
Couldst not have gone beyond thy world. On! on! 
[ They disappear though tlie clouat 



SCENE II. 

Hades. 

Enter Lucifer and Cain. 

CAIN. 

How silent and how vast are these dim worlds ' 
For they seem more than one, and yet more peopien 
Than the huge brilliant luminous orbs which swunn 
So thickly in the upper air, that I 



372 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Had deem'd them rather the bright populace 

Of some all unimaginable heaven 

Than things to be inhabited themselves, 

But that on drawing near them I beheld 

Their swelling into palpable immensity 

Of matter, which seem'd made for life to dwell on, 

Rather than life itself. But here, all is 

So shadowy and so full of twilight, that 

it speaks of a day past. 

LUCIFER. 

It is the realm 
Of death. — Wouldst haye it present ? 

CAIN. 

Till I know 
That which it really is, I cannot answer. 
But if it be as I have heard my father 
Deal out in his long homilies, 't is a thing— 
Oh God! I dare not think on'i! Cursed be 
He who invented life that leads to death ! 
Or the dull mass of life, that being life 
Could not retain, but needs must forfeit it — 
Even for the innocent ! 

LUCIFER. 

Dost thou curse thy father ? 

CAIN. 

Cursed he not me in giving me my birth ? 
Cursed he not me before my birth, in daring 
To pluck the fruit forbidden? 

LUCIFER. 

Thou say'st well : 
The curse is mutual 't wixt thy sire and thee — 
But for thy sons and brother? 

CAIN. 

Let them share it 
With me, their sire and brother ! What else is 
Bequeath'd to me ? I leave them my inheritance. 
Oh ye interminable gloomy realms 
Of swimming shadows and enormous shapes, 
Some fully shown, some indistinct, and all 
Mighty and melancholy — what are ye? 
Live ye, or have ye lived ? 

LUCIFER. 

Somewhat of both. 

CAIN. 

Then what is death? 

LUCIFER. 

What? Hath not He who made ye 
Said 't is another life ? 

CAIN. 

Ti'l now He hath 
Said nothing, save that all shall die. 

LUCIFER. 

Perhaps 
He one day will unfold that further secret. 

CAIN. 

Happy the day ! 

LUCIFER. 

Yes, happy ! when unfolded 
Through agonies unspeakable, and clogg'd 
With agonies eternal, to innumerable 
Yet unborn myriads of unconscious atoms, 
All to be animated for this only ! 

CAIN. 

What are these mighty phantoms which I see 
Floating around me? — they wear not the form 
Of the intelligences I have seen 



Round our regretted and unenter'd Eden, 
Nor wear the form of man as I have view'd it 
In Adam's, and in Abel's, and in mine, 
Nor in my sister-bride's nor in my children's ; 
And yet they have an aspect, which, thoii«li oat 
Of men nor angels, looks like something which, 
If not the last, rose higher than the first, 
Haughty, and high, and beautiful, and full 
Of seeming strength, but of inexplicable 
Shape ; for I never saw such. They bear not 
The wing of seraph, nor the face of man, 
Nor form of mightiest brute, nor aught that is 
Now breathing ; mighty yet and beautiful 
As the most beautiful and mighty Which 
Live, and yet so unlike them, that I scarce 
Can call them living. 

LUCIFER. 

Yet they lived. 

CAIN. 

Where? 

LUCIFER. 



Whue 



Thou livest, 



When? 



LUCIFER. 

On what thou callest earth 



They did inhabit. 



CAIN. 

Adam is the first. 

LUCIFER. 

Of thine, I grant thee — but too mean to be 
The last of these. 

CAIN. 

And what are they ? 

LUCIFER. 

That which 
Thou shalt be. 

CAIN. 

But what were they ? 

LUCIFER. 

Living, high, 
Intelligent, good, great, and glorious things, 
As much superior unto all thy sire, 
Adam, could e'er have been in Eden, as 
The sixty-thousandth generation shall be, 
In its dull damp degeneracy, to 
Thee and thy son ; — and how weak they are, judge 
By thy own flesh. 

CAIN. 

Ah me ! and did they perish ? 

LUCIFER. 

Yes, from their earth, as thou wilt fade from thine. 

CAIN. 

But was mine theirs ? 

LUCIFER. 

It was. 

CAIN. 

But not as now : 
It is too little and too lowly to 
Sustain such creatures. 

LUCIFER. 

True, it was more glorious. 

CAIN. 

And wherefore did it fall ? 



LUCIFER. 

Ask Him who fells. 

CAIN. 

But how ? 

LUCIFER. 

By a most crushing and inexorable 
Destruction and disorder of the elements, 
Which struck a world to chaos, as a coai* 
Subsiding has struck out a world: such things, 
Though rare in time, are frequent in eternity. — 
Pass on, and gaze upon the past. 

CAIN. 

'T is awful ! 

LUCIFER. 

And true. Behold these phantoms ! they were once 

Material as thou art. 

CAIN. 

And must I be 
Like them? 

LUCIFER. 

Let Him who made thee answer that. 
I show thee what thy predecessors arp, 
And what they were thou feelest, in degree 
Interior as thy petty feelings, and 
Thy pettier portion of the immortal part 
Of high intelligence and earthly strength. 
What ye in common have with what they had 
Is life, and what ve shall have — death ; the rest 
Of your poor attributes is such as suits 
Reptiles engender'd out of the subsiding 
Slime of a mighty universe, crush'd into 
A scarcelv-yet shaped planet, peopled with 
Things whose enjoyment was to be in blindness— 
A Paradise of Ignorance, from which 
Knowledge was barr'd as poison. But behold 
What these superior beings are or were: 
Or, if it irk thee, turn thee back and till 
The earth, thy task — I '11 waft thee there in safety. 

CAIN. 

No : I '11 stay here. 

LUCIFER. 

How long ? 

CAIN. 

For ever ! Since 
I must one day return here from the earth, 
I rattier would remain ; 1 am sick of all 
That dust has shown me — let me dwell in shadows. 

LUCIFER. 

It cannot be : thou now beholdest as 

A vision that which is reality. 

To make thyself fit for this dwelling, thou 

Must pass through what the things thou see'st have 

pass'd — 
The gales of death. 

CAIN. 

By what gate have we enter'd 
Even now ? 

LUCIFER. 

By mine ! But, plighted to return, 
My spirit buoys thee up to breathe in regions 
Where all is breathless save thyself. Gaze on ; 
But do not think to dwell here till thine hour 
Is come. 

CAIN. 

And these, too, can they ne'er repass 
To earth again ? 
*2k2 



LUCIFER. 

Their earth is gone for ever — 
So changed by its convulsion, they would not 
Be conscious to a single present spot 
Of its new scarccly-harden'd surface — 't was — 
Oh, what a beautiful world it was .' 

CAIN. 

And is ; 
It is not with the earth, though I must til] it, 
I feel at war, but that I may not profit 
By what it bears of beautiful, untoiling, 
Nor gratify my thousand swelling thoughts 
With knowledge, nor allay my thousand fears 
Of death and life. 

LUCIFER. 

What thy world is thou see'st, 
But canst not comprehend the shadow of 
That which it was. 

CAIN. 

And those enormous creatures, 
Phantoms inferior in intelligence 
(At least so seeming) to the things we have pass'd, 
Resembling somewhat the wild habitants 
Of the deep woods of earth, the hugest which 
Roar nightly in the forest, but ten-fold 
In magnitude and teiror ; taller than 
The cherub-guarded walls of Eden, with 
Eyes flashing like the fiery swords which fence them 
And tusks projecting like the trees stripp'd of 
Their bark and branches — what were they? 

LUCIFER. 

That which 
The mammoth is in thy world ; — but these lie 
By myriads underneath its surface. 

CAIN. 

But 

None on it ? 

LUCIFER. 

No : for thy frail race to war 
With them would render the curse on it useless — 
'T would be destroy'd so early. 

CAIN. 

But why war ? 

LUCIFER. 

You have forgotten the denunciation 
Which drove your race from Eden — war with all tilings 
And death to all things, and disease to most things 
And pangs, and bitterness ; these were the fruits 
Of the forbidden tree. 

CAIN. 

But animals — 
Did they too cat of it, that they must die ? 

LUCIFER. 

Your Maker told ye, they were made for you, 
As you for him. — You would not have their doom 
Superior to your own ? Had Adam not 
Fallen, all had stood. 

CAIN. 

Alas ! the hopeicss wretches . 
They too must share my sire's fate, like his sons : 
Like them, too, without having shared the apple, 
Like them, too, without the so dear-bought knowledgt 
It was a lying tree — for we know nothing. 
At least it promised knowledge at the jrrice 
Of death— but knowledge g'j'ri • but what knows man 



374 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LUCIFER. 

It may be death leads to the highest knowledge; 
And being of all things the sole thing certain, 
At least leads to the surest science : therefore 
The tree was true, though deadly. 

CAIN. 

These dim realms ! 
( see them, but I know them not. 

LUCIFER. 

Because 

Thy hour is yet afar, and matter cannot 
Comprehend spirit wholly — but 't is something 
To know there are such realms. 

CAIN. 

We knew already 
That there was death. 

LUCIFER. 

But not what was beyond it. 

CAIN. 

Nor know I now. 

LUCIFER. 

Thou know'st that there is 
A state, and many states beyond thine own— 
And this thou knewest not this morn. 



CAIN. 



But all 



Seems dim and shadowy. 



Be content ; it will 
Seem clearer to thine immortality. 

CAIN. 

And yon immeasurable liquid space 

Of glorious azure which floats on beyond us, 

Which looks like water, and which I should deem 

The river which flows out of Paradise 

Past my own dwelling, but that it is bankless 

And boundless and of an ethereal hue — 

What is it ? 

LUCIFER. 

There is still some such on earth, 
Although inferior, and thy children shall 
Dwell near it — 't is the phantasm of an ocean. 

CAIN. 

T is like another world ; a liquid sun — 
And those inordinate creatures sporting o'er 
Its shining surface ? 

LUCIFER. 

Are its habitants, 
The past leviathans. 

CAIN. 

And yon immense 
Serpent, which rears his dripping mane and vasty 
Head ten times higher than the haughtiest cedar 
Forth from the abyss, looking as he could coil 
Himself around the orbs we lately look'd on — 
Is he not of the kind which bask'd beneath 
The tree in Eden? 

LUCIFER. 

Eve, thy mother, best 
Can tell what shape of serpent tempted her. 

CAIN. 

I iis seems too terrible. No doubt the other 
Hud more of beauty. 

LUCIFER. 

Hast thou ne'er beheld him ? 



Many of the same kind (at least so call'd), 
But never that precisely which persuaded 
The fatal fruit, nor even of the same aspect. 

LUCIFER. 

Your father saw him not '! 

CAIN. 

No ; 't was my mother 
Who tempted him — she tempted by the serpent. 

LUCIFER. 

Good man ! whene'er thy wife, or thy sons' wives 
Tempt thee or them to aught that 's new or strange. 
Be sure thou see'^t first who hath tempted them. 

CAIN. 

Thy precept comes too late : there is no more 
For serpents to tempt woman to. 

LUCIFER. 

But there 
Are some things still which woman may tempt man to, 
And man tempt woman : — let thy sons look to it ! 
My counsel is a kind one : for 't is even 
Given chiefly at my own expense : 't is true, 
'T will not be follow'd, so there 's little lost. 

CAIN. 

I understand not this. 

LUCIFER. 

The happier thou ! — 
The world and thou are still too young ! Thou thinkest 
Thyself most wicked and unhappy : is it 
Not so ? 

CAIN. 

For crime I know not ; but for pain, 
I have felt much. 

LUCIFER. 

First-born of the first man ! 
Thy present state of sin — and thou art evil, 
Of sorrow — and thou suflerest, are both Eden, 
In all its innocence, compared to what 
Thou shortly may'st be ; and that state again, 
In its redoubled wretchedness, a paradise 
To what thy sons' sons' sons, accumulating 
In generations like to dust (which they 
In fact but add to), shall endure and do. — 
Now let us back to earth ! 

CAIN. 

And wherefore didst thou 
Lead me here only to inform me this ? 

LUCIFER. 

Was not thy quest for knowledge ? 

CAIN. 

Yes : as being 
The road to happiness. 

LUCIFER. 

If truth be so, 
Thou hast k. 

CAIN. 

Then my father's God did well 
When he prohibited the fatal tree. 

LUCIFER. 

But had done better in not planting it. 
But ignorance of evil doth not save 
From evil ; it must still roll on the same, 
A part of all things. 

CAIN. 

Not of all tilings, llo. 
I '11 not believe it — for I thirst for good. 



LUCIFER. 

And who and what doth not ? IVlio covets evil 
For its own bitter sake? — None — nothing! 'tis 
The leaven of all life and lifelessness. 

CAIN. 

Within those glorious orbs which we behold, 
Distant and dazzling, and innumerable, 
Ere we came down into this phantom realm, 
111 cannot come ; they are too beautiful. 

LUCIFER. 

Thou hast seen them from afar. 

CAIN. 

And what of that? 
Distance can but diminish glory — they, 
When nearer, must be more ineffable. 

LUCIFER. 

Approach the things of earth most beautiful, 
And judge their beauty near. 

CAIN. 

I have done this — 
The loveliest thing I know is loveliest nearest. 

LUCIFER. 

Then there must be delusion. — What is that, 
Which being nearest to thine eyes, is still 
More beautiful than beauteous things remote? 

CAIN. 

My sister Adah. — All the stars of heaven, 

The deep blue noon of night, lit by an orb 

Which looks a spirit, or a spirit's world — 

The hues of twilight — the sun's gorgeous coming — 

His setting indescribable, which (ills 

My eyes with pleasant tears as I behold 

Him sink, and feel my heart float softly with him 

Along that western paradise of clouds — 

The forest shade — the green bough — the bird's voice — 

The vesper bird's, which seems to sing of love, 

And mingles with the song of cherubim, 

As the day closes over Eden's walls ; — 

All these are nothing to my eyes and heart, 

Like Adah'3 face : I turn from earth and heaven 

To gaze on it. 

LUCIFER. 

'T is frail as fair mortality, 
In the first dawn and bloom of young creation 
And earliest embraces of earth's parents, 
Can make its offspring; still it is delusion. 

CAIN. 

Vou think so, being not her brother. 

LUCIFER. 

Mortal ! 
My brotherhood 's with those who have no children. 

CAIN. 

Then thou canst have no fellowship with us. 

LUCIFER. 

It may be that thine own shall be for me. 
But if thou dost possess a beautiful 
Being beyond all beauty in thine eyes, 
Why art thou wretched? 

CAIN. 

Why do I exist? 
Why art thru wretched ? why are all things so ? 
Even He who made us must be as the maker 
Of things unhappy ! To produce destruction 
Can surely never be the task of joy, 
And yet my sire says He 's omnipotent . 
Then why is evil — He being good ? I ask'd 



This question of my father ; and he said , 

Because this evil only was the path 

To good. Strange good, that must arise from out 

Its deadly opposite ! I lately saw 

A lamb stung by a reptile : the poor suckling 

Lay foaming on the earth, beneath the vain 

And piteous bleating of its restless dam : 

My father pluck'd some herbs, and laid them to 

The wound ; and by degrees the helpless wreicn 

Resumed its careless life, and rose to drain 

The mother's milk, who o'er it tremulous 

Stood licking its reviving limbs with joy. 

Behold, my son ! said Adam, how from evil 

Springs good ! 

LUCIFER. 

What didst thou answer ? 

CAIN. 

Nothing ; f<M 
He is my father : but I thought, that 't were 
A better portion for the animal 
Never to have been stung at all, than to 
Purchase renewal of its little life 
With agonies unutterable, though 
Dispell'd by antidotes. 

LUCIFER. 

But as thou saidst, 
Of all beloved things thou lovest her 
Who shared thy mother's milk, and giveth hers 
Unto thy children 

CAIN. 

Most assuredly : 
What should I be without her ? 

LUCIFER. 

What am I ? 

CAIN. 

Dost thou love nothing? 

LUCIFER. 

What does thy God love ? 

CAIN. 

All things, my father says ; but I confess 
1 see it not in their allotment here. 

LUCIFER. 

And therefore thou canst not see if / love 
Or no, except some vast and general purpose, 
To which particular tilings must melt like snow, 

CAIN. 

Snows! what are they? 

LUCIFER. 

Be happier in not knowing 
What thy remoter offspring must encounter ; 
But bask beneath the clime which knows no winter' 

CAIN. 

But dost thou not love something like thyself? 

LUCIFER. 

And dost thou love thyself? 

CAIN. 

Yes, but love mote 
What makes my feelings more endurable. 
And is more than myself, because I love it. 

LUCIFER. 

Thou lovest it, because 't is beautiful, 
As was the apple in thy mother's eye ; 
And when it ceases to be so, thy love 
Will cease, like any other appetite. 

cA'jr. 
Cease to be beautiful ! how can that be ? 



37G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LUCIFER. 

With time. 

CAIN. 

Rut time has past, anil hitherto 
Even Adam ami my mother botli arc fair: 
Nut fair like Adah and the seraphim— 
13 ut very fair. 

LUCIFER. 

All that must pass away 
In them and her. 

CAIN. 

I 'm sorry for it ; but 
Cannot conceive my love for her the less. 
Ami when her beauty disappears, mcthiiiks 
He who creates all beauty will lose more 
Than me in seeing perish such a work. 

LUCIFER. 

I pity thee who lovest what must perish. 

CAIN. 

And I thee who lov'st nothing. 

LUCIFER. 

And thy brother — 
Sits lie not near thy heart ? 

CAIN. 

Why should he not ? 

LUCIFER. 

Thy father loves him well — so docs thy God. 

CAIN. 

And so do I. 

LUCIFER. 

'T is well and meekly done. 

CAIN. 

Meekly ! 

LUCIFER. 

He is the second born of flesh, 
And is his mother's favourite. 

CAIN. 

Let him keep 

Her favour, since the serpent was the first 
To win it. 

LUCIFER. 

And his father's? 

CAIN. 

What is that 
To me? should I not love that which all love? 

LUCIFER. 

And the Jehovah — the indulgent Lord, 
Ami beauteous planter of barr'd Paradise- 
He, too, looks smilingly on Abel. 

CAIN. 

I 

Ne'er saw Him, and I know not if He smiles. 

LUCIFER. 

But vou have seen his angels. 

CAIN. 

Rarely. 

LUCIFER. 

But 
Sufficiently to see they love your brother ; 
Hi* sacrifices are acceptable. 

CAIN. 

So be they ! wherefore speak to me of this ? 

LUCIFER. 

Because Uiou hast thought of this ere now. 

CAIN. 

And if 



I have thought, why recall a thought that (hepausex, 

as agitated) — Spirit ! 
Here we are in thy world ; speak not of mine. 
Thou hast shown me wonders ; thou hast shown me those 
Mighty Pre-Adamites who wa'.k'd the earth 
Of which ours is the wreck: thou hast pointed out 
Myriads of starry worlds, of which our own 
Is the dim and remote companion, in 
Infinity of life: thou hast shown me shadows 
Of that existence with the dreaded name 
Winch my sire brought us — death ; thou hast shown me 

much — 
But not all : show me where Jehovah dwells. 
In his especial paradise — or thine : 
Where is it ? 

LUCIFER. 

Here, and o'er all space. 

CAIN. 

But ye 
Have some allotted dwelling — as all (kings ; 
Clay has its earth, and other worlds their tenants ; 
All temporary breathing creatures their 
Peculiar element ; and things which have 
Long ceased to breathe our breath have theirs, thou 

say'st ; 
And the Jehovah and thyself have thine — 
Ye do not dwell together ? 

LUCIFER. 

No, we reign 
Together, but our dwellings are asunder. 

CAIN. 

Would there were only one of ye ! perchance 
An unity of purpose might make union 
In elements which seem now jarr'd in storms. 
How came ye, being spirits, wise and infinite, 
To separate ? Are ye not as brethren in 
Your essence, and your nature, and your glory 7 
LUCIFER. 

Art thou not Abel's brother ? 

CAIN. 

We are brethren, 
And so we shall remain ; but, were it not so, 
Is spirit like to flesh? can it fall out? 
Infinity with immortality? 
Jarring and turning space to misery — 
For what ? 

LUCIFER. 

To reign. 

CAIN. 

Did ye not tell me that 
Ye are both eternal? 

LUCIFER. 

Yea! 

CAIN. 

And what I have seen, 
Yon blue immensity, is boundless? 

LUCIFER. 

Ay. 

CAIN. 

And cannot ye both reign then ? — is there not 
Enough? — why should ye differ ? 

LUCIFER. 

We both reign. 

CAIN. 

But one of you makes evil. 



CAIN. 37 7 


LUCIFER. 


Of worlds and life, which I hold with him — No ! 


Which? 


I have a victor — true ; but no superior. 


CAIN. 


Homage He has from all — but none from me: 


Thou! for 


I battle it against him, as I battled 


If thou canst do man good, why dost thou not ? 


In highest heaven. Through all eternity, 


LUCIFER. 


And the unfathomable gulfs of Hades, 


And why not He who made ? / made ye not ; 


And the interminable realms of space, 


Ye are his creatures, and not mine. 


And the infinity of endless ages, 


CAIN. 


All, all, will I dispute ! And world by world, 


Then leave us 


And star by star, and universe bj universe, 


His creatures, as thou say'st we are, or show me 


Shall tremble in the balance, till the great! 


Thy dwelling, or his dwelling. 


Conflict shall cease, if ever it shall cease, 


LUCIFER. 


Which it ne'er shall, till he or I be quench'd ! 


I could show thee 


And what can quench our immortality, 


Both ; hut the time will come thou shalt see one 


Our mutual and irrevocable hate 1 


Of them for evermore. 


He as a conqueror will call the conquer'd 


CAIN. 


Evil; but what will be the good He gives? 


And why not now ? 


Were I the victor, his works would be deem'u 


LUCIFER. 


The only evil ones. And you, ye new 


Thy human mind hath scarcely grasp to gather 


And scarce-horn mortals, what have been his gilt* 


The little I have shown thee into calm 


To you already in your little world ? 


And clear thought ; and thou wouldst go on aspiring 


CAIN. 


To the great douhle mysteries ! the two Principles .' 


But few ; and some of those but bitte . 


And gaze upon them on their secret thrones ! 


LUCIFER. 


Dust ! limit thy ambition, for to see 


Bacit 


Either of these, would he for thee to perish ! 


With me, then, to thine earth, and try the re&i 


CAIN. 


Of his celestial boons to ye and yours. 


And let me perish, so I see them ! 


Evil and good arc things in their own essence, 


LUCIFER. 


And not made good or evil by the giver ; 


There 


But if he gives you good — so call him ; if 


The son of her who snatch'd the apple spake ! 


Evil springs from him, do not name it mine, 


But thou wouldst. only perish, and not see them ; 


Till ye know better its true fount ; and judge 


That sight is for the o.her state. 


Not by words, though of spirits, but the fruits 


CAIN. 


Of your existence, such as it must be. 


Of death? 


One good gift has the fatal apple given — 


LUCIFER. 


Your reason ; — let it not be oversway'd 


That is the prelude. 


By tyrannous threats to force you into faith 


CAIN. 


'Gainst all external sense and inward feeling : 


Then I dread it less, 


Think and endure, — and form an inner world 


Now that I know it leads to something definite. 


In your own bosom — where the outward fails: 


LUCIFER. 


So shall you nearer be the spiritual 


And now I will convey thee to thy world, 


Nature, and war triumphant with your own. 


When: thou shalt multiply the race of Adam, 


[They disnvptai . 


Eat, drink, toil, tremble, laugh, weep, sleep, and die. 

CAIN. 






And to what end have I beheld these things 


ACT III. 


Which thou hast shown mc ? 


LUCIFER. 


SCENE I. 


Didst thou not require 




Knowledge ? And have I not, in what 1 show'd, 


The Earth near Eden, as in Act I. 


Taught thee to know thyself? 


Enter Cain and Adah. 


CAIN. 




Alas ! I seem 


ADAH. 


Nothing. 


Hush ! tread softly, Cain. 


LUCIFER. 


CAIN. 


And this should be the human sum 


I will ; but wherefore > 


Of knowledge, to know mortal nature's nothingness ; 


ADAH. 


Bequeath that science to thy children, and 


Our little Enoch sleeps upon yon bed 


T will spare them many tortures. 


Of leaves, beneath the cypress. 


CAIN. 


CAIN. 


Haughty spirit ! 


Cypress! 'tis 


Thou speak'st it proudly ; but thyself, though proud, 


A gloomy tree, which looks as if it mourn'd 


Hast a superior. 


O'er what il shadows; wherefore didst thou choose u 


LUCIFER. 


For our child's canopy ? 


No ! By heaven, which Ho 


ADAH. 


Holds, and the abyss, and the immersily 
53 

- 


Because its branches 



378 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Shut out the sun like night, and therefore seem'd 
fitting to shadow slumber. 

CAIN. 

Ay, the last — 
And longest ; but no matter — lead me to him. 

[ They go up to the child. 
How lovely he appears ! his little checks, 
In llieir p're incarnation, vying with 
The rose-leaves strewn beneath them. 

ADAH. 

And his lips, too, 
How beautifully parted ! No, you shall not 
Kiss him, at least not now: he will awake soon — 
His hour of mid-day rest is nearly over, 
But it were pity to disturb him till 
•T is closed. 

CAIN. 

You have said well ; I will contain 
My heart till then. He smiles, and sleeps ! — Sleep on 
And smile, thou little, young inheritor 
Of a world scarce less young : sleep on, and smile ! 
Thine are the hours and days when both are cheering 
And innocent ! thou hast not pluok'd the fruit — 
Thou know'st not thou art naked ! Must the time 
Come thou shalt be amerced for sins unknown, 
Which were not thine nor mine ? But now sleep on ! 
His cheeks are reddening into deeper smiles, 
And shining lids are trembling o'er his long 
Lashes, dark as the cypress which waves o'er them : 
Half open, from beneath them the clear blue 
Laughs out, although in slumber. He must dream — 
Of what? Of Paradise!— Ay ! dream of it, 
My disinherited boy ! 'T is but a dream ; 
For never more thyself, thy sons, nor fathers, 
Shall walk in that forbidden place of joy ! 

ADAH. 

Dear Cain ! Nay, do not whisper o'er our son 
Such melancholy yearnings o'er the past ; 
Why wilt thou always mourn for Paradise ? 
Can we not make another ? 

CAIN. 

Where ? 

ADAH. 

Here, or 
Where'er thou wilt : where'er thou art, I feel not 
The want of this so much regretted Eden. 
Have I not thee, our boy, our sire, and brother, 
And Zillah — our sweet sister, and our Eve, 
To whom we owe so much besides our birth ? 

CAIN. 

Yes, death, too, is amongst the debts we owe her. 

ADAH. 

Cain ! that proud spirit, who withdrew thee hence, 
Hath sadden'd thine still deeper. I had hoped 
The promised wonders which thou hast beheld, 
Visions, thou say'st, of past and present worlds, 
Would have composed thy mind into the calm 
Of a contented knowledge ; but I see 
Thy guide hath done thee evil : still I thank him, 
And can forgive him all, that he so soon 
Ualh given thee back to us. 

CAIN. 

So soon ? 

ADAH. 

'T is scarcely 
Two hours since ye departed : two long hours 



To me, but only hours upon the sun. 

CAIN. 

And yet I have approach'd that sun, and seen 
Worlds which he once shone on, and never more 
Shall light ; and worlds he never lit : methought 
Years had roll'd o'er my absence. 

ADAH. 

Hardly hours. 

CAIN. 

The mind then hath capacity of time, 

And measures it by that which it beholds, 

Pleasing or painful, little or almighty. 

I had beheld the immemorial works 

Of endless beings; skirr'd extinguish'd worlds: 

And, gazing on eternity, methought 

I had borrow'd more by a few drops of ages 

From its immensity ; but now I feel 

My littleness again. Well said the spirit, 

That I was nothing! 

ADAH. 

Wherefore said he so ? 
Jehovah said not that. 

CAIN. 

No : he contents him 
With making us the nothing which we are ; 
And after nattering dust with glimpses of 
Eden and immortality, resolves 
It back to dust again — for what ? 

ADAH. 

Thou know'st— 
Even for our parents' error. 

CMN. 

Whut is that 
To us ? they sinn'd, then let them die ! 

ADAH. 

Thou hast not spoken well, nor is that thought 
Thy own, but of the spirit who was with thee. 
Would / could die for them, so they might live ! 

CAIN. 

Why, so say I — provided that one victim 

Might satiate the insatiable of life, 

And that our little rosy sleeper there 

Might never taste of death nor human sorrow, 

Nor hand it down to those who spring from him. 

ADAH. 

How know we that some such atonement one day 
May not redeem our race ? 

CAIN. 

By sacrificing 
The harmless for the guilty? what atonement 
Were there ? why, u>e are innocent : what have we 
Done, that we must be victims for a deed 
Before our birth, or need have victims to 
Atone for thi« mysterious, nameless sin— 
If it be such a sin to seek for knowledge ? 

ADAH. 

Alas! thou sinnest now, my Cain ; thy words 
Sound impious in mine ears. 

CAIN. 

Then leave me ! 

ADAH. 

Neret 
Though thy Grod left thee. 

CAIN. 

Say, what have we here ? 



CAIN. 



379 



ADAH. 


When thou art gentle. Love us, then, my Cain ! 


Two aUars, which our brother Abel made 


And love thyself for our sakes, for we love thee. 


During thine absence, whereupon to offer 


Look ! how he laughs and stretches out his arms, 


A sacrifice to God on thy return. 


And opens wide his blue eyes upon thine, 


CAIN. 


To hail his father; while his little form 


And how knew he, that / would be so ready 


Flutters as wing'd with joy. Talk not of pain ! 


With the burnt-offerings, wliich he daily brings 


The childless cherubs well might envy thee 


With a meek brow, whose base humility 


The pleasures of a parent ! Bless him, Cain ! 


Shows more of fear than worship, as a bribe 


As yet he hath no words to thank thee, but 


To the Creator ? 


His heart will, and thine own too. 


ADAH. 


CAIN. 


Surely, 't is well done. 


Bless thee, boy ! 


CAIN. 


If that a mortal blessing may avail thee, 


One altar may suffice ; / have no offering. 


To save thee from the serpent's curse ! 


ADAH. 


ADAH. 


The fruits of the earth, the early, beautiful 


It shall. 


Blossom and bud, and bloom of flowers, and fruits ; 


Surely a father's blessing may avert 


These are a goodly offering to the Lord, 


A reptile subtlety. 


Given with a gentle and a contrite spirit. 


CAIN. 


CAIN. 


Of that I doubt ; 


I have toil'd, and till'd, and sweaten in the sun, 


But bless him ne'ertheless. 


According to the curse: — must I do more? 


ADAH. 


For what should I be gentle ? for a war 


Our brother comes. 


With all the elements ere they will yield 


CAIN. 


The bread we eat ? For what must I be grateful ? 


Thy brother Abel. 


For being dust, and grovelling in the dust, 


Enter Abel. 


Till I return to dust ? If I am nothing— 


ABEL. 


For nothing shall I be a hypocrite, 


Welcome, Cain! My brother, 


And seem well pleased with pain ? For what should I 


The peace of God be on thee ! 


Be contrite ? for my father's sin, already 


CAIN. 


Expiate with what we all have undergone, 


Abel! hail! 


And to be more than expiated by 


ABEL. 


The ages prophesied, upon our seed. 


Our sister tells me that thou hast been wandering, 


Little deems our young blooming sleeper, there, 


In high communion with a spirit, far 


The germs of an eternal misery 


Beyond our wonted range. Was he of those 


To myriads is within him ! better 't were 


We have seen and spoken with, like to our father 1 


I snatch'd him in his sleep, and dash'd him 'gainst 


CAIN. 


The rocks, than let him live to 


No. 


ADAH. 


ABEL. 


Oh, my God ! 


Why then commune with him ? he may be 


Touch not the child — my child ! thy child ! Oh Cain ! 


A foe to the Most High. 


CAIN. 


CAIN. 


Fear not ! for all the stars, and all the power 


And friend to man. 


Which sways them, I would not accost yon infant 


Has the Most High been so— if so you term him ? 


With ruder greeting than a father's kiss. 


ABEL. 


ADAH. 


Term him ! your words are strange to-day, my brother 


Then, why so awful in thy speech ? 


My sister Adah, leave us for a while — 


CAIN. 


We mean to sacrifice. 


I said, 


ADAH. 


T were better that he ceased to live, than give 


Farewell, my Cain ; 


Life to so much of sorrow as he must 


But first embrace thy son. May his soft spirit, 


Endure, and, harder still, bequeath ; but since 


And Abel's pious ministry, recall thee 


That saying jars you, let us only say— 


To peace and holiness ! 

[Exit Adah, with her child. 


'T were better that he never had been born. 


Oh, do not say so ! Where were then the joys, 


ABEL. 

Where hast thou been ? 


The mother's joys of watching, nourishing, 


CAIN. 


And loving him ? Soft ! he awakes. Sweet Enoch ! 


I know not. 


[She goes to the child. 


ABEL. 


Oh Cain ! look on him ; see how full of life, 


Nor what thou hast seen 7 


Of strength, of bloom, of beauty, and of joy, 


CAIN. 


How like to me — how like to thee, when gentle, 


The dead. 


For then we are all alike ; is 't not so, Cain ? 


The immortal, the unbounded, the omnipotent, 


Mother, and sire, and son, our features are 


The overpowering mysteries of space — 


Reflected in each o'her ; as they are 


The innumerable worlds that were and are — 


In the clear waters, when they are gentle, and 


A whirlwind of such overwhelming things, 



GO 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Suns, moons, and earths, upon their loud-voiced spheres 
Sinning in thunder round me, as have made me 
Unfit tor mortal converse : leave me, Abel. 

ABEL. 

Thine eyes are flashing with unnatural light — 
Thy cheek is flush'd with an unnatural hue — 
Thy words are fraught witli an unnatural sound — 
What may this mean ? 

CAIN. 

It means 1 pray thee, leave me. 

ABEL. 

Not till we have pray'd and sacrificed together. 

CAIN. 

Abel, I pray thee, sacrifice alone — 
Jehovah loves thee well. 

ABEL. 

Both well, I hope. 

CAIN. 

But thee the better: I care not for that; 
Thou art fitter for his worship than I am : 
Revere him, then — but let it be alone — 
At least without me. 

ABEL. 

Brother, I should ill 
Deserve the name of our great father's son, 
If as my elder I revered thee not, 
And in the worship of our God call'd not 
On thee to join me, and precede me in 
Our priesthood — 'lis thy place. 

CAIN. 

But I have ne'er 
Asserted it. 

ABEL. 

The more my grief; I pray thee 
To do so now ; thy soul seems labouring in 
Some strong delusion ; it will calm thee. 

CAIN. 

No; 
Nothing can calm me more. Calm ! say I ? Never 
Knew I what calm was in the soul, although 
I have seen the elements still'd. My Abel, leave me ! 
Or let me leave thee to thy pious purpose. 

ABEL. 

Neither ; we must perform our task together. 
Spurn me not. 

CAIN. 

If it must be so well, then, 

What shall I do 1 

ABEL. 

Choose one of those two altars. 

CAIN. 

Choose for me : they to me are so much turf 
And stone. 

ABEL. 

Choose thou ! 

CAIN. 

I have chosen. 

ABEL. 

'T is the highest, 
And suits thee, as the elder. Now prepare 
Thine offerings. 

CAIN. 

Where are thine? 

ABEL. 

Behold them here — 
The firstlings of the flock, and fat thereof— 



A shepherd's humble offering. 

CAIN. 

I have no flocks : 
I am a tiller of the ground, and must 
Yield what it yieldelh to my toil — its fruit : 

[He gathers fruit*. 
Behold them in their various bloom and ripeness. 

[They dress their altars, and kindle ajlume upon 
them. 

ABEL. 

My brother, as the elder, oner first 

Thy prayer and thanksgiving with sacrifice. 

CAIN. 

No — I am new to this ; lead thou the way, 
And I will follow — as I may. 

ABEL (kneeli)is). 

Oh God! 
Who made us, and who breathed the breath of life 
Within our nostrils, who hath blessed us, 
And spared, despite our father's sin, to make 
His children all lost, as they might have been, 
Had not thy justice been so temper'd with 
The mercy which is thy delight, as to 
Accord a pardon like a paradise, 
Compared with our great crimes : — Sole Lord of light ! 
Of good, and glory, and eternity ! 
Without whom all were evil, and with whom 
Nothing can err, except to some good end 
Of thine omnipotent benevolence — 
Inscrutable, but still to be fulfill' d — 
Accept from out thy humble first of shepherd's 
First of the first-born flocks — an ottering, 
In itself nothing — as what offering can be 
Aught unto thee ? — but yet accept it for 
The thanksgiving of hiin who spreads it in 
The face of thy high heaven, bowing his own 
Even to the dust, of which he is, in honour 
Of thee, and of thy name, for evermore ! 

cain (standing erect during this speech) 
Spirit ! w hate'er or whosoe'er thou art, 
Omnipotent, it may be — and, if good, 
Shown in the exemption of thy deeds from evL; 
Jehovah upon earth ! and God in heaven ! 
And it may be with other names, because 
Thine attributes seem many, as thy works : 
If thou must be propitiated with prayers, 
Take them ! If thou must be induced with altars, 
And soften'd with a sacrifice, receive them ! 
Two beings here erect them unto thee. 
If thou lovest blood, the shepherd's shrine, which smoke* 
On my right hand, hath shed it for thy service, 
In the first of his flock, whose limbs now reek 
In sanguinary incense to thy skies ; 
Or if the sweet and blooming fruits of earth, 
And milder seasons, which the unstain'd turf 
I spread them on, now offers in the face 
Of the broad sun which ripeu'd them, may seem 
Good to thee, inasmuch as they have not 
Suffer'd in limb or life, and rather form 
A sample of thy works, than supplication 
To look on ours ! If a shrine without victim, 
And altar without gore, may win thy favour, 
Look on it ! and for bin) who dresseth it, 
He is — such as thou mad'st him ; and seeks nothing 
Which must be won by kneeling : if he 's evil, 
Strike him ! thou art omnipotent, and may'st, — 



For what can he oppose? If he be good, 
Strike him, or spare him, as thou will ! since all 
Rests upon thee ; and good and evil seem 
To have no power themselves, save in thy will ; 
And whether that be good or ill I know not, 
Not being omnipotent, or fit to judge 
Omnipotence, but merely to endure 
Its mandate, which thus far I have endured. 

[Theflre upon the altar of Abel kindle* into a 
column of the brightest flame, and ascends 
to heaven; while a whirlwind throws down 
the altar of Cain, and scatters the fruits 
abroad upon the earth. 

ABEL (kneeling). 
Oh, brother, pray ! Jehovah 's wroth with thee ! 

CAIN. 

Why so? 

ABEL. 

Thy fruits are scatter'd on the earth. 

CAIN. 

From earth they came, to earth let them return ; 
Their seed will bear fresh fruit there ere the summer : 
Thy burnt flesh-offering prospers better ; see 
How heaven licks up the flames, when tnick with blood ! 

ABEL. 

Think not upon my offering's acceptance, 
But make another of thine own before 
It is too late. 

CAIN. 

I will build no more altars, 



Nor suffer any. 



ABEL (rising). 
Cain ! what meanest thou ? 



To cast down yon vile flatt'rer of the clouds, 
The smoky harbinger of thy dull prayers — 
Thine altar, with its blood of lambs and kids, 
fVhich fed on milk, to be destroy'd in blood. 

ABEL 'opposing him). 
Thou shalt not: — add not impious works to impious 
Words ! let that altar stand — 't is hallow'd now 
By the immortal pleasure of Jehovah, 
In his acceptance of the victims. 

CAIN. 

Hi* ! 
Hi* pleasure ! what was his high pleasure in 
The fumes of scorching flesh and smoking blood, 
To the pain of the bleating mothers, which 
Still yearn for their dead offspring ? or the pangs 
Of the sad ignorant victims underneath 
Thy pious knife ? Give way ! this bloody record 
Shall not stand in the sun, to shame creation ! 

ABEL. 

Brother, give back ! thou shalt not touch my altar 
With violence : if that thou wilt adopt it, 
To try another sacrifice, 'tis thine. 

CAIN. 

Another sacrifice ! Give way, or else 
That sacrifice may be 

ABEL. 

What meanest thou ? 

CAIN. 

Give- 
Give way ! thy God loves blood ! — then look to it: — 
Give way, ere he hath more ! 
2L 



ABEL. 

In his great name, 
I stand between thee and the shrine wluch halb 
Had his acceptance. 

CAIN. 

If thou lov'st thyself, 
Stand back till I have strew'd this turf along 

Its native soil : — else 

abel (opposing him). 

I love God far more 
Than life. 

cain (striking him with a brand, on the temples, whirA 
he snatches from the altar). 
Then take thy life unto thy God, 
Since he loves fives. 

abel (fail*). 

What hast tho.i done, my brother ? 

CAIN. 

Brother! 

ABEL. 

Oh, God ! receive thy servant, and 
Forgive his slayer, for he knew not what 
He did. — Cam, give me — give me thy hand ; and teh 

Poor Zillah 

CAIN (after a moment'' s stupefaction). 

My hand ! 't is all red, and with — 
What? 

[A long pause. — Looking slowly round. 
Where am I ? alone ! Where 's Abel ? where 
Cain? Can it be that I am he ? My brother, 
Awake ! — why best thou so on the green earth ? 
'T is not the hour of slumber : — why so pale ? 

What hast thou ? thou wert full of life this morn : 

Abel ! I pray thee, mock me not ! I smote 

Too fiercely, but not fatally. Ah, why 

Wouldst thou oppose me ? This is mockery ; 

And only done to daunt me: — 'twas a blow — 

And but a blow. Stir — stir — nay, only stir! 

Why, so — that 's well! — thou breath'st! breathe upoe 

me! 
Oh, God! Oh, God! 

ABEL (very faintly). 

W hat 's he who speaks of God ? 

CAIN. 

Thy murderer. 

ABEL. 

Then may God forgive him ! Cain, 
Comfort poor Zillah: — she has but one brother 
Now. [Abel die*. 

CAIN. 

And I none ! Who makes me brotherless? 
His eyes are open ! then he is not dead ! 
Death is like sleep ; and sleep shuts down our lids. 
His lips, too, are apart; why then he breathes ! 
And yet I feel it not. — His heart ! — his hear - ■ — 

Let me see, doth it beat ? — methinks No : — no '. 

This is a vision, else I am become 
The native of another and worse world. 
The earth swims round me : — what is this ? — 't is wet , 
[Puts his hand to hi* brow, and then looks nt U 
And yet there arc no dews! 'Tis blood — my blood-- 
My brother's and my own ; and shed by me ! 
Then what have I further to do with life, 
Since I have taken life from my own flesh ? 
But he cannot be dead ! — Is silence death ? 
No ; he will wake : then let me watch by him 



382 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Life cannot be so slight, as to be quench'd 
Thus quickly ! — he hath spoken to me since— 
What shall I sr.v to him?— My brother !— No ; 
He will not answer to that name ; for brethren 
Smite not each other. Yet — yet — speak to me. 
Oh! for a word more of that gentle voice, 
That I may bear to hear my own again ! 

Enter Zillah. 

ZILLAH. 

I heard a heavy sound : what can it be ? 

'Tis Cain ; and watching by my husband. What 

Dost vhou there, brother? Doth he sleep? Oh ! heaven ! 

What means this paleness, and yon stream ? — No ! no ! 

It is not blood ; for who would shed his blood? 

Abel ! what 's this ! — who hath done this ? He moves 

not ; 
He breathes not : and his hands drop down from mine 
With stony lifelessnoss ! Ah! cruel Cain! 
Why cam'st thou not in time to save him from 
This violence ? Whatever hath assail'd him, 
Thou wert the stronger, and should'st have stepp'd in 
Between him and aggression ! Father ! — Eve ! — 
Adah ! — come hither ! Death is in the world ! 

[Exit Zillah calling on her parents, etc. 
cain (solus). 
And who hath brought him there ? — I — who abhor 
The name of death so deeply, that the thought 
Empoison'd all my life, before I knew 
His aspect — I have led him here, and given 
My brother to his cold and still embrace, 
As if he would not have asserted his 
Inexorable claim without my aid. 
I am awake at last — a dreary dream 
Had madden'd me : — but he shall ne'er awake ! 

Enter Adam, Eve, Adah, and Zillah. 

ADAM. 

A voice of woe from Zillah brings me here. — 
What do I see ?— 'T is true !— My son ! 
Woman, behold the serpent's work, and thine ! 

[To Eve. 

EVE. 

Oh ! speak not of it now : the serpent's fangs 
Are in my heart. My best beloved, Abel ! 
Jehovah ! this is punishment beyond 
A mother's sin, to take him from me ! 

ADAM. 

Who, 
Or what hath done this deed ? — speak, Cain, since thou 
Wert present : was it some more hostile angel, 
Who walks not with Jehovah ? or some wild 
Brute of the forest ? 

EVE. 

Ah! a livid light 
Breaks through, as trom a thunder-cloud ! yon brand, 
Massy and bloody ! snatch'd from off the altar, 
And black with smoke, and red with 

ADAM. 

Speak, my son ! 
Sjieak, and assure us, wretcned as we are, 
That we are not more miserable still. 

ADAH. 

fipeak. Cain ' and say it was not thou ! 

EVE. 

It was. 



I see it now — he hangs his guilty head, 
And covers his ferocious eye with hands 
Incarnadine. 

ADAH. 

Mother, thou dost him wrong- 
Cain ! clear thee from this horrible accusal, 
Which grief wrings from our parent. 

EVE. 

Hear, Jehovah 
May the eternal serpent's curse be on him ! 
For he was fitter for his seed than ours. 
May all his days be desolate ! May 

ADAH. 

Hold! 
Curse him not, mother, for he is thy son — 
Curse him not, mother, for he is my brother, 
And my betroth' d. 

EVE. 

He hath left thee no brother — 
Zillah no husband — me no son ! — for this 
I curse him from my sight for evermore ! 
All bonds I break between us, as he broke 

That of his nature, in yon Oh death ! death ! 

Why didst thou not take me, who first incurr'd thee 7 
Why dost thou not so now ? 

ADAM. 

Eve ! let not this, 
Thy natural grief, lead to impiety ! 
A heavy doom was long forespoken to us ; 
And now that it begins, let it be borne 
In such sort as may show our God, that we 
Are faithful servants to his holy will. 

eve (pointing to Cain). 
His will! the will of yon incarnate spirit 
Of death, whom I have brought upon the earth 
To strew it with the dead. May all the curses 
Of life be on him ! and his agonies 
Drive him forth o'er the wilderness, like us, 
From Eden, till his children do by him 
As he did by his brother ! May the swords 
And wings of fiery cherubim pursue him 
By day and night — snakes spring up in his path- 
Earth's fruits be ashes in his mouth — the leaves 
On which he lays his head to sleep be strew'd 
With scorpions ! May his dreams be of his victim ! 
His waking a continual dread of death ! 
May the clear rivers turn to blood, as he 
Stoops down to stain them with his raging lip ! 
May every clement shun or change to him ! 
May he live in the pangs which others die with ! 
And death itself wax something worse than death 
To him who first acquainted him with man ! 
Hence, fratricide ! henceforth that word is Cain, 
Through all the coming myriads of mankind, 
Who shall abhor thee, though thou wert their sire ■ 
May the grass wither from thy feet ! the woods 
Deny thee shelter ! earth a home ! the dust 
A grave ! the sun his light ! and heaven her God ' 

[ExitEvt.. 

ADAM. 

Cain ! get thee forth ; we dwell no more together. 
Depart ! and leave the dead to me — I am 
Henceforth alone — we never must meet more. 

ADAH. 

Oh, part not with him thus, my father : do not 
I Add thy deep curse to Eve's upon his head ' 



CAIN. 



383 



ADAM. 

curse him not : his spirit be his curse. 
_omc, Zillah ! 

ZILLAH. 

I must watch my husband's corse. 

ADAM. 

We will return again, when he is gone 
Who hath provided for us this dread office. 
Come, Zillah ! 

ZILLAH. 

Yet one kiss on yon pale clay, 
And those lips onne so warm — my heart ! my heart ! 
[Exeunt Adam arvi Zillah, weeping. 

ADAH. 

Cain ! thou hast heard, we must go forth. I am ready ; 

So shall our children he. I will bear Enoch, 

And you his sister. Ere the sun declines 

Lot us depart, nor walk the wilderness 

I'r.dcr the cloud of night. — Nay, speak to me, 

To me — thine own. 

CAIN. 

Leave me ! 

ADAH. 

Why, all have left thee. 

, CAIN. 

And wherefore lingcrest thou ? Dost thou not fear 
To dwell with one who hath done this ? 

ADAH. 

I fear 
Nothing except to leave thee, much as I 
Shrink from the deed which leaves thee brothcrless. 
I must not speak of litis — it is between thee 
And the great God. 

A Voice from within exclaims, 
Cain! Cain! 

ADAH. 

Hear 1 st thou that voice ? 
The Voice within. 
Cain! Cain! 

ADAH. 

It soundeth like an angel's tone. 
Enter the Angel of the Lord. 

ANGEL. 

Where is thy brother Abel? 

CAIN. 

Am I then 
My brother's keeper ? 

ANKEL. 

Cain ! what hast thou done? 
The voice of thy slain brother's blood cries out, 
Even from the ground, unto the Lord ! — Now art thou 
Cursed from the earth, which opened late her mouth 
To drink thy brother's blood from thy rash hand. 
Henceforth, when thou shalt till the ground, it shall not 
yield thee her strength ; a fugitive shalt thou 
Be from this day, and vagabond on earth ! 

ADAH. 

This punishment is more than he can bear. 
Behold, thou drivest him from the face of earth, 
And from the face of God shall he be hid. 
A fugitive and vagabond on earth, 
'T will come to pass, that whoso findeth him 
Shall slay him. 

CAIN. 

Would they could ! but who are they 



Shall slay me? where are these on the lone earth 
As yet unpeopled? 

ANGEL. 

Thou hast slain thy brother, 
And who shall warrant thee against thy son ? 

A DAH. 

Angel of light ! be merciful, nor say 

That this poor aching breast now nourishes 

A murderer in my boy, and of his father. 

ANGEL. 

Then he would but be what his father is. 

Did not the milk of Eve give nutriment 

To him thou now sce'st so besrncar'd with I lood ? 

The fratricide might well engender parricides. — 

But it shall not be so — the Lord thy God 

And mine commandcth me to set his seal 

On Cain, so that he may go forth in safty. 

Who slayoth Cain, a sevenfold vengeance shall 

Be taken on his head. Come hither ! 

CAIN. 

What 
Wouldst thou with me 7 

ANGEI. 

To mark upon thy brow 
Exemption from such deeds as thou hast done. 

CAIN. 

No, let me die ! 

ANGEL. 

It must not be. 
[The Angel sets the mark on Cain's brow, 

CAIN. 

It burns 
My brow, but nought to that which is within it. 
Is there more ? let me meet it as I may. 

angel. 
Stern hast thou been and stubborn from the womb, 
As the ground thou must henceforth till ; but ho 
Thou slew'st was gentle as the flocks he tended. 

CAIN. 

After the fall too soon was I begotten ; 

Ere yet my mother's mind subsided from 

The serpent, and my sire still mourn'd for Eden. 

That which I am, I am ; I did not seek 

For life, nor did I make myself; but could I 

With my own death redeem him from the duot — 

And why not so ? let him return to day, 

And I lie ghastly ! so shall be restored 

By God the life to him he loved ; and taken 

From me a being I ne'er loved to bear. 

ANGEL. 

Who shall heal murder ? what is done is done. 

Go forth ! fulfil thy days ! and be thy deeds 

Unlike the last ! [The Angel disappear t. 

ADAH. 

He 's gone, let us go forth ; 
I hear our little Enoch cry within 
Our bower. 

CAIN. 

Ah ! little knows he what he weeps !or ' 
And I who have shed blood cannot shed tears ' 
But the four livers ' would not cleanse my souL 
Think'st thou my boy will bear to look on me ? 

ADAH. 

If I thought that he would not, I would — 



1 Tho "four rivers" which flowed round Eden, and conn 
ouently the only waters with v hich Cain was acjuaintcd upas 
the earth. 



384 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAIN {interrupting her). 



No, 



No more of threats : we have had too many of them : 
Go to our children ; I will follow thee. 

ADAH. 

I will not leave thee lonely with the dead; 
Let us depart together. 

CAIN. 

Oh ! thou dead 
And everlasting witness ! whose unsinkiltg 
Blood darkens earth and heaven! what thou now art, 
I know not ! hut if thou see'st what / am, 
I think thou wilt forgive him, whom his God 
Can ne'er forgive, nor his own soul. — Farewell! 
I must not, dare not, touch what I have made thee. 
I, who sprung from the same womb with thee, drain'd 
The same breast, clasp'd thee often to my own, 
In fondness brotherly and boyish, I 
Can never meet thee more, nor even dare 
To do that for thee, which thou shouldst have done 
For me — compose thy limbs into their grave — 
The first grave yet dug for mortality. 
Hut who hath dug that grave? Oh, earth! Oh, earth ! 
For all the fruits thou hast render'd to me, I 
Give thee back this. — Now for the wilderness. 

[Adah stoops down and hisses the body of Abel. 



ADAH. 

A dreary, and an early doom, my brother, 
Has been thy lot! Of all who mourn for thee, 
I alone must not weep. My office is 
Henceforth to dry up tears, and not to shed them , 
But yet, of all who mourn, none mourn like me. 
Not only for thyself, but him who slew thee. 
Now, Cain ! I will divide thy burden with thee. 

CAIN. 

Eastward from Eden will we take our way ; 
'Tis the most desolate, and suits my steps. 

adaii. 
Lead ! thou shall be my guide, and may our God 
Be thine ! Now let us carry forth our children. 

CAIN. 

And he who lieth there was childless. 

1 have dried the fountain of a gentle race, 

Which might have graced his recent marriage couch, 

And might have temper'd this stern blood of mine, 

Uniting with our children Abel's offspring ! 

O Abel ! 

ADAH. 

Peace be with him ! 

CAIN. 

But with me! 

[Exeunt. 



Vffltvntv; or, die Kufierfteucc; 

A TRAGEDY. 



TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS GOETHE, 

BY OXE OF HIS HUMBLEST ADMIRERS, 
THIS TRAGEDY IS DEDICATED. 



PREFACE. 



The following drama is taken entirely from the " Ger- 
man's Tale, Kruitzner" published many years ago in 
" I ax's Canterbury Tales ;" written (I believe) by two 
bisters, of whom one furnished only this story and 
another, both of which are considered superior to the 
remainder of the collection. I have adopted the char- 
acters, plan, and even the language, of many parts of 
this story. Some of the characters are modified or 
altered, a few of the names changed, and one character 
(Ida of Stralenheim) added by myself: but in the rest 
the original is chiefly followed. When I was young 
(about fourteen, I think) I first read this tale, which 
made a deep impression upon me; and may, indeed, be 
said to' contain the germ of much that I have since 
written. I am not sure that it ever was very popular ; or 
at any rate its popularity has since been eclipsed by that 
of oiher great writers in the same department. But I 
have generally found that those who had read it, agreed 
with me in their estimate of the singular power of mind 
and conception which it developes. I should also add 



conception, rather than execution ; for the story might, 
perhaps, have been more developed with greater advan- 
tage. Amongst those whose opinions agreed with mine 
upon this story, I could mention some very high names ; 
but it is not necessary, nor indeed of any use ; for every 
one must judge according to their own feelings. I 
merely refer the reader to the original story, that he may 
see to what extent I have borrowed from it ; and am not 
unwilling that he should find much greater pleasure in 
perusing it than the drama which is founded upon its 
contents. 

I had begun a drama upon this tale so far back as 
1815 (the first I ever attempted, except one at thirteen 
years old, called " Ulric, and Ihina," which I had sense 
enough to burn), and had nearly competed an act, 
when I was interrupted by circumstances This is some- 
where amongst my papers in England ; b ■* - ' 'as not 
been found, I have re-written the first, — - — -d the 
subsequent acts. 

The whole is neither intended, nor in any shape 
adapted, for the stage. 

February, 1822. 



WERNER. 



335 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



MEN. 

Werner. Hknrick. 

Ulisic. Eric 

Strai.enheim. Arnheim. 

Idknstein. Meister. 

G'abor. Rodolph. 

Frit/.. Ludwig. 

WOMEN. 
josephine. 
Ida Strai.enheim. 



S«:cne — partly on the frontier of Silesia, and partly in 
Sicgendbrf Castle, near Prague. 

Time — the close of the thirty years' war. 



WERNER. 



ACT I. 

SCENE I. 

l^e Hull of a decayed Palare near a small Town on the 
nortliern Frontier of Silesia — the Night tempestuous. 
Werner and Josephine his vcife. 

JOSEPHINE. 

My love, be calmer ! 

WERNER. 

I am calm. 

JOSEPHINE. 

To me — 

Ves, but not to thyself: thy pace is hurried, 
And no one walks a chamber like to ours 
With steps like thine when his heart is at rest. 
Were it a garden, I should deem thee happy, 
And stepping with the bee from flower to flower; 
But lie re I 

WERNER. 

'T_is chill ; the tapestry lets through 
The wind to which it waves: my blood is frozen. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Ah, no! 

werner [smiling). 
Why ! wouldst thou have il so ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

I would 
Have it a healthful current. 

WERNER. 

Let it flow 
Until 't is spilt or check'd — how soon, I care not. 

JOSEPHINE. 

And am I nothing in thy heart ? 

WERNER. 

All— all. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Then canst thou wish for that which must break mine? 

werner (approaching her slowly). 
But for thee I had been — no matter what, 
But much of good and evil ; what I am, 
Thou knowest ; what I might or should have been, 
2 l 2 54 



Thou knowest not : but still I love thee, nor 
Shall aught divide us. 

[Webber walk* on abruptly, and then ap- 
proaches Joseph in B. 

The storm of the night, 
Perhaps, affects me : I 'in a thing <>f feelings, 
And have of late been sickly, as, alas! 
Thou Imow'st by sufferings more than mine, my lovo ' 
In watching me. 

JOSEPHINE. 

To sec tl-.ee well is much — 
To see thee happy 

WERNER. 

Where hast thou seen such? 
Let me be wretched with the rest! 

JOSEPHINE. 

But think 
How many in this hour of tempest shiver 
Beneath the biting wind and heavy rain, 
Whose every drop hows them down nearer earth, 
Which hath no chamber for them save beneath 
Her surface. 

WERNER. 

And that 's not the worst : who cares 
For chambers ? rest is all. The wretches whom 
Thou namest — ay, the wind howls round them, and 
The dull and dropping rain saps in their bones 
The creeping marrow. I have been a soldier, 
A hunter, and a traveller, and am 
A beggar, and should know the thing thou talk'st of. 

JOSEPHINE. 

And art thou not now shelter'd from them all / 

WERNER. 

Yes — and from these alone. 

JOSEPHINE. 

And that is sometl.irg. 

WERNER. 

True — to a peasant. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Should the nobly born 
Be thankless for that refuge which their habits 
Of early delicacy render more 
Needful than to the peasant, when the ebb 
Of fortune leaves them on the shoals of life ? 

WERNER. 

It is not that, thou know'st it is not : we 
Have borne all this, I '11 not say patiently, 
Except in thee — but we have borne it. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Well ! 

WERNER. 

Something beyond our outward sufferings (though 
These were enough to gnaw into our souls) 
Hath stung me oft, and, more than ever, now 
When, but for this untoward sickness, which 
Seized me upon this desolate frontier, and 
Hath wasted not alone my strength, but means, 
And leaves us, — no ! this is beyond me ! but 
For this I had been happy — thou been happy — 
The splendour of my rank sustain'd — my name — 
My father's name — been still upheld ; and, more 

Than those 

josEriMNE (nhniptly). 
My son — our son — our TXlnc, 
Been clasp'd again in these long-empty arms. 



And all a mother's hunger satisfied. 

Twelve years ! he was but eight then : beautiful 

He was, and beautiful he must be now. 

My Ulric ! my adored ! 

WERNER. 

I have been full oft 
The chase of fortune ; now she hath o'ertaken 
Mv spirit where it cannot turn at bay, — 
Sick, poor, and lonely. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Lonely ! my dear husband ? 

WERNER. 

Or worse — involving all I love, in this 

Far worse man solitude. Ahnc, I had died, 

And all been over in a nameless grave. 

JOSEPHINE. 

And I had not outlived thee ; but pray take 
Comfort! We have struggled long ; and they who strive 
With fortune win or weary her at last. 
So that they find the goal, or cease to feel 
Further. Take comfort, — we shall find our boy. 

WERNER. 

We were in sight of him, of every thing 

Which could bring compensation for past sorrow — 

And to be batHed thus ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

We are not baffled. 

WERNER. 

Are we not pennyless? 

JOSEPHINE. 

We ne'er were wealthy. 

WERNER. 

But I was born to wealth, and rank, and power ; 
Enjoy'd them, loved them, and, alas ! abused them, 
And forfeited them by my lather's wrath, 
In my o'er-fervent youth; but for the abuse 
Long sufferings have atoned. My father's death 
Loft the path open, yet not without snares. 
This cold and creeping kinsman, who so long 
Kept his eye on me, as the snake upon 
The fluttering bird, hath ere this time outstept mc, 
Become the master of my rights, and lord 
Of that which lifts him up to princes in 
Dominion and domain. 

JOSEPHINE 

Who knows ? our son 
May have return'd back to his grandsire, and 
Even now uphold thy rights for thee ! 

WERNER. 

'T is hopeless. 
Since his strange disappearance from my father's, 
Entailing, as it were, my sins upon 
Himself, no tidings have reveal'd his course. 
I parted with him to his grandsire, on 
The uromise that his anger would stop short 
Of the third generation ; but Heaven seems 
To claim her stern prerogative, and visit 
Upon my boy his father's faults and follies. 

JOSEPHINE. 

I must hope better still,— at least we have yet 
Baffled the long pursuit of Stralenheim. 

WERNER. 

We should have done, but for this fatal sickness, 
More fatal than a mortal malady, 
Because it takes not life, but life's sole solace: 
Even now I feel my spirit girt about 



By the snares of this avaricious fiend ; — 
How do I know he hath not track'd us here ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

He d u>5 not know thy person ; and his spies, 

Who so long watch'd thee, have been left at Hamburgh. 

Our unexpected journey, and this change 

Of name, leave all discovery far behind : 

None hold us here for aught save what we seem. 

WERNER. 

Save what we seem ! save what we are. — sick bege *rs 
Even to our very hopes. Ha ! ha ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Alas ! 
That bitter laugh \ 

WERNER. 

Who would read in this form 
The high soul of the son of a lon« line ? 
Who, m this garb, the heir of princely lands ? 
Him, in this sunken, sickly eye, the pride 
Of rank and ancestry ; in this worn cheek, 
And famine-hrollow'd brow, the lord of halls, 
Which daily feast a thousand vassals? 

JOSEPHINE. 

You 

Ponder'd not thus upon these worldly things, 

My Werner ! when you deign'd to choose for bride 

The foreign daughter of a wandering exile. 

WERNER. 

An exile's daughter with an outcast son 
Were a fit marriage ; but I still had hopes 
To lift thee to the state we both were born for. 
Your father's house was noble, though decay'd ; 
And worthy by its birth to match with ours. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Your father did not think so, though 't was noble ; 
But had my birth been all my claim to match 
With thee, I should have deem'd it what it is. 

WERNER. 

And what is that in thine eyes ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

All which it 
Has done in our behalf, — nothing. 

WERNER. 

How, — nothing T 

JOSEPHINE. » 

Or worse ; for it has been a canker in 

Thy heart from the beginning: but for this, 

We had not felt our poverty, but as 

Millions of myriads feel it, cheerfully ; 

But for these phantoms of thy feudal fathers, 

Thou might'st have earn'd thy bread as thousands earn it. 

Or, if that seem too humbie, tried by commerce, 

Or other civic means, to mend thy fortunes. 

werner (ironically). 
And been an Hanseatic burgher ? Excellent ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Whate'er thou might'st have been, to me thou art, 

What no state, high or low, can ever change, 

My heart's first choice ; — which chose thee, knowing 

neither 
Thy birth, thy hopes, thy pride; nought, save thy sorrows- 
While they last, let me comfort or divide them ; 
When they end, let mine end with them, or thee ! 

WERNER. 

My better angel ! such as I have ever found thee ; 
This rashness, or this weakness of my temper, 



WERNER. 



3S 7 



Ne'er raised a thought to injure thee or thine. 
Thou didst not mar my fortunes : my own nature 
In youth was such as to unmake an empire, 
Had such been my inheritance ; but now, 
Chasten'd, subdued, outworn, and taught to know 
Myself, — to lose this for our son and thee ! 
Trust mo, when, in my two-and-twentieth spring, 
My father barr'd me from my father's house, 
The last sole scion of a thousand sires 
(For I was then the last), it hurt me less 
Than to behold my boy and my boy's mother 
Excluded in their innocence from what 
My faults deserved exclusion ; although then 
My passions were all living serpents, and 
Twined like the gorgon's round me. 

[A knocking is heard. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Hark! 

WERNER. 

A knocking ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Who can it be at this lone hour ? we have 
Few visiters. 

WERNER. 

And poverty hath none, 
Save those who come to make it poorer stiU. 
Well, I am prepared. 

[Werner puts his haw! into his bosom, as if to 
search for some weapon. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Oh ! do not look so. I 
Will to the door ; it cannot be of import 
In this lone spot of wintry desolation — 
The very desert saves man from mankind. 

[She goes to the door, 

Enter Idenstein, 

IDENSTEIN. 

A fair good evening to my fairer hostess 

And worthy what 's your name, my friend ? 

WERNER. 

Are you 
Not afraid to demand it ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Not afraid ! 
Egad ! I am afraid. You look as if 
I ask'd for something better than your name, 
By the face you put on it. 

WERNER. 

Better, sir ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Better or worse, like matrimony, what 

Shall I say more ? You have been a guest this month 

Here in the prince's palace — (to be sure, 

His highness had resign'd it to the ghosts 

And rats these twelve years — but 't is still a palace) - 

I say you have been our lodger, and as yet 

We do not know your name. 

WERNER. 

My name is Wcrne» 

IDENSTEIN. 

A goodly name, a very worthy name, 
As e'er was gilt upon a trader's board ; 
I have a cousin in the lazaretto 
Of Hamburgh, who has got a wife who bore 
The same." He is an officer of trust, 



Surgeon's assistant (hoping to be surgeon), 
And has done miracles i' the way of business. 
Perhaps you are related to my relative ? 

WERNER. 

To yours ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

Oh, yes, we are, but distantly. 

\ Aside to Wernek. 
Cannot you humour the dull gossip, till 
We learn his purpose? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Well, I 'm glad of that ; 
I thought so all along ; such natural yearnings 
Play'd round my heart — blood is net water, cousin; 
And so let's have soma wine, and drink unto 
Our better acquaintance : relatives should be 
Friends. 

WERNER. 

You appear to have drunk enough already, 
And if you had not, I 've no wine to otfer, 
Else it were yours ; but this you know, or should know ' 
You see I am poor and sick, and will not see 
That 1 would be alone ; but to your business ! 
What brings you here ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Why, what should bring me here? 

WERNER. 

I know not, though I think that I could guess 
That which will send you hence. 

Josephine (aside). 

Patience, dear Werner ■ 

IDENSTEIN. 

You don't know what has happen'd, then? 

JOSEPHINE. 

How should we ' 

IDENSTEIN. 

The river has o'erflow'd. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Alas ! we have known 
That to our sorrow, for these five days, since 
It keeps us here. 

IDENSTEIN. 

But what you don't know is, 
That a great perscnage, who fain would cross 
Against the stream, and three postilions' wishes, 
Is drown'd below the ford, with five post-horses, 
A monkey, and a mastitf, and a valet. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Poor creatures ! are you sure ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Yes, of the monke» 
And the valet, and the cattle ; but as yet 
We know not if his excellency 's dead 
Or no ; your noblemen are hard to drown, 
As it is fit that men in office should be ; 
But, what is certain is, that he has swallow'd 
Enough of the Oder to have burst two peasant! ; 
And now a Saxon and Hungarian traveller, 
Who, at their proper peril, snatch'd him from 
The whirling river, have sent on to crave 
A lodging, or a grave, according as 
It ma/ turn out with the live or dead bod\ 

JOS.-PHIPE. 

And whe»e w^l yo» receive hun ? We, I ; pe. 
1 It we can be ot service — sav the word. 



388 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



11'KNSTEIN. 

Here ! no , but in the prince's own apartment, 
As fits a noble guest : 't is damp, no doubt, 
Not having been inhabited these twelve years ; 
Put then he comes from a much damper place, 
So scarcely will catch cold in 't, if he be 
Still liable to cold — and if not, why 
He '11 bo worse lodged to-morrow : ne'ertheless, 
I have order'd fire and all appliances 
To be got ready for the worst — that is, 
In case he should survive. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Poor gentleman ! 
I hope he will, with all my heart. 

WERNER. 

Intendant, 
Have you not learn'd his name 7 My Josephine, 

[Aside to his wife. 
Retire — I '11 sift this <bol. [Exit Josephine. 

IDENSTEIN. 

His name ? oh Lord ! 
Who knows if he hath now a name or no ; 
'T is time enough to ask it when he 's able 
To give an answer, or if not, to put 
His heir's upon his epitaph. Methought, 
Just now you chid me for demanding names? 

WERNER. 

True, true, I did so ; you say well and wisely. 
Enter Gaeor. 

GABOR. 

If I intrude, I crave 

IDENSTEIN. 

Oh ! no intrusion ! 
"ITiis is the palace ; this a stranger like 
yourself; I pray you make yourself at home: 
But where 's his excellency, and how fares he? 

GAEOR. 

Wttly and wearily, but out of peril ; 

He paused to change his garments in a cottage 

(Where I dofFd mine for these, and came on hither), 

And h as almost recover'd from his drenching. 

He will be here anon. 

IDENSTEIN. 

What ho, there! bustle! 
Without there, Herman, Weilburg, Peter, Conrad ! 

[Gives direction* to different servants who enter. 
A nobleman sleeps here to-night — see that 
All is in order in the damask chamber — 
Keep up the stove — I will myself to the cellar — 
And Madame Idenstcin (my consort, stranger) 
Shall furnish forth the bed-apparel ; for, 
To say the truth, they are marvellous scant of this 
Within the palace precincts, since his highness 
Left it some dozen years ago. And then 
His excellency will sup, doubtless ? 

GABOR. 

Faith ! 
I cannot tell ; but I should think the pillow 
Would please him better than the table, after 
His soaking in your river : but for fear 
Your viands should be thrown away, I mean 
To sup myself, and have a friend without 
Who will do honour to your good cheer with 
A. traveller's appetite. 



IDENSTEIN. 

But are you sure 
His excellency but his name, what is it? 

GABOR. 

I do not know. 

IDENSTEIN. 

And yet you saved his life. 

GABOR. 

I hclp'd my friend to do so. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Well, that 's strange, 
To save a man's life whom you do not know. 

GABOR. 

Not so ; for there are some I know so well, 
I scarce should give myself the trouble. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Pray 
Good friend, and who may you be ? 

GABOR. 

By my family, 
Hungarian. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Which is call'd ? 

GABOR. 

It matters little. 
IDENSTEIN (aside). 
I think that all the world are grown anonymous, 
Since no one cares to tell me what he 's call'd ! 
Pray, has his excellency a large suite ? 

GABOR. 

Sufficient. 

IDENSTEIN. 

How many ? 

GAEOR. 

I did not count them. 
We came up by mere accident, and just 
In time to drag him through his carriage window. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Weil, what would I give to save a great man ! 

No doubt you '11 have a swinging sum as recompense. 

GABOR. 

Perhaps. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Now, how much do you reckon on ? 

GABOR. 

I have not yet put up myself to sale : 

In the mean time, my best reward would be 

A glass of your Hochheimer, a green glas.5, 

Wreathed with rich grapes and Bacchanal devices, 

O'erflowing with the oldest of your vintage ; 

For which I promise you, in case you e'er 

Run hazard of being drown'd (although I own 

It seems, of all deaths, the least likely for you), 

I 'II pull you out for nothing. Quick, my friend, 

And think, for every bumper I shall qiuilF, 

A wave the less may roll above your head. 

iDENr.TEiN [aside). 
I don't much like this fellow — close and dry 
He seems, two things which suit me not ; however, 
Wine he shall have; if that unlocks him not 
I shall not sleep to-night for curiosity. 

[Exit IdenstEin. 
gabor (to Werner.) 
This master of the ceremonies is 
The intendant of the palace, I presume. 
'Tis a fine building, but decay'd. 



WERNER. 309 


WERNER. 


WERNER. 


The apartment 


I was. 


Design \1 for liim you rescued, will be found 


GABOR. 


In litter order for a sickly gtli t. 


You look one still. All soldiers are 


GABOR. 


Or should be comrades, even though enemies. 


I wonder then you occupied it not, 


Our swords when drawn must cross, our engines aim 


For you seem delicate in health. 


(While levell'd) at eaoh other's hearts ; but when 


WERNER (OttlcAfy). 


A truce, a peace, or what you will, retni's 


Sir! 


The steel into its scabbard, and lets steep 


CABOS. 


The spark which lights the matchlock, we are brethren. 


Pray 


You are poor and sickly — I am not rich, but healthy, 


Excuse me : have I said aught to offend you ? 


I want for nothing which I cannot want ; 


WERNER. 


You seem devoid of this — wilt share it ? 


Nothing : but we arc strangers to each other. 


[Gabor pulls out his purse. 


CAI1IIR. 


WERNER. 


And that 's the reason I would have us less so ! 


Who 


I thought our bustling guest without had said 


Told you I was a beggr.r ? 


You were a chance and passing guest, the counterpart 


GABOR. 


Of me and my companions. 


You yourself, 


WERNER. 


In saying you were a soldier during peace time. 


Very true. 


Werner (looking at him with suspicion). 


GAEOR. 


You know me not ? 


Then, as we never met before, and never, 


CAEOR. 


II may be, may again encounter, why, 


I know no man, not even 


I thought to cheer up this old dungeon here 


Myself: how should I then know one I ne'er 


(At least to me) by asking you to share 


Beheld, till half an hour since? 


The fare of my companions and myself. 


WERNER. 


WERNER. 


Sir, I thank you. 


Pray, pardon me ; my health 


Your offer 's noble, were it to a friend, 


GABOR. 


And not unkind as to an unknown stranger, 


Even as you please. 


Though scarcely prudent; but no less I thank you. 


t have been a soldier, and perhaps am blunt 


I am a beggar in all save his trade, 


In bearing. 


And when I beg of any one, it shall be 


WERNER. 


Of him who was the first to ofTer what 


I have also served, and can 


Few can obtain by asking. Pardon me. 


Requite a soldier's greeting. 


[Exit Wernep. 


GABOR. 


gabor (solus). 


In what service? 
The Imperial ? 


A goodly fellow, by his looks, though worn, 
As most good fellows are, by pain or pleasure, 


werner (qiickly, and then interrupting himself). 


Which tear life out of us before our time : 


I commanded — no — I mean 


I scarce know which most quickly ; but he seems 


I served ; but it is many years ago, 


To have seen better days, as who has not 


When first Bohimia raised her banner 'gainst 


Who has seen yesterday? — But here approaches 


The Austrian. 


Our sage intendant, with the wine ; however, 


GABOR. 


For the cup's sake, I 'U bear the cup-bearer. 


Well, that's over, now, and peace 




Has turn'd .*»/.< i thousand gallant hearts adrift 


Enter Idenstein. 


To live a." 'hey ^est may : and, to say truth, 


'T is here ! the supernaculum ! twenty years 


Some take the chortest. 


Of age, if 't is a day. 


WERNER. 


GABOR. 


What is that? 


Which epoch makes 


GABOR. 


Young women and old wine, and 't is great p ; !y 


Whatc'er 


Of two such excellent things, increase of years, 


They lay their hands on. All Silesia and 


Which still improves the one, should spoil the oilier. 


Lusatia's woo*M are tenanted by bands 


Fill full — Here 's to our hostess — your fair \\ ill;. 


Of the late troops, who levy on the country 


[Takes the gias» 


Their maintenance : the Chatclains must keep 


IDENSTEIN. 


Their castle walls — beyond them 't is but doubtful 


Fair ! — Well, I trust your taste in wine is equal 


Travel for your rich count or full-blown baron. 


To that you show for beauty ; but I pledge you 


My comfort is that, wander where I may, 


Nevertheless. 


I \e little left to lose now. 


GABOR. 


WERNER. 


Is not the lovely woman 


And I — nothing. 


I met in the adjacent hall, who, with 


j GABOR. 


An air, and port, and eye, which would have bettp.> 


That's harder still. You say you were a soldier. 


Beseem'd this palace in its brightest days 



390 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



(Though in a garb adapted to its present 
Abandonment), rctum'd my salutation — 
Is not the same your spouse? 

IDENSTEIN. 

I would she were ! 
But you're mistaken — that's the stranger's wife. 

GABOR. 

And by her aspect she might be a prince's : 
Though time hath touch'd her too, she still retains 
Much beauty, and more majesty. 

IDENSTEIN. 

And that 
Is more than I can say for Madame Idenstein, 
At least in beauty : as for majesty, 
She has some of its properties which might 
Be spared — but never mind! 

GABOR. 

I don't. But who 
May be this stranger. He too hath a bearing 
Above his outward fortunes. 

IDENSTEIN. 

There I differ. 
He 's poor as Job, and not so patient ; but 
Who he may be, or what, or aught of him, 
Except his name (and that I only learn'd 
To-night), I know not. 

GABOR. 

But how came he here ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

In a most miserable old caleche, 

About a month since, and immediately 

Fell sick, almost to death. He should have died. 

GABOR. 

Tender and true! — but why? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Why, what is life 
Without a living ? He has not a stiver. 

GABOR. 

In that case, I much wonder that a person 
Of your apparent prudence should admit 
Guests so forlorn into this noble mansion. 

IDENSTEIN. 

That 's true ; but pity, as you know, does make 
One's heart commit these follies ; and besides, 
They had some valuables left at that time, 
Which paid their way up to the present hour, 
And so I thought they might as well be lodged 
Here as at the small tavern, and I gave them 
The run of some of the oldest palace rooms. 
They served to air them, at the least as long 
A*> they could pay for fire-wood. 

GABOR. 

Poor souls ! 

IDENSTEIN. 

Exceeding poor. 

GABOR. 

And yet unused to poverty, 
If 1 mistake not. Whither were they going? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Oh ' Heaven knows where, unless to heaven itself. 
Some days ago that look'd the likeliest journey 
Foi Werner. 

GABOR. 

Werner ! I have heard the name, 
But it may be a feign'd one. 



IDENSTEIN. 

Like enough ! 
But hark ! a noise of wheels and voices, and 
A blaze of torches from without. As sure 
As destiny, his excellency's come. 
I must be at my post : will you not join me, 
To help him from his carriage, and present 
Your humble duty at the door ? 

GABOR. 

I dragg'd him 
From out that carriage when he would have given 
His barony or county to repel 
The rushing river from his gurgling throat. 
He has valets now enough: they stood aloof then, 
Shaking their dripping cars upon the shore, 
All roaring, "Help!" but offering none ; and as 
For ditty (as you call it) I did mine then, 
Now do yours. Hence, and bow and cringe him hero' 

IDENSTEIN. 

/ cringe! — but I shall lose the opportunity — 
Plague take it ! he '11 be here, and I not there ! 

[Exit Idenstein, hastily. 

Re-enter Werner, 
werner {to himself). 
I heard a noise of wheels and voices. How 
All sounds now jar me ! 

(Perceiving Gabor). Still here! Is he not 
A spy of my pursuer's ? His frank offer, 
So suddenly, and to a stranger, wore 
The aspect of a secret enemy ; 
For friends are slow at such. 

GABOR. 

You seem rapt, 
And yet the time is not akin to thought. 
These old walls will be noisy soon. The baron, 
Or count (or whatsoe'er this half-drown'd noble 
May be), for whom this desolate village, and 
Its lone inhabitants, show more respect 
Than did the elements, is come. 

IDENSTEIN (without). 

This way— 
This way, your excellence : — have a care, 
The staircase is a little gloom}', and 
Somewhat decay'd ; but if we had expected 
So high a guest — pray take my arm, my lord! 

Enter Stralenheim, Idenstein, and Attendants, 
partly his ovm, and partly retainers of the domain of 
which Idenstein is Intendant. 

STRALENHEIM. 

I "J rest me here a moment. 

idenstein (to the servants). 
Oh ! a chair ! 
Instantly, knaves ! [Stralenheim sits down. 

werner (aside). 
'T is he ! 

STRALENHEIM. 

I 'm better now. 
Who are these strangers ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Please you, my good lord, 
One says he is no stranger. 

WERNER (aloud and hastily). 

Who says that? 
[ They look at him with surprise. 



WERNER. 



391 



IDENSTEIN. 

Why, no one spoke of you, or to you ! — but 

Here 's one his excellency may be pleased 

To recognise. [Pointing to Gabor, 

GABOR. 

I seek not to disturb 
His noble memory. 

STRALENHEIM. 

I apprehend 
This is one of the strangers to whose aid 
I owe my rescue. Is not that the other ? 

[Pointing to Werner, 
My state, when I was succour'd, must excuse 
My uncertainty to whom I owe so much. 

IDENSTEIN. 

He ! — no, my lord ! he rather wants for rescue 
Than can afford it. 'T is a poor sick man, 
Travel-tired, and lately risen from a bed 
From whence he never dream'd to rise. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Methought 
That there were two. 

GABOR. 

There were, in company ; 
But, in the service render'd to your lordship, 
I needs must say but one, and he is absent. 
The chief part of whatever aid was render'd 
Was his ■ it was his fortune to be first. 
My will was not inferior, but his strength 
And youth outstripp'd me ; therefore do not waste 
Your thanks on me. I was but a glad second 
Unto a nobler principal. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Where is he ? 

AN ATTENDANT. 

My lord, he tarried in the cottage, where 
Your excellency rested for an hour, 
And said he would be here to-morrow. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Till 

That hour arrives, I can but offer thanks, 
And then 

GABOR. 

I seek no more, and scarce deserve 
So much. My comrade may speak for himself. 

STRALENHEIM 

{Fixing his eyes upon Werner, then aside). 
It cannot be ! and yet he must be look'd to. 
'T is twenty years since I beheld him with 
These eyes ; and, though my agents still have kept 
Theirs on him, policy has held aloof 
My own from his, not to alarm him into 
Suspicion of my plan. Why did I leave 
At Hamburgh those who would have made assurance 
If this be he or no ? I thought, ere now, 
To have been lord of Siegendorf, and parted 
In haste, though even the elements appear 
To fight against me, and this sudden flood 
May keep mc prisoner here till 

[He pauses and looks at Werner ; then resumes. 
This man must 
Be watch'd. If it is he, he is so changed, 
His father, rising from his grave again, 
Would pass him by unknown. I must be wary : 
An error would spoil all. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Your lordship seems 



Pensive. Will it not please you to pass on ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

'T is past fatigue which gives my weigh'd-down spirit 
An outward show of thought. I will to rest. 

IDENSTEIN. 

The prince's chamber is prepared, with all 
The very furniture the prince used when 
Last here, in its full splendour. 

(Aside. ) Somewhat tattcr'd 
And devilish damp, but fine enough by torch-light ; 
And that's enough for your right noble blood 
Of twenty quarterings upon a hatchment ; 
So let their bearer sleep 'ncath something like one 
Now, as he one day will for ever lie. 

STRALENHEIM (rising and turning to Gaeor', 
Good night, good people! Sir, I trust to-morrow 
Will find me apter to requite your service. 
In the mean time, I crave your company 
A moment in my chamber. 

GABOR. 

I attend you. 

STRALENHEIM 

(After a few steps, pauses, and calls Werner). 
Friend ! 



Sir? 



WERNER. 



IDENSTEIN. 

Sir ! Lord ! — oh, Lord ! Why don't you sa» 
His lordship, or his excellency ? Pray, 
My lord, excuse this poor man's want of breeding: 
He hath not been accustom'd to admission 
To such a presence. 

STRALENHEIM (to IDENSTEIN). 

Peace, intendant ! 

IDENSTEIN. 

Oh! 

I am dumb. 

STRALENHEIM (to WERNER). 

Have you been long here ? 

WERNER. 

Long ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

I sought 
An answer, net an echo. 

WERNER. 

You may seek 
Both from the walls. I am not used to answer 
Those whom I know not. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Indeed ! ne'ertheless, 
You might reply with courtesy, to what 
Is ask'd in kindness. 

WERNER. 

When I know it such, 
I will requite — that is, reply — in unison. 

STRALENHEIM. 

The intendant said, you had been detain'd bv sickucss-- 
If I could aid you — journeying the same way ? 

WERNER (quickly). 
I am not journeying the same way. 

STRALENHEIM. 

How know ye 
That, ere you know my route ? 

WERNER. 

Because there is 
But one way that the rich and poor must tread 



392 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Together. You diverged from thai dread path 
Some hours a»o, and I some days ; henceforth 
Our roads must lie asunder, though they tend 
All to one home. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Your language is above 
Your station. 

Werner {bitterly). 
Is it I 

STRALENHEIM. 

Or, at least, beyond 
Your garb. 

WERNER. 

'T is well that it is not beneath it, 
As sometimes happens to the better clad. 
But, in a word, what would you with me? 
STRALENHEIM {startled). 

I! 

WERNER. 

Yes — you ! You know me not, and question me, 
And wonder that I answer not — not knowing 
My inquisitor. Explain what you would have, 
And then I '11 satisfy yourself, or me. 

STRALENHEIM. 

1 knew not that you had reasons for reserve. 

WERNER. 

Many have such : — Have you none ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

None which can 
Interest a mere stranger. 

WERNER. 

Then forgive 
The same unknown and humble stranger, if 
He wishes to remain so to the man 
Who can have nought in common with him. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Sir, 
I will not balk your humour, though untoward : 
I only meant you service — but, good night ! 
Intendant, show the way ! 

(to Gabok). Sir, you will with me ? 
[Exeunt Stralenheim and Attendants, Iden- 
stein and Gabok. 

WERNER {SOIUS). 

'T is he ! I'm taken in the toils. Before 

I quitted Hamburgh, Giulio, his late steward, 

Inform'd me, that he had obtain'd an order 

From Brandenburgh's elector, for the arrest 

Of Kruitzner (such the name I then bore), when 

I came upon the frontier ; the free city 

Alone preserved my freedom — till I left 

Its walls— fool that I was to quit them ! But 

1 deem'd this humble garb, and route obscure, 

Had baffled the slow hounds in their pursuit. 

What 's to be done ? He knows me not by person ; 

Nor could aught, save the eye of apprehension, 

Have recognised him, after twenty years, 

W e met so rarely and so coldly in 

Our youth. But those about him ! Now I can 

Divine the fran!«ess of the Hungarian, who, 

No doubt, is a mere tool and spy of Stralcnheim's 

1 o sound and to secure me. Without means ! 

Sick, poor — begirt too with the flooding rivers, 

Impassable even to the wealthy, with 

All the appliances which purchase modes 

\>f overpowering peril with men's lives,— 



How can I hope ? An hour ago, methought 
My state beyond despair ; and now, 't is such. 
The past seems paradise. Another day, 
And I 'm detected, — on the very eve 
Of honours, rights, and my inheritance, 
When a few drops of gold might save me still 
In favouring an escape. 

Enter Idenstein and Fritz in conversation. 

FRITZ. 

Immediately. 

IDENSTEIN. 

I tell you, 't is impossible. 

FRITZ. 

It must 

Be tried, however ; and if one express 
Fail, you must send on others, till the answer 
Arrives from Frankfort, from the commandant. 

IDENSTEIN. 

I will do what I can. 

FRITZ. 

And recollect 
To spare no trouble ; you will be repaid 
Tenfold. 

IDENSTEIN. 

The baron is retired to rest ? 

FRITZ. 

He hath thrown himself into an easy chair 
Beside the fire, and slumbers ; and has order'd 
He may not be disturb'd until eleven, 
When he will take himself to bed. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Before 
An hour is past, I '11 do my best to serve him. 

FRITZ. 

Remember! [Exit Fritz. 

IDENSTEIN. 

The devil take these great men ! they 
Think all things made for them. Now here must I 
Rouse up some half a dozen shivering vassals 
From their scant pallets, and, at peril of 
Their lives, despatch them o'er the river towai "k 
Frankfort. Metliinks the baron's own experience 
Some hours ago might teach him fellow-feeling: 
But no, "it must," and there's an end. How n->«v7 
Are you there, Mynheer Werner ? 

WERNER. 

You have left 
Your noble guest right quickly. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Yes — he 's dozing 
And seems to like that none should sleep besides. 
Here is a packet for the commandant 
Of Frankfort, at all risks and all expenses ; 
But I must not lose time : good night ! 

[Exit Idensteiit. 

WERNER. 

"To Frankfort!" 
So, so, it thickens ! Ay, " the commandant." 
This tallies well with all the prior steps 
Of this cool calculating fiend, who walks 
Between me and my father's house. No doubt 
He writes for a detachment to convey me 
Into some secret fortress. — Sooner than 

This 

[Werner looks around, and snatches up tt kni/s 
lying on a table in a recess. 



WERNER. 



39'1 



Now I am master of myself at least. 
Hark ! — footsteps ! How do I know that Stialcnheim 
Will wait for even the show of that authority 
Which is to overshadow usurpation ? 
That he suspects me's certain. I'm alone; 
He with a numerous train. I weak ; he strong 
In gold, in numbers, rank, authority. 
I nameless, or involving in my name 
Destruction, till I reach my own domain ; 
Ho full-blown with his titles, which impose 
Still further on these obscure petty burghers 
Than they could do elsewhere. Hark ! nearer still ! 
I '11 to the secret passage, which communicates 

With the No ! all is silent — 't was my fajicy ! — 

Still as the breathless interval between 

The flash and tnunder : — I must hush my soul 

Amidst its perils. Yet I will retire, 

To see if still be unexplored the passage 

I wot of: it will serve me as a den 

Of secrecy for some hours, at the worst. 

[Werner draws a panel, and exit, dosing it 
after him. 

Enter Gabor and Josephine. 

GABOR. 

Where is your husband ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

Here, I thought : I left him 
Not long since in his chamber. But these rooms 
Have many outlets, and he may be gone 
To accompany the intendant. 

GABOR. 

Baron Stralcnheim 
Put many questions to the intendant on 
The subject of your lord, and, to be plain, 
I have my doubts if he means well. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Alas! 
What can there be in common with the proud 
And wealthy baron and the unknown Werner? 

GABOR. 

That you know best. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Or, if it were so, how 
Come you to stir yourself in his behalf, 
Rather than that of him whose life you saved ? 

GABOR. 

I help'd to save him, as in peril ; but 
I did not pledge myself to serve him in 
Oppression. I know well these nobles, and 
Their thousand modes of trampling on the poor. 
I have proved them ; and my spirit boils up, when 
I find them practising against the weak : — 
This is my only motive. 

JOSEPHINE. 

It would be 
Not easy to persuade my consort of 
Your good intentions. 

GABOR. 

Is he so suspicious ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

He was not once ; but time and troubles have 
Made him what you beheld. 

GABOR. 

I 'm sorry for it. 
Suspicion is a heavy armour, and 
2 M 55 



With its own weight impedes more than protects. 
Good night. I trust to meet with him at day-break. 

[Exit Gabor. 
Re-enter Idenstein ami some peasants. Josephine 
retires up the Hall. 

FIRST PEASANT. 

But if I 'm drown'd ? 

IDENSTKIN. 

Why, you'll be weli paid for t. 
And have risk'd more than drowning fur as much, 
I doubt not. 

SECOND PEASANT. 

But our wives and families ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Cannot be worse ofT than they are, and may 
Be better. 

THIRD PEASANT. 

I have neither, and will venture. 

IDENSTEIN. 

That's right. A gallant carle, and fit to be 
\ soldier. I '11 promote you to the ranks 
In the prince's body-guard — if you succeed ; 
And you shall have besides in sparkling coin 
Two thalers. 

THIRD PEASANT. 

No more ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Out upon your avarice ! 
Can that low vice allov so much ambition ? 
I tell thee, fellow, that two thalers in 
Small change will subdivide into a treasure. 
Do not five hundred thousand heroes daily 
Risk lives and souls for the tithe of one thaler? 
When had you half the sum ? 

THIRD PEASANT. 

Never — but ne'er 
The less I must have three. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Have you forgot 
Whose vassal you were born, knave ? 

THIRD PEASANT. 

No— the prince's 
And not the stranger's. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Sirrah ! in the prince's 
Absence, I 'm sovereign ; and the baron is 
My intimate connexion ; — " Cousin Idenstein ! 
(Quoth he) you '11 order out a dozen villains." 
And so, you villains ! troop — march — march, I say 
And if a single dog's car of this packet 
Re sprinkled by the Oder — look to it ! 
For every page of paper, shall a hide 
Of yours be stretch'd as parchment on a drum, 
Like Ziska's skin, to beat alarm to all ,- 

Refractory vassals, who cannot effect 
Impossibilities — Away, ye earth-worms! 

[Exit, driving them on*. 
Josephine {coming forward). 
I fain would shun these scenes, too oft repeated, 
Of feudal tyranny o'er petty victims ; 
I cannot aid, and will not witness such. 
Even here, id this remote, unnamed, dull spot, 
The dimmest in the distiiet's map, exist 
The insolence of wealth in poverty 
O'er something poorer still — the pride of rank 



394 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



In servitude, o'er something still more servile ; 

And vice in misery, affecting still 

A latter'd splendour. What a state of being! 

In Tuscany, myoivn dear sunny land, 

Our nobles were but citizens and merchants, 

Like Cosmo. We had evils, but not such 

As these ; and our all-ripe and gashing valleys 

Made poverty more cheerful, where each herb 

Was in itself a meal, and every vine 

Rain'd, as it were, the beverage which makes glad 

The heart of man ; and the ne'er unfelt sun 

( But rarely clouded, and when clouded, leaving 

His warmth behind in memory of his beams) 

Makes the worn mantle, and the thin robe, less 

Oppressive than an emperor's jewell'd purple. 

But, here! the despots of the north appear 

To imitate the ice-wind of their clime, 

Searching the shivering vassal through his rags, 

To wring his soul — as the bleak elements 

His form. And 't is to be amongst these sovereigns 

My husband pants ! and such his pride of birth — 

That twenty years of usage, such as no 

Father, born in an humble state, cou'd nerve 

His soul to persecute a son withal, 

Hath changed no atom of his early nature ; 

But I, born nobly also, from my father's 

Kindness was taught a different lesson. Father! 

May thy long-tried and now rewarded spirit 

Look down on us, and our so long-desired 

Ulric ! I love my son, as thou didst me ! 

What's that? Thou, Werner ! can it be: and thus! 

Enter Werner hastily, with the knife in his hand, by 

the secret panel, which he closes hurriedly after him. 
werner {not al first recognising her). 

Discover'd ! then I '11 stab (recognising her). 

Ah! Josephine, 
(VTiy art thou not at rest ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

What rest? My God! 
What doth this mean ? 

werner (showing a rouleau). 

Here 's gold — gold, Josephine, 
Will rescue us from this detested dungeon. 

JOSEPHINE. 

And how obtain'd ? — that knife ! 

WERNER. 

'T is bloodless — yet. 
Iway — we must to our chamber. 

JOSEPHINE. 

But whence com'st thou ? 

WERNER. 

Ask not ! but let us think where we shall go — 
This — this will make us way. (showing the gold) — 
I 'II fit them now. 

JOSEPHINE. 

dare not think thee gudty of dishonour. 

WERNER. 

Dishonour ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

I have said it. 

WERNER. 

Let us hence : 
T is the last night, I trust, that we need pass here. 

JOSEPHINE. 

ind not the worst, I hope. 



WERNER. 

Hope ! I make sure. 
But let us to our chamber. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Yet one question ! 
What hast thou dome ? 

WERNER (fiercely). 

Left one thing un/icne, whicn 
Had made all well: let me not think of it. 
Away ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Alas, that I should doubt of thee ! 

[Exeunt. 



ACT II. 

SCENE I. 
A. Hall in the same Palace. 
Enter Ipenstein and oUicrs. 

IDENSTKIN. 

Fine doings • goodly doings ! honest doings ! 

A baron pillaged in a prince's palace ! 

Where, till this hour, such a sin ne'er was heard of. 

FHITZ. 

It har.llv could, unless the rats despoil'd 
The mice of a few shreds of tapestry. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Oh ! that I ere should live to see this day ! 
The honour of our city 's gone for evei . 

FRITZ. 

Well, but now to discover the delinquent ; 
The baron is determined not to lose 
This sum without a search. 

IDENSTEIN. 

And so am I. 

FRITZ. 

But whom do you suspect? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Suspect ! all people 
Without — within — above — below — Heaven help me • 

FRITZ. 

Is there no other entrance to the chamber ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

None whatever. 

FRITZ. 

Are you sure of that? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Certain. I have lived and served here since mybirt/i. 
And if there were such, must have heard of such, 
Or seen it. 

FRITZ. 

Then it must be some one who 
Had access to the antechamber. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Doubtless. 

FRITZ. 

The man call'd Werner 's poor ! 

IDENSTEIN. 

Poor as a mise , 
But lodged so far off, in the other wing, 
By which there 's no communication with 
The baron's chamber, that it can't be he : 
Besides, I bade him "good night" in the hah, 
Almost a mile off, and which only leads 
To his own apartment, about the same time 
When this burglarious, larcenous felony 
Appears to have been committed. 



WERNER. 



39.S 



The Etranger- 



There 's another- 



IDENSTEIN. 

The Hungarian 1 



To fish the haron from the Oder. 

IDENSTEIN. 



He who help'd 



Not 



Unlikely. But, hold — might it not have been 
One of the suite ? 

FRITZ. 

How? IVe, Sir! 

IDENSTEIN. 

No — not you t 
But some of the inferior knaves. You say 
The baron was asleep in the great chair — 
The velvet chair — in his embroider'd night-gown ; 
His toilet spread before him, and upon it 
A cabinet with letters, papers, and 
Several rouleaux of gold ; of which one only 
Has disappear'd: — the door unbolted, with 
No difficult access to any. 

FRITZ. 

Good sir, 
Be not so quick : the honour of the corps, 
Which forms the baron's household, 's unimpeach'd, 
From steward to scullion, save in the fair way 
Of peculation ; such as in accompts, 
Weights, measures, larder, cellar, buttery. 
Where all men take their prey ; as also in 
Postage of letters, gathering of rents, 
Purveying feasts, and understanding with 
The honest trades who furnish noble masters : 
But for your petty, picking, downright thievery, 
We scorn it as we do board-wages : then 
Had one of our folks done it, he would not 
Have been so poor a spirit as to hazard 
His neck for one rouleau, but have swoop'd all ; 
Also the cabinet, if portable. 

IDENSTEIN. 

There is some sense in that 

FRITZ. 

No, sir ; be sure 
'T was none of our corps ; but some petty, trivial 
Picker and stealer, w ithout art or genius. 
The only question is — Who else could have 
Access, save the Hungarian and yourself? 

IDENSTEIN. 

You don't mean me ? 

FRITZ. 

No, sir ; I honour more 
Four talents 

IDENSTEIN. 

And my principles, I hope. 

FRITZ. 

Of course. But to the point : What 's to be done ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Nothing — but there 's a good deal to be said. 
We '11 offer a reward ; move heaven and earth, 
And the police (though there 's none nearer than 
Frankfort); post notices in manuscript 
(For we've no printer); and set by my clerk 
To r-jad them (for few can, save he and I). 
We'll ;end out villains to strip beggars, and 



Search empty pockets ; also, to arrest 
All gypsies, and ill-clothed and sallow people. 
Prisoners we '11 have at least, if not the culprit ; 
And for the baron's gold — if 't is not found, 
At least he shall have the full satisfaction 
Of melting twice the substance in the raising 
The ghost of this rouleau. Here 's alchymy 
For your lord's losses ! 

FRITZ. 

He hath found a better. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Where? 

FRITZ. 

In a most immense inheritance. 
The late Count Siegendorf, his distant kinsman, 
Is dead near Prague, in his castle, and my lord 
Is on his way to take possession. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Was there 
No heir? 

FRITZ. 

Oh, yes ; but he has disappear'd 
Long from the world's eye, and perhaps the won* 
A prodigal son, beneath his father's ban 
For the last twenty years ; for whom his sire 
Refused to kill the fatted calf; and, therefo" 
If living, he must chew the husks still. bin. 
The baron would find means to silence him, 
Were he to re-appear : he 's politic, 
And has much influence with a certain court. 

IDENSTEIN. 

He 's fortunate. 

FRITZ. 

'T is true, there is a grandson, 
Whom the late count reclaim'd from his son's hands 
And educated as his heir ; but then 
His birth is doubtful. 

IDENSTEIN. 
How SO ? 
FRITZ. 

His sire made 
A left-hand love, imprudent sort of marriage, 
With an Italian exile's dark-eyed daughter : 
Noble, they say, too ; but no match for such 
A house as Siegendorf's. The grandsire ill 
Could brook the alliance ; and could ne'er be brougla 
To see the parents, though he took the son. 

IDENSTEIN. 

If he 's a lad of mettle, he may yet 

Dispute your claim, and weave a web that may 

Puzzle your baron to unravel. 

FRITZ. 

Why, 
For mettle, he has quite enough : they say, 
He forms a happy mixture of his sire 
And grandsirc's qualities, — impetuous as 
The former, and deep as the latter ; but 
The strangest is, that he too disappear'd 
Some months ago. 

IDENSTEIN. 

The devil lie did ' 

FRITZ. 

Whv, yt*, 
It must have been at his suggestion, at 
An hour so critical as was the eve 
Of the old man's death, whose heart was broken by \u 



396 BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Have rank by birth and soldiership, and friends 


Was there no cause assign' d ? 


Who shall be yours. 'Tis true, this pa-.ise of peace 


FRITZ. 


Favours such views at present scantily ; 


Plenty, no doubt, 


But 't will not last, men's spirits are too stirring; 


And none perhaps the true one. Some averr'd 


And, after thirty years of conflict, peace 


It was to seek his parents ; some, because 


Is but a petty war, as the times show us 


The old man held his spirit in so strictly 


In every forest, or a mere arm'd truce. 


(Hut that could scarce be, for he doted on him): 


War will reclaim his own ; and, in the mean tune, 


A third believed he wish'd to serve in war, 


You might obtain a post, which would insure 


But peace being made soon after his departure, 


A higher soon, and, by my influence, fail not 


He might have since return'd, were that the motive ; 


To rise. I speak of Brdndenburgh, wherein 


A fourth set charitably have surmised, 


I stand well with the elector; in Bohemia, 


As there was something strange, and mystic in him, 


Like you, I am a stranger, and we are now 


That in the wild exuberance of his nature, 


Upon its frontier. 


lie had join'd the black bands, who lay waste Lusatia, 


ULRIC 


The mountains of Bohemia and Silesia, 


You perceive my garb 


Since the last years of war had dwindled into 


Is Saxon, and of course my service due 


A kind of general condottiero system 


To my own sovereign. If I must decline 


Of bandit warfare ; each troop with its chief, 


Your offer, 't is with the same feeling which 


And all against mankind. 


Induced it. 


IDENSTEIN. 


STRALENHEIM. 


That cannot be. 


Why, this is mere usury ! 


A young heir, bred to wealth and luxury, 


I owe my life to you, and you refuse 


To risk his life and honours with disbanded 


The acquittance of the interest of the debt, 


Soldiers and desperadoes ! 


To heap more obligations on mc, till 


FRITZ. 


I bow beneath them. 


Heaven best knows ! 


ULRIC. / 


But there are human natures so allied 


You shall say so, when 


Unto the savage love of entcq>risc, 


I claim the payment. 


That they will seek for peril as a pleasure. 


STRALENHEIM. 


I 've heard that nothing can reclaim your Indian, 


Well, sir, since you will not— 


Or tame the tiger, though their infancy 


You are nobly born 7 


Were fed on milk and honey. After all, 


ULRIC. 


Vour Wallenstein, your Tilly and Gustavus, 


I 'vc heard my kinsmen say so 


Your Bannier, and your Torstenson and Weimar, 


STRALENHEIM. 


Were but the same thing upon a grand scale ; 


Your actions show it. Might I ask your nanu>? 


And now that they are gone, and peace proclaim'd, 


ULRIC 


They who would follow the same pastime must 


Ulric. 


Pursue it on their own account. Here comes 


STRALENHEIM. 


The baron, and the Saxon stranger, who 


Your house's ? 


Was his chief aid in yesterday's escape, 


ULRIC 


But did not leave the cottage by the Oder 


When I 'm worthy of it, 


Until this morning. 


I '11 answer you. 


Enter Stralenheim and Ulric. 


STRALENHEIM (aside). 




Most probably an Austrian, 
Whom these unsettled times forbid to boast 


STRALENHEIM. 

Since you have refused 


His lineage on these wild and dangerous frontiers, 
Where the name of his country is abhorr'd. 

[Aloud to Fritz and Idenstej*. 
So, sirs ! how have you sped in your researches 1 


All compensation, gentle stranger, save 
Inadequate thanks, you almost check even them, 
Making me feel the worthlessness of words, 
And blush at my own barren gratitude, 


They seem so niggardly, compared with what 
Your courteous courage did in my behalf. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Indifferent well, your excellency. 


ULRIC 


STRALENHEIM. 


I pray you press the theme no further. 


Then 


STRALENHEIM. 


I am to deem the plunderer is caught? 


But 


IDENSTEIN. 


Can I not serve you ? You arc young, and of 


Humph ! — not exactly. 


That mould which throws out heroes ; fair in favour ; 


STRALENHEIM. 


Brave. I know, by my living now to say so, 


Or at least suspected. 


Ami, doubtlessly, with such a form and heart, 


IDENSTEIN. 


Would look into the fiery eyes of war, 


Oh! for that matter, very much suspected. 


As ardently for glory as you dared 


STRALENHEIM. 


An obscure death to save an unknown stranger 


Who may he be? 


In an us perilous but opposite element. 


IDENSTEIN. 


V«1 »•« made for the service: I have served ; 


Why, don't yon know, my lord ' 



WERNER. 



39^ 



STRALENHEIM. 

How snould I ? I was fast asleep. 

IDENSTEIN. 

And so 
Was I, and that 's the cause I know no more 
Than does your excellency. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Dolt! 

IDENSTEIN. 

Why, if 

Your lordship, being robb'd, don't recognise 

The rogue ; how should I, not being robb'd, identify 

The thief among so many ? In the crowd, 

May it please your excellency, your thief looks 

Exactly like the rest, or rather better : 

'T is only at the bar and in the dungeon 

That wise men know your felon by his features ; 

But I '11 engage, that if seen there but once, 

Whether he be found criminal or no, 

His face shall be so. 

STRALENHEIM (to FrITZ). 

Prithee, Fritz, inform me 
What hath been done to trace the fellow ? 

FRITZ. 

Faith ! 
My lord, not much as yet, except conjecture. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Besides the loss (which, I must own, affects me 
Just now materially), I needs wouid find 
The villain out of public motives ; for 
So dexterous a spoiler, who could creep 
Through my attendants, and so many peopled 
And lighted chambers, on my rest, and snatch 
The gold before my scarce-closed eyes, would soon 
Leave bare your borough, Sir Intendant ! 

IDENSTEIN. 

True; 

If there were aught to carry off, my lord. 

ULRIC. 

What is all this ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

You join'd us but this morning, 
And have not heard that I was robb'd last night. 

ULRIC. 

Some rumour of it reach'd me as I pass'd 
The outer chambers of the palace, but 
I know no further. 

STRALENHEIM. 

It is a strange business : 
The intendant can inform you of the facts. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Most willingly. You see 

straleniieim {impatiently). 
Defer your tale, 
Till certain of the hearer's patience. 

IDENSTEIN. 

That 

Can only be approved by proofs. You see 

stralenheim (again interrupting him, and addrtss- 
ing Ulric). 
In short, I was asleep upon a chair, 
My cabinet before me, with some gold 
Upon it (more than I much like to lose, 
Though in part only) : some ingenious person 
Contrived to glide through all my own attendants 
Besides those of the place, and bore away 
2m 2 



A hundred golden ducats, which to find 

I would be fain, and there 's an end ; perhaps 

You (as I still am rather faint), vould add 

To yesterday's great obligation, this, 

Though slighter, yet not slight, i o aid these men 

(Who seem but lukewarm) in r covering it ? 

ULRIC. 

Most willingly, and without los < of time — 
(2'oIdenstein). Come hither, Mynheer! 

IDENSTEIN. 

But so much haste bodes 
Right little speed, and 

ULRIC 

Standing motionless, 
None ; so let 's march, we '11 talk as we go on. 

IDENSTEIN. 

But 

ULRIC. 

Show the spot, and then I '11 answer you. 

FRITZ. 

I will, sir, with his excellency's leave. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Do so, and take yon old ass with you. 

FRITZ. 

Hence ! 

ULRIC. 

Come on, old oracle, expound thy riddle ! 

[Exit with Idenstein and Fritz. 

STRALENHEIM (solus). 

A stalwart, active, soldier-looking stripling. 

Handsome as Hercules ere his first labour, 

And with a brow of thought beyond his years 

When in repose, till his eye kindle up 

In answering yours. I wish I could engage him ; 

I have need of some such spirits near me now, 

For this inheritance is worth a struggle. 

And though I am not the man to yield without one. 

Neither are they who now rise up between me 

And my desire. The boy, they say, 's a bold one : 

But he hath play'd the truant in some hour 

Of freakish folly, leaving fortune to 

Champion his claims: that's well. The father, whom 

For years I've track'd, as does the blood-hound, neve* 

In sight, but constantly in scent, had put me 

To fault, but here I have him, and that 's better. 

It must be he! All circumstance proclaims it • 

And careless voices, knowing not the cause 

Of my inquiries, still confirm it — Yes ! 

The man, his bearing, and the mystery 

Of his arrival, and the time ; the account, too, 

The intendant gave (for I have not beheld her) 

Of his wife's dignified but foreign aspect : 

Besides the antipathy with which we met, 

As snakes and lions shrink back from each other 

By secret instinct that both must be foes 

Deadly, without being natural prev to cither; 

All — all — confirm it to my mind : however, 

We'll grapple, ne'ertheless. In a few hours 

The order comes from Frankfort, if these water* 

Rise not the higher (and the weather favours 

Their quick abatement), and I 'U have him safe 

Within a dungeon, whese he may avouch 

His real estate and name ; and there 's no harm don*. 

Should he prove other than I deem. This robbery 

(Save for the actual loss) is lucky also : 

He 's poor, and that 's suspicious — he 's unknown. 



393 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And that 's defenceless, — true, we have no proofs 
Of guilt, but what hath he of innocence ? 
Were he a man indifferent to my prospects, 
In other bearings, I should rather lay 
The inculpation on the Hungarian, who 
Hath something which I like not ; and alone 
Of all around, excopt the intendant, and 
The prince's household and my own, had ingress 
Familiar to the chamber. 

Enter Gabor. 

Friend, how fare you ? 

GABOR. 

As those who fare well every where, when they 
Have supp'd and slumbor'd, no great matter how — 
And you, my lord ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

Better in rest than parse : 
Mine inn is like to cost me dear. 

GABOR. 

I heard 
Of your late loss : but 't is a trifle to 
One of your order. 

STRALENHEIM. 

You would hardly think so 
Were the loss yours. 

GABOR. 

I never had so much 
(At once> in mv whole life, and therefore am not 
Fit to decide. But I came here to seek you. 
Your couriers are turn'd back — I have outstript them, 
In my return. 

STRALENHEIM. 

You !— Why ? 

GABOR. 

I went at day-break, 
To watch for the abatement of the river, 
As being anxious to resume my journey. 
Your messengers were all check'd like myself; 
And, seeing the case hopeless, I await 
The current's pleasure. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Would the dogs were in it ! 
Why dia tnev not. at least, attempt the passage ? 
I order'a jus at all risks. 

GABOR. 

Could you order 
The Oder to divide, as Moses did 
The Red Sea (scarcely redder than the flood 
Of the swoln stream), and be obcy'd, perhaps 
They might have ventured. 

STRALENHEIM. 

I must see to it : 
The knaves ! the slaves ! — but they shall smart for this. 

[Exit STRALENHEIM. 
GABOR (solus). 

There goes my noble, feudal, self-will'd baron ! 
Epitome of what brave chivalry 
The preux chevaliers of the good old times 
Have left us. Yesterday he would have given 
His lauds (if he hath any), and, still dearer, 
ITis sixteen quarterings, for as much fresh air 
As would have filled a bladder, while he lay 
Gurgling and foaming half way through the window 
Of his o'erset anci water-logg'd conveyance ; 
Ami now he storms at half a dozen wretches 



Because they love their lives too ! Yet he 's righi 

'T is strange they should, when such as he may put 

them 

To hazard at his pleasure. Oh ! thou world ! 
Thou art indeed a melancholy jest ! [Exit G abor 



SCENE II. 

The Apartment of Werner, in the Palace. 

Enter Josephine and Ulric. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Stand back, and let me look on thee again ! 
My Ulric ! — my beloved !— can it be — 
After twelve years ? 

ulric. 
My dearest mother ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Yes! 
My dream is realized — how beautiful — 
How more than all I sigh'd for ! Heaven receive 
A mother's thanks ! — a mother's tears of joy ! 
This is indeed thy work ! — At such an hour too, 
He comes not only as a son but saviour. 

ULRIC. 

If such joy await me, it must double 

What I now feel, and lighten, from my heart, 

A part of the long debt of duty, not 

Of love (for that was ne'er withheld) — forgive me! 

This long delay was not my fault. 

JOSETH1NE. 

I know it. 
But cannot think of sorrow now, and doubt 
If I e'er felt it, 't is so dazzled from 
My memory, by this oblivious transport ! — 
My son ! 

Enter Werner. 

WERNER. 

What have we here ? — more strangers ? 

JOSEPHINE. 

Nol 

Look upon him ! What do you see ? 

WERNER. 

A stripling, 



For the first time 



Oh, God ! 



ulric (kneeling). 
For twelve long years, my father '. 

WERNER. 



JOSEPHINE. 

He faints ! 

WERNER. 

No — I am better now— 
Ulric! (Embraces him). 

ULRIC. 

My father, Siegendorf ! 

WERNER (starting). 

Hush ! boy — 
The walls may hear that name ! 

ULRIC. 

What then ? 

WERNER. 

Why, then— 
But we will talk of that anon. Remember, 
I must be known here but as Werner. Conic ! 
Come to my arms again ! Why, thou look'st all 



WERNER. 399 


I should have been, and was not. Josephine ! 


WERNER. 


Sure 't is no father's fondness dazzles me ; 


Ay, if at Prague : 


But had I seen that form amid ten thousand 


But here he is all-powerful ; and has spread 


Youth of ihc choicest, my heart would have chosen 


Snares for thy father, which, if hitherto 


This for my son ! 


He hath escaped them, is by fortune, not 


ULRIC. 


By favour 


And yet you knew me not! 


ULRIC 


WERNER. 


Doth he personally know you ? 


Alas ! I have had that upon my soul 


WtliXEll. 


Which makes me look on all men with an eyo 


No ; but he guesses shrewdly at my person, 


That only knows the evil at first glance. 


As he betray'd last night ; and I, perhaps, 


ULRF.C. 


But owe my temporary liberty 


My memory served me far more fondly : I 


To his uncertainty. 


Have not forgotten aught; and oft-limes in 


ULRIC. 


The proud and princely halls of — (I '11 not name them, 


I think you wrong him, 


As you say that 'tis perilous), hut i' the pomp 


(Excuse me for the phrase) ; but Stralenheim 


Of your sun's feudal mansion, I look'd back 


Is not what you prejudge him, or, if so, 


To the Rohemian mountains many a sunset, 


He owes me something both for past and present ; 


And wept to see another day go down 


I saved his life, he therefore trusts in me ; 


O'er thee and me, with those huge hills between us. 


He hath been plunder'd too, since he came hither ; 


They shall not part us more. 


Is sick ; a stranger ; and as such not now 


WERNER. 


Able to trace the villain who hath robb'd him ; 


I know not that. 


I have pledged myself to do so ; and the business 


Are you aware my father is no more ? 


Which brought me here was chieHy that: but I 


ULRIC. 


Have found, in searching for another's dross, 


Oh heavens ! I left him in a green old age, 


My own whole treasure — you, my parents ! 


And looking like the ouk, worn, but still steady 


werner (agitatedly). 


Amidst the elements, whilst younger trees 


Who 


Fell fast around him. 'T was scarce three months since. 


Taught you to mouth that name of "villain?" 


WERNER. 


ULRIC. 


Why did you leave him ? 


What 


JOSEPHINE {embracing Ulric). 


More noble name belongs to common thieves? 


C an you ask that question ? 


WERNER. 


Is he not here ? 


Who taught you thus to brand an unknown being 


WERNER. 


With an infernal stigma? 


True; he hath sought his parfnts, 


ULRIC. 


And found them ; but, oh ! how, and in what state? 


My own feelings 


ULRIC 


Taught me to name a ruffian from his deeds. 


All shall be better'd. What we have to do 


WERNER. 


Is to proceed, and to assert our rights, 


Who taught you, long-sought, and ill-found boy ! tfu* 


Or rather yours ; for I waive all, unless 


It would be safe for my own son to insult me ? 


Your father has disposed in such a sort 


ULRIC. 


Of his broad lauds as to make mine the foremost, 


I named a villain. What is there in common 


So that I must prefer my claim for form : 


With such a being and my father? 


But I trust better, and that all is yours. 


WERNER. 


WERNER. 


Every thing ! 


Have you not heard of Stralenheim ? 


That ruffian is thy father ! 


ULRIC. 


JOSEPHINE. 


I saved 


Oh, my son ! 


His life but yesterday : he 's here. 


Believe him not — and yet! (Her voice falters. ) 


WERNER. 


ulric (starts, looks earnestly at Werner, and Uxut 


You saved 


says slowly). 


The serpent who will sting us all ! 


And you avow it ? 


ULRIC 


WERNER. 


You speak 


Ulric! before you dare despise your father, 


Kiddles : what is this Stralenheim to us ? 


Learn to divine and judge his actions. Young, 


WERNER. 


Rash, new to life, and rear'd in luxury's lap, 


Every thing. One who claims our fathers' lands : 


Is it for you to measure passion's force 


Our distant kinsman, and our nearest foe. 


Or misery's temptation? Wait — (not long, 


ULRIC 


I cometh like the night, and quickly) — Wait! — 


I never heard his name till now. The count, 


Wait till, like me, your hopes are blighted — till 


Indeed, spoke sometimes of a kinsman, who, 


Sorrow and shame are handmaids of your cabin , 


If his own line should fail, might be remotely 


Famine and poverty your guests at table ; 


Involved in the succession : but his titles 


Despair your bcd-fcllow — then rise, but not 


Were never named before me — and what then? 


From sleep, and judge ! Should that day e'er arrrre— 


His riyht must yield to ours. 


i Should you sec then the serpent, who hath coil'd 



400 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



fluiisclf around all that is dear and noble 

Of you and yours, lie slumbering in your path, 

With but 'lis folds between '"ur steps and happiness, 

When he, «!»> IrVes hut to tear from you name, 

Lands, life itself, lies at your mercy, with 

Chaw e your conductor ; midnight ti>r your mantle; 

The bare knife in your hand, and earth asleep, 

Even to your deadliest foe ; and he as 'twere 

Inviting death, by looking like it, while 

His death alone can save you : — Thank your God ! 

If then, like me, content with petty plunder, 

You turn aside 1 did so. 

ULKIC. 

But 

WERNER (abruptly). 

Near me! 
I will not brook a human voice — scarce dare 
Listen to my own (if that be human still) — 
Hear me ! you do not know this man — I do. 
He 's mean, deceitful, avaricious. You 
Deem yourself safe, as young and brave ; but learn 
None arc secure from desperation, few 
From subtilty. My worst foe, Stralcnheim, 
Housed in a prince's palace, couch'd within 
A prince's chamber, lay below my knife! 
An instant — a mere motion — the least impulse — 
Had swept him and all fears of mine from earth. 
He was within my power — my knife was raised— 
Withdrawn — and I 'm in his : are you not so ? 
Who tells you that he knows you not ? Who says 
He hath not lured you here to end you, or 
To plunge you, with your parents, in a dungeon? 

[He pauses. 
ULRIC. 

Proceed — proceed ! 

WERNER. 

Me he hath ever known, 
And hunte 1 through each change of time — name — 

fortune — 
And why no< you ? Are you more versed in men ? 
He wound snares round me ; flung along my path 
Reptiles, whom, in my youth, I would have spurn'd 
Even from my presence : but, in spurning now, 
Fill only with fresh venom. Will you be 
More patient ? Ulric ! — Ulric ! — there are crimes 
Made venial by the occasion, and temptations 
Which nature cannot master or forbear. 

ulric (looks Jirst at him, and then at Josephine). 
My mother ! 

WERNER. 

Ay ! I thought so : you have now 
Only one parent. I have lost alike 
Father and son, and stand alone 

ULRIC. 

But stay ! 
[Werner rushes out of lite chamber. 
josephine (to Ulric). 
Follow him not, until this storm of passion 
Abates., Thmk'st thou that were it well for him 
1 had not follow'd ? 

ULRIC. 

I obey you, mother, 
Although reluctantly. My first act shall not 
Be one of disobedience. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Oh I he is good ! 



Condemn him not from his own mouth, but trust 
To me who have borne so much with him, and for him 
That this is but the surface of his soul, 
And that the depth is rich in better things. 

ULRIC 

These then are but my father's principles ! 
My mother thinks not with him? 

JOSEPHINE. 

Nor doth he 
Think as he speaks. Alas ! long years of grief 
Have made him sometimes thus. 

ULRIC 

Explain to me 
More clearly, then, these claims of Stralenheim, 
That, when I see the subject in its bearings, 
I may prepare to face him, or, at least, 
To extricate you from your present perils. 
I pledge myself to accomplish this — but would 
I had arrived a few hours sooner ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

Ay! 

Hadst thou but done so ! 

Enter Gabor and Idenstein, with Attendants. 
gaeor (to Ulric). 

I have sought you, comrade. 
So this is my reward ! 

ULRIC 

What do you mean ? 

GABOR. 

'S death ! have I lived to these years, and for tins ? 
(To Idlnstein). But for your age a^id folly, I would— 

IDENSTEIN. 

Helj 
Hands off! touch an intendant! 

GABOR. 

Do not think 
I '11 honour you so much as to save your throat 
From the Ravenstone,' by choking you myecif. 

IDENSTEIN. 

I thank you for the respite ; but there are 
Those who have greater need of it than me. 

ULRIC. 

Unriddle this vile wrangling, or 

GABOR. 

At once, then, 
The baron has been robb'd, and upon me 
This worthy personage has deign'd to fix 
His kind suspicions — me ! whom he ne'er saw 
Till yester evening. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Wouldst havt me suspect 
My own acquaintances ? You lit o to learn 
That I keep better company. 

GABOR. 

You shall 
Keep the best shortly, and the last for all men — 
The worms ! you hound of malice ! 

[Gabor seizes on him. 
ulric (interfering). 

Nay, no violence : 
He 's ol i, unarm'd — be temperate, Gabor ! 
gabor (letting go Idenstein). 

True • 



1 The Ravenstone. " Rabenstcin," is the stone gibbet oi 
Germany, and so culled from the ravens perching on it. 



1 - ■ 

WERNER. 40 J 


I am a fool to lose myself because 


I do not ask for hints, and surmises, 


Fools deem me knave: il is their homage. 


And circumstance, and proofs; 1 know enough 


ULRIC (to IdENSTEIN). 


01 what I hare done for yon, and what you owe me, 


IIOW 


To have at least waited your payment rather 


Fare you ? 


Than paid myself, had 1 been eager of 


IDENSTEIN. 


Your gold. I also know that were I even 


Help! 


The villain I am deeni'd, the service render'd 


ULRIC 


So recently would not permit you to 


I have help'd you. 


Pursue me to the death, except through shame, 


IDENSTEIN. 


Such as would leave your scutcheon but a blank. 


Kill him ! then 


Hut this is nothing; I demand of you 


I 'U say so. 


Justice upon your unjust servants, and 


GABOR. 


From your own lips a disavowal of 


I am calm — live on ! 


All sanction of their insolence: thus much 


IDENSTEIN. 


You owe to the unknown, who asks no more, 


That 's more 


And never thought to have ask'd so much. 


Than you shall do, if there be judge or judgment 


STRALENHEIM. 


In Germany. The baron shall decide ! 


This tone 


GABOR. 


May be of innocence. 


Does lie abet you in your accusation ? 


GABOR. 


IDENSTEIN. 


'S death ! who dare doubt it, 


Does he not ? 


Except such villains as ne'er had it ? 


GABOR. 


STRALENHEIM. 


Then next time let him go sink, 


You 


Ere I go hang for snatching him from drowning. 


Are hot, sir. 


But here he comes ! 


GAEOR. 




Must I turn an icicle 


Enter Siralenheim. 


Before the breath of menials, and heir master? 


GABOR (goes tip to him). 


STRALENHEIM. 


My noble lord, I 'm here! 


Ulric ! you know this man ; 1 found mm in 


STRALENHEIM. 


Your company. 


Well, sir ! 


GABOR. 


GABOR. 


We found you in the Oder : 


Have you aught with me ? 


Would we had left you there ! 


STRALENHEIM. 


STRALENHEIM. 


What should I 


I give you thanks, sL\ 


Have with you ? 


GABOR. 


GABOR. 


I 've earn'd them ; but might have earn'd more from 


You know best, if yesterday's 


others, 


Flood has not wash'd away your memory ; 


Perchance, if I had left you to your fate. 


But that 's a trifle. I stand here accused, 


STRALENHEIM. 


In phrases not equivocal, by yon 


Ulric ! you know tills man ? 


Intendanl, of the pillage of your person, 


GABOR. 


Or chamber — is the charge your own, or his ? 


No more than you do, 


STRALENHEIM. 


If he avouches not my honour. 


I accuse no man. 


ULRIC. 


GABOR. 


I 


Then you acquit me, baron ? 


Can avouch your courage, and, as far as my 


STRALENHEIM. 


Own brief connexion led me, honour. 


I know not whom to accuse or to acquit, 


STR.ALENHKIM. 


Or scarcely to suspect. 


Then 


GABOR. 


I 'm satisfied. 


But you at least 


gabor (ironically). 


Should know whom not to suspect. I am insulted — 


Right easily, methinks. 


Oppress'd here by these menials, and I look 


What is the spell in his asseveration 


To you for remedy — teach them their duty ! 


More than in mine ? 


To look for thieves at home were part of it, 


STRALENHEIM. 


If duly taught : but, in one word, if I 


I merely said that / 


Have an accuser, let it be a man 


Was satisfied — not that you were absolved. 


Worthy to be so of a man like me. 


GABOR. 


I am your equal. 


Again ! Am I accused or no 7 


STRALENHEIM. 


STRALENHEIM. 


You! 


Goto! 


GABOR. 


Yon wax too insolent : if circumstance 


Ay, sir ; and for 


And general suspicion be against you, 


Aught that you know, superior ; but proceed— 


Is the fault mine? Is 't not enough that I 


Sfi 





Decline all question of your guilt or innocence ? 

GABOR. 

My lord, my lord, this is mere cozenage ; 

A vile equivocation : you well know 

Your doubts are certainties to all around you — 

Your looks, a voice — your frowns, a sentence ; you 

Are practising your power on me — because 

You have it ; but beware, you know not whom 

You strive to tread on. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Threat'st thou ? 

GABOR. 

Not so much 
As you accuse. You hint the basest injury, 
And I retort it with an open warning. 

STRALENHEIM. 

As you have said, 'l is true I owe you something, 
For which you seem disposed to pay yourseif. 

GABOR. 

Not with your gold. 

STRALENHEIM. 

With bootless insolence. 
[To his Attendants and Idenstein. 
You need not further to molest this man, 
But let him go his way. Ulric, good morrow ! 
[Exit Stralenheim, Idenstein, and Attendants. 

gabor (following). 

I '11 after him, and 

ulric (stopping him). 
Not a step. 

GABOR. 

Who shall 
Oppose me ? 

ULRIC. 

Your own reason, with a moment's 
Thought. 

GABOR. 

Must I bear this ? 

ULRIC 

Pshaw ! we all must bear 
The arrogance of something higher than 
Ourselves — the highest cannot temper Satan, 
Nor the lowest his vicegerents upon earth. 
I 've seen you brave the elements, and bear 
Things which had made this silk-worm cast his skin — 
And shrink you from a few &harp sneers and words ? 

GABOR. 

Must I bear to be deem'd a thief? If 'twere 
A bandit of the woods, I could have borne it — 
There 's something daring in it — but to steal 
The moneys of a slumbering man ! — 

ULRIC. 

It seems, then, 
You are not guilty. 

GABOR. 

Do I hear aright ? 
You, too! 

TTLRIC 

I merely ask'd a simple question. 

GABOR. 

If t'ne judge ask'd me, I would answer " No " — 
T o you I answer thus. [He draws 

ulric (drawing). 

With aU my heart! 



JOSEPHINE. 

Without there ! Ho ! help ! help !— Oh ! God ! here 's 
murder ! [Exit Josephine, shrieking. 

Gabor and Ulric Jight. Gabor is disarmed just as 
Stralenheim, Josephine, Idenstein, etc. re- 
enter. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Oh ! glorious Heaven ! he 's safe ! 

STRALENHEIM (to JOSEPHINE). 

IVho's safe? 

JOSEPHINE. 

My— 
ULRIC (interrupting her with a ftern look, and turning 
afterwards to Stralenheim). 

Both ! 
Here 's no great harm done. 

STRALENHEIM. 

What hath caused all this 7 

ULRIC 

You, baron, I believe ; but as the effect 
Is harmless, let it not disturb you. — Gabor ! 
There is your sword ; and when you bare it next, 
Let it not be against your friends. 

[Ulric pronounces the last words slowly and 
emphatically in a low voice to GaBOR. 
gabor. 

I thank you 
Less for my life than for your counsel. 

STRALENHEIM. 

These 
Brawls must end here. 

gabor (taking his sword). 
They shall. You have wrong'd me, Ulric, 
More with your unkind thoughts than sword ; I would 
The last were in my bosom rather than 
The first in yours. I could have borne yon noble's 
Absurd insinuations — Ignorance 
And dull suspicion are a part of his 
Entail will last him longer than his lands. — 
But I may fit him yet: — you have vanquish'd me. 
I was the fool of passion to conceive 
That I could cope with you, whom I had seen 
Already proved by greater perils than 
Rest in this arm. We may meet by and by, 
However — but in friendship. [Exit Gabor 

STRALENHEIM. 

I will brook 
No more ! This outrage following up his insults, 
Perhaps his guilt, has cancell'd all the little 
I owed him heretofore for the so vaunted 
Aid which he added to your abler succour. 
Ulric, ycu are not hurt ? 

ULRIC 

Not even hy a scratcn. 

STRALENHEIM (to IDENSTEIN). 

Intcndant ! take your measures to secure 
Yon fellow : I revoke my former lenity. 
He shall be sent to Frankfort with an escort, 
The instant that the waters have abated 

IDENSTEIN. 

Secure him ! he hath got his sworu again — 
And seems to know the use on 't ; 't is his trade 
Belike : — I 'm a civilian. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Fool ! are not 
Yon score of vassals dogging at vour heels 



WERNER. 



403 



Enough to seize a dozen such ? Hence ! after him ! 

ui.nic. 
Baron, I do beseech you ! 

STRALENHEIM, 

I must be 
Obey'd No words ! 

IDENSTEIN. 

Well, if it must be so— 
March, vassals ! I 'm your leader — and will bring 
The rear up : a wise general never should 
Expose his precious life — on which all rests. 
I like that article of war. 

[Exit Idenstein anil Attendants. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Come hither, 
Ulric: — what does that woman here? Oh! now 
I recognise her, 't is the stranger's wife 
Whom they name " Werner." 

ULRIC. 

'T is his name. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Indeed ! 
Is not your husband visible, fair dame 7 

JOSEPHINE. 

Who seeks him ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

No one — for the present : but 
I fain would parley, Ulric, with yourself 
Alone. 

ULRIC. 

I will retire with you. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Not so. 
You are the latest stranger, and command 
All places here. 
(Aside to Ulric as she goes out). Oh ! Ulric, have a 

care — 
Remember what depends on a rash word ! 

ulric (to Josephine). 
Fear not ! — 

[Exit Josephine. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Ulric, I think that I may trust you ? 

You saved my life — and acts like these beget 

Unbounded confidence. 

ulric 

Say on. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Mysterious 
And long-engender'd circumstances (not 
To be now fully enter'd on) have made 
This man obnoxious — perhaps fatal to me. 

ULRIC 

Who? Gabor, the Hungarian? 

STRALENHEIM. 

No— this "Werner"— 
With the false name and habit. 

ULRIC 

How can this be 7 
He is the poorest of the poor — and yellow 
Sickness sits cavern'd in his hollow eye : 
The ma*> is helpless. 

STRALENHEIM. 

He is — 't is no matter — 
But > r he be the man I deem (and that 
He is so, all around us here — and much 
That is not here — confirm my apprehension), 



He must be made secure, ere twelve hours Rather. 

ULRIC. 

And what have I to do with this? 

STRALENHEIM. 

I have sent 
To Frankfort, to the governor, my friend — • 
(I have the authority to do 50 by 
An order of the house of Brandenburgh) 
For a fit cscoit — but this cursed flood 
Bars all access, and may do for some hours. 

ULRIC 

It is abating. 

STRALENHEIM. 

That is well. 

ULRIC 

But how 
Am I conccrn'd ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

As one who ilit! so much 
For nic, you cannot be indifferent to 
Thai which is of more import to me than 
The life yon rescued. — Ki?ep your eve on Mm ! 
The man avoids me, knows that I now know him. — 
Watch him ! — as you would watch the will boar when 
He makes against you in the hunter's gap — 
Like him he must be spear'd. 

ULRIC 

Why so 7 

STRALENHEIM. 



Between me and a brave inheritance. 
Oh ! could you sec it ! But you shall. 

ULRIC 



He stands 



I hope so. 



STRALENHEIM. 

It is the richest of the rich Bohemia, 
Unscathed by scorching war. It lies so near 
The strongest city, Prague, that fire and sword 
Have skimm'd it lightly : so that now, besides 
Its own exuberance, it bears double value 
Confronted with whole realms afar and near 
Made deserts. 

ULRIC 

You describe it faithfully. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Ay — could you see it, you would say so— but 
As I have said, you shall. 

ULRIC. 

I accept the omen. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Then claim a recompense from it and me, 
Such as Imlh may make worthy your acceptance 
And services to me and mine for ever. 

ULRIC 

And this sole, sick, and miserablo wretch- 
This wayworn stranger — stands between you and 
This paradise? — (As Aoam did between 
The devil and his.) — [Aside.] 

STRALENHEIM. 

He doth. 

ULRIC. 

Hath he no right 1 

STRALENHEIM. 

Right ! none. A disinherited prodigal, 

Who for these twenty years disgraced his lineage 

In all his acts — but chieflv by his Tiai "iage, 



404 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And living amidst commerce- fetching burghers, 
And dabbling merchants, in a mart of Jews. 

ULRIC. 

He has a wife, then 7 

STRALENHEIM. 

You M be sorry to 
Call surjf your mother. You have seen the woman 
He calls "liis wife. 

ULRIC. 

Is she not so ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

No more 
Than he 's your father : — an Italian girl, 
The daughter of a banishM man, who lives 
On love and poverty with this same Werner. 

ULRIC. 

They are childless, then ? 

STRALENHEIM. 

There is or was a bastard, 
Whom the old man — the grandsire (as old age 
Is ever doting) took to warm his bosom, 
As it went chilly downward to the grave : 
But the imp stands not in my path — he has fled, 
No one knows whither ; and if he had not, 
His claims alone were too contemptible 
To stand. Why do you smile ? 

ULRIC. 

At your vain fears : 
A poor man almost in his grasp — a child 
Of doubtful birth — can startle a grandee! 

STRALENHEIM. 

All 's to be fcar'd, where all is to be gain'd. 

ULRIC. 

True ; and aught done to save or to obtain it. 

STRALENHEIM. 

You have harp'd the very string next to my heart. 
I may depend upon you ? 

ULRIC. 

'T were too late 
To doubt it, 

STRALENHEIM. 

Let no foolish pity shake 
Your bosom (for the appearance of the man 
Is pitiful) — he is a wretch, as likely 
To have robb'd me as the fellow more suspected, 
Except that circumstance is less against him ; 
He being lodged far off", and in a chamber 
Without approach to mine ; and, to say truth, 
I think too well of blood allied to mine, 
To deem he would descend to such an act ; 
Besides, he was a soldier, and a brave one 
Once — though too rash. 

ULRIC. 

And they, my lord, we know 
By your experience, never plunder till 
They knock the brains ou,* first — which makes them 

heirs, 
Not thieve? The dead, who feel nought, can lose 

nothing, 
Nor e'er be robb'd : their spoils are a bequest — 
No more. 

STRALENHEIM. 

Go to ! you are a wag. But say 
I may be sure you Ml keep an eye on this man, 
And let me know his slightest movement towards 
Concealment or escape? 



ULRIC. 

Ycu may be sure 
You yourself could not watch him more than I 
Will be his sentinel. 

STRALENHEIM. 

By this you make me 
Yours, and for ever. 

ULRIC. 

Such is my intention. 

[Exeunt 



ACT III 

SCENE I. 

A Hall in the same Palace, from whence the secret 
Passage leads. 

Enter Werner and Gabor. 
gabor. 
Sir, I have told my tale ; if it so please you 
To give me refuge for a few hours, well — 
If not — I 'U try my fortune elsewhere. 

WERNER. 

How 

Can I, so wretched, give to misery 

A shelter? — wanting such myself as much 

As e'er the hunted deer a covert 

GABOR. 

Or, 

The wounded lion his cool cave. Methinks 
You rather look like one would turn at bay, 
And rip the hunter's entrails. 

WERNER. 

Ah! 

GABOR. 

I care not 
If it be so, being much disposed to do 
The same myself; but will you shelter me? 
I am oppress'd like you — and poor like you— 
Disgraced — 

Werner (abruptly). 
Who told you that I was disgraced ? 
gabor. 
No one ; nor did I say you were so : with 
Your poverty my likeness ended ; but 
I said / was so — and would add, with truth, 
As undeservedly as you. 

WERNER. 

Again ! 
As/? 

GABOR. 

Or any other honest man. 
What the devil would you have ? You don't believe m* 
Guilty of this base theft ? 

WERNER. 

No, no — I cannot. 
gabor. 
Why, that 's my heart of honour ! yon young gallant- 
Your miserly intendant, and dense noble — 
All — all suspected me ; and why ? because 
I am the worst-clothed and least-named amongst them 
Although, were Momus' lattice in our breasts, 
My soul might brook to open it more widely 
Than theirs ; but thus it is — you poor and helpless- 
Both still more than myself 



WERNER. 



401 



WERNER. 

How know you that? 

GABOK. 

fou 're right ; 1 asu for shelter at the hand 

Which I call helpless ; if you now deny it, 

I were well paid. But you, who seem to have proved 

The wholesome bitterness of life, know well, 

By sympathy, thai all the outspread go. J 

Of the New World, the Spaniard boasts about, 

Could never tempt the man who knows its worth, 

Weigh'd at its proper value in the balance, 

Save in such guise (and there I grant its power, 

Because 1 feel it) as may leave no nightmare 

Upon his heart o' nights. 

WERNKR. 

What do you mean? 

CABOP.. 

Just what I say; I thought my speech was plain: 
You are no thief— nor I — and, as true men, 
Should aid each other. 

WERNER. 

It is a damn'd world, sir. 

GABOR. 

So is the nearest of the two next, as 

The tiriests say (and no doubt they should know best), 

Therefore I'll stick by this — as being loth 

To suller martyrdom, at least with such 

An epitaph as larceny upon my tomb. 

It is but a night's lodging which I crave ; 

To-morrow I will try the waters, as 

The dove did, trusting that they have abated. 

WERNER. 

Abated ? is there hope of that ? 

GABOR. 

There was 
\t noontide. 

WERNER. 

Then we may be safe. 

GABOR. 

Are you 
/n peril ? 

WERNER. 

Poverty is ever so. 

GABOR. 

That I know by long practice. Will you not 
Promise to make mine less ! 

WERNER. 

Your poverty ? 

GABOR. 

No — you don't look a leech for that disorder ; 
I meant my peril only: you've a roof, 
And I have none ; I merely seek a covert. 

WERNER. 

Rightly ; for how should such a wretch as I 
Have gold ? 

OABOR. 

Scarce honestly, to say the truth on't, 
Although I almost wish you had the baron's. 

WERNER. 

Dare you insinuate ? 

GAEOR. 

What? 



WERNER. 



To whom you speak ? 

2N 



Are you aware 



GABOR. 

No ; and I am not used 
Greatly to care. (A noise heard without). Bat hark ' 
they come ! 

WERNER. 

Who come ? 

GABOR. 

The intendant and his man-hounds after me: 
1 'd face them — but it were in vain to expect 
Justice at hands like theirs. Where shall I go? 
Hut show me any place, 1 do assure you, 
It there be faith in man, I ;im most guiltless: 
Think if it wore your own c:i-;e ! 

werneu [aaidi ). 

Oh, just God! 
Thy hell is not hereafter ! Am I dust still ? 

GABOK. 

I see you 're moved ; and it shows well in you : 
I may live to requite it. 

WERNER. 

Arc you not 
A spy of Stralenheim's ? 

GABOR. 

Not I ! and if 
I v/cre, what is there to espy in you ? 
Although I recollect his frequent question 
About you and your spouse, might lead to some 
Suspicion ; but you best know — what — and why: 
I am his deadliest foe. 

WERNER. 
You 1 
GABOR. 

After such 
A treatment for the service which in part 
I render'd him — I am his enemy ; 
If you are not his friend, you will assist me. 

WERNER 

I will. 

OABOR. 

But how ? 

Werner (showing tlie panel). 
There is a secret spring ; 
Remember, I discovcr'd it by chance, 
And used it but for safety. 

GABOR. 

Open it, 
And I wiH use it for the same. 

WERNER. 

I found it, 
As I have said: it leads through winding walls, 
(So thick as to bear paths within their ribs, 
Yet lose no jot of strength or stateliuess) 
And hollow cells, and obscure niches, to 
I know not whither ; you must not advance : 
Give me your word. 

GABOR. 

It is unnecessary : 
How should I make my way in darkness, throuoh 
A Gothic labyrinth of unknown windings? 

WERNER. 

Yes, but who knows to what place it may lead 7 

/ know not — (mark you !) — but who knows it might no» 

Lead even into the chambers of your foe? 

So strangely were contrived these galleries 

By our Teutonic fathers in old days, 

When man built less against the elements 



406 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Than his next neighbour. You must not advance 
Beyond the two first windings ; if you do, 
(Albeit I never pass'd them), I 'U not answer 
For what you may be led to. 

GABOR. 

But I will. 
A thousand thanks ! 

WERNER. 

You Ml find the spring more obvious 
On the other side ; and, when you would return, 
It yields to the least touch. 

GABOR. 

I '11 in — farewell ! 
[Gabor goes in by the secret panel. 

WERNER (solus). 

What have I done ? Alas ! what had I done 
Before to make this fearful ? Let it be 
Still some atonement that I save the man, 
Whose sacrifice had saved perhaps my own — 
They come ! to seek elsewhere what is before them ! 
Enter Idenstein, and others. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Is he not here ? He must have vanish'd then 

Through the dim Gothic glass by pious aid 

Of pictured saints, upon the red and yellow 

C asements, through which the sunset streams like sunrise 

On long pearl-colour'd beads and crimson crosses, 

And gilded crosiers, and cross'd arms, and cowls, 

And helms, and twisted armour, and long swords, 

All the fantastic furniture of windows, 

Dim with brave knights and holy hermits, whose 

Likeness and fame alike rest on some panes 

Of crystal, which each rattling wind proclaims 

As frail as any other life or glory. 

He 's gone, however. 

WERNER. 

Whom do you seek ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

A villain ! 

WERNER. 

Why need you come so far, then ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

In the search 
Of him who robb'd the baron. 

WERNER. 

Are you sure 
You have divined the man ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

As sure as you 
Stand tiiere ; but where 's he gone ? 

WERNER. 

Who? 

IDENSTEIN. 

He we sought. 

WERNER. 

V'ou see he is not here. 

IDENSTEIN. 

And yet we traced him 
lip to this hall : are you accomplices, 
Or deal vou in the black art? 

WERNER. 

I deal plainly, 
To many men the blackest. 

IDENSTEIN. 

It may be 



I have a question or two for yourself 
Hereafter ; but we must continue now 
Our search for t' other. 

WERNER 

You had best begin 
Your inquisition now ; I may not be 
So putient always. 

IDENSTEIN. 

I should like to know, 
In good sooth, if you really are the man 
That Stralenhcim 's in quest of? 

WERNER. 

Insolent ! 
Said you not that he was not here ? 

IDENSTEIN. 

Yes, one : 
But there 's another whom he tracks more keenly, 
And soon, it may be, with authority 
Both paramount to his and mine. But, come ! 
Bustle, my boys ! we are at fault. 

[Exit Idenstein and AltcndanU 

WERNER. 

In what 
A maze hath my dim destiny involved me ! 
And one base sin hath done me less ill than 
The leaving undone one far greater. Down, 
Thou busy devil ! rising in my heart ! 
Thou art too late ! I '11 nought to do with blood. 
Enter Ulric. 

ULRIC. 

I sought you, father. 

WERNER. 

Is 't not dangerous ? 

ULRIC 

No ; Stralenheim is ignorant of all 
Or any of the ties between us : more — 
He sends me here a spy upon your actions, 
Deeming me wholly his. 

WERNER. 

I cannot think it : 
'Tis but a snare he winds about us both, 
To swoop the sire and son at once. 

ULRIC. 

I canno' 
Pause at each petty fear, and stumble at 
The doubts that rise like briars in our path, 
But must break through them as an unarm'd carle 
Would, though with naked limbs, were the wolf rustlf i 
In the same thicket where he hew'd for bread : 
Nets are for thrushes, eagles are not caught so ; 
We '11 overfly, or rend them. 

WERNER. 

Show me how • 
ulr'ic. 
Can you not guess ? 

WERNER. 

I cannot. 

ULRIC. 

That is strange. 
Came the thought ne'er into your mind last night ? 

WERNER. 

I understand you not. 

ULRIC. 

Then we shall never 
More understand each other. But to change 
The topic 



WERNER. 



407 



WERNER. 

You mean lo pursue it, as 
'T is of our safety. 

ULRIC 

Right ; I stand corrected. 
I see the subject now more clearly, and 
Our general situation in its bearings. 
The waters are abating ; a few hours 
Will bring his summon'd myrmidons from Frankfort, 
When you will be a prisoner, perhaps worse, 
And I an outcast, bastardized by practice 
Of this same baron, to make way for him. 

WERNER. 

And now your remedy ! I thought to escape 
By means of this accursed gold, but now 
I dare not use it, show it, scarce look on it. 
Methinks it wears upon its face my guilt 
For motto, not the mintage of the state ; 
And, for the sovereign's head, my own begirt 
With hissing snakes, who curl around my temples, 
And cry to all beholders — lo ! a villain ! 

ULRIC. 

You must not use it, at least, now ; but take 

This ring. f He gwe3 Werner a jewel. 

WERNER. 

A gem ! it was my father's. 

ULRIC. 

And 
As such is now your own. With this you must 
Bribe the intendant for his old caleche 
And horses to pursue your route at sunrise, 
Together with tny mother. 

WERNER. 

And leave you, 
So lately found, in peril too? 

ULRIC 

Fear nothing ! 
The only fear were if we fled together, 
For that would make our ties beyond all doubt. 
The waters only lie in floods between 
This burgh and Frankfort ; so far 's in our favour. 
The route on to Bohemia, though encumber'd, 
Is not impassable ; and when you gain 
A few hours' start, the difficulties will be 
The same to your pursuers. Once beyond 
The frontier, and you 're safe. 

WERNER. 

My noble boy ! 

ULRIC. 

Hush ! hush ! no transports : we '11 indulge in them 

In Castle Siegendorf! Display no gold: 

Show Idenstcin the gem (I know the man, 

And have look'd through him) : it will answer thus 

A double purpose. Stralenheim lost gold — 

JVo jewel : therefore, it could not be his ; 

And then, the man who was possess'd of this 

Can hardlv be suspected of abstracting 

The baron's coin, when he could thus convert 

This ring to more than Stralenheim has lost 

By his last night's slumber. Be not over limid 

In your address, nor yet too arrogant, 

And Idenstcin will serve you. 

WERNER. 

I will follow 
la all things your direction. 



ULRIC 

I would have 
Spared you the trouble ; but had I appear'd 
To take an interest in you, and still more 
By dabbling with a jewel in your favour, 
All had been known at once. 

WERNER 

My guardian angel ! 
This overpays the past! But how wilt thou 
Fare in our absence 7 

ULRIC 

Stralenheim knows nothing 
Of me as aught of kindred with yourself. 
I will but wait a day or two with him 
To lull all doubts, and then rejoin my father. 

WERNER. 

To part no more ! 

ULRIC 

I know not that ; but at 
The least we '11 meet again once more. 

WERNER. 

My boy ! 
My friend — my only child, and sole preserver ! 
Oh, do not hate me! 

ULRIC 

Hate my father ! 

WERNER. 

Ay, 

My father hated me : why not my son ? 

ULRIC 

Your father knew you not as I do. 

WERNER. 

Scorpions 
Are in thy words! Thou know me? In this guise 
Thou canst not know me — I am not myself — 
Yet (hate me not) I will be soon. 

ULRIC. 

I 'II wail ! 
In the mean time be sure that all a son 
Can do for parents shall be done for mine. 

WERNER. 

I see it, and I feel it ; yet I feel 

Further — that you despise me. 

ULRIC 

Wherefore should 1 1 

WERNER. 

Must I repeat my humiliation ? 

ULRIC 

No! 

I have fathom'd it, and you. But let us talk 
Of this no more. Or if it must be ever, 
Not now ; your error has redoubled all 
The present difficulties of our house, 
At secret war with that of Stralenheim ; 
All we have now to think of is to baffle 
Him. 1 have shown one way. 

WERNER. 

The only one, 
And I embrace it, as I did my son, 
Who show'd himself and father's safety in 
One day. 

ULRIC. 

You shall be safe : let that suffice. 
Would Stralcnhcim's appearance in Bohemia 
Disturb your right, or mine, if onco we were 
Admitted lo our lands 7 



408 BYRON'S WORKS. 


WERNER. 


ULRIC. 


Assuredly, 


An old Bohemian — an imperial gipsy. 


Situate as we arc now, although the first 


IDENSTEIN. 


Possessor might, as usual, prove the strongest, 


A gipsy or Bohemian, 'tis the same. 


Especially the next in blood. 


For they pass by both names. And was he one ? 


ULRIC. 


ULRIC 


Blond! 'tis 


I 've heard so ; but I must take leave. Intendant, 


A word of many meanings : in the veins 


Your servant ! — Werner (to Werner, sligluly), if tlia'. 


And out of them it is & different thing — 


be your name, 


And so it should be, when the same in blood 


Yours. [Exit Ulric, 


(As it is calPd) are aliens to each other, 


IDENSTEIN. 


Like Theban brethren : when a part is bad, 


A well-spoken, pretty-faced young man ! 


A few spilt ounces purify the rest. 


And prettily behaved ! He knows his station, 


You sec, sir : how he gave to each lus due 


WERNER. 


I do not apprehend you. 


Precedence ! 

WERNER. 


Ulric. 


I perceived it, and applaud 


That may be — 


His just discernment and your own. 


And should, perhaps, — and yet — but get ye ready ; 


IDENSTEIN. 


You and my mother must away to-night. 


That 's well- 


Here comes the attendant ; sound him with the gem ; 


That 's very well. You also know your plane, too, 


'Twill sink into his venial soul like lead 


And yet I don't know that 1 know your place. 


Into the deep, and bring up slime, and mud, 


werner (showing the ring). 


And ooze, too, from the bottom, as the lead doth 


Would this assist your knowledge ? 


With its greased understratum; but no less 


IDENSTEIN. 


Will serve to warn our vessels through these shoals. 


How!— What!— Eh! 


The freight is rich, so heave the line in time ! 


A jewel ! 


Farewell ! I scarce have time, but yet your hand, 


WERNER. 


My father ! 


'T is your own, on one condition. 


WERNER. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Let me embrace thee ! 


Mine! — Name it! 


ULRIC. 


WERNER. 


We may be 


That hereafter you permit rae 


Observed : subdue your nature to the hour! 


At thrice its value to redeem it : 't is 


Keep off" from me as from youi foe ! 


A family ring. 


WERNER. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Accursed 


A family ! yours ! a gem ! 


Be he who is the stifling cause, which smothers 


I 'm breathless ! 


The best aud sweetest feeling of our hearts, 


WERNER. 


At such an hour too ! 


You must also furnish me, 


ULRIC. 


An hour ere daybreak, with all means to ijUU 


Yes, curse— it will ease you ! 


This place. 


litre is the intendant. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Eider Idenstein 


But is it real ? let me look on it : 


Master Idenstein, 


Diamond, by all that 's glorious ! 


How fare vou in your purpose ? Have you caught 


WERNER. 


The rogue ? 


Come, I '11 trust you j 


IDENSTEIN. 


You have guess'd, no doubt, that I was born above 


No, faith ! 


My present seeming. 


ULRIC. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Well, there are plenty more : 


I can't say I did, 


You may have bettor luck another chase. 


Though this looks like it; tins is the true breeding 


Where is the baron ? 


Of gentle blood ! 


IDENSTEIN. 


WERNER. 


Gone back to his chamber: 


I have important reasons 


And, now I think on 't, asking after you 


For wishing to continue privily 


With nobly-born impatience. 


My journey hence. 


ULRIC. 


IDENSTEIN. 


Your great men 


So then you are the man 


Must be answer'd on the instant, as the bound 


Whom Stralcnheim 's in quest of! 


Of the stun" steed replies unto the spur : 


WERNER. 


T is well they have horses, too, for if they had not, 


I am not ; 


I fear thai men must <lraw their chariots, as 


But being taken for him might conduct 


They say lungs did Sesostris. 


So much embarrassment to me just now, 


IDENSTEIN. 


And to the baron's self hereafter — 't is 


Who was he 7 


To spare both, that I would avoid all bustle. 



WERNER. 



400 



IDENSTEIN. 

Be you the man or no, 't is not my business ; 

Besides, I never should obtain the half 

From this proud niggardly noble, who would raise 

The country for some missing bits of coin, 

And never ofTer a precise reward — 

But this ! Another iook ! 

WERNER. 

Gaze on it freely ; 
At day-dawn it is yours. 

IDENSTEIN. 

Oh, thou sweet sparkler ! 
Thou more than stone of the philosopher ! 
Thou touchstone of Philosophy herself! 
Thou bright eye of the Mine ! thou load-star of 
The soul ! the true magnetic pole to which 
All hearts point duly north, like trembling needles ! 
Thou flaming spirit of the earth ! which, sitting 
High on the monarch's diadem, attractest 
More worship than the majesty who sweats 
Beneath the crown which makes his head ache, like 
Millions of hearts which bleed to lend it lustre ! 
Shalt thou be mine? I am, methinks, already 
A little king, a lucky alchymist ! — 
A wise magician, who has bound the devil 
Without the forfeit of his soul. But come, 
Werner, or what else ? 

WERNER. 

Call me Werner still : 
Vou may yet know me by a loftier title. 

IDENSTEIN. 

I do believe in thee ! thou art the spirit 
Of whom I long have dream'd, in a low garb. — 
But come, I '11 serve thee ; thou shalt be as free 
As air, despite the waters : let us hence — 
I 'II show thee I am honest — (oh, thou jewel !) 
Thou shalt be furnish'd, Werner, with such means 
Of flight, that if thou wert a snail, not birds 
Should overtake thee. — Let me gaze again! 
I have a foster-brother in the mart 
Of Hamburgh, skill'd in precious stones — how many 
Carats may it weigh? — Come, Werner, I will wing thee. 

[Exeunt. 



SCENE II. 
Stralenheim's Chamber. 
Stralenheim and Fritz, 
fritz. 
AU 's ready, my good lord ! 

STRALENHEIM. 

I am not sleepy, 
And yet I must to bed ; I fain would say 
To rest, but something heavy on my spirit, 
Too dull for wakefulness, too quick for slumber, 
Sits on me as a cloud along the sky, 
Which will not let the sunbeams through, nor yet 
Descend in rain and end, but spreads itself 
'Twixt earth and heaven, like envy between man 
And man, an everlasting mist ; — I will 
Unto my pillow. 

FRITZ. 

May you rest there well ! 

SI KALENHEIM. 

I fed, eind fear, I shall. 

2 k 2 57 



FRITZ. 

And wherefore fear? 

STRALENHEIM. 

I know not why, and therefore do fear more, 

Because an uiideseribaUe but 'tis 

All folly. Were the locks (as I desired) 
Changed to-day, of llns chamber? for last night's 
Adventure inakes it needful. 

FRITZ. 

Certainlv, 
According to your order, and beneath 
The inspection of myself and the young Saxon 
Who saved your iife. I think they call him "Ulric." 

STRALENHEIM. 

You think ! you supercilious slave ! what right 

Have you to tax your memory, which should be 

Quick, proud, and happy to retain the name 

Of him who saved your master, as a litany 

Whose daily repetition marks your duty — 

Get hence ! "you think" indeed ! vou, who stood still 

Howling and dripping on the bank, whilst I 

Lay dying, and the stranger dash'd aside 

The roaring torrent, and restored me to 

Thank him — and despise you. " You think /" and scarce 

Can recollect his name ! I will not waste 

Mere words on you. Call me betimes. 

FRITZ. 

Good night ! 
I trust tc -morrow will restore your lordship 
To renovated strength and temper. 

[The seme close* 



SCENE III. 

The secret Passage. 

Gabor (solus). 

Four — 
Five — six hours have I counted, like the guard 
Of out-posts, on the never-merry clock : 
That hollow tongue of time, which, even when 
It sounds for joy, takes something from enjoyment 
With every clang. 'T is a perpetual knell, 
Though for a marriage feast it rings : each stroke 
Peals of a hope the less ; the funeral note 
Of love deep-buried without resurrect inn 
In the grave of possession ; while the knoll 
Of long-lived parents finds a jovial echo 
To triple time in the son's ear. 

I 'm cold- 
I 'm dark — I 've blown my fingers — number'a o'er 
And o'er my steps — and knock'd my head against 
Some fifty buttresses — and roused the rats 
And bats in general insurrection, till 
Their cursed pattering feet and whirring wings 
Leave me scarce hearing for another sound. 
A light ! It is at distance (if I can 
Measure in darkness distance) : but it blinks 
As through a crevice or a key-hole, in 
The inhibited direction ; I must on, 
Nevertheless, from curiosity. 
A distant lamp-light is an incident 
In such a den as this. Pray Heaven it lead me 
To nothing that may tempt me ! Else Heaven aid nv> 
To obtain or to escape it ! Shining still ' 
Were it the star of Lucifer himself. 



•110 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Or lie himself girt with its beams, I could 

Contain no longer. Softly ! mighty well ! 

That corner 'a ti.rn'd — so — ah ! no, right ! it draws 

Nearer. Here is a darksome angle — so, 

Th;it 's weather'd. — Let me pause. — Suppose it leads 

Into some greater danger than that which 

I have escaped / — no matter, 't is a new one ; 

And novel periis, like fresh mistresses, 

Wear more magnetic aspects : I will on, 

And be it where it may — I have my dagger, 

Which may protect me at a pinch. — Bum still, 

Thou little light ! Thou art my ignis fatuus ! 

My stationary Will o' the wisp ! — So ! so ! 

He hears my invocation, and fails not. 

[The scene cbsts. 



SCENE IV. 
A Garden. 
Enter Werner. 
I could not sleep — and now the hour 's at hand ; 
All 's ready. Idcnstein has kept his word: 
And, station'd in the outskirts of the town, 
Upon the forest's edge, the vehicle 
Awaits us. Now the dwindling stars begin 
To pale in heaven ; and for the last time I 
Look on these horrible walls. Oh ! never, never 
Shall I forget them. Here I came most poor, 
Rut not dishonour'd : and I leave them with 
A stain, — if not upon my name, yet in 
My heart ! A never-dying canker-worm, 
Which all the coming splendour of the lands, 
And rights, and sovereignty of Siegendorf, 
Can scarcely lull a moment : I must find 
Some means of restitution, which would ease 
My soul in part ; but how, without discovery ? — 
It must be done, however ; and I '11 pause 
Upon the method the first hour of safely. 
The madness of my miser r led to this 
Base infamy ; repentance must retrieve it: 
I will have nought of Stralenheim's u[K>n 
My spirit, though he would grasp all of mine ; 
Lands, freedom, life, — and yet he sleeps ! as soundly, 
Perhaps, as infancy, with gorgeous curtains 
Spread for his canopy, o'er silken pillows, 

Such as when Hark ! what noise is that ? Again ! 

The branches shake ; and some loose stones have fallen 
From yonder terrace. 

[Ulric haps down from the terrace. 
Ulric ! ever welcome ! 
Thrice welcome now ! this filial 

ULRIC. 

Stop! before 
vVe approach, tell me 

WERNER. 

Why look you so? 

ULRIC. 

Do I 

rtcbold my father, or 

WERNER. 

What? 

ULRlc. 

An assassin ! 



WLRNER. 



•nsur.'i or insolent ' 



ULRII'. 

Reply, sir, as 
You prize your life, or mine ! 

WERNER. 

To what must I 
Answer? 

ULRIC. 

Arc you or are you not the assassin 
Of Stralenheim ? 

WERNER. 

I never was as yet 
The murderer of any man. What mean you? 

ULRIC 

Did you not this night (as the night before) 
Retrace the secret passage ? Did you not 

Again revisit Stralenheim's chamber ? anil 

[Ulric pause*. 

WERNER. 

Proceed. 

ULRIC. 

Died he not by your hand ? 

WERNER. 

Great God ! 

ULRIC 

You are innocent, then ! my father 's innocent ! 
Embrace me ! Yes, — your tone — your look — yes, yes — 
Yet say so ! 

WERNER. 

If I e'er, in heart or mind, 
Conceived deliberately such a thought^ 
But rather strove to trample back to hell 
Such thoughts — if e'er they glared a moment through 
The irritation of my oppress'd spirit — 
May Heaven be shut for ever from my hopes 
As from mine eyes ! 

ULRIC. 

But Stralenheim is dead. 

WERNER. 

'T is horrible ! 't is hideous, as 't is hateful !- 
But what have I to do with this ? 

ULRIC 

No bolt 
Is forced ; no violence can be detected, 
Save on his body. Part of his own household 
Have been alarm'd ; but as the intendant is 
Absent, I took upon myself the care 
Of mustering the police. His chamber has, 
Past doubt, been enter'd secretly. Excuse me, 
If nature 

WERNER. 

Oh, my boy ! what unknown woes 
Of dark fatality, like clouds, are gathering 
Above our house ! 

ULRIC 

My father, I acquit you ! 
But will the world do so ? Will even the judge, 
If but you must away this instant. 

WERNER. 

No! 
I '11 face it. Who shall dare suspect me ? 

ULRIC. 

Yet 

You had no guests — no visitors — no life 
Breathing around you, save my mother's ? 

WERNER. 

Ah! 



WERNER. 411 


1 ne Hungarian ! 


You, my son ! — doubted 


ULRIC. 


ULRIC 


He is gone ! he disappear'd 


And do you doubt of him 


Ere sunset. 


The fugitive ? 


WERNER. 


WERNER. 


No ; I hid him in that very 


Boy ! since I fell into 


Conceal'd and fatal gallery. 


The abyss of crime (though not of such crime), I, 


ULRIC. 


Having seen the innocent oppress'd for me, 


There I '11 find him. 


May doubt even of the guilty's guilt. Your heart 


[Ulric is going. 


Is free, and quick with virtuous wrath to accuse 


WERNER. 


Appearances ; and views a criminal 


Il is too late : he had left the palace ere 


In innocence's shadow, it may be, 


I quitted it. I found the secret panel 


Because 't is dusky. 


Open, and the doors which lead from that hall 


ULRIC 


Which masks it : I but thought he had snatch'd the silent 


And if I do so, 


And favourable moment to escape 


What will mankind, who know you not, or knew 


The myrmidons of Idenstein, who were 


But to oppress ? Vou must not stand the hazard. 


Dogging him yester-even. 


Away ! — I 'U make all easy. Idenstein 


ULRIC. 


Will, for his own sake and his jewel's, hold 


You re-closed 


His peace — he also is a partner in 


The panel ? 


Your flight — moreover 


WERNER. 


WERNER. 


Yes ; and not without reproach 


Fly ! and leave my name 


(And inner trembling for the avoided peril) 


Link'd with the Hungarian's, or preferr'd, as poorest, 


At his dull heedlessness, in leaving thus 


To bear the brand of bloodshed ? 


His shelterer's asylum to the risk 


ULRIC 


Of a discovery. 


Pshaw ! leave any thing 


UXRIC. 


Except our fathers' sovereignty and castles, 


You are sure you closed it ? 


For which you have so long panted and in vain ! 


WERNER. 


What name ? You leave no name, since that you beat 


Certain. 


Is feign'd. 


ULRIC 


WERNER. 


That 's well ; but had been better if 


Most true ; but still I would not have it 


You ne'er had turn'd it to a den for [He pauses. 


Engraved in crimson in men's memories, 


WERNER. 


Though in this most obscure abode of men — 


Thieves ! 


Besides, the search 


Thou wouldst say : I must bear it, and deserve it j 


ULRIC 


But not 


I will provide against 


ULRIC 


Alight that can touch you. No one knows you here 


No, father, do not speak of this ; 


As heir of Siegendorf : if Idenstein 


This is no hour to think of petty crimes, 


Suspects, 't is but suspicion, and he is 


But to prevent the consequence of great ones. 


A fool : his folly shall have such employment, 


Why would you shelter this man ? 


Too, that the unknown Werner shall give way 


WERNER. 


To nearer thoughts of self. The laws (if e'er 


Could I shun it? 


Laws reach'd this village) are all in abeyance 


A man pursued by my chief foe ; disgraced 


With the late general war of thirty years, 


For my own crime ; a victim to my safety, 


Or crush'd, or rising slowly from the dust, 


Imploring a few hours' concealment from 


To which the march of armies trampled them. 


The very wretch who was the cause he needed 


Stralenheim, although noble, is unheeded 


Such refuge. Had he been a wolf, I could not 


Here, save as such — without lands, influence, 


Have, in such circumstances, thrust him forth. 


Save what hath perish'd with him ; few prolong 


ULRIC 


A week beyond their funeral rites their sway 


And like the wolf he hath repaid you. But 


O'er men, unless by relatives, whose interest 


It is too late to ponder this : you must 


Is roused : such is not here the case ; he died 


Set out ere dawn. I will remain here to 


Alone, unknown, — a solitary grave, 


Trace out the murderer, if 't is possible. 


Obscure as his deserts, w ; ihout a scutcheon, 


WERNER. 


Is all he '11 have, or wants. If / discover 


But this my sudden flight will give the Moloch 


The assassin, 't will be well — if not, believe me, 


Suspicion, two new victims, in the lieu 


None else, though all the full-fed train of menial* 


Of one, if I remain. The fled Hungarian, 


May howl above his ashes, as they did 


Who seems the culprit, and 


Around him in his danger on the Oder, 


ULRIC 


Will no more stir a finger now than then. 


Who seems ! Who else 


Hence ! hence ! I must not hear your answer- —loo* 


Can be so? 


The stars are almost faded, and the gray 


WERNER. 


Begins to grizzle the black hair of night. 


Not 7, though just now you doubted — 

L 


You shall not answer — Pardon me, that I 







412 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Am peremptory ; 't is your son that speaks, 

Your long-lost, late-found son — Let 's call my mother ! 

Softly and swiftly step, and leave the rest 

To me ; I Ml answer for the event as far 

As regards you, and that is the chief point, 

As my first duty, which shall he observed. 

We'll meet in Castle Sicgendorf — once more 

Our banners shall be glorious ! Think of that 

Alone, and leave all other thoughts to me, 

Whose youth may better battle with them — Hence ! 

And may your age be happy ! — I will kiss 

My mother once more, then Heaven's speed be with you! 

WERNER. 

This counsel 's safe — but is it honourable ? 

UI.RIC 

To save a father is a child's chief honour. 

[Exeunt. 



ACT IV. 

SCENE I. 

A Gothic Hall in the Castle of Siegendorf, near Prague, 
Enter Eric and Henrick, retainers of the Count. 
eric. 
S<>, better times are come at last ; to these 
' )ld walLs new masters and high wassail, both 
A long desideratum. 

henrick. 
Yes, for masters, 
It might be unto those who long for novelty, 
Though made by a new grave: but as for wassail, 
Methinks the old Count Siegendorf maintain'd 
His feudal hospitality as high 
As e'er another prince of the empire. 
eric 

Why, 
For the mere cup and trencher, we no doubt 
Fared passing well ; but as for merriment 
And sport, without which salt and sauces season 
The cheer but scantily, our sizings were 
Even of the narrowest. 

HENRICK. 

The old count loved not 
The roar of revel ; are you sure that tltis does ? 

ERIC 

As yet he hath been courteous as he 's bounteous, 
And we all love him. 

HENRICK. 

His reign is as yet 
Hardly a year o'erpast its honey-moon, 
And tlie first year of sovereigns is bridal; 
Anon, we shall perceive his real sway 
And moods of mind. 

ERIC. 

Pray Heaven he keep the present 
Then his brave son, Count Ulric — there 's a knight! 
Pity the wars are o'er ! 

HENRICK. 

Why so? 

ERIC. 

Look on him ! 
And answer that yourself. 

HENRICK. 

He 's very youthful, 



And strong and beautiful as a young tiger. 

ERIC 

That's not a faithful vassal's likeness. 

HENRICK. 

But 

Perhaps a true one. 

ERIC 

Pity, as I said, 
The wars arc over: in the hall, who like 
Count Ulric for a well-supported pride, 
Which awes but yet offends not '/ in the field, 
Who like him with his spear in hand, when, gnashing 
His tusks, and ripping up from right to left 
The howling hounds, the boar makes for the thicket ? 
Who backs a horse, or bears a hawk, or wears 
A sword like him ? Whose plume nods knightlier ? 

HENRICK. 

No one's, I grant you : do not fear, if war 
Be long in coming, he is of that kind 
Will make it for himself, if he hath not 
Already done as much. 

ERIC 

What do you mean? 

HENRICK. 

You can't deny his tram of followers 
(But few our fellow native vassals born 
On the domain) are such a sort of knaves 
As (pauses). 

ERIC 

What? 

HENRICK. 

The war (you lo»s so much) leaves living ; 
Like other parents, she spoils her worst children. 

ERIC 

Nonsense ! they are all brave iron-visaged fellows, 
Such as old Tilly loved. 

HENRICK. 

And who loved Tilly ? 
Ask that at Magdebourg — or, for that matter, 
Wallenstein either — they are gone to 

ERIC. 

Rest; 

But what beyond, 't is not ours to pronounce. 

HENRICK. 

I wish they had left us something of their rest: 
The country (nominally now at peace) 
Is overrun with — God knows who — they fly 
By night, and disappear with sunrise ; but 
Leave no less desolation, nay, even more 
Than the most open warfare. 

ERIC 

But Count Ulric— 
What has all this to do with him ? 

HENRICK. 

With him ! 

He might prevent it. As you say he 's fond 

Of war, why makes he it not on those marauders? 

ERIC 

You'd better ask himself. 

HENRICK. 

I would as soon 
Ask of the lion why he laps not milk. 

ERIC 

And here he comes ! 

HENRICK. 

The devil ! you 'U hold your tongue 7 



WERNER. -*I3 


ERIC. 


Is to be strcngthen'd. I must join them soon. 


Why do you turn so pale ? 


RODOLPH. 


HENRICK. 


Best wait for further and more sure advices. 


'T is nothing — but 


ULRIC 


Be silent ! 


I mean it — and indeed it could not well 


ERIC. 


Have fallen out at a time more opposite 


I will, upon what you have said. 


To all my plans. 


HENRICK. 


RODOLPH. 


I assure you I meant nothing, a mere sport 


It will be difficult 


Of words, no more ; besides, had it been otherwise, 


To excuse your absence to the count, your father. 


He is to espouse the gentle baroness, 


ULRIC 


Ida of Stralenheim, the late baron's heiress, 


Yes, but the unsettled state of our domain 


And she no doubt will soften whatsoe'er 


In High Silesia, will permit and cover 


Of fierceness the late long intestine wars 


My journey. In the mean time, when we are 


Have given all natures, and most unto those 


Engaged in the chase, draw otf the eighty men 


Who were bom in them, and bred up upon 


Whom Woltfe leads — keep the forests on your route : 


The knees of homicide ; sprinkled, as it were, 


You know it well ? 


With blood even at their baptism. Prithee, peace, 


RODOLPH. 


On all that I have said ! 


As well as on that night 




When we— 


Enter Ulric and Rodolph. 


ULRIC 


Good morrow, count ! 


We will not speak of that until 


ulric. 


We can repeat the same with like success ; 


Good morrow, worthy Henrick. Eric, is 


And when you have join'd, give Rosenberg this letter. 


All ready for the chase ? 


[Giles a letter. 


ERIC 


Add further, that I have sent this slight addition 


The dogs are order'd 


To our force with you and Wollfe, as herald of 


Down to the forest, and the vassals out 


My coming, though I could but spare them ill 


To beat the bushes, and the day looks promising. 


At this time, as my father loves to keep 


Shall I call forth your excellency's suite? 


Full numbers of retainers round the castle, 


What courser will you please to mount ? 


Until this marriage, and its feasts and fooleries, 


ULRIC 


Are rung out with its peal of nuptial nonsense. 


The dun, 


RODOLPH. 


Walstein. 


I thought you loved the lady Ida? 


ERIC 


ULRIC 


I fear he scarcely has recovered 


Why, 


The toils of Monday : 't was a noble chase — 


I do so — but it follows not from that 


You spear'd four with your own hand. 


I would bind in my youth and glorious years, 


ULRIC 


So brief and burning, with a lady's zone, 


True, good Eric, 


Although 't were that of Venus ; — but I love her, 


I had forgotten — let it be the gray, then, 


As woman should be loved, fairly and solely. 


Old Ziska : he has not been out this fortnight. 


RODOLPH. 


ERIC 


And constantly ? 


He shall be straight caparison'd. How many 


ULRIC 


Of your immediate retainers shall 


I think so ; for I love 


Escort you ? 


Nought else. — But I have not the time to pause 


ULRIC 


Upon these gewgaws of the heart. Great tilings 


I leave that to Weilburgh, our 


We have to do ere long. Speed ! speed ! good Rodo'ph' 


Master of the horse. [Exit Eric 


RODOLPH. 


Rodolph ! 


On my return, however, I shall find 


RODOLPH. 


The Baroness Ida lost in Countess Sicgcndorf! 


My lord! 


ULRIC 


ULRIC 


Perhaps : my father wishes it, and sootn, 


The news 


'T is no bad policy ; this union with 


Is awkward from the — (Rodolph points to Henrick.) 


The last bud of the rival branch at oncu 


How now, Henrick, why 


Unites the future and destroys the past. 


Loiter you here ? 


RODOLPH. 


HENRICK. 


Adieu! 


For your commands, my lord. 


ULRIC 


ULRIC 


Yet hold — we had better keep .ogotnti 


Go to my father, and present my duty, 


Until the chase begins ; then draw thou off", 


And learn if he would aught with me before 


And do as I have said. 


I mount. [Exit Henrick. 


RODOLPH. 


Rodolph, our friends have had a check 


I will. But to 


Upon the frontiers of Franconia, and 


Return — 't was a most kind act in the count, 


'T is rumour'd that the column sent against them 


Your father, to send up to Eonigsburg 



414 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



For this fair orphan of the baron, and 
To h Jl her as his daughter. 

ULRIC 

Wondrous kind ! 
Especially as little kindness till 
Ther. grew between them. 

RODOLPH. 

The late baron died 
Of a fever, did he not ? 

ULRIC 

How should I know 7 

RODOLPH. 

I have heard it vvhisper'd there was something strange 
About his death — and even the place of it 
Is scarcely known. 

CLRIC. 

Some obscure village on 
The Saxon or Silesian frontier. 

RODOLPH. 

He 

Has left no testament — no farewell words I 

ULRIC. 

I am neither confessor nor notary, 
So cannot say. 

RODOLPH. 

Ah ! here 's the lady Ida. 
Enter Ida Stralenheim. 

ULRIC 

1 »u arc early, my sweet cousin ! 

IDA. 

Not too early, 
Dear Ulric, if I do not interrupt you. 
Why do you call me " cousin ?" 

ulric [smiling). 

Are we not so ? 

IDA. 

¥>s, but I do not like the name ; methinka 
f» sounds so cold, as if you thought upon 
Our pedigree, and only weigh'd our blood. 

ulric [starting). 
Blood! 

IDA. 

Why does yours start from your cheeks ? 
ulric. 

Ay! doth it? 

t IDA. 

It doth — but no ! it rushes like a torrent 
Kven to your brow again. 

ulric [recovering himself). 
And if it fled, 
It only was because your presence sent it 
Back to my heart, which beats for you, sweet cousin ! 

IDA. 

" Cousin " again ! 

ULRIC 

Nay, then I '11 call you sister. 

IDA. 

i like that name still worse — would we had ne'er 
Been aught of kindred ! 

ulric [gloomily). 

Would we never had ! 

IDA. 

Uh Heaven ! and can you wish that ? 

ULRIC 

Dearest Ida ! 



Did I not echo your own wish ? 

IDA. 

Yes, Ulric, 
But then I wish'd it not with such a glance, 
And scarce knew what I said ; but let me be 
Sister or cousin, what you will, so that 
I still to you am something. 

ULRIC 

You shall be 
All— all 

IDA. 

And you to me are so already j 
But I can wait. 

ULRIC. 

Dear Ida ! 

IDA. 

Call me Ida, 
Your Ida, for I would be yours, none else's — 
Indeed I have none else left, since my poor father 

[She pauses. 

ULRIC 

You have mine — you have me. 

IDA. 

Dear Ulric ! how I wish 
My father could but view our happiness, 
Which wants but this ! 

ULRIC 

Indeed ! 

IDA. 

You would have loved him ; 
He you ; for the brave ever love each other : 
His manner was a little cold, his spirit 
Proud (as is birth's prerogative), but under 
This grave exterior — would you had known each other ! 
Had such as you been near him on his journey. 
He had not died without a friend to soothe 
His last and lonely moments. 

ULRIC 

Who says that ? 

IDA. 

What? 

ULRIC. 

That he died alone. 

IDA. 

The general rumour, 
And disappearance of his servants, who 
Have ne : er return'd : that fever was most deadly 
Which swept them all away. 

ULRIC 

If they were near him, 
He could not die neglected or alone. 

IDA. 

Alas ! what is a menial to a death-bed, 
When the dim eye rolls vainly round for what 
It loves ? — thev say he died of a fever. 

ULRIC 

Say! 



It was so. 



IDA. 

I sometimes dream otherwise. 



All dreams are false. 



I see you. 



IDA. 

And yet I see him u 



WERNER. 



415 



ULRIC. 

Where! 

IDA. 

In sleep — I see him lie 
Pale, Weeding, and a man with a raised knife 
Beside him. 

ulric. 
But do you not see h'isface ? 
IDA (looking at him). 
No ! oh, my God ! do you ? 

ULRIC. 

Why do you ask ? 

IDA. 

Because you look as if you saw a murderer ! 
ulric (agitatedly). 

Ida, tins is mere childishness: your weakness 
Iiilicis me, to my shame ; but as all feelings 
Ol yours are common to me, it affects me. 
Prithee, sweet child, change 

IDA. 

Child, indeed ! I have 
Full fifteen summers ! [A bugle, sounds. 

EOnOLPH. 

Hark, my lord, the bugle ! 
ida (peevishly to Rodolph). 
Whv iced you tell him that 7 Can he not hear it, 
Without your echo 1 

RODOLPH. 

Pardon me, fair baroness ! 

IDA. 

I will not pardon you, unless you earn it 
By aiding me in my dissuasion of 
Count Ulric from the chase to-day. 

RODOLPH. 

You will not, 
Lady, need aid of mine. 

ULRIC. 

I must not now 
Forego it. 

IDA. 

But you shall ! 

ULRIC. 

Shall ! 

IDA. 

Yes, or be 
No true knight. — Come, dear Ulric ! yield to mo 
In this for this one day ; the day looks heavy, 
And you are turn'd so pale and ill. 

ULRIC. 

You jest. 

IDA. 

Indeed I do not : ask of Rodolph. 

RODOLPH. 

Truly, 
My lord, within this quarter of an hour, 
Von have changed more than I e'er saw ycu change 
In years. 

ULRIC. 

'T is nothing ; but if 't were, the air 
Would soon restore me. I 'm the true cameleon, 
And live but on the atmosphere ; your feasts 
In castto halls, and social banquets, r.ur«e not 
My spirit — I 'm a forester, and breather 
Of the steep mountain-lops, where I love all 
The eagte loves. 



IDA. 

Except his prey, I hope. 

ULRIC. 

Sweet Ida, wish me a fair chase, and I 

Will bring you six boars' heads for trophies home 

IDA. 

And will you not stay, then? You shall not go ! 
Come ! 1 will sing to you. 

ULRIC. 

Ida, you scarcely 
Will make a soldier's wife. 

IDA. 

I do not wisli 
To he so ; for I trust these wars are over, 
And you will live in peace on your domains. 

Enter Werner, as Count Siegendorf. 

ulric. 
My father, I salute you, and it grieves me 
With such brief greeting. — You have heard our bugle; 
The vassals wait. 

SIEOENDORF. 

So let them — you forget 
To-morrow is the appointed festival 
In Prague, for peace restored. You are apt to follow 
The chase with such an ardour as will scarce 
Permit you to return to-day, or if 
Return'd, too much fatigued to join to-morrow 
The nobles in our marshall'd ranks. 

ULRIC. 

You, count, 
Will well supply the place of both — I am not 
A lover of these pageantries. 

SIEGENDORF. 

No, Ulric ; 
It were not well that you alone of all 
Our young nobility 

IDA. 

And far the noblest 
In aspect and demeanour. 

SIEGENDORF (folDA). 

True, dear child, 
Though somewhat frankly said for a fair damsel.— 
But, Ulric, recollect too our position, 
So lately reinstated in our honours. 
Believe me, 't would be mark'd in any house, 
But most in ours, that one should be found wanting 
At such a time and place. Besides, the Heaven 
Which gave us back our own, in the same mement 
It spread its peace o'er all, hath double claims 
On us for thanksgiving ; first, for our country, 
And next, that we are here to share its blessings. 

ulric (aside). 
Devout, too ! Well, sir, I obey at once. 

[ Then aloud to a sei vani. 
Ludwig, dismiss the train without ! 

[Exit Ludwio, 

IDA. 

And so 
You yield at once to him, what 1 for hours 
Might supplicate in vain. 

SIEGENDORF (*» Uittg). 

You art not jealous 
Of me, I trust, my pretty rebel ! who 
Would sanction disobedience against all 



116 BYRON'S WORKS. 


Except thyself? But fear not, thou shall rule him 


SIEGENDORF. 


Hereafter with a fonder sway and firmer. 


I talk not of his birth, 


IDA. 


But of his bearing. Men speak lightly of him. 


But I should like to govern now. 


ULRIC. 


SIEGENDORF. 


So they will do of most men. Even the monarch 


You shall, 


Is not fenced from his chamberlain's slander, or 


Your harp ; which, hy the way, awaits you with 


The sneer of the last courtier whom he has made 


The countess in her chamber. She complains 


Great and ungrateful. 


That you arc a sad truant to your music : 


SIECENDORF. 


She attends you. 


If I must be plain, 


IDA. 


The world speaks more than lightly of this Rodolph ; 


Then good morrow, my kind kinsmen ! 


They say he is leagued with the " black bands" who slil 


Ulric, you '11 come and hear me ? 


Ravage the frontier. 


ulric 


ULRIC 


By and hy. 


And will you believe 


IDA. 


The world ? 


Be sure I '11 sound it better than your bugles ; 


SIEGENDORF. 

In this case — yes. 


Th':n pray yon be as punctual to its notes : 


I '11 play you King Gustavus' march. 

ULRIC. 

And why not 


ULRIC 

In any case, 
I thought you knew it better than to take 


Old Tilly's. 


An accusation for a sentence. 


IDA. 


SIEGENDORF. 


Not that monster's ! I should think 


Son! 


My harp-strings rang with groans, and not with music, 


I understand you : you refer to but 


Could aught of his sound on it ; — but come quickly ; 


My destiny has so involved about me 


Your mother will be eager to receive you. 


Her spider web, that I can only flutter 


[Exit Ida. 


Like the poor fly, but break it not. Take heed, 


SIEGENDORF. 


Ulric ; you have seen to what the passions led me ; 


Ulric, I wish to speak with you alone. 


Twenty long years of misery and famine 


ULRIC 


Quench'd them not — twenty thousand more, perchance 


My time 's your vassal. — [Aside to Rodolph. 


Hereafter (or even here in moments which 


Rodolph, hence ! and do 


Might date for years, did anguish make the dial), 


As I directed ; and by his best speed 


May not obliterate or expiate 


And readiest means let Rosenberg reply. 


The madness and dishonour of an instant. 


RODOLPH. 


Ulric, be warn'd by a father ! — I was not 


Count Siegendorf, command you aught? I am bound 


By mine, and you behold me ! 


Upon a journey past the frontier. 


ULRIC 


SIEGENDORF {starts). 


I behold 


Ah!— 


The prosperous and beloved Siegendorf, 


Where ? on what frontier ? 


Lord of a prince's appanage, and honour'd 


RODOLPH. 


By those he rules, and those he ranks with. 


The Siiesian, on 


SIEGENDORF. 


My way — (aside to Ulric). Where shall I say ? 


Ah! 


ulric (aside, to Rodolph). 


Why wilt thou call me prosperous, while I fear 


To Hamburgh. 


For thee ? Beloved, when thou lovest me not ! 


(Aside to himself). That 


All hearts but one may beat in kindness for me — 


Word will, I think, put a firm padlock on 


But if my son's is cold ! 


His further inquisition. 


ULRIC 


RODOLPH. 


Who dare say that ? 


Count, to Hamburgh. 


SIEGENDORF. 


siegendorf (agitated). 


None else but I, who see it— -fed it — keener 


Hamburgh ! po, I have nought to do there, nor 


Than would your adversary, who dared say so, 


Am aught connected with that city. Then 


Your sabre in his heart ! But mine survives 


God speed you ! 


The wound. 


RODOLPH. 


CLRIC 


Fare ye well, Count Siegendorf! 


You err. My nature is not given 


[Exit Rodolph. 


To outward fondling ; how should it be so, 


SIEGENDORF. 


After twelve years' divorcement from my parents ? 


Ulric, this man, who has just departed, is 


SIEGENDORF. 


One of those strange companions, whom I fain 


And did not I too pass those twelve torn years 


Would reason with you on. 


In a like absence ? But 't is vain to urge yon- 


ULRIC. 


Nature was never call'd back by remonstrance. 


My lord, he is 


Let 's change the theme. I wish you to consider 


Noble by birth, of one of the first houses 


That these young violent nobles of high name, 


In Saxony. 


But dark deeds (ay, the darkest, if all rumour 



WERNER. 



417 



deports be true), with whom thou consortest, 

Will lead thee 

ULRic (irnpaliptilli/). 
I '11 be led by no man. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Nor 
Be leader of such, I would hope : at once 
To wean thee from the perils of thy youth 
And haughty spirit, I have thought it well 
That thou should'st wed the lady Ida — more, 
As thou appear'st to love her. 

ULRIC. 

I have said 
I will obey vour orders, were they to 
Unite with Hecate — can a son say more ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

He says too much in saying this. It is not 

The nature of thine age, nor of thy blood, 

Nor of thy temperament, to talk so coolly, 

Or act so carelessly, in that which is 

The bloom or blight of all men's happiness, 

(For glory's pillow is but restless, if 

Love lay not down his cheek there)! some strong bias, 

Some master fiend, is in thy service, to 

Misrule the mortal who believes him slave, 

And makes his every thought subservient ; else 

Thou'dst say at once, "I love young Ida, and 

Will wed her," or, "I love her not, and all 

The powers of earth shall never make me." — So 

Would I have answer'd. 

ui.ric. 

Sir, ynu wed for love. 

SIEGENDORF. 

\ did, and it has been my only refuge 
In many miseries. 

UI.RIC 

Which miseries 
Had never been but for this love-match. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Still 
Against your age and nature ! who at twenty 
E'er answer'd thus till now ? 

ULRIC. 

Did you not warn me 
Against your own example ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

Boyish sophist! 
In a word, do you love, or love net, Ida? 

ULRIC. 

What matters it, if I am ready to 
Obey you in espousing her ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

As far 
As you feel, nothing, but all life for her. 
She 's young — all-beautiful — adores you — is 
Endow'd with qualities to give happiness, 
Such as rounds common life into a dream 
Of something which your poets cannot paint, 
And (if it were not wisdom to love virtue) 
For which philosophy might bartei wisdom ; 
And giving so much happiness deserves 
A little in return. I would not have her 
Break her heart for a man who has none to break, 
Or wither on her stalk like some pale rose 
Deserted by the bird she thought a nightingale, 

According to the orient tale. She is 

2 58 



ULRIC. 

The daughter of dead Slralenheim, your loe! 
I 'II wed her, ne'erthelcss ; though, to say truth, 
Just novv I am not violently transported 
In favour of such unions. 

SIEGENDORF. 

But she loves you. 

UI.RIC 

And I love her, and therefore would think twice. 

SIECENDORF. 

Alas ! Love never did so. 

ULRIC 

Then 't is time 
He should begin, and take the bandage from 
His eyes, and look before he leaps : till now 
He halh ta'en a jump i' the dark. 

• SIEGENDORF. 

But you consent? 

ULRIC 

I did and do. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Then fix the day. 

ULRIC 

'T is usual, 
And, ccrtes, courteous, to leave that to the lady. 

SIEGENDORF. 

/ will engage for her. 

ULRIC 

So will not / 
For any woman ; and as what I fix, 
I fain would see unshaken, when she gives 
Her answer, I'll give mine. 

SIEGENDORF. 

But 'tis your office 
To woo. 

ULRIC 

Count, 'tis a marriage of your making, 
So be it of your wooing ; but to please you 
I will now pay my duty to my mother, 
With whom, you know, the lady Ida is — 
What would you have? You have forbid my stirring 
For manly sports beyond the castle walls, 
And I obey ; you bid me turn a chambcrcr, 
To pick up gloves, and fans, and knitting-needles, 
And list to songs and tunes, and watch for smiles, 
And smile at pretty prattle, and look into 
The eyes of feminie, as though they were 
The stars receding early to our wish 
Upon the dawn of a world-winning battle — 
What can a son or man do more ? [Exit Ulric. 

SIEGENDORF (solll.l). 

Too much ! — 
Too much of duty and too little love ! 
He pays me in the coin he owes me not : 
For such hath been mv wa y w a rd fate, I could not 
Fulfil a parent's duties by his side 
Till now ; but love he owes me, for my thoughts 
Ne'er left him, nor my eyes long'd without tears 
To see my child again, and now I have found him* 
But how? obedient, but with coldness ; duteous 
In my sight, but with carelessness ; mysterious, 
Abstracted — distant — much given to long absencr, 
And where — none know — in league with the most riotom 
Of our young nobles: though, to do him justice, 
He never stoops down to their vulgar pleasures ; 
Yet there 's some tie between them which I cannot 



413 



BYRON'S WORKS 



Unuvcl. They look up to him — consult him — 
Throng round liim as a leader: but with me 
He hath no confidence ! Ah ! can I hope it 
After — what ! doth my father's curse descend 
Even to my child? Or is the Hungarian near 
To shed more blood, or — oh ! if it should be ! 
Spirit of Stralenheim, dost thou walk these walls 
To wither him and his — who, though they slew not, 
Unlatch'd the door of death for thee? 'T was not 
Our fault, nor is our sin : thou wert our foe, 
And yet I spared thee when my own destruction 
Slept with thee, to awake with thine awakening ! 
And only took — accursed gold ! thou liest 
Like poison in my hands ; 1 dare not use thee, 
Nor part from thee ; thou earnest in such a guise, 
Methinks thou wouldst contaminate all hands 
Like mine. Yet I have done, to atone for thee, 
Thou villanous gold ! and thy dead master's doom, 
Though he died not by me or mine, as much 
As if he were my brother ! I have ta'en 
His orphan Ida — cherish'd her as one 
Who will be mine. 

Enter an Attendant. 

ATTENDANT. 

The abbot, if it please 
Your excellency, whom you sent for, waits 
Upon you. [Exit Attendant. 

Enter the. Prior Albert. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Peace be with these walls, and all 
Within them ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

Welcome, welcome, holy father ! 
And may thy prayer be heard ! — all men have need 
Of such, and I 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Have the first claim to all 
The prayers of our community. Our convent, 
Erected by your ancestors, is still 
Protected by their children. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Yes, good father ; 
Continue daily orisons for us 
In these dim days of heresies and blood, 
Though the schismatic Swede, Gustavus, is 
Gone home. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

To the endless home of unbelievers, 
Where there is everlasting wail and woe, 
Gn&shing of teeth, and tears of blood, and fire 
Eternal, and the worm which dicth not ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

True, father : and to avert those pangs from one, 
Who, though of our most faultless, holy church, 
Yet died without its last and dearest offices, 
Which smooth the soul through purgatorial pains, 
1 have to offer humbly this donation 
In masses for his spirit. 

[Sieoendorf offers the gold which he had taken 
from Stralenheim. 

prior albert. 
Count, if I 
Receive it, 't is because I know too well 
Refusal would offend you. Be assured 



The largess shall be only dealt in alms, 
And every mass no less sung for the dead. 
Our house needs no donations, thanks to yours, 
Which has of old endow'd it ; but from you 
And yours in all meet things 't is fit we obey. 
For whom shall mass be said? 

siegendork {/altering). 

For — for — the acad 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

His name. 

SIEGENDORF. 

'T is from a soul, and not a name, 
I would avert perdition. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

I meant not 
To pry into your secret. We will pray 
For one unknown, the same as for the proudest. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Secret ! I have none ; but, father, he who 's gone 
Might have one; or, in short, he did bequeath — 
No, not bequeath — but I bestow this sum 
For pious purposes. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

A proper deed 
In the behalf of our departed friends. 

SIEGENDORF. 

But he, who 's gone, was not my friend, but foe, 
The deadliest and the staunchest. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Better still ! 
To employ our means to obtain heaven for the soul 
Of our dead enemies, is worthy those 
Who can forgive them living. 

SIEGENDORF. 

But I did not 
Forgive this man. I loathed him to the last, 
As he did me. I do not love him now, 
But 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Best of all ! for this is pure religion ! 
You fain would rescue him you hate from hell — 
An evangelical compassion ! — with 
Your own goW too ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

Father, 't is not my gold. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Whose then ? you said it was no legacy. 

SIEGENDORF. 

No matter whose — of this be sure, that he 
Who own'd it never more will need it, save 
In that which it may purchase from your altars : 
'T is yours, or theirs. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Is there no blood upon it? 

SIEGENDORF. 

No : but there 's worse than blood — eternal shame ! 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Did he who own'd it die in his bed 1 

SIEGENDORF. 

Alas! 
He did. 

PRIOR ALBERT, 

Son ! you relapse into revenge, 
If you regret your enemy's bloodless death. 

SIEGENDORF. 

His death was fathondessly deep in blood. 



WERNER. 



419 



PRIOR ALBERT. 

Vou said he died in his bed, not battle. 



SIEGENDORF. 



He 



Died, I scarce Know — oin — ne was stabb'd i' the dark, 

A nd now you have it — perish'd on his pillow 

By a cut-throat ! — ay ! you may look upon me ! 

1 am not the man. I '11 meet your eye on that point, 

As I can one day God's. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Nor did he die 
By means, or men, or instrument of yours ? 

SIEOENDORF. 

No ! by the God who sees and strikes ! 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Nor know you 
Who slew him? 

SIEGENDORF. 

I could only guess at one, 
And he to me a stranger, unconnected, 
As unemploy'd. Except by one day's knowledge, 
I never saw the man who was suspected. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

Then you are free from guilt. 

SIEGENDORF (eagerly). 

Oh ! am I ? — say ! 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

You have said so, and know best. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Father ! I have spoken 
The truth, and nought but truth, if not the whole: 
Vet say I am not guilty ! for the blood 
'Jf this man weighs on me, as if I shed it, 
Though by the Power who abhorreth human blood, 
I did not ! — nay, once spared it, when I might 
And couUl — ay, perhaps should — (if our self-safety 
Be e'er excusable in such defences 
Against the attacks of over-potent foes) ; 
But pray for him, for me, and all my house ; 
For, as I said, though I be innocent, 
{ know not why, a like remorse is on me 
As if he had fallen by me or mine. Pray for me, 
Father ! I have pray'd myself in vain. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

I will. 
Be comforted ! You are innocent, and should 
Be calm as innocence. 

SIEGENDORF. 

But calmness is not 
Alwavs the attribute of innocence : 
I feel it is not. 

PRIOR ALBERT. 

But it will be so, 
When the mind gathers up its truth within it. 
Remember the great festival to-morrow, 
In which you rank amidst our chiefest nobles, 
As well as your brave son ; and smooth your aspect ; 
Nor in the general orison of thanks 
For bloodshed stopt, let blood, you shed not, ris« 
A cloud upon your thoughts. This were to bo 
Too sensitive. Take comfort, and forget 
Such things, and leave remorse unto the guilty. 

[Exeunt. 



ACT V. 

SCENE I. 

A large and magnificent Gotliic Htdl in the Castle of 
Siegendorf, decorated with Trophies, Banners, and 
Arms of that Family. 

Enter Arnheim and Mf.ister, Attendants of Cow t 

SlEGENDORF. 
ARHHEIM. 

Be quick ! the count will soon return : the ladies 
Already are at the portal. Have you sent 
The messengers in se-xrch of him he seeks for? 

MEISTER. 

I have, in all directions, over Prague, 
As lar as the man's dress and figure could 
By your description track him. The devil take 
These revels ami processions' All the pleasure 
(If such there be) must fill to the spectators. 
I 'm sure none doth to us who make the show. 

AKNHEIM. 

Go to '. my lady countess conies. 

MEISTER. 

I 'd rather 
Ride a day's hunting on an outworn jade, 
Than follow in the train of a great man 
In these dull pageantries. 

ARNHEIM. 

Begone, and rail 

Within. [Exeunt. 

Enter the Countess Josephine, Siegendorf, and 

Ida Stralenheim. 

josephine. 

Well, Heaven be praised, the show is over ! 

IDA. 

How can you say so ! Never have I dreamt 
Of aught so beautiful! The flowers, the boughs, 
The banners, and the nobles, and the knights, 
The gems, the robes, the plumes, the happy faces, 
The coursers, and the incense, and the sun, 
Streaming through the stain'd windows, even the tombs, 
Which look'd so calm, and the celestial hymns, 
Which seem'd as if they rather came from heaven 
Than mounted there. The bursting organ's peal 
Rolling on high like a harmonious thunder , 
The white robes, and the lifted eyes ; the world 
At peace ! and all at peace with one anotner ! 
Oh, my sweet mother ! [Embracing Josephin* 

JOSEPHINE. 

My beloved child ! 
For such, I trust, thou shall be shortly. 

IDA. 

Oh! 
I am so already. Feel how my heart beats ! 

JOSEPHINE. 

It does, my love ; and never may t throb 
With aught more bitter ! 

IDA. 

Never shall it do so ! 
How should it? What should make us grieve? I hate 
To hear of sorrow : how can we be sad, 
Who love each other so entirely ? You, 
The count, and Ulric, and vour daughter, Ida. 



420 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



JOSEPHINE. 

Poor child ! 

IDA. 

Do you pity me? 

JOSEPHINE. 

No ; I but envy, 
And that in sorrow, not in the world's sense 
Of the universal vice, if one vice be 
More general than another. 

IDA. 

I '11 not hear 
A word against a world which still contains 
You and my Ulric. Did you ever see 
Aught like him? How he tower'd amongst them all! 
How all eyes follow'd him ! The flowers fell faster — 
Rain'd from each lattice at his feet, methought, 
Than before all the rest, and where he trod 
I dare be sworn that they grow still, nor e'er 
Will wither. 

JOSEPHINE 

You will spoil him, little flatterer, 
If he should hear you. 

IDA. 

But he never will. 
I dare not say so much to him — I fear him. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Why so ? he loves you well. 

IDA. 

But I can never 
Shape my thoughts of him into words to him. 
Besides, he sometimes frightens me. 

JOSEPHINE. 

How SO ? 
IDA. 

A cloud comes o'er his blue eyes suddenly, 
Yet he says nothing. 

JOSEPHINE. 

It is nothing : all men, 
Especially in these dark troublous times, 
Have much to think of. 

IDA. 

But I cannot think 
Of aught save him. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Yet there are other men, 
In the world's eye, as goodly. There 's, for instance, 
The young Count Waldorf,' who scarce once withdrew 
His eyes from yours to-day. 
IDA. 

I did not sec him, 
B'»t TJlric. Did you not see at the moment 
When all knelt, and l-wept? and yet methought 
Through my fast tears, though they were tliick and 

warm, 
I saw him smiling on me. 

JOSEPHINE. 

I could not 
See aught save heaven, to which my eyes were raised 
Together with the people's. 

IDA. 

I thought too 
Of heaven, although I look'd on Ulric. 

JOSEPHINE. 

Come, 
Ket us retire ; they will be here anon, 
Expectant of the banquet. We will lay 



Aside these nodding plumes and dragging trains. 

IDA. 

And, above all, these stiff and heavy jewels, 
Which make my head and heart ache, as both throb 
Beneath their glitter o'er my brow and zone. 
Dear mother, I am with you. [Exeunt 

Enter Count Siegendorf in full dress, from tlir 
sulcmnilu, and Ludwig. 

6IEGEND0RF. 

Is he not found ? 

LUDWIG. 

Strict search is making every where ; and if 
The man be in Prague, be sure he will be found. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Where's Ulric? 

LUDWIG. 

He rode round the other way, 
With some young nobles ; but he left them soon ; 
And, if I err not, not a minute since 
I heard his excellency, with his train, 
Gallop o'er the west drawbridge. 

Enter Ulric, splendidly dressed. 

SIEGENDORF (to LuDWIG). 

See they cease not 
Their quest of him I have described. [Exit Lu tjwia. 

Oh! Ulric, 
How have I long'd for thee ! 



Behold me ! 



ULRIC. 

Your wish is granted — 



SIEGENDORF. 

I have seen the murderer. 

ULRIC 

Whom? Where? 

SIEGENDORF. 

The Hungarian, who slew Stralenheim. 

ULRIC. 

You dream. 

SIEGENDORF. 

I live ! and as I live, I saw him — 
Heard him ! He dared to utter even my name. 

ULRIC 

What name ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

Werner ! 't was mine. 

ULKIC 

It must be so 
No more : forget it. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Never ! never ! all 
My destinies were woven in that name . 
It will not be engraved upon my tomb, 
But it may lead me there. 

ULRIC 

To the point — the Hungarian ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

Listen! — The church was throng'd; the hymn was raised! 
" Te Deum" peal'd from nations, rather than 
From choirs, in one great cry of " God be praised" 
For one day's peace after thrice ten dread years, 
Each bloodier than the former ; I arose, 
With all the nobles, and as I look'd down 
Along the lines of lifted faces, — from 
Our banner'd and escutcheon' d gallerv, I 



WERNER. 



4 C 21 



Saw, like a flash of lightning (for I saw 

A moment, and no more), what struck me sightless 

To all else — the Hungarian's face ; I grew 

Sick ; and when I recover'd from the mist 

Which curl'd about my senses, and again 

Look'd down, I saw him not. The thanksgiving 

Was over, and we march'd hack in procession. 

. ULRIC. 

Continue. 

SIEGENDORF. 

When we reach'd the Muldau's bridge, 
The joyous crowd above, the numberless 
Barks mann'd with revellers in their best garbs, 
Which shot along the glancing tide below, 
The decorated street, the long array, 
The clashing music, and the thundering 
Of far artillery, which seem'd to bid 
A long and loud farewell to its grea* doings, 
The standards o'er me, and the trampling* round, 
The roar of rushing thousands, all — all could not 
Chase this man from my mind ; although my senses 
No longer held him palpable. 

ULRIC. 

You saw him 
No more, then ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

I look'd, as a dying soldier 
Looks at a draught of water, for this man ; 
But still I saw him not ; but in his stead 

ULRIC. 

What in his stead ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

My eye for ever fell 
Upon vour dancing crest ; the loftiest, 
As on the loftiest and the loveliest head 
It rose the highest of the stream of plumes, 
Which overllow'd the glittering streets of Prague. 

ULRIC 

What 's this to the Hungarian ? 

S'EGENDORF. 

Much, for I 
Had almost then forgot him in my son, 
When just as the artillery ceased, and paused 
The music, and the crowd embraced in lieu 
Of shouting, I heard in a deep, low voice, 
Distinct and keener far upon my ear 
Than the late cannon's volume, this word — " Werner .'" 

ULRIC. 

Utter'd by 

SIEOENDORF. 

IIim ! I tum'd — and saw — and fell. 

ULRIC. 

And wherefore ? Were you seen ? 

SIEOENDORF. 

The officious care 
Of those around me dragg'd me from the spot, 
Seeing my faintness, ignorant of the cause ; 
You, too, were too remote in the procession 
(The old nobles being divided from their children) 
To aid me. 

ULRIC. 

But I'll aid you now. 

SIEGENDORF. 

In what ? 

ULRIC. 

In searching for this man, or when he's found, 

2 o 2 



What shall we do with him ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

I know not that. 

ULRIC. 

Then wherefore seek ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

Because I cannot rest 
Till he is found. His fate, and Slralenheim's, 
And ours, seem intertwisted ; nor can be 
Unravell'd, til! 

Enter an Attendant. 

ATTENDANT. 

A stranger, to wait on 
Your Excellency. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Who ? 

ATTENDANT. 

He gave no name. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Admit him, ne'erthelcss. 

[The Attendant introduces Gabor, and af- 
terwards exit. 

Ah! 

GABOR. 

'T is, then, Werner! 
SIEGENDORF (haughtily). 
The same you knew, sir, by that name ; and you ? 

gabor (looking round). 
I recognise you both ; father and son, 
It seems. Count, I have heard that you, or yours, 
Have lately been in search of me : I am here. 

SIF.GENDORF. 

I have sought you, and have found you ; you are charge^ 
(Your own heart may inform you why) with such 
A crime as [He pause* 

GABOR. 

Give it utterance, and then 
I '11 meet the consequences. 

SIEGENDORF. 

You shall do so— 
Unless 

GABOR. 

First, who accuses me ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

All things, 
If not all men : the universal rumour — 
My own presence on the spot — the place — the time— 
And every speck of circumstance, unite 
To fix the blot on you. 

GABOR. 

And on me only ? 
Pause ere you answer: is no other name, 
Save mine, stain'd in this business ? 

8IEGEND0RF. 

Trifling villain . 
Who play'st with thine own guilt ? Of all that breathe 
Thou best dost know the innocence of him 
'Gainst whom thy breath would blow thy bloody slander. 
But I will talk no further with a wretch, 
Further than justice asks. Answer at once, 
And without quibbling, to my charge. 

GABOR. 

'T is Talso ' 

SIEGENDORF. 

Who says so ? 



422 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



GABOR. 
I. 

SIEGENDORF. 

And how disprove it? 

OABOR. 

By 

The presence of the murderer. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Name him ! 

GABOR. 

He 

May have more names than one. Your lordship had so 
Once on a time. 

SIEGENDORF. 

If you mean me, I dare 
Your utmost. 

GABOR. 

You may do so, and in safety : 
I know the assassin. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Where is he ? 
gabor {pointing to Ulric). 

Beside you ! 
[Ulric rushes forward to attack Gabor; 
Siegendorf interposes. 

8IEGEND0RF. 

Liar and fiend ! but you shall not be slain ; 

These walls are mine, and you are safe within them. 

[He turns to Ulric. 
Ulric, repel this calumny, as I 
Will do. I avow it is a growth so monstrous, 
I could not deem it earth-born : but, be calm ; 
It will refute itself. But touch him not. 

[Ulric endeavours to compose himself. 

GABOR. 

Look at him, and then hear me. 

SIEGENDORF. 

(First to Gabor, and then looking at Ulric). 
I hear thee. 
My God ! you look 

ULRIC. 

How? 

SIEGENDORF. 

As on that dread night 
When we met in the garden. 

ulric (composes himself ). 
It is nothing. 

GABOR. 

Count, you are bound to hear me. I came hither 
Not seeking you, but sought. When I knelt down 
Amidst the people in the church, I dream'd not 
To find the beggar'd Werner in the seat 
Of senators and princes ; but you have call'd me, 
And we have met. 

SIEGENDORF. 

Go on, sir. 

GABOR. 

Ere I do so, 

Allow me to inquire who profited 

By Stralenheim's death ? Was 't I — as poor as ever ; 

And poorer by suspicion on my name. 

The baron lost in that last outrage neither 

Jewels nor gold ; his life alone was sought — 

A life which stood between the claims of others 

To honours and estates, scarce less than princely. 



SISGENEORF. 

These hints, as vague as vain, attach no less 
To mc than to my son. 

CABOR. 

I can't help that. 
But let the consequence alight on him 
Who feels himself the guilty one amongst us. 
I speak to you, Count Siegendorf, because 
I know you innocent, and deem you just. 
But ere I can proceed — Dare you protect mc '»— 
Dare you command me? 

[Siegendorf first looks at the Hungarian, and 
then at Ulric, who has unbuckled hit sabre, and 
is drawing lines with it on the floor — stiU in it* 
sheath. 
ulric (looks at his father, and says) 

Let the man go on ! 

GABOR. 

I am unarm'd, count — bid your son lay down 
His sabre. 

ulric (offers it to him contemptuously). 
Take it. 

GABOR. 

No, sir ; 't is enough 
That we are both unarm'd — I would not choose 
To wear a steel which may be stain'd with more 
Blood than came there in battle. 

ulric (casts the sabre from him in contempt). 
It — or some 
Such other weapon, in my hands — spared yours 
Once, when disarm'd and at my mercy. 

GABOR. 

True— 
I have not forgotten it : you spared me for 
Your own especial purpose — to sustain 
An ignominy not mine own. 

ULRIC 

Proceed. 
The tale is doubtless worthy the relater. 
But is it of my father to hear further ? 

[To SlEGENDOnlr- 
siegendorf (takes his son by the hand). 
My son ! I know mine own innocence — and doubt not 
Of yours — but I have promised this man patience ; 
Let him continue. 

GABOR. 

I will not detain you 
By speaking of myself much ; I began 
Life early — and am what the world has made me. 
At Frankfort, on the Oder, where I pass'd 
A winter in obscurity, it was 
My chance at several places of resort 
(Which I frequented sometimes, but not often) 
To hear related a strange circumstance, 
In February last. A martial force, 
Sent by the state, had, after strong resistance 
Secured a band of desperate men, supposed 
Marauders from the hostile camp. — They proved, 
However, not to be so — but banditti, 
Whom either accident or enterprise 
Had carried from their usual haunt — the forests 
Which skirt Bohemia— even into Lusatia. 
Many amongst them were reported of 
Ilifjli rank — and martial law slept for a time. 
At last they were escorted o'er the frontiers, 
And placed beneath the civil jurisdiction 



WERNER. 423 


Of the free town of Frankfort. Of tlieir fate, 


My purse, though slender, with you — you refused it. 


I know no more. 


SIEGENDORF. 


SIEGENDORF. 


Doth my refusal make a debt to you, 


And what is this to Uiric ? 


That thus you urge it ? 


GABOR. 


GABOR. 


Amongst them there was said to be one man 


Still you owe me something, 


Of wonderful endowments: — birth and fortune, 


Though not for that — and I owed you my safety, 


Youth, strength, and bea'ity, almost superhuman, 


At least my seeming safety — when the slaves 


And courage as unrivall'd, were proclaim'd 


Of Stralenheim pursued me on the grounds 


His by the public rumour; and his sway, 


That / had robb'd him. 


Not only over his associates but 


SIEGENDORF. 


His judges, was attributed to witchcraft. 


I conceal'd you — I, 


Such was his influence : — I have no great faith 


Whom, and whose house, you arraign, reviving vipei ' 


In any magic save that of the mine — 


GABOR. 


I therefore dcem'd him wealthy. — But my soul 


I accuse no man — save in my defence. 


Was roused with various feelings to seek out 


You, count ! have made yourself accuser — judge — 


This prodigy, if only to behold him. 


Your hall 's my court, your heart is my tribunal. 


SIEGENDORF. 


Be just, and / '11 be merciful. 


And did you so ? 


SIEGENDORF. 


GABOR. 


You merciful ! 


You'll hear. Chance favour'd me: 


You ! base calumniator ! 


A popular affray in the public square 


GABOR. 


Drew crowds together — it was one of those 


I. 'T will rest 


Occasions, where men's souls look out of them, 


With me at last to be so. You conceal'd me — 


And show them as they are — even in their faces : 


In secret passages known to yourself, 


The moment my eye met his — I exclaim'd 


You said, and to none else. At dead of night, 


"This is the man !" though he was then, as since, 


Weary with watching in the dark, and dubious 


With the nobles of the city. I felt sure 


Of tracing back my way — I saw a glimmer 


I had not err'd, and watch'd him long and nearly : 


Through distant crannies of a twinkling light. 


I noted down his form — his gesture — features, 


I follow'd it, and reach'd a door — a secret 


Stature and bearing — and amidst them all, 


Portal — which open'd to the chamber, where, 


'Midst every natural and acquired distinction, 


With cautious hand and slow, having first undone 


I could discern, methought, the assassin's eye 


As much as made a crevice of the fastening, 


And gladiator's heart. 


I look'd through, and beheld a purple bed, 


ulric {smiling'). 


And on it Stralenheim ! — 


The tale sounds well. 


SIEGENDORF. 


GABOR. 


Asleep! And yet 


And may sound better. — He appear'd to me 


You slew him — wretch ! 


One of those beings to whom Fortune bends 


GABOR. 


As she doth to the daring — and on whom 


He was already slain, 


The fates of others oft depend ; besides, 


And bleeding like a sacrifice. My own 


An indescribable sensation drew me 


Blood became ice. 


Near to this man, as if my point of fortune 


SIEGCNDORF. 


Was to be fix'd by him — There I was wrong. 


But he was all alone ! 


SIEGENDORF. 


You saw none else ! You did not see the 


And may not be right now. 


[He pauses from agitation. 


GABOR. 


GABOR. 


I follow'd him— 


No; 


Solicited his notice — and obtain'd it— 


He, whom you dare not name — nor even I 


Though not his friendship : — it was his intention 


Scarce dare to recollect — was not then in 


To leave the city privately — we left it 


The chamber. 


Together — and together we arrived 


SIEGENDORF (to UlMc). 


In the poor town where Werner was concealed, 


Then, my boy ! thou art guiltless still- 


And Stralenheim was succour'd Now we are on 


Thou bad'st me say / was so once — Oh ! now 


The verge — dare you hear further ? 


Do thou as much ! 


SIEGENDORF. 


GABOR. 


I must do so— 


Be patient ! I can not 


Or I have heard too much. 


Recede now, though it shake the very walls 


GABOR. 


Which frown above us. You remember, or 


I saw in you 


If not, your son does, — that the locks were changeu 


A man above his station — and if not 


Beneath his chief inspection— on the morn 


So high, as now I find you, ir my then 


Which led to this same night: how he had enter'd 


Conceptions — 't was that I had rarely seen 


He best knows — but within an antechamber. 


Men such as you appear'd in hcignt of mind, 


The door of which was half ajar — I saw 


In the most high of worldly rank ; you were 


A man who wash'd his bloody hands, and oft 


Poor — even to all save rags — I would have shared 


With stern and anxious glance gazed back upon 



424 BYRON'S WORKS. 


The bleeding body — but it moved no more. 


Been somewhat damaged in my name to save 


SIEGENDORF. 


Yours and your son's. Weigh well what I have said. 


Oh! God of fathers! 


SIEGENDORF. 


GABOR. 


Dare you await the event of a few minutes' 


I beheld his features 


Deliberation ? 


As I see yours — but yours they were not, though 


gabor (casts Iris eye on Ulric, who is leaning against 


Resembling them — behold them in Count Ulrie's ! 


a pillar). 


Distinct — as I beheld them — though the expression 


If I should do so ? 


Is not now what it then was ; — but it was so 


SIEGENDORF. 


When I first charged him with the crime : — so lately. 


I pledge my life for yours. Withdraw into 


SIEGENDORF. 


Tins tower. [Opens a turret door. 


This is so 


gabor (hesitatingly). 


gabor (interrupting him). 


This is the second safe asylum 


Nav — but hear me to the end ! 


You have offer'd me. 


Now you must do so. — I conceived myself 


SIEGENDORF. 


Betray'd by you and him (for now I saw 


And was not the first so ? 


There was some tie between you) into this 


GABOR. 


Pretended den of refuge, to become 


I know not that even now — but will approve 


The victim of your guilt; and my first thought 


The second. I have still a further shield. — 


Was vengeance : but though arm'd with a short poniard 


I did not enter Prague alone — and should I 


(Having lift my sword without), I was no match 


Be put to rest with Stralenheim — there arc 


For him at any time, as had been proved 


Some tongues without will wag in my behalf. 


That morning — either in address or force. 


Be brief in your decision ! 


I turn'd, and fled — i' the dark : chance, rather than 


SIEGENDORF. 


Skill, made me gain the secret door of the hall, 


I will be so— 


And thence the chamber where you slept — if I 


My word is sacred and irrevocable 


Had found ynu waking t Heaven alone can tell 


Within these walls, but it extends no further. 


What vengeance and suspicion might have prompted ; 


GABOR. 


But ne'er slept guilt as Werner slept that night. 


I '11 take it for so much. 


SIEGENDORF. 


siegendorf (points to Ulric's sabre, still upon 


And yet I had horrid dreams ! and such brief sleep — 


the ground). 


The stars had not gone down when I awoke — 


* Take also that— 


Whv didst thou spare me? I dreamt of my father — 


I saw you eye it eagerly, and him 


And now my dream is out ! 


Distrustfully. 


GABOR. 


gabor (takes vp the sabre). 


'T is not my fault, 


I will ; and so provide 


If I have read it. — Well ! I fled and hid me — 


To sell my life — not cheaply. 


Chance led me here after so many moons — 


[Gabor goes into the turret, which Siegendorf closes. 


And show'd me Werner in Count Siegendorf! 


siegendorf (advances to Ulric). 


Werner, whom I had sought in huts in vain, 


Now, Count Ulric! 


Inhabited the palace of a sovereign ! 


For son I dare not call thee — What say'st thou ? 


You sought me, and have found me — now you know 


ULRIC. 


My secret, and may weigh its worth. 


His tale is true. 


siegendorf (after a pause). 


siegendorf. 


Indeed ! 


True, monster ! 


GABOR. 


ULRIC. 


is it revenge or justice which inspires 


Most true, father; 


Your meditation ? 


And you did well to listen to it : what 


SIEGENDORF. 


We know, we can provide against. He must 


Neither — I was weighing 


Be silenced. 


The value of your secret. 


SIF.GENDORF. 


GABOR. 


Ay, with half of my domains ; 


You shall know it 


And with the other half, could he and thou 


At once — when you were poor, and I, though poor, 


Unsay this villany. 


Rich enough to relieve such poverty 


ULRIC. 


As might have envied mine, I offer'd you 


It is no time 


My purse — you would not share it : — I '11 be franker 


For trifling or dissembling. I have said 


With you ; you are wealthy, noble, trusted by 


His story 's true ; and he too must be silenced. 


The imperial powers — you understand me ? 


SIEGENDORF. 


SIEGENDORF. 


How so ? 


Yes.— 


UI.RIC. 


GABOR. 


As Stralenheim is. Are you so dull 


Not quite. You think me venal, and scarce true: 


As never to have hit on this before ? 


'T is no less true, however, that my fortunes 


When we met in the garden, what except 


Have made me both at present ; you shall aid me ; 


Discovery in the act could make me know 


1 would have aided you — and also have 


His death ? or had the prince's household been 



WERNER. 42.1 


Then summon'd, would the cry for the police 


No more to learn or hide: I know no fear, 


Been left, to such a stranger ? Or should I 


And have within these very walls men who 


Have loiter'd on the way? Or could you, Werner, 


(Although 1 you know them not) dare venture all things. 


The ohject of the baron's hate and fears, 


Von stand high with the state ; what passes here 


Have fled — unless by many an hour befuie 


Will not excite her too great curiosity : 


Suspicion woke? I sought and fathom'd you — 


Keep your own secret, keep a steady eye, 


Doubling if you were false or feeble ; I 


Stir not, and speak not ; — leave the rest to me : 


Perceived you were the latter ; and yet so 


We must have no third babblers thrust between us. 


Confiding have I found you, that I doubted 


[Exit Ulric. 


At times your weakness. 


SIEGENDORF (solus). 


SIEGENDORF. 


Am 1 awake? are th< sc my father's halls? 


Parricide ! no less 


And yon — my son ? Aly son ! mini s'r.o have ever 


Than common stabber ! What deed of my life, 


Abhorr'd both mystery and bldM, ai.<i y : 


Or thought of mine, could make you deem me fit 


Am plunged into the deepest hell of bow! 


For your accomplice ? 


I must be speedy, or more will be shod — 


ULRIC 


The Hungarian's! — Ulric — he halh partisans, 


Father, do not raise 


It seems. I might have guess'd as much. Oh fool' 


The devil you cannot lay, between us. This 


Wolves prowl in company. He hatfi the key 


Is time for union and for action, not 


(As I too) of the opposite door which leads 


For family disputes. While you were tortured 


Into the turret. Now then ! or once more 


Could / be calm? Think you that I have heard 


To be the father of fresh crimes — no 


This fellow's tale without some feeling ? you 


Than of the criminal ! Ho! Gabor! Gabor! 


Have taught me feeling for you and myself; 


[Exit into the turret, closing tlie duor after hxm. 


For whom or what else did you ever teach it ? 




SIEGENDORF. 




Oh ! my dead father's curse ! 't is working now. 

ULRIC. 




SCENE II. 


Let it work on ! the grave will keep it down ! 
Ashes are feeble foes : it is more easy 


The Interior of the Turret. 


To baffle such, than countermine a mole, 


Gabor and Siegendorf. 


Which winds its blind but living path beneath you. 


gabor. 


Yet hear me still ! — If you condemn me, yet 


Who calls? 


Remember who hath taught me once too often 


SIEGENDORF. 


To listen to him ! Who proclaim'd to me 


I — Siegendorf! Take these, and fly ' 


That there were crimes made venial by the occasion ? 


Lose not a moment ! 


That passion was our nature ? that the goods 


[Tears off a diamond star and oilier jrvils. an.1 


Of heaven waited on the goods of fortune ? 


tfirusts them into G A Bon's hand. 


JVlio show'd me his humarity secured 


GABOR. 


By his nerves only? Who deprived me of 


What am I to do 


All power to vindicate myself and race 


With these? 


In open day ? By his disgrace which stamp'd 


SIEGENDORF. 


(It might be) bastardy on me, and on 


Whate'er you will : sell them, or hoard. 


Himself— a felon's brand ! The man who is 


And prosper; but delay net — or you are lost! 


At once both warm and weak, invites to deeds 


OABOR. 


He longs to do, but dare not. Is it strange 


Vou pledged your honour for my safety ! 


That I should act what you could think ? We have done 


SIEGENDORF. 


With right or wrong, and now must only ponder 


And 


Upon effects, not causes. Stralenheim, 


Must thus redeem it. Fly ! I am not master, 


Whose life I saved, from impulse, as, unknown, 


It seems, of my own castle — of my own 


I would have saved a peasant's or a dog's, I slew, 


Retainers — nay, even of these very walls, 


Known as our (be — but not from vengeance. He 


Or I would bid them fall and crush me ! Fly! 


Was a rock in our way, which I cut through, 


Or you '11 be slain by 


As doth the bolt, because it stood between us 


GABOR. 


And our true destination — but not idly. 


Is it even so ? 


As stranger I preserved him, and he owed me 


Farewell, then ! Recollect, however, count, 


His life; when due, I but resumed the debt. 


You sought this fatal interview ! 


He, you, and I stood o'er a gulf, wherein 


SIEGENDORF. 


I have plunged our enemy. You kindled first 


I did : 


The torch — you show'd the path: now trace me that 


Let it not be more fatal still : — Begone! 


Of safety — or let me ! 


GABOR. 


SIEGENDORF. 

I have done with life ! 


By the same path I enter'd? 




SIEGENDORF. 


ULRIC. 




Let us have done with that which cankers life- 


Yes ; that 's safe stilt . 


Familiar feuds and vain recriminations 


But loiter not in Prague ; — you do not know 


Of things which cannot be undone. We have 
59 


With whom you have to deal. 



426 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



GAB 09. 

I know too well — 
And knew it crc yourself, unhappy sire ! 
Farewell" [Exit Gabor. 

siFGHNnoRF (joki and listening). 
He hath clcar'd the staircase. Ah ! I hear 
The door sound loud behind him ! he is safe ! 

Safe ! — Oli, my father's spirit! — I am faint 

[He leans down vpnn a stone seat, ■mar the wall 
of tlie tower, in a drooping posturt. 

Enter Ulkic, with otiiers armed, and with weapons 
drawn. 

ULRIC. 

Despatch ! — he 's there ! 

LUDWIO. 

Tlie count, my lord ! 
ulric {recognising Siegendorf). 

You here, sir ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

Yes : if you want another victim, strike ! 

ULnic {seeing him stript of his jewels). 
Where is the ruffian who hath plunder'd you ? 
Vassals, despatch in search of him ! You see 
'T was as I said, the wretch hath stript my father 
Of jewels which might form a prince's heirloom! 
Away ! I '11 follow you forthwith. 

[Exeunt all but Siegendorf and Ulric. 
What's this? 
Where is the villain ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

There are two, sir ; which 
Ate you in quest of? 

ULRIC. 

Let us hear no more 
Of this : he must be found. You have not let him 
Escape ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

He 's gone. 

ULRIC. 

With your connivance ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

With 
My fullest, freest aid. 

ULRIC. 

Then fare you well ! 

[Ulric is going. 

SIEGENDORF. 

clop ! I command — entreat — implore ! Oh, Ulric ! 
Will you then leave me ? 

ULRIC. 

What ! remain to be 
Denounced — dragg'd, it may be, in chains ; and all 
By your inherent weakness, half-humanity, 
Selfish remorse, and temporising pity, 
That sacrifices your whole race to save 
A wretch to profit by our ruin ! No, count, 
Henceforth you have no son ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

I never had one ; 
And would you ne'er had borne the useless name! 



Where will you go ? I would not serd you forth 
Without protection. 

ULRIC 

Leave that unto me. 
I am not alone ; nor merely the vain heir 
Of your domains: a thousand, ay, ten thousand 
Swords, hearts, and hands, are mine. 

SIKGENDORF. 

The foresters ! 
With whom the Hungarian found you first at Frank 
fort? 

ULRIC. 

Yes — men — who are worthy of the name ! Go tell 
Your senators that they look well to Prague ; 
Their feast of peace was early for the times ; 
There are more spirits abroad than have been L ; J 
With Wallenstein ! 

Enter Josephine and Ida. 

JOSEPHINE. 

What is't we hear? My Sieg^nJorP 
Thank Heaven, I see you safe ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

Safe! 

IDA. 

Yes, dear 1 . her 

SIEGENDORF. 

No, no ; I have no children : never more 
Call me by that worst name of parent. 

JOSEPHINE. 

What 
Means my good lord ? 

SIEGENDORF. 

That you have givew ! .' ] 
To a demon ! 

IDA {taking Ulric's hand). 
Who shall dare say this of U .1 \ 

SIEGENDORF. 

Ida, beware ! there 's blood upon that lm.d 

IDA {stooping to kiss it). 
I 'd kiss it off, though it were mine ! 

SIEGENDORF. 

It it re ' 

ULRIC. 

Away ! it is your father's ! [jf xit Ulric. 

IDA. 

Oh, great rj A ! 
And I have loved this man ! 

[Id a falls senseless — Josephine stands spcechlei 
with horror. 

SIEGENDORF. 

The wretch hath slain 
Them both ! — my Josephine ! we arc now alone ! 
Would we had ever been so ! — All is over 
For me ! — Now open wide, my sire, thy grave ; 
Thy curse hath dug it deeper for thy son 
In mine ! — The race of Sicgendorf is past! 



( 427 ) 
A DRAMA. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



This production is founded partly on the story of a 
Novel, called " The Three Brothers," published many 
years ago, from which M. G. Lewis's " Wood Demon" 
was also taken — and partly on the "Faust" of the great 
Goethe. The present publication contains the first two 
Parts only, and the opening chorus of the third. The 
rest may perhaps appear hereafter. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



MEN. 

Stranger, afterwards Cesar. 

Arnold. 

Bourbon. 

Philibert. 

Cellini. 

WOMEN. 
Bertha. 
Olimpia. 



Spirits, Soldiers, Citizens of Rome, Priests, 
Peasants, etc. 



DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



PART I. 



SCENE I.— A Forest. 
Enter Arnold and his mother Bertha. 

BERTHA. 



Out, hunchback ! 



ARNOLD. 

I was born so, mother ! 

BERTHA. 

Out! 

Thou incubus ! Thou nightmare ! Of seven sons 
The sole abortion 1 

ARNOLD. 

Would that I had been so, 
And never seen the light ■ 

BERTHA. 

I would so too ! 
But as thou hast — hence, hence — and do thy best. 
That back of thine may bear its burthen ; 't is 
More high, if not so broad as that of others. 

ARNOLD. 

It hears its burthen ; — but, my heart! will it 
Sustain that which you lay upon it, mother? 



I love, or at the least, I loved you : nothing, 
Save you, in nature, can love aught like me. 
You nursed me— do not kill me. 

BERTHA. 

Yes — I nursed thee 
Because thou wert my first-born, and I knew not 
If there would be another unlike thee, 
That monstrous sport of nature. But get hence. 
And gather wood ! 

ARNOLD. 

I will : but when I bring it, 
Speak to me kindly, Though my brothers are 
So beautiful and lusty, and as free 
As the free chase they follow, do not spurn me : 
Our milk has been the same. 

BERTHA. 

As is the hedgehog's 
Which sucks at midnight from the wholesome dam 
Of the young bull, until the milkmaid finds 
The nipple next day sore and udder dry. 
Call not thy brothers brethren ! call me not 
Mother ; for if I brought thee forth, it was 
As foolish hens at times hatch vipers, by 
Sitting upon strange eggs. Out, urchin, out ! 

[Exit BerthAi 

ARNOLD (so/us). 

Oh mother! She is gone, and I must do 

Her bidding ; — wearily but willingly 

I would fulfil it, could I only hope 

A kind word in return. What shall I do? 

[Arnold begins to cut icood : in doing this ht 
wounds one of his hands. 
My labour for the day is over now. 
Accursed be this blood that flows so fast ; 
For double curses will be my meed now 
At home. — What home? I have no home, no kin, 
No kind — nor made like other creatures, or 
To share their sports or pleasures. Must I bleed too, 
Like them ? Oh that each drop which falls to earth 
Would rise a snake to sting them as they have stung me ! 
Or that the devil, to whom they liken me, 
Would aid his likeness ! If I must partake 
His form, why not his power ? Is it because 
I have not his will too ? For one kind word 
From her who bore me, would still reconcile me 
Even to this hateful aspect. Let me wash 
The wound. 

[Arnold goes to a spring, and scoops to wasn 
his hand j he starts back. 
They are right ; and Nature's mirror shows mo 
What she hath made me. I will not look on it 
Again, and scarce dare think on 't. Hideous wretcn 
That I am ! The very waters mock me with 
My horrid shadow — like a demon placed 
Deep in the fountain to scare back the cattle 
From drinking therein. [He pause* 

And shall I live on. 



428 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



A burthen to the earth, myself, and shame 
Onto what bronght me into life? Thou blood, 
Which (lowest so freely from a scratch, let me 
Try if thou will not in a fuller stream 
Pour forth my woes for ever with thyself 
On earth, to which I will restore at once 
This hateful compound of her atoms, and 
Resolve back to her elements, and take 
The shape of any reptile save myself, 
And make a world for myriads of new worms! 
This knife ! now let me prove if it will sever 
This wither'd slip of nature's nightshade — my 
Vile form — from the creation, as it hath 
The green bough from the forest. 

[Arnold places the knife in the ground, with 

the point upwards. 

Now 't is set, 
And I can fall upon it. Yet one glance 
On the fair day, which sees no foul thing like 
Myself, and the sweet sun, which warrn'd me, but 
In vain. The birds — how joyously they sing ! 
So let them, for I would not be lamented : 
But let their merriest notes be Arnold's knell ; 
The falling leaves my monument ; the murmur 
Of the near fountain my sole elegy. 
Now, knife, stand firmly, as I fain would fall ! 

[As he rushes to throw himself upon the knife, 

his eye is suddenly caught by the fountain, 

v;hich seems in motion. 
The fountain moves without a wind : but shall 
The ripple of a spring change my resolve ? 
No. Yet it moves again ! the waters stir, 
Not as with air, but by some subterrane 
And rocking power of the internal world. 
What 's here ? A mis'. ! no more ? — 

[A cloud comes from the fountain. He stands 

gazing upon it : it is dispelled, and a tall 

black man comes towards him. 

ARNOLD. 

What would you ? Speak ! 
Spirit or man ? 

STRANGER. 

As man is both, why not 
Say both in one ? 

ARNOLD. 

Your form is man's, and yet 
You may be devil. 

STRANGER. 

So many men are that 
Which is so call'd or thought, that you n.ay add me 
To which you please, without much wrong to either. 
But come : you wish to kill yourself; — pursue 
Your purpose 

ARNOLD. 

You have interrupted me. 

STRANGER. 

What is that resolution which can e'er 

Be interrupted ? If I be the devil 

V ou deem, a single moment would have made you 

Mine, and for ever, by your suicide ; 

And yet my coming saves you. 

ARNOLD. 

I said not 
Vou were the demon, but that your approach 
W as like one. 



STRANGER. 

Unless you keep company 
With him (and you seem scarce used to such high 
Society), you can't tell how he approaches ; 
And fir his aspect, look upun the fountain, 
And then, on me, and judj;e which of us twain 
Looks likesl what the boors believe to be 
Their cloven-footed terror. 

ARNOLD. 

Do you — dare y»a 
To taunt me with my born deformity ! 

STRANGER. 

Were I to taunt a buffalo with this 

Cloven foot of thine, or the switt dromedary 

With thy sublime of humps, tho Ulimals 

Would revel in the compliment. And yet 

Both beings are more swift, m<'re strong, more mighty 

In action and endurance than thyself, 

And all the fierce and fair of the same kind 

With thee. Thy form is natural : 't was only 

Nature's mistaken largess to bestow 

The gifts which are of others upon man. 

ARNOLD. 

Give me the strength then ef the buffalo's foot, 
When he spurns high the dust, beholding his 
Near enemy ; or let me have the long 
And patient swiftness of the desert-ship, 
The helmless dromedary : — and I 'II bear 
Thy fiendish sarcasm with a saintly patience. 

STRANGER. 

I will. 

Arnold [with surprise). 
Thou canst ? 

STRANGER. 

Perhaps. Would you aught else J 

ARNOLD. 

Thou mockest ine. 

STRANGER. 

Not I. Why should I mock 
What all are mocking ? That 's poor sport, methinks. 
To talk to thee in human language (Cor 
Thou canst not yet speak mine), the forester 
Hunts not the wretched coney, but the boar, 
Or wolf, or lion, leaving paltry game 
To petty burghers, who leave once a-year 
Their walls, to fill their household caldrons with 
Such scullion prey. The meanest gibe at thee, — 
Now J can mock the mightiest. 

ARNOLD. 

Then waste not 
Thy time on me : I seek thee not. 

STRANGER. 

Your thoughts 
Are not far from me. Do not send me back : 
I am rot so easily recall'd to do 
Good service. 

ARNOLD. 

What wilt thou do for me ? 

STRANGER. 

Change 
Shapes with you, if you will, since yours so irks you 
Or form you to your wish in any shape. 

ARNOLD. 

Oh ! then you arc indeed the demon, for 
Nought else would wittingly wear mine. 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORM V -D. 



429 



STRANGER. 

I '11 show thee 
The brightest which the world e'er bore, and give thee 
Thy choice. 

ARNOLD. 

On what condition ? 

STRANGER. 

There 's a question ! 
An hour ago you would have given your soul 
To look like other men, and now you pause 
To wear the form of heroes. 

ARNOLD. 

No ; I will not. 
I must not compromise my soul. 

STRANGER. 

What soul, 
Worth naming so, would dwell in such a carcass ? 

ARNOLD. 

'T is an aspiring one, whate'er the tenement 

In which it is mislodged. But name your compact : 

Must it be sign'd in blood ? 

STRANGER. 

Not in your own. 

ARNOLD. 

Whose blood then ? 

STRANGER. 

We will talk of that hereafter. 
But I 'II be moderate with you, for I see 
Great things within you. You shall have no bond 
But your own will, no contract save your deeds. 
Are you content? 

ARNOLD. 

I take thee at thy word. 

STRANGER. 

Now then ! — 

[The Stranger approaches the fountain, and 
turns to Arnold. 
A little of your blood. 

ARNOLD. 

For what ? 

STRANGER. 

To mingle with the majic of the waters, 
And make the charm effective. 

Arnold {holding out hh wounded arm). 
Take it all. 

STRANGER. 

Not now. A few drops will suffice for this. 

[Tfie Stranger take? some of Arnold's blood in 
his hand, and rusts it into the fountain. 

Shadows of beauty ! 

Shadows of power! 
Rise to your duty — 

This is the hour! 
Walk lovely and pliant ! 

From the depth of this fountain, 
As the cloud-shapen giant 

Bestrides the Hartz mountain. 1 
Come as ye were, 

That our eyes may behold 
Tli'- model in air 

Of the form I will mould, 
Brieht as the Iris 

When ether is spann'd — 

1 This is a well-known ficrmnn superstition — a gigantic 
shadow produced by reflection on the Brocken. 
2P 



Such his desire is, [Pointing to Arnold, 

Such my command! 
Demons heroic — 

Demons who wore 
The form of the Stoic 

Or Sophist of yore — 
Or the shape of each victor, 

From Macedon's boy 
To each high Roman's picture, 

Who breathed to destroy — 
Shadows of beaut v ! 

Shadows of power ! 
Up to your duty — 

This is the hour ! 
[Various Phantoms arise from tlie waters, and 
pass in succession before the Stranger and 
Arnold. 

ARNOLD. 

What do I see ? 

STRANGER. 

The black-eyed Roman, with 
The eagle's beak between those eyes which ne'er 
Beheld a conqueror, or look'd along 
The land he made not Rome's, while Rome became 
His, and all theirs who heir'd his very name. 

ARNOLD. 

The phantom 's bald ; my quest is beauty. Could I 
Inherit but his fame with his defects ! 

STRANGER. 

His brow was girt with laurels more than hairs. 
You see his aspect — choose it or reject. 
I can but promise you his form ; his fame 
Must be long sought and fought for. 

ARNOLD. 

I will fight too. 
But not as a mock Caesar. Let him pass ; 
His aspect may be fair, but suits me not. 

STRANGER. 

Then you are far more difficult to plca?e 
Than Cato's sister, or than Brutus' mother, 
Or Clopatra at sixteen — an age 
When love is not less in the eye than heart. 
But be it so ! Shadow, pass on ! 

[The Phantom of Julius Casar disappears, 

ARNOLD. 

And can it 
Be, that the man who shook the earth is gone 
And left no footstep ? 

STRANGER. 

There you err. His substanco 
Left graves enough, and woes enough, and fame 
More than enough to track his memory ; 
But for his shadow, 't is no more than yours, 
Except a little longer and less crooked 
I' the sun. Behold another ! 

[.i second Phantom passe* 

ARNOLD. 

Who is he ? 

STRANGER. 

He was the fairest and the bravest of 
Athenians. Look upon him weil. 

ARNOLD. 

He is 
More lovely than the last. How beautiful ' 

STRAN3EK. 

Such was the curled son of Clinias ; — woulasl 'tum 



430 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Invest thee with his form ? 

ARNOLD. 

Would that I had 
Been born with it ! But since I may choose further, 
I will look further. 

[The Shade of Alcibiades disappears. 

BTRAI")ES. 

Lo ! Behold again ! 

ARNOLD. 

What! that low, swarthy, short-nosed, round-eyed satyr, 
With the wide nostrils and Silenus' aspect, 
The splay feet and low stature ! I had better 
Remain that which I am. 

STRANGER. 

And yet he was 
The earth's perfection of all mental beauty, 
And personification of all virtue. 
But you reject him ? 

ARNOLD. 

If his form could bring me 
That which redeem'd it — no. 

STRANGER. 

I have no power 
To promise that ; but you may try, and find it 
Easier in such a form, or in your own. 

ARNOLD. 

No. I was not born for philosophy. 

Though I have that about me which has need on 't. 

Let him fleet on. 

STRANGER. 

Be air, thou hemlock-drinker ! 
[The Shadow of Socrates disappears : another rises. 

ARNOLD. 

What 's here? whose broad brow and whose curly beard 

And manly aspect look like Hercules, 

Save that his jocund eye hath more of Bacchus 

Than the sad purger of the infernal world, 

Leaning dejected on his club of conquest, 

As if he knew the worthlessness of those 

For whom he had fought. 

STRANGER. 

It was the man who lost 
The ancient world for love. 

ARNOLD. 

I cannot blame him, 
Since I have risk'd my soul, because I find not 
That which he exchanged the earth for. 

STRANGER. 

Since so far 
You seem congenial, will you wear his features ? 

ARNOLD. 

No. As you leave me choice, I am difficult, 
If but to see the heroes I should ne'er 
Have seen else on this side of the dim shore 
Whence they float back before us. 

STRANGER. 

Hence, Triumvir ! 
Thv Cleopatra's waiting. 

[The Shade of Antony disappears : another rises. 

ARNOLD. 

Who is this ? 
Who truly looketh like a demigod, 
Blooming and bright, with golden hair, and stature, 
If not more high than mortal, yet immortal 
In all that nameless bearing of his limbs, 
Which he wears as the sun his rays — a something 



Which shines from him, and yet is but the flashing 
Emanation of a thing more glorious still. 
Was he e'er human only 1 

STRANGER. 

Let the earth speak, 
If there be atoms of him left, or even 
Of the more solid gold that furin'd his urn. 

ARNOLD. 

Who was this glory of mankind ? 

STRANGER. 

The shame 
Of Greece in peace, her thunderbolt in war- 
Demetrius the Macedonian, and 
Taker of cities. 

ARNOLD. 

Yet one shadow more. 
strancer (atldressing the Shadow). 
Get thee to Lamia's lap ! 

[The Shade of Demetrius Poliorcetes vanishes • 
another rises. 

STRANGER. 

I '11 fit you still, 
Fear not, my hunchback. If the shadow of 
That which existed please not your nice taste, 
I '11 animate the ideal marble, till 
Your soul be reconciled to her new garment. 

ARNOLD. 

Content ! I will fix here. 

stranger. 

I must commend 
Your choice. The god-like son of the sea-goddess. 
The unshorn boy of Peleus, with his locks 
As beautiful and clear as the amber waves 
Of rich Pactolus roll'd o'er sands of gold, 
Softened by intervening crystal, and 
Rippled like flowing waters by the wind, 
All vow'd to Sperchius as they were — behold them I 
And him — as he stood by Polyxena, 
With sanction'd and with soften'd love, before 
The altar, gazing on his Trojan bride, 
With some remorse within for Hector slain 
And Priam weeping, mingled with deep passion 
For the sweet downcast virgin, whose young hand 
Trembled in his who slew her brother. So 
He stood i' the temple ! Look upon him as 
Greece look'd her last upon her best, the instant 
Ere Paris' arrow flew. 

ARNOLD. 

I gaze upon him as 
As if I were his soul, whose form shall soon 
Envelop mine. 

STRANGER. 

You have done well. The greatest 
Deformity should only barter with 
The extremest beauty, if the proverb 's true 
Of mortals, that extremes meet. 

ARNOLD. 

Come! Be qtr'tr. f 
I am impatient. 

STRANGER. 

As a youthful beauty 
Before her glass. You both see what is not, 
But dream it is what must be. 

ARNOLD. 

Must I wait ? 

STRANGER. 

No ; tl at were pity. But a word or two : 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



431 



His stature is twelve cubits : would you so far 
Outstep these times, and be a Titan ? Or 
(To talk canonically) wax a son 
Of Anak? 

ARNOLD. 

Why not 7 

STRANGER. 

Glorious ambition ! 
I love thee most in dwarfs ! A mortal of 
Philistine stature would have gladly pared 
His own Goliath down to a slight David ; 
But thou, my manikin, wouldst soar a show 
Rather than hero. Thou shalt be indulged, 
If siu-h be thy desire ; and yet, by being 
A little less removed from present men 
In figure, thou canst sway them more; for all 
Would rise against thee now, as if to hunt 
A new-found mammoth ; and their cursed engines, 
Their culverins and so forth, would find way 
Through our friend's armour there, with greater ease 
Than the adulterer's arrow through his heel 
Which Thetis had forgotten to baptize 
In Styx. 

ARNOLD. 

Then let it be as thou deem'st best. 

STRANGER. 

Thou shalt be beauteous as the thing thou see'st, 
And strong as what it was, and 

ARNOLD. 

I ask not 

For valour, since deformity is oaring. 

It is its essence to o'ertake mankind 

By heart and soul, and make itself the equal — 

Ay, the superior of the rest. There is 

A spur in its halt movements, to become 

All that the others cannot, in such things 

As still are free to both, to compensate 

For stepdame Nature's avarice at first. 

They woo with fearless deeds the smiles of fortune, 

And oft, like Timour the lame Tartar, win them. 

SRANGER. 

Well spoken ! And thou doubtless wilt remain 
Form'd as thou art. I may dismiss the mould 
Of shadow, which must turn to flesh, to encase 
This daring soul, which could achieve no less 
Without it ? 

ARNOLD. 

Had no power presented me 
The possibility of change, I would 
Have done the best which spirit may, to make 
Its way, with all deformity's dull, deadly, 
Discouraging weight upon me, like a mountain, 
In feeling, on my heart as on my shoulders — 
A hateful and unsightly mole-hill to 
The eyes of happier man. I would have look'd 
On beauty in that sex which is the type 
Of all we know or dream of beautiful 
Beyond the world they brighten, with a sigh- 
Nat of love, but despair; nor sought to win, 
Though to a heart all love, what could not love me 
In turn, because of this vile crooked clog, 
Which makes me lonely. Nay, I could have borne 
It all, had not my mother spurn'd me from her. 
The she-bear licks her cubs into a sort 
Of shape : — mv dam beheld my shaDe was hopeless. 



Had she exposed me, like the Spartan, ere 
I knew the passionate part of life, I had 
Been a clod of the valley, — happier nothing 
Than what I am. But even thus, the lowest, 
Ugliest, and meanest of mankind, what courage 
And perseverance could have done, perchance, 
Had made me something — as it has made heroes 
Of the same mould as mine, i'ou lately saw mo 
Master of my own life, and quick to quit it ; 
And he who is so is the master of 
Whatever dreads to die. 

STB ANGER. 

Decide between 
What you have been, or will be. 

ARNOLD. 

I have done so. 
You have open'd brighter prospects to my eyes, 
And sweeter to my heart. As I am now, 
I might be. fear'd, admired, respected, loved, 
Of all save those next to me, of whom I 
Would be beloved. As thou showest me 
A choice of forms, I take the one I view. 
Haste! haste! 

STRANGER. 

And what shall / wear ? 

ARNOLD. 

Surely he 
Who can command all fo' ms, will choose the highest, 
Something superior even '0 that which was 
Pelides now before us. Perhaps his 
Who slew him, that of Paris : — or — still higher — 
The poet's god, clothed in such limbs as are 
Themselves a poetry. 

STRANGER. 

Less will content me ; 
For I too love a change. 

ARNOLD. 

Your aspect is 
Dusky, but not uncomely. 

STRANGER. 

If I chose, 
I might be whiter ; but I have a penchant 
For black — it is so honest, and besides 
Can neither blush with shame nor pale with fear ■ 
But I have worn it long enough of late, 
And now I 'U lake your figure. 

ARNOLD. 

Mine ! 

STRANGER. 

Yes. You 

Shall change with Thetis' son, and I with Bertha 
Your mother's offspring. People have their tastes , 
You have yours — I mine. 

ARNOLD. 

Despatch ! despatch ! 

STRANGER. 

Even so. 
[The Stranger takes somr earth and mould* 
it along the turf; and then addresse* A* 
Phantom of Achilles. 

Beautiful shadow 

Of Thetis's boy ! 
Who sleeps in the meadow 

Whose grass grows o er Trov : 



432 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



From the red earth, like Adam,' 

Thy likeness I shape, 
As i!u: Being who made him, 

Whose actions I ape. 
Thou clay, be all glowing, 

Till the rose in his cheek 
Be as fair as, when blowing, 

II w<:irs its first streak ! 
Ye violets, I scatter, 

Now turn into eyes ! 
And thou sunshiny water, 

Of blood take the guise ! 
Let these hyacinth boughs 

Be his long, flowing hair, 
And wave o'er his brows, 

As thou wavest in air ! 
Let his heart be this marble 

I tear from the rock ! 
But his voice as the warble 

Of birds on yon oak ! 
Let his flesh be the purest 

Of mould, in which grew 
The lily-root surest, 

And drank the best dew! 
Let his limbs be the lightest 

Which clay can compound ! 
And his aspect the brightest 

On earth to be found ! 
Elements, near me, 

Be mingled and stirr'd, 
Know me and hear me, 

And leap to my word ! 
Sunbeams, awaken 

This earth's animation ! 
'T is done ! He hath taken 

His stand in creation ! 
[Arnold falls senseless ; his soul passes into 

the shape of Achillea, which rises from the 

ground , while the phantom has disappeared, 

part by part, as the figure was formed from 

the earth. 
ARNOLD {in his new form). 
• I love, and I shall be beloved !• Oh life ! 
At last I feel thee ! Glorious spirit ! 

STRANGER. 

Stop! 
What shall become of your abandon'd garment, 
Your hump, and lump, and clod of ugliness, 
Which late you wore, or were ? 

ARNOLD. 

Who cares 7 Let wolves 
And vultures take it, if they will. 

STRANGER. 

And if 
1 hey do, and are not scared by it, you '11 say 
It must be peace time, and no better faro 
Abroad i' the fields. 

ARNOLD. 

Let us but leave it there, 
Hk> matter what becomes on 't. 

6TRANGER. 

That 's ungracious, 
If not ungrateful. Whatsoe'er it be, 



1 Adam means "red earth," from which the first man was 
Itemed 



It hath sustain'd your sou! full many a day. 

ARNOLD. 

Ay, as the dunghill may conceal a gem 
Which is now set in gold, as jewels should be. 

STRANGER. 

But if I give another form, it must be 
By fair exchange, not robbery. For they 
Who make men without women's aid, have long 
Had patents for the same, and do not love 
Your interlopers. The devil may take men, 
Not make them, — though he reap the benefit 
Of the original workmanship : — and therefore 
Some one must be found to assume the shape 
You have quitted. 

ARNOLD. 

Who would do so ? 

STRANGER. 

That I know not, 
And therefore I must. 

ARNOLD. 

You! 

STRANGER. 

I said it, ere 
You inhabited your present dome of beauty. 

ARNCLD. 

True. I forget all things in the new joy 
Of this immortal change. 

STRANGER. 

In a few moments 
I will be as you were, and you shall see 
Yourself for ever by you, as your shadow. 

ARNOLD. 

I would be spared this. 

6TRANGER. 

But it cannot be. 
What ! shrink already, being what you are, 
From seeing what you were? 

ARNOLD. 

Do as thou wilt. 
stranger {to the late form of Arnold, extended on 
the earth). 
Clay! not dead, but soulless ! 

Though no man would choose thee, 
An immortal no less 

Deigns not to refuse thee. 
Clay thou art: and unto spirit 
All clay is of equal merit. 

Fire ! without which nought can live ; 

Fire ! but in which nought can live, 
Save the fabled salamander, 
Or immortal souls which wander, 

Praying what doth not forgive, 

Howling for a drop of water, 

Burning in a quenchless lot : 

Fire ! the only element 

Where nor fish, beast, bird, nor worm. 

Save the worm which dieth not, 
Can preserve a moment's form, 

But must with thyself be blent : 

Fire ! man's safeguard and his slaughter • 

Fire ! creation's first-born daughter, 
And destruction's threaten'd son, 
When Heaven with the world hath dow 

Fire ! assist me to renew 

Life in what lies in my view 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



433 



Stiff and cold ! 
His resurrection rests with me arid you ! 
One little marshy spark of tiame — 
And he again shall seem the same; 
But I his spirit's place shall hold ! 
[An ignia-fatuux Jliis through the wood, and rests 
on the brow of the body. The Stranger disap- 
pears : the body risis. 

ar.nold (in Ins newform). 
Oh! horrible! 

stranger (in Arnold's late shape). 
What! trcmblest thou? 

ARNOLD. 

Not so— 
I merely shudder. Where is fled the shape 
Thou lately worcst ! 

STRANGER. 

To the world of shadows. 
But let us thread the present. Whither wilt thou' 

ARNOLD. 

Must thou be my companion ? 

STRANGER. 

Wherefore not ? 
Your betters keep worse company. 

ARNOLD. 

My betters ! 

STRANCER. 

Oh ! you wax proud, I see, of your new form : 
I 'm glad of that. Ungrateful too ! That 's well ; 
You improve apace : — two changes in an instant, 
And you are old in the world's ways already. 
But bear with me : indeed you '11 find me useful 
Upon your pilgrimage. But come, pronounce 
Where shall we now be errant? 

ARNOLD. 

Where the world 
Is thickest, that I may behold it in 
Its working. 

STRANGER. 

That 's to say, where there is war 
And woman in activity. Let 's see ! 
Spain — Italy — the new Atlantic world — 
Afric with all its Moors. In verv truth, 
There is small choice: the whole race are just now 
Tugging as usual at each others' hearts. 

ARNOLD. 

I have heard great things of Rome. 

STRANGER. 

A goodly choice — 
And scarce a better to be found on earth, 
Since Sodom was put out. The field is wide too ■ 
For now the Frank, and Hun, and Spanish scion 
Of the old Vandals, arc at play along 
The sunny shores of the world's garden. 

ARNOLD. 

How 

Shall we proceed? 

STRANGFR. 

Like gallants on good coursers. 
What ho ! my chargers ! Never yet were better, 
Since Phaeton was upset into the Po. 
Our pages too! 

Enter two Pagis, with four coal-black Horses. 

ARNOLD. 

A noble sight ! 
2 r "2 60 



STRANGER. 

And of 
A nobler brcfd. Match me in Barbary, 
Or your Kochlani race of Araby, 
With these ! 

ARNOLD. 

The mighty stream, which volumes high 
From their proud nostrils, burns the verv air; 
And sparks of flame, like dancing fire-tlies, wli^el 
Around their manes, as common insects swarm 
Round common steeds towards subset. 

STRANGER. 

Mount, my lord, 
They and I are your servitors. 

ARNOLD. 

And these, 
Our dark-eyed pages — what may be their names? 

STRANGER. 

You shall baptize them. 

ARNOLD. 

What ! in holy water? 

STRANGER. 

Why not? The deeper sinner, better saint. 

ARNOLD. 

They are beautiful, and cannot, sure, be demons ? 

STRANGER. 

True ; the devil 's always ugly ; and your beauty 
Is never diabolical. 

ARNOLD. 

I '11 call him 
Who bears the golden horn, and wears such bright 
And blooming aspect, Hunn ; for he looks 
Like to the lovely boy lost in the forest, 
And never found till now. And for the other 
And darker, and more thoughtful, who smiles not, 
Rut looks as serious though serene as night, 
He shall be Memnon, from the Ethlop king, 
Whose statue turns a haqier once a-day. 
And you ? 

STRANGER. 

I have ten thousand names, and twice 
As many attributes ; but as I wear 
A human shape, will take a human name. 

ARNOLD. 

More human than the shape (though it was mine once) 
I trust. 

STRANGER. 

Then call me Ca:sar. 

ARNOLD. 

Why, that name 
Belongs to empires, and has been but borne 
By the world's lords. 

STRANGER. 

And therefore fittest for 
The devil in disguise — since so you deem me, 
Unless you call me pope instead. 

ARNOLD. 

Well then, 
Caesar thou shalt be. For myself, my name 
Shall be plain Arnold still. 

CESAR. 

We '11 add a title— 
"Count Arnold :" it hath no ungracious sound, 
And will look well upon a billet-doux. 

ARNOLD. 

Or in an order for a battle-field. 



fXSIB (.Wigs). 

To horse ! to horse ! my coal-black steed 
Paws the ground and snuffs the air ! 

There 's not a foal of Arab's breed 
More knows whom he must bear ! 

On the hill he will not tire, 

Swifter as it waxes higher ; 

In the marsh he will not slacken, 

On the plain be overtaken ; 

In the wave he will not sink, 

Nor pause at the brook's side to drink ; 

In the race he will not pant, 

In the combat he '11 not faint ; 

On the stones he will not stumble, 

Tune nor toil shall make him humble : 

In the stall he will not stiffen, 

But be winged as a griffin, 

Only flying with his feet : 

And will not such a voyage be sweet? 

Merrily ! merrily ! never unsound, 

Shall our bonny black horses skim over the ground! 

From the Alps to the Caucasus, ride we, or tly ! 

For we'll leave them behind in the glance of an eye. 
[They im.unl their horses, and disappear. 



SCENE II. 

A Camp before the IVcdU of Rome. 

Arnold and Cesar. 
Caesar. 
Fou are well enter'd now. 

ARNOLD. 

Ay ; but my path 
Has been o'er carcasses : mine eyes are full 
Of blood. 

CESAR. 

Then wipe them, and see clearly. Why ! 
Thou art a conqueror ; the chosen knight 
And Iree companion of the gallant Bourbon, 
Late constable of France ; and now to be 
Lord of the city which hath been earth's lord 
Under its emperors, and — changing sex, 
Not sceptre, a hermaphrodite of empire — 
Lady of the world. 

ARNOLD. 

HowoM? What! arc there 
New worlds ? 

CESAR. 

To you. You 'II find there are such shortly 
By its rich harvests, new disease, and gold ; 
From one half of the world named a u,7io/e new one, 
Because you know no better than the dull 
And dubious notice of your eyes and ears. 

ARNOLD. 

I 'U trust them. 

CESAR. 

Do ! They will deceive you sweetly, 
And that is better than the bitter truth ! 



Dog! 



Man : 



ARNOLD. 
CESAR. 
ARNOLD. 



Devil ' 



C£SAR. 

Your obedient, humble servant. 

ARNOLD. 

Say master rather. Thou hast lured me on, 
Through scenes of blood and lust, till I am here. 

C£SAR. 

And where wouldst thou be ? 

ARNOLD. 

Oh, at peace — in peace! 

CESAR. 

And where is that which is so ? From the star 

To the winding worm, all life is motion, and 

In life commotion is the extremest point 

Of life. The planet wheels till it becomes 

A comet, and, destroying as it sweeps 

The stars, goes out. The poor worm winds its waj 

Living upon the death of other things, 

But still, like them, must live and die, the subject 

Of something which has made it live and die. 

You must obey what all obey, the rule 

Of fix'd necessity : against her edict 

Rebellion prospers not. 

ARNOLD. 

And when it prospers— 

CJSAR. 

'T is no rebellion. 

ARNOLD. 

Will it prosper now ? 

CJESAR. 

The Bourbon hath given orders for the assault, 
And by the dawn there will be work. 

AK.NOLD. 

Alas! 
And shall the city yield? I see the giant 
Abode of the true God, and his true saint, 
Saint Peter, rear its dome and cross into 
That sky whence Christ ascended from the cross, 
Which his blood made a badge of glory and 
Of joy (as once of torture unto him, 
God and God's son, man's sole and only refuge). 

CESAR. 

'T is there, and shall be. 

ARNOLD. 

What? 

CESAR. 

The crucifix 
Above, and many altar shrines below, 
Also some culverins upon tiie walls, 
And harquehusses, and what not, besides 
The men who arc to kindle them to death 
Of other men. 

ARNOLD. 

And those scarce mortal arches, 
Pile above pile of everlasting wall, 
The theatre where emperors and their subjects 
(Those subjects Romans) stood at gaze upon 
The battles of the monarchs of the wild 
And wood, the lion and his tusky rebels 
Of the then untamed desert, brought to joust 
In the arena (as right well they might. 
When they had left no human foe uno.iii.ufc. 
Made even the forest pay its tribute of 
Life to their amphitheatre, as well 
As Dacia men to die the eternal death 
For a sole instant's pastime, and "Pass on 
To a new gladiator !" — Must it fall? 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



43o 



CESAR. 

The city or the amphitheatre ? 

The church, or one, or all ? for you confound 

Both them and me. 

ARNOLD. 

To-morrow sounds the assault 
With the first cock-crow. 

CESAR. 

Which, if it end with 
The evening's first nightingale, will be 
Something new in the annals of great sieges : 
For men must have their prey after long toil. 

ARNOLD. 

The sun goes down as calmly, and perhaps 
More beautifully, than he did on Rome 
On the day Remus leapt her wall. 

CESAR. 

I saw him. 

ARNOLD. 

Fou! 

CESAR. 

Yes, sir. You forget I am or was 
Spirit, till I took up with your cast shape 
And a worse name. I 'm Cssar and a hunchback 
Now. Well ! the first of Caesars was a bald-head, 
And loved his laurels better as a wig 
(So history says) than as a glory. Thus 
The world runs on, but we '11 be merry still. 
I saw your Romulus (simple as I am) 
Slay his own twin, quick-born of the same womb, 
Because he leapt a ditch ('t was then no wall, 
Whate'er it now be) ; and Rome's earliest cement 
Was brother's blood ; and if its native blood 
Be spilt till the choked Tiber be as red 
As e'er 't was yellow, it will never wear 
The deep hue of the ocean and the earth, 
Which the great robber sons of Fratricide 
Have made their never-ceasing scene of slaughter 
For ages. 

ARNOLD. 

But what have these done, their far 
Remote descendants, who have lived in peace, 
The peace of heaven, and in her sunshine of 
Piety ? 

CESAR. 

And what had they done whom the old 
Romans o'erswept? — Hark ! 

ARNOLD. 

They are soldiers singing 
A reckless roundelay, upon the eve 
Of many deaths, it may be of their own. 

CESAR. 

And why should they not sing as well as swans? 
They are black ones, to be sure. 

ARNOLD. 

So, you are leam'd, 
see, too. 

CESAR. 

In my grammar, certes. I 
Was educated for a monk of all times, 
And once I was well versed in the forgotten 
Etruscan letters, and — were I so minded— 
Could make their hieroglyphics plainer than 
Your alphabet. 

ARNOLD. 

And wherefore do you not ? 



CESAR. 

It answers better to resolve the alphabet 

Back into hieroglyphics. Like your statesman, 

And prophet, pontiff, doctor, alchymist, 

Philosopher, and what not, they have built 

More Babels without new dispersion, than 

The stammering young ones of the Hood's dull ooze, 

Who faiPd and tied each other. Why? why, marry, 

Because no man could understand his neighbour. 

They are wiser now, and will not separate 

For nonsense. Nay, it is their brotherhood, 

Their Shibboleth, their Koran, Talmud, their 

Cabala; their best bnck-work, wherewithal 

They build more 

ARNOLD (interrupting him). 

Oh ! thou everlasting sneerer ' 
Bo silent ! How the soldiers' roiii;li strain seems 
Softcn'd by distance to a hymn-like cadence ! 
Listen ! 

CESAR. 

Yes. I have heard the angels sing. 



And demons howl. 



CESAR. 

And man loo. Let us listen 



I love all music. 



Song of the soldiers within. 

The Black Bands came over 

The Alps and their snow, 
With Bourbon, the rover, 

They pass'd the broad Po. 
We have beaten all foemen, 

We have captured a king, 
We have tum'd back on no men, 

And so let us sing! 
Here 's the Bourbon for ever ! 

Though penniless all, 
We'll have one more endeavour 

At yonder old wall. 
With the Bourbon we '11 gather 

At day-dawn before 
The gates, and together 

Or break or climb o'er 
The wall : on the ladder, 

As mounts each firm foot, 
Our shout shall grow gladder, 

And death only be mute. 
With the Bourbon we '11 mount e'er 

The walls of old Rome, 
And who then shall count o'er 

The spoils of each dome'' 
Up ! up ! with the lily ! 

And down with the keys'. 
In old Rome, the Seven-hilly, 

We '11 revel at ease : 
Her streets shall be gory, 

Her Tiber all red, 
And her temples so hoary 

Shall clang with our tread. 
Oh ! the Bourbon ! the Bourbon ' 

The Bourbon for aye ! 
Oi our song bear the burthen ! 

And fire, fire away ! 
With Spain for the vanguard, 

Our varied host comes ; 



43b 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



And next to the Spania-J 

Beat Germany's drums ; 
And Italy's lances 

Are couch'd at their mother ; 
But our leader from France is, 

Who warr'd with his brother. 
Oh, the Bourbon! the Bouibon! 

Sans country or home, 
We '11 follow the Bourbon, 

To plunder old Rome. 

CESAR. 

An indifferent song 
For those within the walls, methinks, to hear. 

ARNOLD. 

Vcs, if thoy keep to their chorus. But here comes 

The general with his chiefs and men of trust. 

A goodly rebel ! 

Enter the Constable Bourbon, "cumsuis," etc., etc., etc. 

PHILIBERT. 

How now, noble prince, 
You are not cheerful ? 

BOURBON. 

Why should I be so? 

PHILIBERT. 

Upon the e>e of conquest, such as ours, 
Most men would be so. 

BOURBON. 

If I were secure ! 

PHILIBERT. 

Doubt not our soldiers. Were the walls of adamant, 
They 'd crack them. Hunger is a sharp artillery. 

BOURBON. 

That they will falter, is my least of fears. 
That they will be repulsed, with Bourbon for 
Their chief, and all their kindled appetites 
To marshal them on — were those hoary walls 
Mountains, and those who guard them like the gods 
Of the old fables, I would trust my Titans ; — 
But now 

PHILIBERT. 

They are but men who war with mortals. 

BOJRBON. 

True : but those walls have girded in great ages, 

And sent forth mighty spirits. The past earth 

And present phantom of imperious Rome 

Is peopled with those warriors ; and methinks 

They flit along the eternal city's rampart, 

And stretch their glorious, gory, shadowy hands, 

And beckon me away ! 

PHILIBERT. 

So let them ! Wilt thou 
Turn back from shadowy menaces of shadows ? 

BOURBON. 

They do not menace me. I could have faced, 
Methinks, a Sylla's menace ; but they clasp 
And raise, and wring their dim and deathlike hands, 
And with their thin aspen faces and fixed eyes 
Fascinate mine. Look there ! 

PHILIBERT. 



A lofty battlement. 



I look upon 



BOURBON. 

And there! 

PHILIBERT. 

Not even 



A guard in sight ; they wisely keep below, 
Shclter'd by the gray parapet, from some 
Stray bullet of our lansquenets, who inig.V. 
Practise in a cool twilight. 

BOURBON. 

You are blind. 

PHILIBERT. 

If seeing nothing more than may be seen 
Be so. 

BOURBON. 

A thousand years have mann'd the walls 
With all their heroes, — the last Cato stands 
And tears his bowels, rather than survive 
The liberty of that I would enslave ; 
And the first Ca;sar with his triumphs flits 
From battlement to battlement. 

PHILIBERT. 

Then conquer 
The walls for which he conquer'd, and be greater ! 

BOURBON. 

True : so I will, or perish. 

PHILIEERT. 

You can not. 
In such an enterprise, to die is rather 
The dawn of on eternal day, than death. 

Count Arnold and Cesar advance. 

CESAR. 

And the mere men — do they too sweat beneath 
The noon of this same ever-scorching glory? 

BOURBON. 

Ah; 
Welcome the bitter hunchback ! and his master, 
The beauty of our host, and brave as beauteous, 
And generous as lovely. We shall find 
Work for you both ere morning. 

CESAR. 

You will find, 
So please your highness, no less for yourself. 

BOURBON. 

And if I do, there will not be a labourer 
More forward, hunchback ! 

CESAR. 

You may well say so, 
For you have seen that back — as general, 
Placed in the rear in action — but your foes 
Have never seen it. 

BOURBON. 

That 's a fair retort, 
For I provoked it: — but the Bourbon's breast 
Has been, and ever shall be, far advanced 
In danger's face as yours, were you the devil. 

CESAR. 

And if I were, I might have saved myself 
The toil of coming here. 

PHILIBERT. 

Why so? 

CESAR. 

One half 
Of your brave bands of their own bold accord 
Will go to him, the other half be sent, 
More swiftly, not less surely. 

BOURBON. 

Arnold, your 
Slight crooked friend 's as snake-like in his worda 
As his deeds. 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



437 



CfiSAR. 

Your h\ghness much mistakes me. 
rhe first snake was a flatterer— I am none ; 
4nd for my deeds, I only sting when stung. 

BOURBON. 

You are brave, and that 's enough for me : and quick 
In speech as sharp in action — and '.hat 's more. 
I am not alone a soldier, but the soldiers' 
Comrade. 

CESAR. 

They are but bad company, your highness ; 
And worse even for their friends than foes, as being 
More permanent acquaintance. 

PHILIBERT. 

How now, fello'v ! 
Thou waxest insolent, beyond the privilege 
Of a buffoon. 

CESAR. 

You mean, I speak the truth. 
I '11 lie — it is as easy ; then you '11 praise me 
For calling you a hero. 

BOURBON. 

Philibert ! 
Let mm alone ; he 's brave, and ever has 
Been first with that swart face and mountain shoulder 
In field or storm ; and patient in starvation ; 
And for his tongue, the camp is ful' of licence, 
And the sharp stinging of a lively rogue 
Is, to my mind, far preferable to 
The gross, dull, heavy, gloomy execration 
Of a mere famish'd, sullen, grimbling slave, 
Whom nothing can convince save a full meal, 
And wine, and sleep, and a few maravedis, 
With which he deems him tich. 

CESAR. 

It would be well 
If the earth's princes as'.c'd no more. 

FOURBON. 

Be silcr.! 

CESAR. 

Ay, but not idle. Work yourself with w ,rds ! 
You have few to s»ieak. 

PHJt.IBERT. 

Wnat jneans the audacious prater ? 

CESAR. 

To prate, like uthtt prophets. 

BOURBON. 

Pnilibert ! 
Why will y m vex him ? Have we not enough 
To think en ? Arnold! I wi)'. lead the attack 
To-morrr w. 

ARNOLD. 

I have heaid as much, my lord. 

BOUREON. 

nd you will fullow ? 

ARNOLD. 

Since I must not lead. 

BOURBON. 

T is necessan, for the further daring 
Of our too needy army, that their chief 
Plan', the fiist foot upon the foremost ladder's 
First step . 

CISAR, 

Upon its topmost, let us hope : 
So shall he have his full deserts. 



BOUREON. 

The world's 
Great capital perchance is ours to-morrow. 
Through every change the seven-hill'd city hath 
Retain'd her sway o'er nations, and the Crusars 
But yielded to the Alarics, the Alarica 
Unto the pontiffs. Roman, Goth, or priest, 
Still the world's masters! Civilized, barbarian, 
Or saintly, still the walls of Romulus 
Have been the circus of an empire. Well ! 
'T was their turn — now 't is ours ; and let us hope 
That we will fight as well, and lule much better. 

CESAF. 

No doubt, the camp 's the school of civic rights. 
What would you make of Kume 1 

BOl'RBON. 

That which it was. 

CESAR. 

In Alaric's time ? 

BOURBON. 

No, slave ! In the first Caesar's, 
Whose name yo j bear like other curs. 

CESAR. 

And kings. 
'T is a grea' name for blood-hounds. 

BOURBON. 

There 's a demon 
In that derce rattle-snake thy tongue. Will never 
Be se.ious? 

CESAR. 

On the eve of battle, no ; — 
Tnat were not soldier-like. 'T is for the general 
fo be more pensive : we adventurers 
Must be more cheerful. Wherefore should we think ? 
Our tutelar deity, in a leader's shape, 
Takes care of us. Keep thought aloof from hosts ! 
If the knaves take Uj thinking, you will have 
To crack those walls alone. 

BOURBON. 

You may sneer, since 
'T is lucky for you that you fight no worse for 'L 

CESAR. 

I thank you for the freedom ; 't is the only 
Pay 1 have taken in your highness' service. 

BOURBON. 

Well, sir, to-morrow you shall pay yourself. 
Look on those towers ; they hold my treasury. 
But, Philibert, we '11 in to council. Arnold ! 
We would request your presence. 

ARNOLD. 

Prince ! my scrvic* 
Is yours, as in the field. 

EOURBON. 

In both, we prize it, 
And yours will be a post of trust at day-break. 

CESAR. 

And mine ? 

BOURBON. 

To follow glory with the Bourbon. 
Good night ! 

Arnold (to Cesar). 
Prepare our armour for the assault, 
And wait within my tent. 

[Exeunt Bourbon, Arnold, Philiekk. ,o*« 

CESAR (solus). 

Within thy >ent ! 



&*> 



438 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Think'si thou that I pass from thee with my presence? 

Or that this crooked coffer, which contain'd 

Thy principle of life, is aught to me 

Except a mask ? And these are men, forsooth ! 

Heroes and chiefs, the flower of Adam's bastards I 

This is the consequence of giving matter 

The power of thought. It is a stubborn substance, 

And thinks chaotically, as it acts, 

Ever relapsing into its first elements. 

Well ! I must play with these poor puppets : 't is 

The spirit's pastime in his idler hours. 

When I grow weary of it, I have business 

Amongst the stars, which these poor creatures deem 

Were made for them to look at 'T were a jest now 

To bring one down amongst them, and set fire 

Unto their ant-hill : how the pismires then 

Would scamper o'er the scalding soil, and, ceasing 

From tearing down each others' nests, pipe forth 

One universal orison! Ha! ha! [Exit Cesar. 



PART II. 

SCENE I. 

Before the walls of Rome. The assault ; tlie army in 
motion, with ladders to scale the walls; Bourbon, 
with a white scarf over his armour, foremost. 

Chorus of Spirits in the air. 

1. 

'T is the morn, but dim and dark. 
Whither flies the silent lark ? 
Whither shrinks the clouded sun? 
Is the day indeed begun ? 
Nature's eye is melancholy 
O'er the city high and holy ; 
But without there is a din 
Should arouse the saints within, 
And revive the heroic ashes 
Round which yellow Tiber dashes. 
Oh ! ye seven hills ! awaken, 
Ere your very base be shaken ! 

2. 
Hearken to the steady stamp ! 
Mars is in their every tramp ! 
Not a step is out of tune, 
As the tides obey the moon ! 
On they march, though to self-slaughter, 
Regular as rolling water, 
Whose high waves o'ersweep the border 
Of huge moles, but keep their order, 
Breaking only rank by rank. 
Hearken to the armour's clank ! 
Look down o'er each frowning warrior, 
[low he glares upon the barrier : 
Look on each step of each ladder, 
As the stripes that streak an adder. 

3. 

Look upon the bristling wall, 
Mann'd without an interval ! 
Bound and round, and tier on tier, 
Gannon's black mouth, shining spear, 
Lit match, bell-mouth'd musquetoon, 
'Japing to be murderous soon. 



All the warlike gear of old, 
Mix'd with what we now behold, 
In this strife 'twixt old and new, 
Gather like a locust's crew. 
Shade of Remus ! 't is a time 
Awful as thy brother's crime ! 
Christians war against Christ's shrine:—- 
Must its lot be like to thine ? 

4. 
Near — and near — nearer still, 
As the earthquake saps the hill, 
First with trembling, hollow motion, 
Like a scarce-awaken'd ocean, 
Then with stronger shock and louder, 
Till the rocks are crush'd to powder, — 
Onward sweeps the rolling host ! 
Heroesof the immortal boast ! 
Mighty chiefs ! Eternal shadows ! 
First flowers of the bloody meadows 
Which encompass Rome, the mother 
Of a people without brother ! 
Will you sleep when nations' quarrels 
Plough the root up of your laurels ? 
Ye who wept o'er Carthage burning, 
Weep not — strike ! for Rome is mourning ! 

5. 
Onward sweep the varied nations ! 
Famine long hath dealt their rations ; 
To the wall, with hate and hunger, 
Numerous as wolves, and stronger, 
On they sweep. Oh ! glorious city, 
Must thou be a theme for pity ? 
Fight, like your first sire, each Roman ! 
Alaric was a gentle foeman, 
Match'd with Bourbon's black banditti ! 
Rouse thee, thou eternal city ! 
Rouse thee ! Rather give the porch 
With thy own hand to thy torch, 
Than behold such hosts pollute 
Your worst dwelling with their foot. 

6. 
Ah ! behold yon bleeding spectre ! 
Ilion's children find no Hector ; 
Priam's offspring loved their brother ; 
Roma's sire forgot his mother, 
When he slew his gallant twin, 
With inexpiable sin. 
See the giant shadow stride 
O'er the ramparts high and wide ! 
When he first o'erleapt thy wall, 
Its foundation mourn'd thy fall. 
Now, though towering like a Babel, 
Who to stop his steps are able ? 
Stalking o'er thy highest dome, 
Remus claims his vengeance, Rome ! 



Now they reach thee in their anger : 
Fire, and smoke, and hellish clangour 
Are around thee, thou world's wonder ! 
Death is in thy walls and under 



1 Seipio, the second Africanus. is said to have repeated i 
verse of Homer, and wept over the burning of Cailhagc. II) 
had better have granted it a capitulation. 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



43'J 



Now the meeting steel first clashes ; 
Downward then the ladder crashes, 
With its iron load all gleaming, 
Lying at its foot blaspheming ! 
Up again ! for every warrior 
Slain, another climbs the barrier. 
Thicker grows the strife : thy ditches 
Europe's mingling gore enriches. 
Rome ! Although thy wall may perish, 
Such manure thy fields will cherish, 
Making gay the harvest-home ; 
But thy hearths, alas ! oh, Rome !— 
Yet be Rome amidst thine anguish, 
Fight as thou wast wont to vanquish ! 

8. 
Yet once more, ye old Penates ! 
Let not your quench'd hearths be Ate's ! 
Yet again, ye shadowy heroes, 
Yield not to these stranger Neros ! 
Though the son who slew his mother, 
Shed Rome's blood, he was your brother : 
'T was the Roman curb'd the Roman : — 
Brennus was a baffled foeman. 
Yet again, ye saints and martyrs, 
Rise, for yours are holier charters. 
Mighty gods of temples falling, 
Yet in ruin still appalling ! 
Mightier founders of those altars, 
True and Christian — strike the assaulters ! 
Tiber ! Tiber ! let thy torrent 
Show even nature's self abhorrent. 
Let each breathing heart dilated 
Turn, as doth the lion baited ! 
Rome be crush'd to one wide tomb, 
But be still the Roman's Rome ! 

Bourbon, Arnold, Ctesar, and others, arrive at the 
foot of the wall. Arnold is about to plant his ladder. 
bourbon. 
Hold, Arnold ! I am first. 

ARNOLD. 

Not so, my lord. 

BOURBON. 

Hold, sir, I charge you ! Follow ! I am proud 
Of such a follower, but will brook no leader. 

[Bourbon plants his ladder, and begins to mount. 
Now, boys ! On ! on ! 

[A shot strikes him, and Bourbon falls. 

CESAR. 

And off! 

ARNOLD. 

Eternal powers ! 
The host will be appall'd. — But vengeance ! vengeance! 

BOURBON. 

T is nothing — lend me your hand. 

[Bourbon takes Arnold by the hand and rises : 
but, as he puts his foot on the step, falls again. 

Arnold ! I am sped. 
Conceal my fall — all will go well — conceal it ! 
Fling my cloak o'er what will be dust anon ; 
Let not the soldiers see it. 

ARNOLD. 

You must be 
Removed ; the aid *»C-- — 



BOURBON. 

No, my gallant boy ; 
Death is upon me. But what is one life ? 
The Bourbon's spirit shall command them still. 
Reep them yet ignorant that 1 am but clay, 
Till they are conquerors — then do as you may. 

CESAR. 

VVould not your highness choose to kiss the cross? 
We have no priest here, but the hilt of sword 
May serve instead : — it did the same for Bayard. 

BOURBON. 

Thou bitter slave .' to name him at this time ! 
But I deserve it. 

Arnold (to Cesar). 
Villain, hold your peace ! 

CESAR. 

What, when a Christian dies? Shall I not offer 
A Christian " Vade in pace?" 

ARNOLD. 

Silence! Oh! 
Those eyes are glazing, which o'erlook'd the world, 
And saw no equal. 

BOURBON. 

Arnold, shouldst thou see 
France — but hark ! hark ! the assault grows warmer— 

Oh! 
For but an hour, a minute more of life 
To die within the wall ! Hence, Arnold ! hence ! 
You lose time — they will conquer Rome without thee. 

ARNOLD. 

And without thee ! 

BOURBON. 

Not so ; I '11 lead them still 
In spirit. Cover up my dust, and breathe not 
That I have ceased to breathe. Away ! and be 
Victorious ! 

ARNOLD. 

But I must not leave thee thus. 

BOURBON. 

You must — farewell — Up ! up ! the world is winning. 

[Bourbon dies. 
cesar (to Arnold). 
Come, count, to business. 

ARNOLD. 

True. I '11 weep hereafter. 
[Arnold covers Bourbon's body with amantle, and 
mounts the ladder, crying, 
The Bourbon ! Bourbon ! On, boys ! Rome is ours ! 

CESAR. 

Good night, Lord Constable ! thou wert a man. 

[Cx:s An follows Arnold ; they reach the battlement; 
Arnold and Cesar are struck down. 
A precious somerset ! Is your countship injured? 

ARNOLD. 

No. [Remounts the ladder. 

CSSAR. 

A rare blood-hound, w hen his own is heated ! 
And 't is no boy's play. Now he strikes them down ' 
His hand is on the battlement — he grasps it 
As though it were an altar ; now his foot 

Is on it, and What have we here, a Roman 7 

[A man fad* 
The first bird of the covey ! he has fall'n 
On the outside of the nest. Why, how now, fellow t 

THE WOUNDED MAN. 

A drop of water ! 



410 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



[Dies. 



CESAR. 

Blood 's the only liquid 
Noa'cr than Tiber. 

WOUNDED M \N T . 

I have <iie<l for Rome. 

CESAR. 

And so did Bourbon, in another sense. 

Oh, these immortal men ! and their great motives ! 

But I must after my young charge. He is 

By this time i' the forum. Charge! charge! 

[C*s.ik mounts the ladder ; the Scene closes. 



SCENE II. 

27ie City. — Combats between the Besiegers and Besieged 
in the streets. — lnhalritants flying in confusion. 

Enter Cesar. 

CESAR. 

I cannot find my hero ; he is mix'd 

With the heroic crowd that now pursue 

Yin- fugitives, or battle with the desperate. 

What have we here? A cardinal or two, 

That do not seem in love with martvrdom. 

How the old red-shanks scamper! Could they dolF 

Their hose as they have dolf'd their hats, 'twould be 

A blessing, as a mark the less for plunder. 

But let them rly, the crimson kennels now 

Will not much stain their stockings, since the mire 

Is of the self-same purple hue. 

Enter a party fighting. — Arnold at the head of the 
Besiegers. 

He comes, 
Hand in hand with the mild twins — Gore and Glory. 
Holla ! hold, count ! 

ARNOLD. 

Away ! they must not rally. 

CjESAR. 

I tell thee, be not rash ; a golden bridge 

Is for a flying enemy. I gave thee 

A form of beauty, and an 

Exemption from some maladies of body, 

But not of mind, which is not mine to give. 

But though I gave the form of Thetis' son, 

I dipt thee not in Styx ; and 'gainst a foe 

I would not warrant thy chivalric heart 

More than Policies' heel ; why then, be cautious, 

And know thyself a mortal still. 

ARNOLD. 

And who 
With aught of soul would combat if he were 
Invulnerable? That were pretty sport. 
Think'st thou I beat for hares when lions roar ? 

[Arnold rushes into the combat. 

CAESAR. 

A precious sample of humanity ! 

Well, his blood 's up, and if a little 's shed, 

'T will serve to curb his fever. 

[Arnold engages with a Roman, who retires towards 
a portico. 

ARNOLD. 

Yield thee, slave 
I promise quarter. 

ROMAN. 

That's soon said. 



ARNOLD. 

And done — 
My word is known. 

ROMAN. 

So shall be my deeds. 
[They re-engage. Cesar comes forwaru. 

CESAR. 

Why, Arnold .' Hold thine own ; thou hast in hand 

A famous artisan, a cunning sculptor; 

Also a dealer in the sword and dagger. 

Not so, my musqueteer ; 't was he who slew 

The Bourbon from the wall. 

ARNOLD. 

Ay, did he so? 
Then he hath carved his monument. 

ROMAN. 

I yet 
May live to carve your better's. 

CjESAR. 

Well said, my man of marble ! Benvenuto, 

Thou hast some practice in both ways ; and he 

Who slays Cellini, will have work'd as hard 

As e'er thou didst upon Carrara's blocks. 

[Arnold disarms and wounds Cellini, but slightly ; 

the latter draws a pistol, andflrcs • then retires and 

disappears through the portico. 

CESAR. 

How farest thou ? Thou hast a taste, methinks, 
Of red Bellona's banquet. 

ARNOLD (staggers). 

'T is a scratch. 
Lend me thy scarf. He shall not 'scape me thus. 

CESAR. 

Where is it ? 

ARNOLD. 

In the shoulder, not the sword arm— 
And that 's enough. I am thirsty : would I had 
A helm of water ! 

CESAR. 

That 's a liquid now 
In requisition, but by no means easiest 
To come at. 

• ARNOLD. 

And my thirst increases ; — but 
I '11 find a way to quench it. 

CESAR. 

Or be quench'd 
Thyself? 

ARNOLD. 

The chance is even ; we will throw 
The dice thereon. But I lose time prating ; 
Prithee, be quick. [Caesar binds on the tucrf 

And what dost thou so >d!y '{ 
Why dost not strike ? 

CESAR. 

Your old philosophers 
Beheld mankind, as mere spectators of 
The Olympic games. When I behold a prize 
Worth wrestling for, I may be found a Milo. 

ARNOLD. 

Ay, 'gainst an oak. 

CESAR. 

A forest, when it suiti me. 
I combat with a mass, or not at all. 
Meantime, pursue thy sport, as I do mine : 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



441 



Which is just now to gaze, since all these labourers 
Will reap my harvest gratis. 



A fiend ! 



ARNOLD. 

Thou art still 



CESAR. 

And thou — a man. 

ARNOLD. 

Whv, such I fain would show me. 

CjESAR. 

True — as men are. 

ARNOLD. 

And what is that ? 

CXSAR. 

Thou feelest and thou see's t. 
[Exit Arnold, joining in tlie combat 'tihir.h still 
continues between detached parties, the Scene 
dusts. 



SCENE III. 

S<. Piter's. The Interior of the Chur h. Tlie Pnpc 
at the Altar. Priests, etc. crowding in confusion, 
md Citizens flying for refuge, pursued by Soldiery. 

Enter CjES.ar. 

A SPANISH S0LDIEU. 

t><.ivn with them, comrades ! seize upon those lamps! 
Cleave yon bald paled shaveling t i the chine ! 
His rosary 's of gold ! 

LUTHERAN SOLDIER. 

Revenge ! Revenge ! 
Plunder hereafter, but for veng ance now — 
Yonder stands Anti-Christ ! 

CESAR (intc fjosing). 

How now, schismatic ! 
What wouldst thou ? 

LUTHERAIS SOLDIER. 

In th'; holy name of Christ, 
Destroy proud Anti-Chrin. I am a Christian. 

f/ESAR. 

Yea, a disciple that wot .Id make the founder 

Of your belief renounce it, could ne see 

Such proselytes. Be-t stint thyself to plunder. 

LUTTIERA.H SOLDIER. 

I say he is the devil. 

CESAR. 

Hush ! keep that secret, 
Lest he should re< ognise you for his own. 

I UTHERAN SOLDIER. 

Why would you save him ? I repeat he is 
The devil, or tie devil's vicar upon earth. 

CESAR. 

And that 's thi, reason ; would you make a quarrel 
With your b st friends? You had far best be quiet : 
His hour is not yet come. 

LUTHERAN SOLDIER. 

That shall be seen ! 

[The I utheran Soldier rushes forward : a shot strikes 
him from one of the Pope's gv~ds, and he fulls at 
the foot of the altar. 



I told you so. 



c^sar (lo the Lutheran). 
61 



LUTHERAN SOLDIER. 

And will you not avenge me ? 

CESAR. 

Not I ! You know that " vengeance is the Lord's :" 
You see he loves no interlopers. 

LUTHERAN (dying). 

' * Oh! 
Had I but slain him, I had gone on high, 
Crown'd with eternal glory ! Heaven, forgive 
My feebleness of arm that reach'd him not, 
And take thy servant to thy mercy. 'T is 
A glorious triumph still ; proud Babylon 's 
No more : the Harlot of the Seven Hills 
Hath changed her scarlet raiment for sackcloth 
And ashes ! [ The Lutheran dies. 

CESAR. 

Yes, thine own amidst the rest. 
Well done, old Babel ! 

[The Guards defend themselves desperately, whilg 
the Pontiff escapes, l>y a privule pmssage, to the 
Vatican and the Castle of St. Angela. 

CESAR. 

Ha ! right nobly battled ! 
Now, priest ! now, soldier ! the two great professions 
Together by the ears and hearts ! I have not 
Seen a more comic pantomime since Titus 
Took Jewry. But the Romans had the best then ; 
Now they must take their turn. 

SOLDIER. 

He hath escaped ! 
Follow ! 

ANOTHER SOLDIER. 

They have barr'd the narrow passage up, 
And it is clogg'd with dead even to the door. 

CXSAR. 

I am glad he hath escaped : he may thank me for 't 

In part. I would not have his bulls abclish'd — 

'T were worth one half our empire : his indulgence!! 

Demand some in return; — no, no, he must not 

Fall ; and besides, his now escape may furnish 

A future miracle, in future proof 

Of his infallibility. [To the Spanish Soldiery. 

Well, cut-throats ! 
What do you pause for ? If you make not haste, 
There will not be a link of pious gold (eft, 
And you, too, Catholics ! Would ye return 
From such a pilgrimage without a relic? 
The very Lutherans have more true devotion : 
See how they strip the shrines ! 

SOLDIERS. 

By holy w eter ! 
He speaks the truth ; the heretics will ben. 
The best away. 

CESAR. 

And that were shame! Go to. 
Assist in their conversion. 

[The Soldiers dispute; many quit tlie CJ* 
others enter. 

CERAn. 

They are gone, 
And others come ; so flows the wave on wave 
Of what these creatures call eternity, 
Deeming thcmse'»"!« the breakers of the ocean 



442 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



While they are but its bubbles, ignorant 
That foam is their foundation. So, another ! 

Enter Olimpia, Jiying from the pursuit — She springs 
upon the Altar. 

SOLDIER. 

She 's mine. 

another soldier (ojtposing the former). 

You lie, I track'd her first ; and, were she 
The pope's niece, I '11 not yield her. [ They fglit. 

tiiikd soldier {advancing towards Olimpia). 
You may settle 
Your claims ; I '11 make mine good. 

OLIMPIA. 

Infernal slave ! 
You touch me not alive. 

THIRD SOLDIER. 

Alive or dead ! 
olimpia {embracing a massive crucifix). 
Respect your God ! 

THIRD SOLDIER. 

Yes, when he shines in gold. 
Girl, you but grasp your dowry. 

[As lie advances, Olimpia, tvith a strong and sudden 
effort, rusts down the crucifix ; it strikes the Soldier, 
who falls. 

THIRD SOLDIER. 

Oh, great God ! 

OLIMPIA. 

Ah ! now you recognise him. 

THIRD SOLDIER. 

My brain 's crush'd ! 
Comrades, help, ho ! All 's darkness ! [He dies. 

OTHER SOLDIERS (coming Up). 

Slay her, although she had a thousand lives : 
She hath kill'd our comrade. 

olimpia. 

Welcome such a death ! 
You have no life to give, which the worst slave 
Would take. Great God] through thy redeeming Son, 
And thy Son's Mother, now receive me as 
I would approach thee, worthy her, and him, and thee ! 

Enter Arnold. 

ARNOLD. 

What do I see ? Accursed jackals ! 
Forbear ! 

cesar [aside, and laughing). 
Ha ! ha ! here 's equity ! The dogs 
Have as much right as he. But to the issue ! 

SOLDIERS. 

Count, she hath slain our comrade. 

ARNOLD. 

With what weapon ? 

SOLDIER. 

The cross, beneath which he is crush'd ; behold him 
Lie there, more like a worm than man ; she cast it 
Uuon his head. 

ARNOLD. 

Even so ; there is a woman 
Wort!.y a brave man's liking. Were ye such, 
Ye would have honour'd her. But get ye hence, 
And thank your meanness, other God you have none, 
For your existence, Had vou touch'd a hair 



Of those dishcvell'd locks, I would have thinn'd 
Your ranks more than the enemy. Away ! 
Ye jackals! gnaw the bones the lion leaves, 
But not even these till he permits. 

A soldier (murmuring). 

The lion 
Might conquer for himself then. 

arnold (cuts him dmvn). 

Mutineer ! 
Rebel in hell — you shall obey on earth ! 

[1 'he Soldiers assault Arnoi D. 
ARNOLD. 

Come on ! I 'm glad on 't ! I will show you, slaves, 
How you should be commanded, and who led you 
First o'er the wall you were as shy to scale, 
Until I waved my banners from its height, 
As you are bold within it. 

[Arnold mows down the foremost ; tlie rest throw 
down their arms. 

SOLDIERS. 

Mercy ! mercy ! 

ARNOLD. 

Then learn to grant it. Have I taught you who 
Led you o'er Rome's eternal battlements? 

SOLDIERS. 

We saw it, and we know it ; yet forgive 
A moment's error in the heat of conquest — 
The conquest which you led to. 

ARNOLD. 

Get you hence ! 
Hence to your quarters ! you will find them hx'd 
In the Colonna palace. 

olimpia (aside). 
In my father's 
House ! 

ARNOLD (to the soldiers). 
Leave your arms ; ye have no further need 
Of such : the city's render'd. And mark well 
You keep your hands clean, or I '11 find out a stream 
As red as Tiber now runs, for your baptism. 

soldiers (deposing their arms and departing). 
We obey. 

Arnold (to Olimpia). 
Lady ! you are safe. 
olimpia. 

I should be so, 
Had I a knife even ; but it matters not — 
Death hath a thousand gates ; and on the marble, 
Even at the altar foot, whence I look down 
Upon destruction, shall my head be dash'd, 
Ere thou ascend it. God forgive thee, man ! 

ARNOLD. 

I wish to merit his forgiveness, and 

Thine own, although I have not injured thee. 

olimpia. 
Go ! Thou hast only sack'd my native land — 
No injury ! — and made my father's house 
A den of thieves — No injury ! — this temple, 
Slippery with Roman and holy gore — 
No injury ! And now thou wouldst preserve me, 

To be but that shall never be ! 

[She raises her eyes to heaven, folds her robe round her, 
arid prepares to dash herself down on the side »f lilt 
Altar, opposite to that where Arnold stands. 



THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED. 



443 



ARNOLD. 

Hold! hold! 
I swear. 

OHMPIA. 

Spare thine already forfeit soul 
A porjiiry for which even hell would loathe thee. 
I know thee. 

ARNOLD. 

No, thou know'st me not ; I am not 
Of these men, though 

OLIMPIA. 

I judge thee by thy mates ; 
It is for God to judge thee as thou art. 
I see thee purple with the blood of Rome ; 
Take mine, 't is all thou e'er shalt have of me ! 
And here, upon the marble of this temple, 
Where the baptismal font baptized me God's, 
I offer him a blood less holy 
Hut not less pure (pure as it left me then, 
A redeem'd infant) than the holy water 
The saints have sanctified ! 

[Olimpi a waves her hand to Arnold with disdain, and 
dashes herself on the pavement from the Altar. 

ARNOLD. 

Eternal God! 
I feel thee now ! Help ! help ! She 's gone. 
Cesar (approaches). 

I am here. 

ARNOLD. 

Thou ! but oh, save her ! 

ca:sAR (assisting him to raise Olimpia). 
She hath done it well ; 
The leap was serious. 

ARNOLD. 

Oh ! she is lifeless ! 

CESAR. 

If 

She be so, I have nought to do with that : 
The resurrection is beyond me. 

ARNOLD. 

Slave! 

CjESAR. 

Ay, slave or master, 't is all one : methinks 
Good words however are as well at times. 

ARNOLD. 

Words! — Canst thou aid her? 

CiESAR. 

I will try. A sprinkling 
Of that same holy water may be useful. 

[He (rings some in his helmet from the font 

ARNOLD. 

'T is mix'd with blood. 

CESAR. 

Then is no cleaner now 
In Rome. 

ARNOLD. 

How pale ! how beautiful ! how lifeless ! 
Alive or dead, thou essence of all beauty, 
I love but thee ! 

CESAH. 

Even so Achilles loved 
Ptnthesilea ; with his form it seems 
Ifou have his heart, and yet it was no soft one. 



ARNOLD. 

She breathes ! But no, 'twas nothing, or tne last 
Faint flutter life disputes with death. 

CESAR. 

She breathes. 

ARNOLD. 

Thou say'st it ? Then 't is truth. 

CESAR. 

You do me right — 
The devil speaks trutn much oftener than he 's deem'd : 
He hath an ignorant audience. 

Arnold (without attending to him). 

Yes ! her heart beats. 
Alas ! that the first beat of the only heart 
I ever wish'd to beat with mine, should vibrate 
To an assassin's pulse 

CESAR. 

A sage reflection, 
But somewhat late i' the day. Where shall we bear hei ? 
I say she lives. 

ARNOLD. 

And will she live ? 

CESAR. 

As much 
As dust can. 

ARNOLD. 

Then she is dead ! 

CESAR. 

Bah ! bah ! You are so, 
And do not know it. She will come to life — 
Such as you think so, such as you now are ; 
But we must work by human means. 

ARNOLD. 

We will 
Convey her unto the Colonna palace, 
Where I have pitch'd my banner. 

CESAR. 

Come then ! raise her up ! 

ARNOLD. 

Softly ! 

CESAR. 

As softly as they bear the dead, 
Perhaps because they cannot feel the jolting. 

ARNOLD. 

But doth she live indeed 7 

CESAR. 

Nay, never fear ! 
But if you rue it after, blame not me. 

ARNOLD. 

Let her but live ! 

CESAR. 

The spirit of her life 
Is yet within her breast, and may revive. 
Count ! count! I am your servant in all thing*, 
And this is a new office : — 't is not oft 
I am employ'd in such ; but you perceive 
How staunch a friend is what you call a fieno 
On earth you have often only fiends for friends , 
Now J desert not mine. Soft ' bear her henre. 
The beautiful half-clay, and nearly spirit ! 
I am almost enamour'd of her, as 
Of old the angels of her earliest sex. 

ARNOLD. 

Thou! 



444 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



UMB> 

I. But fear not. I '11 not be /our rival. 

ARNOLD. 

Rival ! 

CESAR. 

I could be one right form lable ; 
But since 1 slew the seven husb mds of 
Tobia's future bride (and after ill 
'T was suck'd out but by some incense) I have laid 
Aside intrigue: 'tis rarely wo.th the trouble 
Of gamins, or — what is morn difficult — 
Getting rid of your prize ag:iin ; for there '3 
The rub ! at least to mortal.* 

ARNOLD. 

Prithee, peace ! 
Softly ! mcthinks her lips move, her eyes open ! 

resAR. 
I, ike stars, no doubt ; f r that 's a metaphor 
For Lucifer and Venus. 

ARNOLD. 

To the palace 
Colonna, as I told y< .u ! 

CESAR. 

Oh ! I know 
My way through Kome. 

ARNOLD. 

Now onward, onward ! Gently ! 
[Exeunt, bearing Olimpia. — The Scene cbses. 



PART III. 

SCENE I. 
A Castle in the Apennines, surrounded by a wild but 
smiling country. Chorus of Peasants singing before 
the Gatis. 

Chorus. 



The wars are over, 

The spring is come ; 
The bride and her lover 
Have sought their home : 
They are happy, we rejoice, 
Let their hearts have an echo in every voice ! 

2. 
The spring is come ; the violet 's gone, 
The first-born child of the early sun ; 
With us she is but a winter's flower, 
The snow on the hills cannot blast her bower, 
And she lifts up her dewy eye of blue 
To the youngest sky of the self-same hue. 

3. 
And when the spring comes with her host 
Of flowers, that flower beloved the most 
Shrinks from the crowd that may confuse 
Ht-r heavenly odour and virgin hues. 

4. 
Pluck the others, but still remember 
Th r -ir herald out of dim December — 



The morning-star of all the flowers, 
The pledge of daylight's lengthen'd hours ; 
Nor, 'midst the roses, e'er forget 
The virgin, virgin violet. 

Enter Cesar. 

cesar (singing). 
The wars arc all over, 

Our swords are all idle, 

The steed bites the bridle, 
The casque 's on the wall. 
There 's rest for the rover ; 

But his armour is rusty, 

And the veteran grows crusty, 
As he yawns in the hall. 
He drinks — but what 's drinking ? 
A more pause from thinking ! 
No bugle awakes him with life and deatn »' 

Chorus. 

But the hound baycth loudly, 

The boar 's in the wood, 
And the falcon longs proudly 

To spring from her hood. 
On the wrist of the noble, 

She sits like a crest, 
And the air is in trouble 

With birds from their nest. 



Oh ! shadow of glory ! 

Dim image of war ! 
But the chase hath no story, 

Her hero no star, 
Since Nimrod, the founder 

Of empire and chase, 
Who made the woods wonder, 

And quake for their race, 
When the lion was young, 

In the pride of his might, 
Then 'twas sport for the strong 

To embrace him in fight ; 
To go forth, with a pine 

For a spear, 'gainst the mammoth, 
Or strike through the ravine 

At the foaming behemoth ; 
While man was in stature 

As towers in our time, 
The first-born of Nature, 

And, like her, sublime ! 

Chorus. 
But the wars are over, 
The spring is come ; 
The bride and her lover 
Hav.- sought their home : 
Triey are happy, and we rejoice ; 
Let their hearts have an echo in every voice ! 

[Exeunt the Peasantry, singing. 



( 445 ) 

Watom mils faavtii; 

A JMYSTERY. 



FOUNDED ON THE FOLLOWING PASSAGE IN GENESIS, CIIAF. VI. 
And it came to pass. ... that the sons of Goil saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and Ihty 
took them whes of all which they chose. 
And woman wailing for her demon lover. — COLERIDGE. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



ANGELS. 

Samiasa. 

AzAZIEL. 

Raphael, the Archangel. 

MEN. 
Noah, and his Sons. 
Irad. 

WOMEN. 
Anah. 
Aholibamah. 



Chorus of Spirits of the Earth. — Chorus of Mortals. 



HEAVEN AND EAUTH. 



SCENE I. 



A woody and mountainous district near Mount Ararat. 
Tim e — midnight. 

Enter Asah and Aholibamah. 
anah. 
Our father sleeps : it is the hour when they 
Who love us are accustom'd to descend 
Through the deep clouds o'er rocky Ararat :— 
How my heart beats ! 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

Let us proceed upon 
Our invocation. 

ANAH. 

But the stars are hidden. 
I tremble. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

So do I, but not with fear 
Of aught save their delay. 

ANAH. 

My sister, though 
I love Azaziel more than— oh, too much ! 
What was I going to say ? my heart grows impious. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

And where is the impiety of loving 
Celestial natures? 

ANAH. 

But, Aholibamah, 
I love our God less since his angel loved me : 
This cannot be of good ; and though I know not 
That I do wrong, I feel a thousand fears 
Which are not ominous of right. 

2 q. 2 



AHOLIBAMAH. 

Then wed thee 
Unto some son of clay, and toil and spin ! 
There 's Japhet bves thee we'll, hath loved thee 'onj; ; 
Marry, and bring forth dust ! 

ANAH. 

I should have loved 
Azaziel not less were he mortal : yet 
I am glad he is not. I cannot outlive him. 
And when I think that his immortal wings 
Will one day hover o'er the sepulchre 
Of the poor child of clay which so adored him, 
As he adores the Highest, death becomes 
Less terrible ; but yet I pity him ; 
His grief will be of ages, or at least 
Mine would be such for him, were I the seraph, 
And he the perishable. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

Rather say, 
That he will single forth some other daughter 
Of earth, and love her as he once loved Anah. 

ANAH. 

And if it should be so, and she so loved him, 
Better thus than that he should weep for me. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

If I thought thus of Samiasa's love, 

All seraph as he is, I 'd spurn him from me. 

But to our invocation ! 'T is the hour. 

ANAH. 

Seraph ! 
From thy sphere ! 
Whatever star contain thy glory ; 
In the eternal depths of heaven 
Albeit thou watchest with " the seven, " 
Though through space infinite and hoary 
Before thy bright wings worlds be driven, 
Yet hear ! 
Oh ! think of her who holds thec dear ! 

And though she nothing is to thet, 
Yet think that thou art all to her. 
Thou canst not tell, — and never be 
Such pangs decreed to aught save nie,-- 
The bitterness of tears. 
Eternity is in thine years, 
Unborn, undying beauty in thine eyes : 
With me thou canst Hot sympathize, 
Except in love, and there thou must 
Acknowledge that more loving dust 
Ne'er wept beneath the skies. 
Thou walk'st thy many worlds, thou see'si 
The face of Him who made thee great, 



1 The archangels, said to be seven in number 



446 BYRON'S WORKS. 


As He hath made me of the least 


With Him if He will war with us ; with thee 


Of those cast out from Eden's gate : 


I can share all things, even immortal sorrow; 


Yet, seraph dear ! 


For thou hast ventured to share life with m<-, 


Oh hear ! 


And shall 1 shrink from thine eternity ? 


For thou hast loved me, and I would not die 


No ! though the serpent's sting should pierce me 


Until I know what I must die in knowing, 


through, 


That thou forget'st in thine eternity 


And thou thyself wert like the serpent, ''.oil 


Her whose heart death could not keep from o'erflowing 


Around me still ! and 1 will smile 


For thee, immortal essence as thou art ! 


And curse thee not ; but hold 


Great is their love who love in sin and fear ; 


Thee in as warm a fold 


And such I feel are waging in my heart 


As but descend ; and provo 


A war unworthy : to an Adamite 


A mortal's love 


Forgive, my seraph ! that such thoughts appear, 


For an immortal. If the skies contain 


For sorrow is our element ; 


More joy than thou canst give and take, remain! 


Delight 


ANAH. 


An Eden kept afar from sight, 


Sister ! sister ! I view them winging 


Though sometimes with our visions blent. 


Their bright way through the parted ni^ht. 


The hour is near 


AHOLIBAMAH. 


Which tells me we are not abandon'd quite. — 


The clouds from off their pinions flinging 


Appear ! appear ! 


As though they bore to-morrow's light. 


Seraph ! 


ANAH. 


My own Azaziel ! be but here, 


But if our father see the sight ! 


Ard leave the stars to tneir own light. 


AHOLIBAMAH. 


AHCLIBAMAH. 


He would but deem it was the moon 


Samiasa! 


Rising unto some sorcerer's tune 


VVheresof.'cr 


An hour too soon. 


Thou rulest in the upper air — 


ANAH. 


Or warring with the spirits who may dare 


They come ! he comes ! — Azaziel ! 


Dispute wi'.h Him 


AHOLIBAMAH. 


Who made all empires, empire ; or recalling 


Haste 


Some wandering star which shoots through the abyss, 


To meet them ! Oh ! for wings to bear 


Whose tenants, dying while their world is falling, 


My spirit, while they hover there, 


Share the dim destiny of clay in this ; 


To Samiasa's breast ! 


Or joining with the inferior cherubim, 


ANAH. 


Thou deignest to partake their hymn — 


Lo ! they have kindled all the west, 


Samiasa ! 


Like a returning sunset ; — lo ! 


I call thee, I await thee, and I love thee. 


On Ararat's late secret crest 


Many worship thee — that will I not: 


A mild and many-colour'd bow, 


If that thy spirit down to mine may move thee, 


The remnant of their flashing path, 


Descend and share my lot ! 


Now shines ! and now, behold ! it hath 


Though I be form'd of clay, 


Return'd to night, as rippling foam, 


And thou of beams 


Which the leviathan hath lash'd 


More bright than those of day 


From his unfathomable home, 


On Eden's streams, 


When sporting on the face of the calm deep, 


Thine immortality cannot repay 


Subsides soon after he again hath dash'd 


With love more warm than mine 


Down, down, to where the ocean's fountains sleep. 


My love. There is a ray 


AHOLIBAMAH. 


In me, which, though forbidden yet to snine, 


They have touch'd earth ! Samiasa ! 


I feel was lighted at thy God's and thine. 


ANAH. 


It may be hidden long: death and decay 


My Azaziel ! 


Our mother Eve bequeath'd us — but my heart 


[Exeunt 


Defies it: though this life must pass away, 


- 


Is that a cause for thee and me to part ? 
Thou art immortal — so ami: I feel, 


SCENE II. 


I feel my immortality o'ersweep 


Enter Irad and Japhet. 


All pains, all tears, all time, all fears, and peal 


irad. 


Like the eternal thunders of ihe deep, 


Despond not : wherefore wilt thou wander thus 


Into my ears this truth — " thou livest for ever!" 


To add thy silence to the silent night, 


But if it be in joy, 


And lift thy tearful eye unto the stars ? 


I 1«iow not, nor would knew ; 


They cannot aid thee. 


That secret rests with the Almighty giver 


JAPHET. 


Who folds in clouds the fonts of bliss and woe. 


But they soothe me mw 


But thee and me He never can destroy; 


Perhaps she looks upon them as I look. 


Change us He may, but not o'erwhelm ; we are 


Methinks a being that is beautiful 


as eternal essence, and must war 


Becometh more so as it looks on beauty, 



HEAVEN AND EARTH. 



44' 



The eternal beauty of undying things. 


For milk, and wool, and flesh, and fruits, and all 


Oh, Anah ! 


Our flocks and wilderness afford. — Go, Japhet, 


IRAD. 


Sigh to the stars, as wolves howl to the moon — 


But she loves thee not. 


I must back to my rest. 


JAPHET. 


JAPHET. 


Alas! 


And so would I, 


IRAD. 


If I could rest. 


And proud Aholibamah spurns me also. 


IRAD. 


JAPHET. 


Thou wilt not to our tents, then ? 


I feel for thee too. 


JAPHET. 


IRAD. 


No, Irad ; I will to the cavern, whose 


Let her keep her pride : 


Mouth, they say, opens from the internal world, 


Mine halh enabled me to bear her scorn ; 


To let the inner spirits of the earth 


Ii may be, time too will avenge it. 


Forth, when they walk its surface. 


JAPHET. 


IRAD. 


Canst thou 


Wherefore so? 


Find joy in such a thought ? 


What wouldst thou there ? 


IK AD. 


JAPHET. 


Nor jov, nor sorrow. 


Soothe further my sad spirit 


I Inved her well ; I would have loved her better, 


With gloom as sad : it is a hopeless spot, 


Had love been met with love: as 't is, I leave her 


And I am hopeless. 


To brighter destinies, if so she deems them. 


IRAD. 


JAPHET. 


But 't is dangerous ; 


What destinies? 


Strange sounds and sights have peopled it wit* terrors. 


IRAD. 


I must go with thee. 


I have some cause to think 


JAPHET. 


She loves another. 


Irad, no ; believe me 


JAPHET. 


I feel no evil thought, and fear no evil. 


Anah ? 


IRAD. 


IRAD. 


But evil things will be thy foe the more 


No ; her sister. 


As not being of them: turn thy steps aside, 


JAPHET. 


Or let mine be with thine. 


What other ? 






JAPHET. 


IRAD. 


No ; neithci , /rad : 


That I know not ; but her air, 


I must proceed alone. 


If not her words, tells me she loves another. 


IRAD. 


JAPHET. 


Then peace be with thee ! 


Ay, but not Anah : she but loves her God. 


[Exit Irad. 


IRAD. 


JAPHET (solus). 


Whate'er she loveth, so she loves thee not. 


Peace ! I have sought it where it should be found, 


What can it profit thee ? 


In love — with love too, which perhaps deserved it : 


JAPHET. 


And, in its stead, a heaviness of heart — 


True, nothing ; but 


A weakness of the spirit — listless days, 


I love. 


And nights inexorable to sweet sleep — 


IRAD. 


Have come upon me. Peace ! what peaco ? the calm 


And so did I. 


Of desolation, and the stillness of 


JAPHET. 


The untrodden forest, only broken by 


And now thou lovest not, 


The sweeping tempest through its groaning boughs ; 


Or think'st thou lovest not, art thou happier? 


Such is the sullen or the fitful state 


IRAD. 


Of my mind overworn. The earth 's grown wicked, 


Yes. 


And many signs and portents have proclaim'd 


JAPHET. 


A change at hand, and an overwhelming doom 


7 pity thee. 


To perishable beings. Oh, my Anah ! 


IRAD. 


When the dread hour denounced shall open wida 


Me! why? 


The fountains of the deep, how mightest thou 


JAPHET. 


Have lam within this bosom, folded from 


For being happv, 


The elements ; this bosom, which in vain 


Deprived of that which makes my misery. 


Halh beat for thee, and then will beat more vainW 


IRAD. 


While thine Oh, God ! at least remit to her 


I take thy taunt as part of thy distemper, 


Thy wrath ! for she is pure amidst the failing, 


And would not fool as thou dost, for more shekels 


As a siar in the clouds, which cannot quench, 


Than all our father's herds would bring if weigh'd 


Although they obscure it for an hour. My Anafc ' 


Against the metal of the sons of Cain — 


How would I have adored thee, but thou wouldst dm , 


The yellow dust they try to barter with us, 


And still would I redeem thee — see thee live 


As if such useless and discolour'd trash, 


When ocean is earth's grave, and, unopposed 


The refuse of the earth, could be received 


By rock or shallow, the leviathan, 



4 13 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Lord of the shoreless sea and watery world, 
Shall wonder at his boundlessness of realm. 

[Exit Japhet. 

Enter Noah and Shem. 

NOAH. 

Where is thy brother Japhet ? 

SHEM. 

He went forth, 
According to his wont, to meet with Irad, 
He said ; but, as I fear, to bend his steps 
Towards Allah's tents, round which he hovers nightly, 
Like a dove round and round its pillaged nest ; 
Or else he walks the wild up to the cavern 
Which opens to the heart of Ararat. 

NOAH. 

What doth he there ? It is an evil spot 
Upon an earth all evil ; for things worse 
Than even wicked men resort there : he 
Still loves this daughter of a fated race, 
Although he could not wed her if she loved him, 
And that she doth not. Oh, the unhappy hearts 
Of men ! that one of my blood, knowing well 
The destiny and evil of these days, 
And that the hour approacheth, should indulge 
In such forbidden yearnings ! Lead the way ; 
He must be sought for! 

SHEM. 

Go not forward, father : 
I wJl seek Japhet. 

NOAH. 

Do not fear for me : 
All evil things are powerless on the man 
Selected by Jehovah — let us on. 

SHEM. 

To the tents of the father of the sisters ? 

NOAH. 

No ; to the cavern of the Caucasus. 

[Exeunt Noah and Shem. 



SCENE III. 

Tlie mountains. — A cavern, and the rocks of Caucasus. 

japhet {solus). 
Ye wilds, that look eternal ; and thou cave, 
Which scem'st unfathomable ; and ye mountains, 
So varied and so terrible in beauty ; 
Here, in your rugged majesty of rocks 
And lopling trees that twine their roots with stone 
In perpendicular places, where the foot 
Of man would tremble, could he reach them — yes, 
Ye look eternal ! Yet, in a few days, 
Perhaps even hours, ye will be changed, rent, hurl'd 
Before the mass of waters: and yon cave, 
Which seems to lead into a lower world, 
Shall have its depths search'd by the sweeping wave, 
And dolphins gambol in the lion's den ! 

Arid man Oh, men ! my fellow-beings ! Who 

Shall weep above your universal grave, 

Save I? Who shall be left to weep ? My kinsmen, 

Alas ! what am I better than ye are, 

That 1 must live beyond ye? Where shall be 

The pleasant places where I thought of Anah 

While I had hope ? or the more savage haunts, 

Scarce leas beloved, where I despair'd for her ? 



And can it be ? — Shall yon exulting peak, 

Whose glittering top is like a distant star, 

Lie low beneath the boiling of the i 

No more to have the morning sun break forth, 

And scatter back the mists in floating folds 

From its tremendous brow ? no more to have 

Day's broad orb drop behind its head at even, 

Leaving it with a crown of many hues ? 

No more to be the beacon of the world, 

For angels to alight on, as the spot 

Nearest the stars ? and can those words " no mort " 

Be meant for thee, for all things, save for us, 

And the predestined creeping things reserved 

By my sire to Jehovah's bidding ? May 

lie preserve them, and / not have the power 

To snatch the loveliest of earth's daughters from 

A doom which even some serpent, with his mate, 

Shall 'scape to save his kind to be prolong'd, 

To kiss and sting through some emerging world, 

Reeking and dank from out the slime, whose ooze 

Shall slumber o'er the wreck of this, until 

The salt morass subside into a sphere 

Beneath the sun, and be the monument, 

The sole and undistinguish'd sepulchre, 

Of yet quick myriads of all life ? How much 

Breath will be still'd at once! All-beauteous world! 

So young, so mark'd out for destruction, I 

With a cleft heart look on thee day by dav, 

And night by night, thy number'd days and nights. 

I cannot save thee, cannot save even her 

Whose love had made me love thee more ; but as 

A portion of thy dust, I cannot think 

Upon thy coming doom, without a feeling 

Such as — Oh God ! and canst thou 

[ He pannes. 
[A rushing sound from the cavern is heard, and shouts 
of laughter — afterwards a Spirit passes. 

JAPHET. 

In the name 
Of the Most High, what art thou ? 
spirit (laughs). 

Ha! ha! ha' 

JAPHET. 

By all that earth holds holiest, speak ! 
spirit (laughs). 

Ha! ha! 

JAPHET. 

By the approaching deluge ! by the earth 
Which will be strangled by the ocean ! by 
The deep which will lay open all her fountains ! 
The heaven which will convert her clouds to seas, 
And the Omnipotent who makes and crushes! 
Thou, unknown, terrible, and indistinct, 
Yet awful thing of shadows, speak to me ! 
Why dost thou laugh that horrid laugh? 

SPIRIT. 

Why weep'st thou 1 

JAPHET. 

For earth, and all her children. 

SPIRIT. 

Ha! ha! ha! [Spirit vanishes. 

JAPHET. 

How the fiend mocks the tortures of a world, 

The coming desolation of an orb, 

On which the sun shall rise and warm no life ' 



HEAVEN AND EARTH. 



4-1 "J 



How the earth sleeps ! and all that in it is 

Sleep too upon the very eve of death ! 

Why should they wake to meet it 1 What is here, 

Which look like death in life, and speak like things 

Born ere this dying world I They come like clouds ! 

[ Various Spirits pass from the cavern. 
BPIBIT. 

Rejoice ! 
The abhorred race 
Which could not keep in Eden their high place, 

Bui listen'd to the voice 
Of knowledge without power, 
Are nigh the hour 
Of death ! 
Not slow, not single, not by sword, nor sorrow, 

Nor years, nor heart-break, nor time's sapping 
motion, 
Shall they drop off. Behold their last to-morrow! 
Earth shall be ocean ! 
And no breath, 
Save of the winds, be on the unbounded wave ! 
Angels shall tire their wings, but find no spot; 
Not even a rock from out the liquid grave 

Shall lift its point to save, 
Or show the place where strong Despair hath died, 
After long looking o'er the ocean wide 
For the expected ebb which conieth not: 
All shall be void, 
Destroy'd ! 
Another element shall be the lord 

Of life, and the abhorr'd 
Children of dust be quench'd ; and of each hue 
Of earth nought left but the unbroken blue ; 
And of the variegated mountain 
Shall nought remain 
Unchanged, or of the level plain ; 
Cedar and pine shall lift their tops in vain : 
All merged within the universal fountain, 
Man, earth, and fire, shall die, 
And sea and. sky 
Look vast and lifeless in the eternal eye. 
Upon the foam 
Who shall erect a home ? 

japhet (coming forward). 
My sire ! 
Earth's seed shall not expire ; 

Only the evil shall be put away 
From day. 
Avaunt ! ye exulting demons of the waste ! 
Who howl vour hideous joy 
When God destroys whom you dare not destroy ; 
Hence ! haste ! 
Back to your inner caves ! 
Until the waves 
Shall search yon in your secret place, 
And drive your sullen race 
Forth, to be roll'd upon the tossing winds 
In restless wretchedness along all space ! 

SPIRIT 

Son of the saved ! 
When thou and tnme have braved 
The wide ami warring element; 
When the great barrier of the deep is rent, 
Shalt thou and thine be good or happy ? — No! 
Thy new world and new race shall be of woe — 
62 



Less goodly in their aspect, in their years, 
Less than tbe glorious giants, who 
Yet walk the world in pride, 
The sons of Heaven l>y many a mortal bride. 
Thine shall be nothing of the past, save tears. 
And art thou not ashamed 

Tims to survive, 
And eat, ami drink, and wive 1 
With a base heart so far subdued and lamed, 
As even to hear this wide destruction named, 
Without such grief and courage, as should rather 

Bid thee await the vvorld-dissnlving wave, 
Than seek a shelter with thy favoiir'd father, 

And build thy city o'er the drown'd earth'* gravel 
Who would outlive their kind, 
Except the base and blind ? 
Mine 
Hateth thine, 
As of a different order in the sphere, 
But not our own. 
There is not one who hath not left a throne 

Vacant in heaven to dwell in darkness here, 
Rather than see his mates endure alone. 
Go, wretch ! and give 
A life like thine to other wretches — live ! 
And when the annihilating waters roar 
Above what they have done, 
Envy the giant patriarchs then no more, 
And scorn thy sire as the surviving one ! 
Thyself for being his son ! 
Chorus of Spirits issuing from the caiern. 

Rejoice ! 
No more the human voice 
Shall vex our joys in middle air 

With prayer; 
No more 

Shall they adore ; 
And we, who ne'er for ages have adored 

The prayer-exacting Lord, 
To whom the omission of a sacrifice 
Is vice ; 
We, we shall view the deep's salt sources pouru 
Until one element shall do the work 

Of all in chaos ; until they, 
The creatures proud of their poor clay, 
Shall perish, and their bleached bones shall lurli 
In caves, in dens, in clefts of mountains, where 
The deep shall follow to their latest lair ; 

Where even the brutes, in their despair, 
Shall cease to prey on man and on each other, 

And the striped tiger shall lie down to die 
Beside the lamb, as though he were his brother ■ 
Till all things shall be as they were, 
Silent and uncreated, save the sky: 
While a brief truce 
Is made with Death, who shall forbear 
The little remnant of the past creation, 
To generate new nations for his use ; 

This remnant, floating o'er the undulation 
Of the subsiding deluge, from its slime, 
When the hot sun hath baked the reeking soft 
Into a world, shall give again to time 
New beings — years — diseases — sorrow — crim«— 
Willi all companionship of hate and toil. 
Until 



450 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



japhet (interrupting them). 
The eternal will 
Shall deign to expound this dream 
Of good and evil ; and redeem 

Unto himself all times, and things; 
And, gather'd under his almighty wings, 
Abolish hell | 
And to the expiated earth 
Restore the beauty of her birth, 
Her Eden in an endless paradise, 
Where man no more can fall as once he fell, 
And even the very demons shall do well ! 

SPIRITS. 

And when shall take effect this wondrous spell ? 

JAPHET. 

When the Redeemer cometh ; first in pain, 
And then in glory. 

SPIRIT. 

Meantime still struggle in the mortal chain, 

Till earth wax hoary ; 
War with yourselves, and hell, and heaven, in vain, 

Until the clouds look gory 
With the blood reeking from each battle plain ; 
New times, new climes, new arts, new men ; but still 
The same old tears, old crimes, and oldest ill, 
Shall be amongst your race in different forms ; 

But the same moral storms 
Shall overswecp the future, as the waves 
In a few hours the glorious giants' graves. ' 
Chorus of Spirits. 
Brethren, rejoice ! 
Mortal, farewell ! 
Hark ! hark ! already we can hear the voice 
Of growing ocean's gloomy swell ; 

The winds, too, plume their piercing wings ! 
The clouds have nearly fill'd their springs ! 
The fountains of the great deep shall be broken, 

And heaven set wide her windows ; while mankind 
View, unacknowledged, each tremendous token — 
Still, as they were from the beginning, blind. 

We hear the sound they cannot hear, 
The mustering thunders of tiie threatening sphere ; 
Yet a few hours their coming is delay'd ; 
Their flashing banners, folded still on high. 
Yet undisplay'd, 
Save to the spirits' all-pervading eye. 

Howl ! howl ! oh earth ! 
Thy death is nearer than thy recent birth : 
Tremble, ye mountains, soon to shrink below 

The ocean's overflow ! 
The wave shall break upon your cliffs ; and shells, 

The little shells of ocean's least things, be 
Deposed where now the eagle's offspring dwells — 
How shall he shriek o'er the remorseless sea ! 
And call his nestlings up with fruitless yell, 
Unanswer'd save by the encroaching swell : — 
While man shall long in vain for his broad wings, 

The wings which could not save: — 
Where could he rest them, while the whole space brings 
Nought to his eye beyond the deep, his grave? 
Brethren, rejoice ! 
And loiiciiy lift each superhuman voice — 
All die, 



1 "And there wire giants in those Jays, and after; mighty 
men. winca were of old men of reoown." — Ocncsii. 



Save the slight remnant of Seth's seed — 

The seed of Scth, 
Exempt for future sorrow's sake from death 
But of the sons of Cain 
None shall remain ; 
And all his goodly daughters 
Must !ie beneath the desolating waters ; 
Or, floating upward with their long hair laid 
Along the wave, the cruel Heaven upbraid, 

Which would not spare 
Beings even in death so fair. 

It is dec. eed, 
All die ! 
And to the universal h.unan cry 
The universal silence shall succeed ! 

Fly, brethren, lly .' 

But still rejoice ! 
We fell ! 
They fall ! 
So perish all 
These petty foes of Heaven who shiinii from Hell ! 

[The Spirits diiappeur, sowing upwarri\. 
japhet (solus). 
God hath proclaim'd the destiny of earth ; 
My father's ark of safety hath announced it ; 
The very demons shriek it from their caves ; 
The scroll ' of Enoch prophesied it long 
In silent books, which, in their silence, say 
More to the mind than thunder to the ear : 
And yet men listen'd not, nor listen : hut 
Walk darkling to their doom ; which, though so nigh, 
Shakes them no more in their dim disbelief, 
Than their last cries shall shake the Almighty purpose, 
Or deaf obedient ocean, which fulfils it. 
No sign yet hangs its banner in the air ; 
The clouds are few, and of their wonted texture ; 
The sun will rise upon the earth's last day 
As on the fourth day of creation, when 
God said unto him, " Shine !" and he broke forth 
Into the dawn, which lighted not the yet 
Unform'd forefather of mankind — but roused 
Before the human orison the earlier 
Made and far sweeter voices of the birds, 
Which in the open firmament of heaven 
Have wings like angels, and like them salute 
Heaven first each day before the Adamites ! 
Their matins now draw nigh — the east is kindling — 
And they will sing ! and day will break ! Both near, 
So near the awful close ! For these must drop 
Their outworn pinions on the deep : and day, 
After the bright course of a few brief morrows, — 
Ay, day will rise ; but upon what ? A chaos, 
Which was ere day ; and which, renew'd, makes time 
Nothing ! for, without life, what are the hours ? 
No more to dust than is eternity 
Unto Jehovah, who created both. 
Without him, even eternity would be 
A void : without man, time, as made for man, 
Dies with man, and is swallow'd in that deep 
Which has no fountain ; as his race will be 
Devour' d by that which drowns his infant world. — 
What have we here? Shapes of both earth and air? 
No — all of heaven, they are so beautiful. 



1 The Book of Enoch, preserved by the Ethiopians, istaid 
by them to be anterior to the flood 



HEAVEN AND EARTH. 



45 



I cannot trace their features ; but their forms, 
How lovelily they move along the side 
Of the gray mountain, scattering its mist ! 
And after the swart savage spirits, whose 
Infernal immortality pour'd forth 
Their impious hymn of triumph, they shall be 
Welcome as Eden. It may be they come 
To tell me the reprieve of our young world, 
For which I have so often pray'd — They come ! 
Anah ! oh God ! and with her 

EWctSamiasa, Azaziel, Anah, a/u/ Aholibamah. 

ANAH. 

Japhet ! 



SAM! ASA. 



Lo! 



A son of Adam ! 

AZAZIEL. 

What doth the earth-born here, 
While all his race are slumbering ? 

JAPHET. 

Angel ! what 
Dost thou on earth when thou shouldst be on high ? 

AZAZIEL. 

Know'st thou not, or forget'st thou, that a part 
Of our great function is to guard thine earth ? 

JAPHET. 

But all good anjels have forsaken earth, 
Which is condemn'd : nay, even the evil fly 
The approaching chaos. Anah ! Anah ! my 
In vain, and long, and still to be beloved ! 
Why walk'st thou with this spirit, in those hours 
When no good spirit longer lights below ? 

ANAH. 

Japhet, I cannot answer thee ; yet, yet 
Forgive me 

JAPHET. 

May the Heaven, which soon no more 
Will pardon, do so ! for thou art greatly tempted. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

Back to thy tents, insulting son of Noah ! 
We know thee not. 

JAPHET. 

The hour may come when thou 
May'st know me better ; and thy sister know 
Me still the same which I have ever been. 

SAMIASA. 

Son of the patriarch, who hath ever been 
Upright before his God, whate'er thy griefs, 
And thy words seem of sorrow, rnix'd with wrath, 
How have Azaziel, or myself, brought on thee 
Wrong ? 

JAPHET. 

Wrong ! the greatest of all wrongs : but thou 
Say'st well, though she be dust, I did not, could not, 
Deserve her. Farewell, Anah ! I have said 
That word so often ! but now say it, ne'er 
To be repeated. Angel ! or whate'er 
Thou art, or must be soon, hast thou the power 
To save this beautiful — tliese beautiful 
Children of Cain? 

AZAZIEL. 

From what? 

JAPHET. 

And is it so 
That ye too know not ? Angels ! angels ! ye 



Have shared man's sin, and, it may be, now must 
Partake his punishment: or at the least 
My sorrow. 

SAMIASA. 

Sorrow ! I ne'er thought till now 
To hear an Adamite speak riddles to me. 

JAPHET. 

And hath not the Most High expounded ihem? 
Then ye are lost, as they are lost. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

So be it ! 
If they love as they are loved, thev will not slirink 
More to be mortal, than I would to dare 
An immortality of agonies 
With Samiasa ! 

ANAH. 

Sister ! sister ! speak not 
Thus. 

AZAZIEL. 

Fearest thou, my Anah ? 

ANAH. 

Yes, for thee ; 
I would resign this greater remnant of 
This little life of mine, befure one hour 
Of thine eternity should know a pang. 

JAPHE I. 

It is for him, then ! for the seraph, thou 

Hast left me ! That is nothing, if thou hast not 

Left thy God too ! for unions like to these, 

Between a mortal ami immortal, cannot 

He happy or be hallow'd. We are sent 

Upon the earth to toil and die ; and they 

Are made to minister on high unto 

The Highest ; but if he can save thee, soon 

The hour will come in which celestial aid 

Alone can do so. 

ANAH. 

Ah ! he speaks of death. 

SAMIASA. 

Of death to us ! and those who are with us! 
But that the man seems full of sorrow, I 
Could smile. 

JAPHET. 

I grieve not for myself, nor fear ; 
I am safe, not for my own deserts, but those 
Of a well-doing sire, who hath been found 
Righteous enough to save his children. Would 
His power were greater of redemption ! or 
That by exchanging my own life for here, 
Who could alone have made mine happy, she, 
The last and loveliest of Cain's race, could share 
The ark which shall receive a remnant of 
The seed of Seth ! 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

And dost thou think that we, 
With Cain's, the eldest born of Adam's blood 
Warm in our veins, — strong Cain, who was begotten 
In Paradise, — would mingle with Seth'a children I 
Seth, the last offspring of old Adam's dotage ? 
No, not to save all earth, were earth in pert) ! 
Our race hath always dwelt apart from thine 
From the beginning, and shall do so ever. 

JAI'IIET. 

I did not speak to thee, Aholibamah ! 

Too much of the forefather, wnom thou vaumest 

Has come down in that haughty blood which spring* 



From him who shed the first, and that a brother's ! 
But thou, my Anali ! let me call thee mine, 
Albeit thou art not ; 't is a word I cannot 
Part with, although I must from thee. My Anah! 
Thou who dost rather make me dream that Abel 
Had left a daughter, whose pure pious race 
Survived in thee, so much unlike thou art 
The rest of the stern Canutes, save in beauty, 

For all of them are fairest in their favour 

AHOLIBAMah {interrupting him). 
And W'ouidst thou have her like our father's foe 
In mind, and soul? If /partook thy thought, 
And drcam'd that aught of Abel was in her ! — 
Get thee hence, son of Noah ; thou mak'st strife. 

JAPHET. 

Offspring of Cain, thy father did so ! 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

But 

He slew not Seth ; and what hast thou to do 
With other deeds between his God and him ? 

JAPHET. 

Thou speakest well : his God hath judged him, and 
I had not named his deed, but that thyself 
Didst seem to glory in him, nor to shrink 
From what he had done. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

He was our father's father : 
The eU 'est bom of man, the strongest, bravest, 
And mos. enduring: — Shall I blush for him, 
From whom we had our being? Look upon 
Our race; bthold their stature and their beauty, 
Their courage, strength, and length of days 

JAPHET. 

They are number'd. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

Be it so ! but while yet their hours endure, 
I glory in my brethren an '. our fathers ! 

JAPFET. 

My sire and race but glory in their God, 
Anah ! and thou ? 

ANAH. 

Whate'er out God decrees, 
The God of Seth as Cain, I must obt^v, 
And will endeavour patiently to obey ; 
But could I dare to pray in this dread ho.'T 
Of universal vengeance (if such should be ( . 
It would not be to live, alone exempt 
01 all my house. My sister! Oh, my sister! 
What were the world, or other worlds, or all 
The brightest future without the sweet past— 
Thy love — my father's — all the life, and all 
The thingj which sprung up with me, like the stars, 
Making my dim existence radiant with 
S'>ft lights which were not mine? Aholibamah ! 
Oh! if there should be mercy — seek it, find it: 
I abhor death, because that thou must die. 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

What ! hatn this dreamer, with his father's ark, 
The bugbear he hath built to scare the world, 
Shaken my sister ? Are we not the loved 
Ol seraphs? and if we were not, must we 
Cling to a son of Noah for our lives ? 

Rather than thus But the enthusiast dreams 

The wore, of dreams, the phantasies engender'd 

by hopeless love and heated vigils. Who 

Stall snake these solid mountains, this firm earth, 



And bid those clouds and \* j.ers take a shape 
Distinct from that which we and all our sires 
Have seen them wear on their eternal way? 
Who shall do this? 

JAPHET. 

He whose one word produced them 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

Who heard that word ? 

JAPHET. 

The universe, which leap'd 
To life before it. Ah ! smilest thou still in scorn / 
Turn to thy seraphs ; if they attest it not, 
They are none. 

SAMIASA. 

Aholibamah, own thy God ! 

AHOLIBAMAH. 

I have ever hail'd our Maker, Samiasa, 

As thine, and mine ; a God of love, not sorrow. 

JAPHET. 

Alas ! what else is love but sorrow ? Even 
He who made earth in love, had soon to grieve 
Above its first and best inhabitants. 



AHOLIBAMAH. 



'T is said so. 



JAPHET. 

It is even so. 

Enter Noah and Shem. 

NOAH. 

Japhct! What 
Dost thou here with these children of the wicked? 
Dread'st thou not to partake their coming doom ? 

JAPHET. 

Father, it cannot be a sin to seek 
To save an earth-born being ; and behold, 
These are not of the sinful, since they have 
The fellowship of angels. 

NOAH. 

These are they, then, 
Who leave the throne of God, to take them wives 
From out the race of Cain : the sons of Heaven, 
Who seek earth's daughters for their beauty ! 

AZAZIEL. 

Patriarcli ' 
Thou hast said it. 

NOAH. 

Woe, woe, woe to such communion ! 
Has not God made a harrier between earth 
And heaven, and limited each, kind to kind ? 

SAMIASA. 

Was not man made in high Jehovah's image ? 
Did God not love what he had made ? And what 
i\> we but imitate and emulate 
I1l» love unto created love ? 

NOAH. 

I am 

But man, and was not made to judge mankind, 
Far less thv sons of God ; but as our God 
Has deign'd to commune with me, and reveal 
I I'm judgments, I reply, that the descent 
Of seraphs from .heir everlasting seat 
Unto a perishable and perishing, 
Even on the very evt of perishing, world, 
Cannot be good. 

AZ.ZIEL. 

What ! uiough it were to save ^ 



HEAVEN AND EARTH. 



453 



NOAH. 

Not ye in all your glory can redeem 

What He who made you glorious hath condemn'd. 

Were your immortal mission safety, 't would 

Be general, not for two, though beautiful, 

And beautiful they are, but not the less 

Condemn'd. 

JAPHET. 

Oh father ! say it not. 

NOAH. 

Son ! son ! 
If that thou wouldst avoid their doom, forget 
That they exist ; they soon shall cease to be, 
While thou shalt be the sire of a new world, 
And better. 

JAPHET. 

Let me die with this, and them I 

NOAH. 

Thou shoulrlst for such a thought, but shalt not ; He 
Wiio can, redeems thee. 

SAMIASA. 

And why him and thee, 
More than what he, thy son, prefers to both ? 

NOAH. 

A»k Him who made thee greater than myself 
And mine, but not less subject to his own 
Almightiness. And lo ! his mildest and 
Least to be tempted messenger appears ! 

Enter Raphael tlie Archangel, 

RAPHAEL. 

Spirits! 
Whose seat is near the throne, 
What do ye here ? 
Is thus a seraph's duty to be shown 
Now that the hour is near 
When earth must be alone'/ 
Return! 
And burn 
In glorious homage with the elected " seven." 
Your place is heaven. 

s A MI ASA. 

Raphael ! 
The first and fairest of the sons of God, 

How long hath this been law, 
That earth by angels must be left untrod ? 

Earth ! which oft saw 
Jehovah's footsteps not disdain her sod ! 
The world He loved, and made 
For love ; and oft have we obey'd 
His frequent mission with delighted pinions ; 

Adoring Him in his least works display'd ; 
Watching this youngest star of his dominions: 
And as the latest birth of His great word, 
Eager to keep it worthy of our Lord. 
Why is thy brow severe ? 
And wherefore speak'st thou of destruction near ? 

RAFHAEL. 

Had Samiasa and Azaziel been 
In their true place, with the angelic choir, 
Written in fire 
They would have seen 
Jehovah's late decree, 
And not inquired their Maker's breath of me. 
But ignorance must ever be 
A part of sin : 
2 R 



And even the spirits' knowledge shall grow less 

As they wax proud within ; 
For blindness is the first-born of excess. 

When all good angels left the world, yc stay'd, 
Stung with Strange passions, and debased 

By mortal feelings for a mortal maid ; 
But ye are pardon'd thus far, and replaced 
With your pure equals : Hence ! away ! away ' 
Or stay, 

And lose eternity by that delay ! 

AZA7.II- I.. 

And thou! if earth be thus forbidden 
In the decree 
To us until this moment hidden, 

Dost thou not err as we 
In being here '! 

BAPHAEO. 

I came to call ye back to your fit sphere, 

In the great name and at the word of God ! 
Dear, dearest in themselves, and scarce less dear 

That which I came to do : till now we trod 
Together the eternal space — together 

Let us still walk the stars. True, earth must die! 
Her race, return'd into her womb, must wither, 

And much which she inherits ; but oh ! why 
Cannot this earth be made, or be destroy'd, 
Without involving ever some vast void 
In the immortai ranks ? immortal still 

In their immeasurable forfeiture. 
Our brother Satan fell, his burning will 

Rather than longer worship dared endure! 

But ye who still are pure ! 
Seraphs ! less mighty than that mightiest one, 

Think how he was undone ! 
And think if tempting man can compensate 

For heaven desired too late ? 
Long have I warr'd, 
Long must I war 

With him who deem'd it hard 

To be created, and to acknowledge Him 

Who 'midst the cherubim 
Made him as sun to a dependent star, 
Leaving the archangels at his right hand dim. 

I loved him — beautiful he was : oh Heaven ! 
Save His who made, what beauty and what powef 
Was ever like to Satan's ! Would the hour 

In which he fell could ever be forgiven !' 
The wish is impious : but oh ye ! 
Yet undestroy'd, be warn'd ! Eternity 

With him, or with his God, is in your choice: 
He hath not tempted you, he cannot tempt 
The angels, from his further snares exempt; 

But man hath listen'd to his voice, 
And ye to woman's — beautiful she is, 
The serpent's voice less subtle than her kiss. 
The snake but vanquish'd dust ; but she will draw 
A second host from heaven, to break H ►wen's law. 
Yet, yet, oh fty ! 
Ye cannot die, 
But they 
Shall pass away, 
While ye shall fill with shrieks the upper <ihy 

For perishable clay, 
Whose memory in your immortality 

Shall iong outlast the sun whim gave incm (Uf 
Think how your essence dilfereth from their« 



454 BYRON'S WORKS. 


In all but suffering! Why partake 


The first who taught us knowledge hath been huri'd 


The agony to which they must be heirs — 


From his once archangehc throne 


Born to bo plough'd with tears, and sown with cares, 


Into some unknown world : 


And rcap'd by Death, lord of the human soil? 


And thou, A7.azicl ! No — 


Even had their days been left to toil their path 


Thou shall not suffer woe 


Through time to dust, unshorten'd by God's wrath, 


For me. Away ! nor weep ! 


Still they are evil's prey and sorrow's spoil. 


Thou canst not weep ; but yet 


AIIOLIBAMAH. 


May'st suffer more, not weeping : then forget 


Let them fly ! 


Her whom the surges of the all-strangling deep 


I hear the voice which says that all must die, 


Can bring no pang like this. Fly! fly! 


Sooner than our white-bearded patriarchs died ; 


Being gone, 'twill be less difficult to die. 


And that on high 


JAPHET. 


An ocean is prepared, 


CIi say not so ! 


While from below 


Father ! and thou, archangel, thou ! 


The deep shall rise to meet heaven's overflow. 


Surely celestial mercy lurks below 


Few shall be spared, 


That pure severe serenity of brow : 


It seems ; and, of that few, the race of Cain 


Let them not meet this sea without a shore, 


Must lift their eyes to Adam's God in vain. 


Save in our ark, or let me be no more ! 


Sister ! since it is so, 


NOAH. 


And the eternal Lord 


Peace, child of passion, peace ! 


In vain would be implored 


If not within thy heart yet with thy tongue 


For the remission of one hour of woe, 


Do God no wrong ! 


Let us resign even what we have adored, 


Live as he wills it — die, when he ordains, 


And meet the wave, as we would meet the sword, 


A righteous death, unlike the seed of Cain's. 


If not unmoved, yet undismay'd, 


Cease, or be sorrowful in silence ; cease 


And wailing less for us than those who shall 


To weary Heaven's ear with thy selfish plaint. 


Survive in mortal or immortal thrall, 


Wouldst thou have God commit a sin for thee? 


And, when the fatal waters are allay'd, 


Such would it be 


Weep for the myriads who can weep no more. 


To alter his intent 


Fly, seraphs ! to your own eternal shore, 


For a mere mortal sorrow. Be a man ! 


Where winds nor howl nor waters roar. 


And bear what Adam's race must bear, and can. 


Our portion is to die, 


JAPHET. 


And yours to live for ever : 


Ay, father ! but when they are gone, 


But which is best, a dead eternity, 


And we are all alone, 


Or living, is but known to the great Giver : 


Floating upon the azure desert, and 


Obey him, as we shall obey ; 


The depth beneath us hides our own dear land, 


I would not keep this life of mine in clay 


And dearer, silent friends and brethren, all 


An hour beyond His will ; 


Buried in its immeasurable breast, 


Nor see ye lose a portion of His grace, 


Who, who, our tears, our shrieks, shall then command? 


For all the mercy which Seth's race 


Can we in desolation's peace have rest? 


Find still. 


Oh, God ! be thou a god, and spare 


Fly! 


Yet while 't is time ! 


And as your pinions bear ye back to heaven, 


Renew not Adam's fall : 


Think that my love still mounts with thee on high, 


Mankind were then but twain, 


Samiasa ! 


But they are numerous now as are the waves 


And if I look up with a tearless eye, 


And the tremendous rain, 


'T is that an angel's bride disdains to weep — 


Whose drops shall be less thick than would their grav<>- , 


Farewell ! Now rise, inexorable deep ! 


Were graves permitted to the seed of Cain. 


ANAH. 


NOAH. 


And must we die ? 


Silence, vain boy ! each word of thine 's a crime ! 


And must I lose thee too, 


Angel ! forgive this stripling's fond despair. 


Azaziel ? 


RAPHAEL. 


Oh, my heart ! my heart ! 


Seraphs ! these mortals speak in passion : Ye, 


Thy prophecies were true, 


Who are, or should be, passionless and pure, 


And yet thou wert so happy too ! 


May now return with me. 


The blow, though not unlook'd for, falls as new ; 


SAM*ASA. 


But yet depart ! 


It may not be : 


Ah, why ? 


We have chosen, and will endure. 


Vet let me not retain thee — fly ! 


RAPHAEL. 


My pangs can be but brief: but thine would be 


Say'st thou ? 


Eternal, if repulsed from heaven for me. 


AZAZIEL. 


Too much already hast thou deign'd 


He hath said it, and I say, Amen ! 


To one of Adam's race ! 


RAPHAEL. 


Ou. doom is sorrow ! not to us alone, 


Again ! 


But to the spirits who have not disdain'd 


Then from this hour, 


To love us, cometh anguish with disgrace. 


Shorn as ye are of all celestial power, 



HEAVEN AND EARTH. 



455 



And aliens from your God, 

Farewell ! 

JAPHET. 

Alas ! where shall they dwell ? 
Hark ! hark ! Deep sounds, and deeper still, 

Are howling from the mountain's bosom : 
There 's not a breath of wind upon the hill, 

Yet quivers every leaf, and drops each blossom: 
Earth groans as if beneath a heavy load. 

NO A II. 

Hark ! hark ! the sea-birds cry ! 
In clouds they overspread the lurid sky, 
And hover round the mountain, where before 
Never a white wing, wetted by the wave, 

Yet dared to soar, 
Even when the waters wax'd too fierce to brave. 
Soon it shall be their only shore, 
And then, no more ! 

JAPHET. 

The sun ! the sun ! 
He riseth, but his better light is gone ; 
And a black circle, bound 

His glaring disk around, 
Proclaims earth's last of summer days hath shone ! 
The clouds return into the hues of night, 
Save where their brazen-colour'd edges streak 
The verge where brighter morns were wont to break. 

NOAH. 

And lo ! yon flash of light, 
The distant thunder's harbinger, appears ! 

It cometh ! hence, away ! 
Leave to the elements their evil prey ! 
Hence to where our all-hallow'd ark uprears 
Its safe and wreckless sides. 

JAPHET. 

Oh, father, stay ! 
Leave not my Anah to the swallowing tides ! 

NOAH. 

Must we not leave all life to such ? Begone ! 

JAPHET. 

Not I. 

NOAH. 

Then die 
With them ! 
How darest thou look on that prophetic sky, 
And seek to save what all things now condemn, 
In overwhelming unison 

With just Jehovah's wrath? 

JAPHET. 

Can rage and justice join in the same path ? 

NOAH. 

Blasphemer ! darest thou murmur even now 7 

Raphael. 
Patriarcti, be still a father ! smooth thy brow : 

Thy son, despite his folly, shall not sink ; 
He knows not what he says, yet shall not drink 

With sobs the salt foam of the swelling waters ; 
But be, when passion passeth, good as thou, 
Nor perish like Heaven's children with man's daugh- 
ters. 

AII0LIBAMAH. 

1'he tempest cometh ; heaven and earth unite 

For the annihilation of all life. 

Unequal is the strife 
Between our strength and the eternal might ! 



SAMIASA. 

But ours is with thee : we will bear ye far 

To some untroubled star, 
Where thou and Anah shall partake f>ur lot : 

And if thou dost not weep for thy lost earth, 
Our forfeit heaven shall also be forgot. 

ANAH. 

Oh, my dear father's tents, my place of birth ! 
And mountains, land, and woods, when ye are not, 
Who shall dry up my tears ? 

AZAZIEL. 

Thy spirit-lord. 
Fear not, though we are shut from heaven, 
i r et much is ours, whence we cannot be driven. 

RAPHAEL. 

Rebel ! thy words are wicked, as thy deeds 
Shall henceforth be but weak: the flaming sword, 
Which chased the first-born out of paradise, 
Still flashes in the angelic hands. 

AZAZIEL. 

It cannot slay us: threaten dust with death, 
And talk of weapons unto that which bleeds ! 
What are thy swords in our immortal eyes ? 

RAPHAEL. 

The moment cometh to approve thy strength : 
And learn at length 

How vain to war with what thy G od commands : 
Thy former force was in thy faith. 

Enter Mortals, flying for refuge. 

Chorus of Mortals. 

The heavens and earth are mingling — God ! oh God ! 

What have we done ? Yet spare ! 

Hark ! even the forest beasts howl forth their prayer ' 

The dragon crawls from out his den, 

To herd in terror innocent with men ; 
And the birds scream their agony through air. 
Yet, yet, Jehovah ! yet withdraw thy rod 
Of wrath, and pity thine own world's despair ! 
Hear not man only but all nature plead ! 

RAPHAEL. 

Farewell, thou earth ! ye wretched sons of clay, 
I cannot, must not aid you. 'T is decreed ! 

[Exit Raphael. 

JAPHET. 

Some clouds sweep on, as vultures for their prey, 
While others, fix'd as rocks, await the word 
At which their wrathful vials shall be pour'd. 
No azure more shall robe the firmament, 
Nor spangled stars be glorious : death hath risen 
In the sun's place a pale and ghastly glare 
Hath wound itself around the dying air. 

AZAZIEL. 

Come, Anah ! quit this chaos-founded prison, 

To which the elements again repair, 

To turn it into what it was : beneath 

The shelter of these wings thou shall lie safe, 

As was the eagle's nestling once within 

Its mother's. — Let the coming chaos chafe 

With all its elements ! Heed not their din ! 

A brighter world than this, where thou shall breatho 

Ethereal life, will we explore : 

ThoM darken'd clouds are not the only skies, 

[Azaziel and Samiasa fly off, and disappear 
with Anah and Ahombamaii. 



456 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



, j 

The corpses of the world of thy young days: 
Then to Jehovah raise 
Thy song of praise ! 

A WOMAN. 

Blessed are the dead 
Who die in the Lord ! 
And though the waters he o'er earth outspread, 
Yet, as His word, 
' Be the decree adored ! 
lie gave me life — He taketh but 
The breath which is His own: 
And though these eyes should be for ever shut, 
Nor longer tills weak voice before His throne 
Be heard in supplicating tone, 
Still blessed be the Lord, 
For what is past, 
For that which is : 
For all are His, 
From first to last — 
Time — space — eternity — life — death — 

The vast known and immeasurable unknown. 
He made, and can unmake ; 

And shall 1, for a little gasp of breath, 
Blaspheme and groan? 

No ; let me die, as I have lived, in faith, 
Nor quiver, though the universe may quake I 

Chorus of Mortals. 
Where shall we fly ? 
Not to the mountains high ; 
For now their torrents rush with double roar, 
To meet the ocean, which, advancing still, 
Already grasps each drowning hill, 
Nor leaves an unsearch'd cave. 

Enter a JVoman. 

WOMAN. 

Oh, save me, save ! 
Our valley is no more : 
My father and my father's tent, 
My brethren and my brethren's herds, 
The pleasant trees that o'er our noon-day bent, 
And sent forth evening songs from sweetest birds, 
The little rivulet which frcshen'd all 
Our pastures green, 
No more are to be seen. 
When to the mountain cliff" I climb'd this morn, 

I turn'd to bless the spot, 
And not a leaf appear'd about to fall ;— 

And now they are not ! — 
Why was I born ? 

JAPHET. 

To die ! in youth to die ; 

And happier in that doom, 

Than to behold the universal tomb 

Which I 

Am thus condemn'd to weep above in vain. 

Why, when all perish, why must I remain ? 

[The J Voters rise; Men fly in every direction , 
many are overtaken by the leaves ; the Chorus 
of Mortals disperses in search of safety up the 
Mountains; Japiiet remains upon a -ock, 
while the Ark floats towards him in tlie dis- 
tance. 



JAPIIET. 

They arc gone ! Theyhave disappear'd amidst the roar 
Of the forsaken world ; and never more, 
Whether they live, or die with all earth's life, 
Now near its last, can aught restore 
Anah unto these eyes. 

Chorus of Mortals, 
Oh son of Noah ! mercy on thy kind ! 
What, wilt thou leave us all— all — all behind? 
While safe amidst the elemental strife, 
Thou sit'st within 'hy guarded ark? 

a mother {iiff'ering her infant to Japhet). 
Oh let this child embark ! 
I brought him forth in woe, 

But thought it joy 
To see him to my bosom clinging so. 
Why was he born ? 
What hath he done — 
My unweau'd son — 
To move Jehovah's wrath or scorn ? 
What is there in this milk of mine, that death 
Shoidd stir all heaven and earth up to destroy 

My boy, 
And roll the waters o'er his placid breath ? 
Save him, thou seed of Seth ! 
Or cursed be — with Him who made 
Thee and thy race, for which we are betray'd ! 

JAPHET. 

Peace ! 't is no hour for curses, hut for prayer ! 
Chorus of Mortals. 
For prayer ! ! ! 
And where 
Shall prayer ascend, 
When the swoln clouds unto the mountains bend 

And burst, 
And gushing oceans every barrier rend, 

Until the very deserts know no thirst ? 
Accursed 
Be He, who made thee and thy sire ! 
We deem our curses vain ; we must expire ; 

But, as we know the worst, 
IVhv should our hymns be raised, our knees be bent 
Before the implacable Omnipotent, 
Since we must fall the same ? 
If He hath made earth, let it be His shame, 

To make a world for torture : — Lo! they come, 

The loathsome waters in their rage ! 
And with their roar make wholesome nature dumb ! 

The forest's trees (coeval with the hour 
When paradise upsprung, 

Ere Eve gave Adam knowledge for her dower, 
Or Adam his first hymn of slavery sung), 

So massy, vast, yet green in their old age, 
Are overtopp'd, 

Their summer blossoms by the surges lopp'd, 
Which ris", and rise, and rise. 
Vamly we look up to the louring skies — 

They meet the seas, 
And shut oul God from our beseeching eyes. 

Ply, son of Noah, fly, and take thine case 
In thine allotted ocean-tent; 
'Vnd view ull floating o'er the element, 



( 457 ) 



Etie $hrb|riircg of 2tantr< 



*T is the sunsot of lite sives me mystienl lore, 
And coining events casl iheir shadows before 



CAMPBELL. 



DEDICATION. 



Ladt! if for the cold and cloudy clime 

Where I was born, but where I would not die, 
Of the great poet-siro of Italy 

I dare to build the imitative rhyme, 

Harsh Runic copy of the South's sublime, 

Thou art the cause ; and, howsoe'er I 

Fall short of his immortal harmony, 
Thy gentle heart will pardon me the crime. 
Thou, in the pride of beauty and of youth, 

Spakest ; and for thee to speak and be obey'd 
Are one ; but only in the sunny South 

Such sounds are utter d, and such charms display'd, 
So sweet a language from so fair a mouth — 

Ah ! to what effort would it not persuade? 
Ravenna, June 21, 1819. 



PREFACE. 



ly the course of a visit to the city of Ravenna, in 
the summer of 1819, it was suggested to the author 
that, having composed something on the subject of 
Tasso's confinement, he should do the same on Dante's 
exile — the tomb of the poet forming one of the princi- 
pal objects of interest in that city, both to the native 
and to the stranger. 

" On this hint I spake," and the result has been the 
following fovir cantos, in terza rima, now offered to the 
reader. If they are understood and approve.!, it is my 
purpose to continue the poem in various other cantos 
to its natural conclusion in the present age. The reader 
is requested to suppose that Dante addresses him in 
the interval between the conclusion of the Divina Corn- 
media and his death, and shortly before the latter event, 
foretelling the fortunes of Italy in general in the ensu- 
ing centuries. In adopting this plan, I have had in my 
mind the Cassandra of Lycophron, and the Prophecy 
of Ncreus bv Horace, as well as the Prophecies of 
Holy Writ. The measure adopted is the terza rima of 
Dante, which I am not aware to have seen hitherto 
tried in our language, ever,.! it may be by Mr. 
cf whose translation I never saw but one extract, 
quoted in the notes of Caliph Vathek; so that — if I 
do not err — this poem may be considered as a metrical 
experiment. The cantos are short, and about the same 
length of those of the poet whose name I have bor- 
rowed, and most probably taken in vain. 

Amongst the inconveniences of authors in the pres- 
ent day, it is difficult f>r any who have a name, good 
or bad, to escape translation. I have had the fortune 
to sec the fourth canto of Childc Harold translated 
2 a 2 



into Italian versi seiolti — that is, a poem written in the 
in stoma into blank vcrsr, without regard to 
the natural divisions of the stanza, or of the sense. If 
the present poem, being on a national topic, should 
chance to undergo the same fate, I would request the 
Italian reader to remember, that when 1 have, failed in 
the imitation of his great "Padre Alighier," I have 
failed in imitating that which all study and few under- 
stand, since to this very day it is not yet settled what 
was the meaning of the allegory in the first canto of 
the Inferno, unless Count Marchetti's ingenious and 
probable conjecture may be considered as having de- 
cided the question. 

He may also pardon my failure the more, as I am 
not quite sure that he would be pleased with my suc- 
cess, since the Italians, with a pardonable nationality, 
are particularly jealous of all that is left them as a na- 
tion — their literature ; and, in the present bitterness of 
the classic and romantic war, are but ill disposed to 
permit a foreigner even to approve or imitate them, with- 
out finding some fault with his ultramontane presump- 
tion. I can easily enter into all this, knowing what 
would be thought in England of an Italian imitator of 
Milton, or if a translation of ,'Ionti, or Pmdemonte, or 
Arici, should be held up to thr rising generation, as a 
model for their future poetical ► ssays. But I perceive 
that I am dev iating into an addn ss to the Italian readei, 
w hen mv business is with the E iglish one, and, be they 
few or many, I must take my leave of both. 



PROPHECY OF DANTE. 



CANTO I. 

Once more in man's frail world ! which 1 had left 
So long that 't was forgotten ; and I feel 
The weight of clay again, — too soon bereft 

Of the immortal vision which could heal 

My earthly sorrows, and to God's own skies 
Lift me from that deep gulf without repeal, 

Where late my cars rung with the damned cries 
Of souls in !•■ bale; and from that place 

Of li whence men may arise 

Pure li'- 1 1 to r\g< lie race ; 

'Midst whom mj own bright Beatrce i 
My spirit w'uh h r light ; and to the base 

Of the Eternal triad ! first, last, best, 

Mvsvrioiis, three, sole, infinite, great G<xl! 
Soul universal ! led the mortal 

Unblasted by the glory, though lie trod 

From star to star to reach the almighty throne 
Oh Beatrice ! whose sweet limbs the sou 



458 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



So long hath press'd, and the cotJ marble stone, 
Thou sole pure seraph of my earliest love, 
Love so ineffable, ami so alone, 
That nought on earth could more my bosom move, 
And meeting thee in heaven was but to meet 
That without which my soul, like the arkless dove, 
Had wander'd still in search of, nor her feet 
Relieved her wing till found ; without thy light 
My paradise had still been incomplete. 3 
Since my tenth sun gave summer to my Bight 
Thou wcrt my life, the essence of my thought, 
Loved ere I knew the name of love, and bright 
Still in tlxso dim old eyes, now overwrought 

With the world's war, and years, and banishment, 
And tears for thee, by other woes untaught ; 
For mine is not a nature to be bent 

By tyrannous faction, and the brawling crowd ; 
And "though the long, long conflict hath been spent 
In vain, and never more, save when the cloud 
Whi.-li overhangs the Apcnnine, my mind's eye 
Pierces to fancy Florence, once so proud 
Of me, can I return, though but to die, 
Unto my native soil, they have not yet 
Qucnch'd the old exile's spirit, stern and high. 
But tho «un, though not overcast, must set, 
And the night cometh ; I am old in daj s, 
And deeds, and contemplation, and have met 
Destruction face to face in all his ways. 

The world hath left me, what it found me— pure, 
And if I have not gather'd yet its praise, 
I sought it not by any baser lure ; 

Man wrongs, and Time avenges, and my name 
May form a monument not all obscure, 
Though such was not my ambition's end or aim, 
To add to the vain-glorious list of those 
Who dabble in the pettiness of fame, 
And make men's fickle b-eath the wind that blows 
Their sail, and deem it glory to be class'd 
With conquerors, and virtue's other foes, 
In bloody chronicles of ages past. 

I would have had my Florence great and free : 3 
Oh Florence ! Florence! unto me thou wast 
Like that Jerusalem which the Almighty He 

Wept over : " but thou wouldst not ;" as the bird 
Gathers its young, I would have gather'd thee 
Beneath a parent pinion, hadst thou heard 
My voice ; but as the adder, deaf and fierce, 
Against the breast that cherish'd thee was stirr'd 
Thy venom, and my state thou didst amerce, 
And doom this body forfeit to the fire. 
Alas ! how bitter is his country's curse 
To him who for that country would expire, 
But did not merit to expire by her, 
And loves her, loves her even in her ire. 
The day may come when she will cease to err, 
The day may come she would be proud (o have 
The dust she dooms to scatter, 4 and transfer 
Of him, whom she denied a home, the grave. 
But this shall not be granted ; let my dust 
Lie whpre it falls ; nor shall the soil which gave 
Me bicath, but in her sudden fury thrust 
Mo forth to breathe elsewhere, so reassume 
My indignant bones, because her angry gust 
Forsooth is over, and repeal'd her doom. 
No,---shc denied me what was mine — my roof, 
And shall not have what is not hers — my tomb. 



Too long her armed wrath hath kept aloof 

The breast which would have bled for her, the heart 
That heat, the mind that was temptation-proof, 
The man who fought, toil'd, iravcll'd, and each part 
Of a true citizen fuliili'd, and saw 
For his reward the GueiPs ascendant art 
Pass his destruction even into a law. 

things are not made for forgetfulness — 
Florence shall be forgotten first ; too raw 
The wound, too deep the wrong, and the distress 
Of such endurance too prolong'd, to make 
My pardon greater, her injustice less, 
Fhpugn late repented ; yet — yet for her sake 
I feel some fonder yearnings, and. fir thine, 
My own Beatrice, I would hardly take 

U| the land whi.-h ortce was mine. 

And still is hallowed by thy (last's return, 
Who'll would protect the murderess like a shrine, 
And save ten thousand foes by thy sole urn. 

TJhough, like old Marios from Mintunne's marsh 
And Carthage' ruins, my lone breast may burn 
At times with evil feelings hot and harsh, 
And sometimes the last pangs of a vile foe 
Writhe in a dream before me, and o'er-areh 
My brow with hopes of triumph, — let them go ! 
Such are the last infirmities of those 
Who long have suP~:r'd more than mortal woe, 
And yet, being morta 'till, have no repose 
But on the pillow of Reyehge — Etevi 
Who sleeps to dream of blood, and waking n'.ows 
With the oft-baffled, slakeless thirst of change, 
When we shall mount again, and they that trod 
Be trampled on, while Death and Ate ran;;e 
O'er humbled heads and s< \ -threat God 

Take these thoughts from me — to thy hands I yield 
My many wrongs, and thine almighty rod 
Will fall on those who smote me, — he my shield ! 
As thou hast been in peril, and in pain, 
In turbulent cities, and the tented field — 
In toil, and many troubles borne in vain 
For Florence. — I appeal from her to Thee ! 
Thee, whom I late saw in thy loftiest reign, 
Even in that glorious vision, which to see 
And live was never granted until now, 
And yet thou hast permitted this to me. 
Alas! with what a weight upon my brow 

The sense of earth and earthly things comes back. 
Corrosive passions, feelings dull and low, 
The heart's quick throb upon the mental rack, 
Long day, and dreary night ; the retrospect 
Of half a century bloody and black, 
And the frail few years I may yet expert 
Hoary and hopeless, but It ss hard to hear; 
For I have been too long and deeply wreek'd 
On the lone rock of desolate despair 
To lift my eyes more to the passing sail 
Which shuns that reef so horrible and bare ; 
Nor raise my voice— fir who would heed my wail? 
I am not of this people, nor this age, 
And yet my harpings will unfold a tale 
Which shall preserve these times, when not a page 
Of their perturbed annals could attract 
An eye to gaze upon their civil rage, 
Did not my verse embalm full many an act 

Worthless as they who wrought it : 'tis the doom 
Of spirits of my order to be rack'd 



THE PROPHECY OF DANTE. 



459 



In life, to wear their hearts out, and consume 
Their aays in endless strife, and die alone ; 
Then future thousands crowd around their tomb, 

Ami pilgrims come from climes where they have known 
The name of him — who now is but a name. 
And wasting homage o'er the sullen stone 

Spread his —by him unheard, unheeded — fame ; 
And mine at least hath cost mc dear : to die 
Is nothing ; but to wither thus — to tame 

My mind down from its own infinity — 
To live in narrow ways with little men, 
A common sight to every common eye, 

A wanderer, while even wolves can find a den, 
Ripp'd from all kindred, from all home, all things 
That make communion sweet, and soften pain — 

To feel me in the solitude of kings, 
Without the power that makes them bear a crown — 
To envy every dove his nest and wings 

Which waft him where the Apenninc looks down 
On Arno, till he perches, it may be, 
Within my all-inexorable town, 

Where yet my boys are, and that fatal she, 6 

Their mother, the cold partner who hath brought 
Destruction for a dowry — this to see 

And feel, and know without repair, hath taught 
A bitter lesson ; but it leaves me free : 
I h.ive not vilely found, nor basely sought,— 

They made an exile — not a slave of me. 



CANTO II. 



I'he spirit of the fervent days of old, 

When words were things that came to pass, and 
thought 

Fiasn'd o'er the future, bidding men behold 
Their children's children's doom already brought 

Forth from the abyss of lime which is to be, 

The chaos of events, where lie half-wrought 
Shapes that must undergo mortality ; 

What the great seers of Israel wore within, 

That spirit was on them, and is on me, 
And if, Cassandra-like, amidst the din 

Of conflict none will hear, or hearing heed, 

This voice from out the wilderness, the sin 
Be theirs, and my own feelings be my meed, 

The only guerdon I have ever known. 

Hast thou not bled ? and hast thou still to bleed, 
Italia? Ah! to me such things, foreshown 

With dim sepulchral light, bid mo forg» t 

In thine irreparable wrongs my own ; 
We can have but one country, and even 7et 

Thou 'rt mine — my bones shall be wit; in thy breast, 

My soul within thy language, which i/ice set 
With our old Roman sway in the wide west; 

Hut I will make another tongue arise 

As lofty and more sweet, in which exprest 

he hero's ardour, or the lover's sighs, 

Shall find alike such sounds for every theme 

That every word, as brilliant as thy skies, 
Shall realize a poet's proudest dream, 

And make thee Europe's nightingale of song ; 

So that all present speech to thine shall seem 
Tin- note of meaner birds, and every tongue 

Confess its barba-ism when compared with thine. 



This shalt thou owe to him thou didst so wrong, 
Thy Tuscan bard, the banish'd Ghibelline. 
Woe ! woe ! the veil of coming centuries 
Is rent, — a thousand years, which yet supine 

Lie like the ocean waves ere winds arise, 
Heaving in dark and sullen undulation, 
Float from eternity into these eyes ; 

The storms yet sleep, the clouds stiil keep their station, 
The unborn earthquake yet is in the womb, 
The bloody chaos yet expects creation, 

But all things are disposing for thy doom ; 
The elements await but for the word, 
" Let there be darkness !" and thou grow'st a tomD ! 

Yes ! thou, so beautiful, shalt feel the sword, 
Thou, Italy ! so fair that paradise, 
Revived in thee, blooms forth to man restored : 

Ah ! must the sons of Adam lose it twice? 
Thou, Italy ! whose ever-golden neldsj 
Plough'd by the sunbeams solely, would suffice 

For the world's granary; thou whose sky heaven gilds 
With brighter stars, and robes with deeper blue ; 
Thou, in whose pleasant places summer builds 

Her palace, in whose cradle empire grew, 
And form'd the eternal city's ornaments 
From spoils of kings whom freemen overthrew ; 

Birth-place of heroes, sanctuary of saints, 
Where earthly first, then heavenly glory made 
Her home ; thou, all which fondest fancy paints, 

And finds her prior vision but portray'd 
In feeble colours, when the eye — from the Alp 
Of horrid show, and rock and shaggy shade 

Of desert-loving pine, whose emerald scalp 
Nods to the storm — dilates and dotes o'er thee, 
And wistfully implores, as 'twere, fur help 

To see thy sunny fields, my Italy, 

Nearer and nearer yet, and dearer still 

The more approach'd, and dearest were they free, 

Thou — thou must wither to each tyrant's will : 

The Goth hath been, — the German, Frank, and Hui , 
Are yet to come, — and on the Imperial hill 

Ruin, already proud of the deeds done 

By the old barbarians, there awaits the new, 
Throned on the Palatine, while, lost and won, 

Rome at her feet lies bleeding ; and the hue 
Of human sacrifice and Roman slaughter 
Troubles the clotted air, of late so blue, 

And deepens into red the saffron water 

Of Tiber, thick with dead ; the helpless priest, 
And still more helpless nor less holy daughter, 

Vow'd to their god, have shrieking fled, and ceased 
Their ministry : the nations take their pre} - , 
Iberian, Almain, Lombard, and the beast 

And bird, wolf, vulture, more humane than they 
Are ; these but gorge the fior;h and lap the gore 
Of the departed, and then go their way ; 

But those, the human savages, explore 
All paths of torture, and insatiate yet 
With Ugolino hunger prowl for more. 

Nine moons shall rise o'er scenes like this and set;' 
The chicfless army of the dead, which late 
Beneath the traitor prince's b^ner met, 

Hath left its leader's ashes at the gate ; 
Had but the royal rebel lived, perchance 
Thou hadst been spared, but his involved thy fa<* 

Oh ! Rome, the spoiler of the spoil of France, 
From Brennus to the Bourbon, never never 



I 



460 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Shall foreign standard to thy walls advance, 
But Tiber shall become a mournful river. 

Oh ! when the strangers pass the Alps and Po, 

Crush them, ye rocks ! floods, whelm them, and for 
ever ! 
Why sleep the idle avalanches so, 

To topple on the lonely pilgrim's head? 

Why doth Eridanus but overflow 
The peasant's harvest from his turbi I bed? 

Were not each barbarous horde a nobler prey ? 

Over Cambyscs' host the desert spread 
Her sandy ocean, and the sea-waves' sway 

Roll'd o'er Pharaoh and his thousands, — why, 

Mountains an 1 waters, do ye not as they? 
And you, ye men ! Romans, who dare not die, 

Sons of the conquerors who overthrew 

Those who o'erthrew proud Xerxes, where yet lie 
The dead whose tomb oblivion never knew, 

Are the Alps weaker than Thermopylae? 

Their passes more alluring to the view 
Of an invader? is it they, or ye 

That to each host the mountain-gate unbar, 

And leave the march in peace, the passage free? 
Why, Nature's self detains the victor's car, 

And makes your land impregnable, if earth 

Could be so : but alone she will not war, 
Yet aids the warrior worthy of his birth, 

In a soil where the mothers bring forth men ! 

Not so with those whose souls are little worth ; 
For them no fortress can avail, — the den 

Of the poor reptile which preserves its sting 

Is more secure than walls of adamant, when 
The hearts of those within are quivering. 

Are ye not brave ? Yes, yet the Ausonian soil 

Hath hearts, and hands, and arms, and hosts to bring 
Against oppression ; but how vain the toil, 

While still division sows the seeds of woe 

And weakness, till the stranger reaps the spoil. 
On ' my own beauteous land ! so long laid low, 

So long the grave of thy own children's hopes, 

When there is but required a single blow 
To break the chain, yet — yet the avenger stops, 

And doubt and discord step 'twixt thine and thee, 

And join their strength to that which with thee copes : 
What is there wanting then to set thee free, 

And show thy beauty in its fullest light? 

To make the Alps impassable ; and we, 
Her sons, may do this with one deed Unite ! 



CANTO III. 



F kom out the mass of never-dymg ill, 

The plague, the prince, the stranger, and the sword, 
Vials of wrath but emptied to refill 

And flbw again, I cannot all record 
That crowds on my prophetic eye : the earth 
And ocean written o'er would not afford 

Space for the annal, yet it shall go forth ; 

Yes, all, though not by human pen, is graven, 
There where the farthest suns ar.d stars have birth. 

Spread uke a banner at the gate of heaven, 
The bloody scroll of our millennial wrongs 
Waves, anl the echo of our groans is driven 

Afr-wiirt the sound of archangelic songs, 



An 1 Italy, the martvr'd nation's 2ore, 
Will not in yam arise to where I" 
Omnipotence and mercy evermore ; 
Like tu a harp-string stricken by the wind, 
The sound of her lament shall, rising o'er 
The seraph voices, touch the Almighty .Mini. 
Meantime I, humblest of thy suns, and of 
Earth's dusl by immortality refined 
To sense and suffering, (hough the vain may scoO 
And tyrants threat, an 1 meeker victims bow 
Before the storm because its breath is rough, 
To tine, my country ! whom before, as now, 
I loved and love, devote the mournful lyre 
Ami hrielancholy gifi high powers allow 
To read the future ; and if now my fire 
Is not as once it shone o'er thee, forgive! 
I but foretell thy fortunes — then i 
Think not that I would look on them and live. 
A spirit forces me to see and speak, 
And for my guerdon grants not to survive ; 
My heart shall lie pour'd over thoe and break 
Yet for a moment, ere I must resume 
Thy sable web of sorrow, let me take, 
Over the gleams that flash athwart thy gloom, 
A softer glimpse ; some stars shine through thy nigh. 
And many meteors, and above thy tomb 
Leans sculptured beauty, which death cannot blight; 
And from thine ashes boundless spirits rise 
To give thee honour and the earth delight ; 
Thy soil shall still be pregnant with the wise, 

The nay, the lear&'d, the generous, and the brave, 
Native to thee as: summer to thy skies, 
Conquerors on foreign shores and the far wave, 7 

Discoverers of new worlds, ,vhich take their name: 1 ' 
For thee alone they have no arm to save, 
And all thy recompense is in their fame, 
A noble one to them, but not to thee — 
Shall they he glorious, and thou still the same? 
Oh ! more than these illustrious far shall be 
The being — and even yet he may be born — 
The mortal saviour who sik.I1 set iV e free, 
And see thy diadem, so changed and worn 
By fresh barbarians, on thy brow replaced ; 
And the sweet sun replenishing thy mom, 
Thy moral morn, too long with clouds defaced 
And noxious vapours from Avernus risen, 
Such as all they must breathe who are debased 
By servitude, and have the mind in prison. 
Yet through this cenluried eclipse of woe 
Some voices shall be heard, and earth shall listen , 
Poets shall follow in the path I show, 

And make it broader ; the same brilliant sky 
Which cheers the birds to song shall bid them glow 
And raise their notes as natural and high ; 

Tuneful shall be their numbers : they shall sing 
Many of love, and some of liberty ; 
But few shall soar upon that eagle's wing', 
And look in the sun's faC3 with eagle's gaze 
All free and fearless as the feathered king, 
But fly more near the earth : how many a phrase 
Sublime shall lavish'd be on some small prince 
In all the prodigality of praise ! 
And language, eloquently false, evince 

The harlotry of genius, which, like beauty, 
Too oft forgets its own self-reverence, 
And looks on prostitution as a dutv. 



THE PROPHECY OF DANTE. 



4H 



He who once enters in a tyrant's hall 9 

As guest is slave, his thoughts become a boot)', 

And the first day which sees the chain enthral 
A Captive sees his half of manhood gone — l0 
The soul's emasculation saddens all 

His spirit ; thus the bard too near the throne 
Quails from his inspiration, bound to plcasr, — 
How servile is the task to please alone ! 

To smooth the verse to suit the sovereign's case 
And royal leisure, nor too much prolong 
Aught save his eulogy, and find, and seize, 

Or force or forge fit argument of song ! 

Thus trammell'd, thus condemn'd to flattery's trebles, 
He toils through all, still trembling to be wrong: 

For fear some noble thoughts, like heavenly rebels, 
Should rise up in high treason to his brain, 
He sings, as the Athenian spoke, with pebbles 

In 's mouth, lest truth should stammer through his strain. 
But out of the long file of sonnettcers 
There shall be some who will not sing in vain, 

And he, their prince, shall rank among my peers, 11 
And love shall be his torment ; but his grief 
Shall make an immortality of tears, 

And Italy shall hail him as the chief 
Of poet lovers, and his higher song 
Of freedom wreathe him with as green a leaf. 

But in a further age shall rise along 

The banks of Po two greater still than he ; 

The world which smiled on him shall do them wrong 

Til! they arc ashes and repose with me. 
The first will make an epoch with his lyre, 
And fill the earth with feats of chivalry : 

His fancy like a rainbow, and his fire 

Like that of heaven, immortal, and his thought 
Borne onward with a wing that cannot tire; 

Pleasure shall, like a butterfly new caiiL'lii, 
Flutter her lovely pinions o'er his theme, 
And art itself seem into nature wrought 

Bv the transparency of his bright dream. — 
The second, of a tenderer, sadder mood, 
Shall pour his soul out o'er Jerusalem ; 

Fie, too, shall sing of arms, and Christian blood 
Shed where Christ bled for man ; and his high harp 
Shall, by the willow over Jordan's flood, 

Revive a song of Sion, and the sharp 
Conflict, and final triumph of the brave 
And pious, and the strife of hell to warp 

Their hearts from their great purpose, until wave 
The red-cross banners where the first red cross 
Was erimson'd from his veins who died to save, 
Shall be his sacred argument ; the loss 

Of years, of favour, freedom, even of fame 
Contested for a time, while the smooth gloss 
Of courts would slide o'er his forgotten name, 
And call captivity a kindness, meant 
To shield him from insanity or shame : 
Such shall be his meet guerdon ! who was sent 
To be Christ's laureate — they reward him well ! 
Florence doomi me but death or banishment, 
Ferrara him a pi'*«ince and a cell, 

Harder to bea' and less deserved, for I 
Had stung tit* factions which I strove to quell ; 
But thi? n?«e!i ."in, who with a lover's eye 

Will ' jc'» rtit irth and heaven, and who will deign 
1o &^r xin. M.ih his celestial flattery 



As poor a thing as e'er was spawn'd to reign, 
What will he do to merit such a doom ? 
Perhaps he'll low, — and is not love in vain 

Torture enough without a living tomb ? 
Yet it will be so — he and his compeer, 
The Bard of Chivalry, will both consume 

In penury and pain too many a year, 
And, dying in despondency, bequeath 
To the kind world, which scarce will yield a tear, 

A heritage enriching M who breathe 

With the wealth of a genuine poet's soul, 
And to their country a redoubled wreath, 

Unmateh'd by time ; not Hellas can unroll 

Through her olvmpiads two such names, though one 
Of hers be mighty ; — and is this the whole 

Of such men's destiny beneath the sun .' 

Must all the finer thoughts, the thrilling sense, 
The electric blood with which their arteries run, 

Their body's self-turn'd soul with the intense 
Feeling of that which is, and fancy of 
That which should be, to such a recompense 

Conduct? shall their bright plumage on the rough 
Storm be still scatter'd? Yes, and it must be. 
For, form'd of far too penetrable stutf, 

These birds of paradise but long to flee 
Back to their native mansion, soon they find 
Earth's mist with their pure pinions not agree, 

And die, or are degraded, for the mind 
Succumbs to bug infection, and despair, 
And vulture passions, flying close behind, 

Await the moment to assail and tear ; 

And when at length the winged wanderers stoop. 
Then is the prey-birds' triumph, then they share 

The spoil, o'erpower'd ai length by one fell swoop. 
Yet some have been untouch'd, who learuM to beat. 
Some whom no power could ever force to droop, 

Who could resist themselves even, hardest care ! 
And task most hopeless ; but some such have been, 
And if mv name amongst the number were, 

That destiny austere, and yet serene, 

Were prouder than more dazzling fame unblest ; 
The Alp's snow summit nearer heaven is seen 

Than the volcano's fierce eruptive crest, 

Whose splendour from the black abyss is flung, 
While the scorch'd mountain, from whose burning 
breast 

A temporary torturing flame is wrung, 
Shines for a night of terror, then repels 
Its fire back to the hell from wheifce it sprung, 

The hell which in its entrails ever dwells. 



CANTO IV. 



M \nv are poets who have never pi nn'd 
Their inspiration, and perchance the best . 
They felt, and loved, and died, but wodld 1101 icnu 

Their thoughts to meaner l»'im.'s; tl ey compress' J 
The god within them, and rojoin'd the stars 
Unlanrell'd upon earth, but tar more blest 

Than those who arc degraded by the jars 

Of passion, and their frailties link'd to fame. 
Conquerors of high renown, but full of scars 

Many arc poets, but without the name; 
For what is poesy but to create 



462 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



From overfeeling good or ill ; and aim 
At an external life beyond our fate, 
And bo the new Prometheus of new men, 
Bestowing fire from heaven, and then, too late, 
finding the pleasure given repaid with pain, 
And vultures to the heart of the bestower, 
Who, having lavish'd his high gift in vain, 
Lies chain'd to his lone rock by the sea-shore ! 
So be it ; we can bear. — But thus all they, 
Whose intellect is an o'ermastering power, 
Whi. h still recoils from its encumbering clay, 
Or lightens it to spirit, whatsoe'er 
The form which their creations may essay, 
Are bards ; the kindled marble's bust may wear 
More poesy upon its speaking brow f 

Than aught less than the Homeric page rattf bear ; 
One noble stroke with a whole life may glow, 
Or deify the canvas till it shine 
With beauty so surpassing all below, 
That they who kneel to idols so divine 

Break no commandment, for high heaven is there 
Transfused, transtigurated : and the line 
Of poesy which peoples but the air 

With thought and beings of our thought reflected, 
Can do no more : then let the artist share 
The palm, he shares the peril, and dejected 
Faints o'er the labour unapproved — Alas ! 
Despair and genius are too oft connected. 
Within the ages which before me pass, 
Art shall resume and equal even the sway 
Which with Apelles and old Phidias 
She held in Hellas' unforgc-ttcn day. 
Ye shall be taught by ruin to revive 
The Grecian forms at least from their decay, 
And Roman souls at last again shall live 
In Roman works wrought by Italian hands, 
And temples loftier than the old temples, give 
New wonders to the world ; and while still stands 
The austere Pantheon, into heaven shall soar 
A dome, 12 its image, while the base expands 
Into a fane surpassing all before, 

Such as all flesh shall flock to kneel in : ne'er 
Such sight hath been unfolded by a door 
As this, to which all nations shall repair, 
And lay their sins at this huge gate of heaven. 
And the bold architect unto whose care 
The daring charge to raise it shall be given, 
Whom all arts shall acknowledge as their lord, 
Whether into the marble chaos driven 
His chisel bid the Hebrew, 13 at whose word 
Israel left Egypt, stop the waves in stone, 
Or hues of hell be by his pencil pour'd 
O/er the damn'd before the Judgment throne,'* 
Such as I saw them, such as a!! shall see, 
Or fanes be built of grandeur yet unknown, 
The stream of his great thoughts shall spring from me, 1 i 
The Ghibelline, who traversed the three realms 
Which form the empire of eternity. 
Amidst the clash of swords and clang of helms, 
The age which I anticipate, no less 
Shall be the age of beauty, and while whelms 
Calamity the nations with distress, 
The genius of my country shall arise, 
A cedar towering o'er the wilderness, 
liovely in all its branches to all eyes, 
Fragrant as fair, and recognised afar, 



Wafting its native incense through the skies. 
Sovereigns shall pause amid their sport of war, 
Wean'd for an hour from blood, to turn and gaze 
On canvas or on stone; ami they who mar 
All beauty upon earth, compell'd t<> praise, 

Shall feel the power of that wlm h they destroy; 
And art's mistaken gratitude shall raise 
To tyrants who but take her for a toy 

Emblems and monuments, and prostitute 

Her charms to pontiifs proud, 10 who but employ 

The man of genius as the meanest brute 
To bear a burthen, and to serve a need, 
To sell his labours, and his soul to boot : 

Who toils for nations may be poor indeed^ 

But free ; who sweats for monarchs is no more 
Than the gilt chamberlain, who, clothed and fee'd, 

Stands sleek and slavish bowing at his door. 
Oh, Power that rulest pjid inspirest ! how 
Is it that they on earth, whose earthly power 

Is likest thine in heaven in outward show, 
Least like to thee in attributes divine, 
Tread on the universal necks that bow, 

And then assure us that their rights are thine ? 
And how is it that they, the sons of fame, 
Whose inspiration seems to them to shine 

From high, they whom the nations oftest name, 
Must pass their days in penury or pain, 
Or step to grandeur through the paths of shame, 

And wear a deeper brand and gaudier chain 1 
Or if their destiny be borne aloof 
From lowliness, or tempted thence in vain, 

In their own souls sustain a harder proof, 
The inner war of passions deep and tierce? 
Florence ! when thy harsh sentence razed my roof, 

I loved thee, but the vengeance of my verse, 
The hate of injuries, which every year 
Makes greater and accumulates my curse, 

Shall live, outliving all thou holdest dear, 

Thy pride, thy wealth, thy freedom, and even that, 
The most infernal of all evils here, 

The sway of petty tyrants in a state ; 
For such sway is not limited to kings, 
And demagogues yield to them but in date 

As swept cfF sooner ; in all deadly things 

Which make men hate themselves and one anothei 
In discord, cowardice, cruelty, all that springs 

From Death, the Sin-born's incest with his mother, 
In rank oppression in its rudest shape, 
The faction chief is but the sultan's brother, 

And the worst despot's far less human ape : 
Florence ! when this lone spirit which so long 
Yearn'd as the captive toiling at escape, 

To fly back to thee in despite of wrong, 
An exile, saddest of all prisoners, 
Who has the whole world for a dungeon strong, 

Seas, mountains, and the horizon's verge for bars, 
Which shut him from the sole small spot of earth 
Where, whatsoe'er his fate — he still were hers, 

His country's, and might die where he had birth — 
Florence! when this lone spirit shall return 
To kindred spirits, thou wilt feel my worth, 

And seek to honour with an empty urn 
The ashes thou shalt ne'er obtain. — Alas ! 
"What have I done to thee, my people ?" " Stern 

Arc all thy dealings, but in this they pass 
The limits of man's common malice, for 



THE PROPHECY OF DANTE. 



4G3 



All that a citizen could be I was ; 
Raised by thy will, all thine in peace or war, 

And for this thou hast warr'd with me. — 'Tis done: 

I may not overleap the eternal bar 
Built up between us, and will die alone, 

Beholding, with the dark eye of a seer, 

The evil days to gifted souls foreshown, 
Foretelling them to those who will not hear, 

As in the old time, till the hour be come 

W hen truth shall strike their eyes through man/ a tear, 
Ad I make them own the prophet in his tomb. 



NOTES. 



Note I. Page 457, line 11. 
'Midst whom my own !j r i lt 1 1 1 Beatrfofi Mess'd. 
The reader is requested to adopt the Italian pronun- 
ciation of Beatrice 1 , sounding all the syllables. 

Note 2. Page 45S, line 9. 
My paradise bad s'.rll been incomplete. 
' ('lie boJ per Ie bells opre 
('lir Fanno in Cielo il sole e 1' altre stelle 
[tanirc di lui' H cmtr.U Paradiso, 
( lost Be gtuirdi rtso 

Pi ns.ir ben <!ei ch'ogni terren' piaeerc." 
Canzone, in which Dante describes the person of Bea- 
trice, strophe third. 

Note 3. Page 45S, line 41. 
I would have had my Florence great and free. 

" L' eeilio che m' e dato onor mi tegno. 

****** 

" Catler tra' buoni e pur di lode degno." 

Sifntiel of Dante, 
in which he represents Right, Generosity, and Tem- 
perance, as banished from among m« ji, and seeking 
refuge from Love, who inhabits his boson* 

Note 4. Page 458, line 57. 
The dust she dooms to scatter. 
" Ul si qu'.s praxhctonim uUo tempore in fortiam 
dicti communis pervenerit, talis perteniens igne com- 
buralnr, sic quod moriatur.'" 

Second sentence of Florence against Dante and the 
fourteen accused with him. — The Latin is worthy of 
the sentence. 

Note 5. Page 459, line 22. 
Where yet my boys are, and that fatal she. 
This lady, whose name was Gevima, sprung from one 
of the most powerful Guelf families, named Donati. 
Corso Donati was the principal adversary of the Ghibel- 
lines. She is described as being " Admodum morosa, 
ut de Xantippe Socrutis pliilosnphi conjuge scriptum 
esse legimus," according to Giannozzo Manetti. But 
Lionardo Aretino is scandalized with Boccace, in his 
life of Dante, for saying that literary men should not 
marry. " Qui il Boccaccio non ha pazienza, e dice, le 
mogli esscr contrarie agli stuaj ; e ncn si ricorda che 
Socrate il piu nobile filosofo che mai fosse, ebbe moglie 
e figliuoli e uflicj della Repujbblica nella sua Citth ; e 
Aristotele che, etc., etc. ebbe due mogli in farj tempi, 
ed ebbe figliuolije ricchezze assai. — E Marco Tullio — 
e C atone — c Varrone — e Seneca — ebbero moglie," etc., 
etc. It is oild that honest Lionardo's examples, with 
the exception of Seneca, and, for any thing I know, of 



Aristotle, are not the most felicitous. Tully's Terentia, 
and Socrates' Xantippe, by no means contributed to 
their husbands' happinens, whatever they might do to 
their philosophy — Cato gave away his wife — of Varro's 
we know nothing — and of Seneca's, only that she was 
disposed to die with him, but recovered, and lived sev 
era] years afterwards. But, says Lionardo, " L'uomo 
e animait civile, secondo piaoe a tutti i filosofi." And 
thence concludes that the greatest proof of the animal's 
civism is " la prima congiunzione, dalla quale multipli- 
cata nasce la Citta." 

Note 6. Page 459, line 119. 

Nine moons shall rise o'er scenes like lliis and set. 
See " Sacco di Roma," generally attributed to Guic- 
ciardini. There is another written by a Jacopo Buona- 
parte, Geutiluomo Samminiatese che vi si trovo pre- 
scnte. 

Note 7. Page 460, line 93. 
Conquerors on foreign shores and die Tar wave. 
Alexander of Parma, Spinola, Pescara, Eugene of 
Savoy, Montecucco. 

Note 8. Page 460, line 94. 

Discoverers of new worliis, which take their name. 

Columbus, Americus Vespusius, Sebastian Cabot. 

Note 9. Page 461, line 1. 
He who once enters in a tyrant's hall, etc. 
A verse from the Greek tragedians, with which Pom 
pey took leave of Cornelia on entering the boat in 
which he was slain. 

Note 10. Page 461, line 4. 

And the first day which sees the chain enthral, etc. 

The verse and sentiment are taken from Homer. 

Note 11. Page 461, line 21. 
And he their prince shall rank among my peers. 
Pstrarch. 

Note 12. Page 462, line 40. 
A dome, its image. 
The cupola of St. Peter's. 

Note 13. Page 462, line 50. 
His chisel hid the Hebrew. 
The statue of Moses on the monument of Julius II. 

SONETO. 
Di Giovanni Battista Zappi. 

Chi e eostui, che in dura pietra scolto, 
^nile gigantc; e le piu illustri, e conte 
Prove deil' arte nvanza, e ha vivo, a pronto 
Lehibbia si, che le parole ascolto ? 

Quest, e Mose: ben me 'Idicera il folto 
Onor del mento, e '1 doppio raggio in fronte, 
Quest' e Mose, quando scendea del montq 
E gran parte del Name avea nel vol>o, 

Tal era allor che le sonanti, e vastu 
Acque ei sospesc a se d'intorno, e tale 
Quundo il mat chiuse, o no le toiniiu altrui 

E voi sue turhe un rio vitelln filiate J 
Alzata aveste inm»o a queste eguale ! 
eh' era men fallo 1' adorar ooslui. 

Note 14. Page 462. line 53. 
Over the damn'd before the J nd gi n e sfl throne 
The Last Judgment, in the Sistine chapel. 

Note 15. Page «62, lino 56. 
The stream of his great thoughts »hall spring from me. 
I have read somewhere (if . do not err, for I rami.* 
recollect where) that Dante was so great a favourite of 



401 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Michel Angiolo's, (hat he had designed the whole of 
the Divina Conimedia; but that the volume containing 
these studies was lost by sea. 

Note 16. Page 462, line 76. 
Her charms lo pontiffs proud, who but employ, etc. 
See the treatment of Michel Angiolo by Julius II., 
and his neglect by Leo X. 



Note 17. Page 4G'2, line 131. 
"What have I done tu thee, my people V 

"E Bcrisse i'ii'i volte, nun solamente a particolari cit 
tadini del reggimento t fna ancorn al popolo, e intra 1' 
altre una ep'istbla. assai lunga die comincia : — ' I'opule 
mi, qiwl Jlci tibi V " 

]'it i ili Dante tcriila da lAunardo Aietino, 



£fie BsUutr; 

OR, 

CHRISTIAN AND HIS COMRADES. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The foundation of the following story will be found 
partly in the account of the Mutiny of the Bounty, in 
the South Sea, in 17S9, and partly in Mariner's "Ac- 
count of the Tonga Islands." 



THE ISLAND. 



The morning watch was come : the vessel lay 
Her course, and gently made her liquid way ; 
The cloven billow flash'd from ofF her prow 
In furrows form'd by that majestic plough ; 
The waters with their world were all before ; 
Behind, the South Sea's many an islet shore. 
The quiet night, now dappling, 'gan to wane, 
Dividing darkness from the dawning main ; 
The dolphins, not unconscious of the day, 
Swam high, as eager of the coming ray ; 
The stars from broader beams began to creep, 
And lift their shining eyelids from the deep ; 
The sail resumed its lately-shadow'd white, 
And the wind fluttcr'd with a freshening llight; 
The purpling ocean owns the coming sun — 
But, ere he break, a deed is to be done. 

II. 

The gallant chief within his cabin slept, 
Secure in those by whore the watch was kept : 
His dreams were of Old England's welcome shore, 
Of toils rewarded, and of dangers o'oi , 
His name was added to the glorious roll 
Of those who search the storm-surrounded pole. 
The worst was o'er, and the rest scem'd sure, 
And why should not his slumber be secure ? 
Alas .' his deck was trod by unwilling feet, 
And wilder hands would hold the vessel's sheet; 
Young hearts, which languish'd for some sunny isle, 
Where summer years and summer women smilo; 
Men without country, who, too long estranged, 
Had found no native home, or found it changed, 
And, half-uncivilized, preferr'd the cave 
> If Nome soft savage to the uncertain wave ; 



The gushing fruits that nature gave untill'd; 

The wood without a path but where they wi'.l'd ; 

The field o'er which promiscuous plenty pour'd 

Her horn ; the equal land without a lord ; 

The wish — which ages have not yet subdued 

In man — to have no master save his mood ; 

The earth, whose mine was on its face, unsold, 

The glowing sun and produce all its gold ; 

The freedom which can call each grot a home ; 

The general garden, where all steps may roam, 

Where Nature owns a nation as her child, 

Exulting in the enjoyment of the wild ; 

Their shells, their fruits, the milv wealth they know; 

Their unexplofing navy, the canoe ; 

Their sport, the dashing breakers and the chase; 

Their strangest sight, an European face: — 

Such was the country which these strangers yearn'd 

To see again — a sight they dearly earn'd. 

III. 
Awake, bold Bligh ! the foe is at the gate ! 

Awake ! awake ! Alas ! it is too late ! 

Fiercely beside thy cot the mutineer 
Stands, and proclaims the reign of rage and fear. 
Thy limbs are bound, the bayonet at thy breast, 
The hands, which trembled at thy voice, arrest : 
Dragg'd o'er the deck, no more at thy command 

• .licnt helm shall veer, the sail expand ; 
That savage spirit, which would lull by wrath 
Its desperate escape from duty's path, 
Glares round thee, in the scarce-believing eyes 
Of those who fear the chief they sacrifice ; 
For ne'er can man his conscience all assuage, 
Unless he drain the wine of passion — rage. 

IV. 

In vain, not silenced by the eye of death, 

Thou call'st the loyal with thy menaced breath : — 

They come not ; they are few, and, overawed, 

Must acquiesce while sterner hearts applaud. 

In vain thou dost demand the cause ; a curse 

Is all the answer, with the threat of worse. 

Full in thine eyes is waved the glittering blade, 

Close to thy throat the pointed bayonet laid, 

The levell'd muskets circle round thy breast 

In hands as steel'd to do the deadly rest. 

Thou darest thein to their worst, exclaiming, " Fire ! 

But they who pitied not could yet admire ; 



THE ISLAND. 



465 



Some lurking remnant of their former awe 
Restraint them longer than their broken law ; 
They would not dip their soule at once iii blood, 
But left thee to the niereies of the flood. 



'Hoist out the boat!" was now the leader's cry: 
And who dare answer "No" to mutiny, 
In the first dawning of the drunken hour, 
The Saturnalia of unhoped-for power .' 
The boat is lowcrM with all the haste of hale, 
With its slight plank between thee and thy fate; 
Her only cargo such a scant supply 
As promises the death their hands deny ; 
And just enough of water and of bread 
To keep, some days, the dying from the dead : 
Some cordage, canvas, sails, and lines, and twine, 
But treasures all to hermits of the brine, 
Were added after, to the earnest prayer 
Of those who saw no hope save sea and air ; 
And last, that trembling vassal of the pole, 
The feeling compass, navigation's soul. 

VI. 

And now the self-elected chief finds time 

To stun the first sensation of his crime, 

And raise it in his followers — " Ho ! the bow! !" 

I.est passion should return to reason's shoal. 

" Brandy for heroes!" Burke could once exclaim, — 

No doubt a liquid path to epic fame ; 

And such the new-born heroes found it here, 

And drain'd the draught with an applauding cheer. 

" Huzza ! for Otaheite !" was the cry ; 

How strange such shouts from sons of mutiny ! 

The gentle island, and the genial soil, 

The friendly hearts, the feast without a toil, 

The courteous manners but from nature caught, 

The wealth unhoarded, and the love unbt 

Could these have charms for rudt , driven 

Before the mast by every wind of heaven .' 

And now, even now, prepared with others' woes 

To earn mild virtue's vain desire — repose? 

Alas ! such is our nature ! all but aim 

At the same end, bv pathways not the same ; 

Our means, our birth, our nation, and our name, 

Our fortune, temper, even our outward frame, 

Are far more potent over yielding clay 

Than aught v. e know bejond our little day. 

Yet still there whispers the small voice within, 

Heard through gain's silence, and o'er glory's din : 

Whatever creed be taught or land be trod, 

Man's conscience is the oracle of God ! 

VII. 

The launch is crowded with the faithful few 
Who wait their chief, a melancholy crew: 
But some rcmain'd reluctant on the deck 
Of that proud vessel — now a moral wreck — 
And view'd their captain's fate with piteous eyes; 
While others scoff'd his angur'd miseries, 
Snecr'd at the. prospect of his pigmy sail, 
And the slight bark, so laden and so frail. 
The tender nautilus who steers his prow, 
Tie- sea-born sailor of his shell < 
Th,' ocean Mali, the fairy of th< 
Seems far less fragile, and, alas ! more free ! 
2S t4 



!!■', when the Rghtning-wing'd tornadoes sweep 
The surge, i< safe — his port (s in the del ;> — 
Ami triumphs o'er the armadas of mankin I, 
Which shake the world, yet crumble in the wind. 

VIII. 
When all was now prepared, the vessel clear 
Wine], hail'd her master in t 1 " n uli n er — 
ile than hi-- :■ 
he \ ain pitv which hut tir 
Watch'd his late chieftain with exploring 
An,! told in signs repentant sympathy ; 
Held the moist shaddock t" his parched mouth, 
Which felt exhaustion's deep and hitter <! 
But, soon observed, this guardian was withdrawn, 
Nor further mercy clouds rebellion's dawn. 
'['In n forward stepp'd the I ol I and frowai 
His chief had chcrish'd only to destroy, 
And, pointing to the hopeh ss prow beneath, 
Exelaim'd, " Depart at once ! delay is d -a?h!" 
Yet then, even then, his feelings ceased hot all: 
In that last moment CQul I a word r 
Remorse for the black deed, us v.i hidf-lone, 
And, what he hid from many, ghow'd to one : 
When Bligh, in stern reproach, demanded where 
Was now his grateful sense of former care? — 
Where all his hopes to»see his name aspire, 
And blazon Britain's thousand glories higher? 
His feverish lips thus broke their gloomy spell, 
'"T is that! 'tis that! I am in hell 1 in hell!" 
No more he said ; but, urging to the bark 
His chief, commits him to his fragile ark : 
These the sole accents from his tongue that fell, 
But volumes lurk'd below his fierce farewell. 

IX. 

The arctic sun rose broad above the wave ; 

The breeze now sunk, now whisper' d from his cave, 

As on the ..•Eolian harp, his fitful wings 

Now swell'd, now fluttered o'er his ocean strings. 

With slow despairing oar, the abandon'd skitf 

Ploughs its drear progress to the scarce-seen cliff", 

Which lifts its peak a cloud above the main : 

That boat and ship shall never meet again! 

But 'tis not mine to tell their tale of grief, 
Their constant peril, and their scant relief; 
Their days of danger, and their nights of pain ; 
Their manly courage, even when deem'd in vain: 
The sapping famine', rendering scarce a son 
Known to his mother in the skeleton ; 
The ills that lessened still their little store, 
And starved even hunger till he wrung no more ; 
The varying frowns and favours of the di ep, 
That now almost engulfs, then leaves to creep 
With crazy oar and shatter'd strength along 
The tide, that yields reluctant to (he strong; 
The incessant fever of that arid thirst 
Which welcomes, as a well, the clouds that burst 
Above their naked bones, and feels 
In the cold drenching of the stormy night, 
And from the outspread canvas gladly wrings 
A drop to moisten life's all-gasping springs ; 

vage foe escaped, to geek again 
More hospitable shelter from the main; 

1 ily spectres which were doom'd at a«i 

To tell as trus a tale of dangers past, 



4GG 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



As ever the ilark annals of the deep 
Disclosed for man to dread or woman weep. 

X. 

We leave them to their fate, but not unknown 

Nor unredrcss't) ! Revenge, may have her own : 

Boused discipline aloud proclaims their causa, 

And injured navies urge their broken laws. 

Pursue we on his track the mutineer, 

Whom Distant vengeance had not taught to fear, 

Wide o'er the wave — awav! away! away! 

Once more his eves shall hail the welcome bay; 

Once more the happy shores without a law 

Receive the outlaws whom they lately saw; 

Nature, and nature's goddess — Woman — woos 

To lands where, save their conscience, none accuse; 

Where all partake the earth without dispute, 

And bread itself is gather'd as a fruit ; ' 

Where nonecontest the fields, the woods, the streams:- 

The goldless age, where gold disturbs no dreams, 

Inhabits or inhabited the shore, 

Till Europe taught them better than before, 

Bestow'd her customs, and amended theirs, 

But left her vices also to their hei>-s. 

Away with this ! behold them as they were, 

Do good with nature, or with nature err. 

" Huzza ! f< >r Otaheite !" was the cry, 

As stately swept the gallant vessel by. 

The bree/.o springs up ; the lately-Happing sail 

Extends its arch before the growing gale ; 

In swifter ripples stream aside the seas, 

Which her bold bow Sings olf with dashing ease. 

Thus Argo plough' d the Euxine's virgin foam ; 

But those she wafted still look'd back to home — 

These spurn their country with their rebel bark, 

And fly her as the raven fled the ark; 

A nd yet they seek to nestle with the dove, 

And tame their fiery spirits down to love. 



CANTO II. 



T. 

How pleasant were the songs of Toobonai, 2 

When summer's sun went down the coral bay! 

Come, let us to the islet's softest shade, 

And hear the warbling birds ! the damsels said : 

The wood-dove from the forest depth shall coo, 

Like voices of the gods from Bolotoo ; 

We'll cull the flowers that grow above the dead, 

For these most bloom where rests the warrior's head ; 

And we will sit in twilight's face, and see 

The sweet moon dancing through the tooa tree, 

The lofty accents of whose sighing bough 

Shall sadly please us as we lean below ; 

Or climb the steep, and view the surf in vain 

Wrestle with rocky giants o'er the main, 



1 The new celebrated bread-fruit, to transplant which Cap 
tain Bligh'a expedition was undertaken. 

•2 The first three sections are taken from an actual song of 
the Tontra Islanders, of which a prose translation is given m 
Mariner's .lmmni of the Tonga Islands. Tooboriai is pot 
however one of them ; hut was one of '.'.osc where Christian 

and the mini rs look refuge. 1 have altered and added, but 

have rewined as much as possible of die originui 



Which spurn in columns back the baffled spray. 
How beautiful are these, how happy they, 
Who, from the toil and tumult of their livi -, 
Steal to look down where nought but ocean strives 1 
Even he too loves at times the blue lagoon, 
And smooths his ruilled mane beneath the moon. 

II. 

Yes — from the sepulchre we '11 gather towers, 
Then feast like spirits in their promised bowers, 
Then plunge and revel in the rolling surf, 
Then lay our lipibs. alo.og \be '■ nder turf, 
And, wet and shining from the sportive toil, 
Anoint our bodies with the fragrant oil, 
And plait our garlands gnth' r'd from the grave, 
\n d wear the wreaths that sprung from out the brave 
But lo ! night conies, the Mooa woos us back, 
The sound of mats is heard along our track ; 
Anon the torchlight-dance shall fling its sbcl u 
In flashing mazes o'er the Marly's green ; 
And we too will be there; we too recall 
The memory bright with many a festival, 
Ere Fiji blew the shell of war, Whe 
For the first time were wafted in canoes. 
Alas ! for them the flower of mankind bleeds ; 
Alas ! for them our fields are rank with wee te : 
Forgotten is the rapture, or unknown, 
Of wandering with the moon an I love alone* 
But be it so: — lhi-if taught us how lo wield 
The club, and rain our arrows o'er the field ; 
Now let them reap the harvest of their art ! 
Bui feast to-night ! to-morrow we depart. 
Strike up the dance, the cava bowl liil high, 
Dram everv drop! — to-morrow we may die. 
In summer garments be our limbs arrav'd ; 
Around our waist the Tappa's white displayed ; 
Thick wreaths shall form our coronal, like spring's. 
And round our necks shall glance the Hocni strings ; 
So shall their brighter hues contrast the glow 
Of the dusk bosoms that beat high below. 

HI. 

But now the dance is o'er — yet stay awhile ; 

Ah, pause ! nor yet put out the social smile. 

To-morrow for the Mooa we depart, 

But not to-night- -to-night is for the heart. 

Again bestow the wreaths we gently woo, 

Ye veiling enchantresses of gay LlCOO'! 

How lovely are your forms ! how every sense 

Bows to your beauties, softeu'd, but intense, 

Like tO the flowers on Mataloco's steep, 

Which fling their fragrance far athwart the deep: 

We too will see Licoo ; but oh ! my heart — 

What do I say 7 to-morro wo depart. 

IV. 

Thus rose a song — the harmonv of times 
Before the winds blew Europe o'er these climes. 
True, they had vices — such are nature's growth— 
But only the barbarian's — we have both; 
The sordor of civilization, nn\M 
With all the savage which man's fall hath fix'd. 
Who hath not seen dissimulation's reign, 
The prayers of Abel link'd to deeds of Cain? 
Who such would see, may from his lattice view 
The old world more degraded than the new, — 



THE ISLAND. 



46" 



Now new no more, save where Columbia rears 
Twin giants, born by freedom to her spheres, 
YS h'Te Chunborazo, over air, earth, wave', 
Glares with his Titan eye, and sees no slave. 

V. 
Such was this ditty of tradition's days, 
Which to the dead a lingering fame conveys 

In song, where fame as yet. hath left no sign 

Beyond the sound, whose charm is hajf divine ; 

Which leaves no record to the sceptic eye, 

But yields young history all to harmony ; 

A boy Achilles, with the Centaur's lyre 

In hand, to teach him to surpass his sire : 

For otie long-cherish'd ballad's simple slave, 

Rung from the rock, or mingled with ihe wave, 

Or from the bubbling streamlet's grassy i le« 

Or gathering mountain echoes as they glide, 

Hath greater power o'er each true heart and ear, 

Than all the columns conquest's minions rear; 

Invites, when hieroglyphics are a theme 

For sages' labours or the student'.s dream; 

Attracts, when history's volumes are a toil, — 

The first, the freshest bud of feeling's soil. 

Such was this rude rhvme — rhyme is of the rude — 

But such inspired the Norseman's solitude, 

Who came and conquered ; such, wherever rise 

Lands which no foes destroy or civilize, 

Exist: and what can our accomplished art 

Of verse do more than reach the awaken' d heart? 

VI. 

And sweetly now those untaught melodies 

Broke the luxurious silence of the skies, 

The sweet siesta of a summer day, 

The tropic afternoon of Toobonai, 

When every flower was bloom, and air was balm, 

And the first breath began to stir the palm, 

The first vet voiceless wind to urge the wave 

All gently to refresh the thirsty cave, 

Where sale the songstress with the stranger boy, 

Who taught her passion's desolating joy, 

Too powerful over every heart, but most 

O'er those who know not how it may be lost ; 

O'er those who, burning in the new-horn fire, 

Like martyrs revel in their funeral pyre, 

With such devotion to their ecstasy, . 

That life knows no such rapture as to die : 

And die they do ; for earthly life has nought 

Match'd with that burst of nature, even in thought; 

And all our dreams of better life above 

But close in one eternal gush of love. 

VII. 
There sate the gentle savage of the wild, 
In growth a woman, though in years a child, 
As childhood dates within our colder clime, 
Whore nought is ripen'd rapidly save crime; 
The infant of an infant world, as pure 
Fiom nature — lovely, warm, and premature ; 
Dusky like night, but night with all her stars, 
Or cavern sparkling with its native spars; 
Willi eves that were a language and a spell, 
A form like Aphrodite's in her shell ; 
With all her loves around her on the deep, 
Voluptuous as the first approach of sleep ; 



Vet full of life — for through her tropic cheek 
Th" Mush would make its way, and all but speak : 
The sun-horn blood dilfused her neck, and threw 
O'er her cleat nut-brown skin a lucid hue, 

Like coral reddemng through the darken'd wave, 
Which draws the .liver to the crimson b 

Such was this daughter of the Southern 6 
Herself a billow in her energies; 

To bear the hark of others' happiness, 

Xur feel a sorrow til! their joy gi"' H 

Her wild and warm, yet. faithful bosom knew 

No joy like, what ii gave ; her hopes ne'er drew 

Aught fri i ice, th 't chill touch' tone, whose 

Sad proof re luces ali things from their hues: 

Shi- fear'd no ill, In ■cause she knew it not, 

Or what she knew was soon — too soon —forgot : 

Her smiles and tears had pa'ss'd, as light winds pa5S 

O'er lakes, to raffle, not destroy, their glass, 

Whose ih pths unsearch'd, and fountains from the hiil, 

Restore their surface, in itself so still, 

Until the earthquake tear the Nui.i I' , 

Moo! up the spring, and trample on the. wave, 

And crush the living waters to a mi i , 

The amphibious dc.-ort of the dank morass! 

And must their fate be hers ' The eternal change 

But grasps humanitv with quicker range; 

And they who fall, but fall as world- will fall, 

To rise, if just, a spirit o'er them all. 

VIII. 

And who is he ? the blue-eyed northern child 
Of isles more known to man, but scarce less wild ; 
The fair-hair'd offspring of the Hebri les, 
Where roars the Pentland with its whirling seas; 
Rock'd in his cradle by the roaring wind, 
The tempest-horn in body and in mind, 
His young eyes opening on the ocean foam, 
Had from that moment deem'd the deep his home, 
The giant comrade of his pensive moods, 
The sharer of his craggy solitudes, 
The only Mentor of his youth, where'er 
His bark was borne, the spot of wave and air ; 
A careless thing) who placed his choice in chance, 
Nursed by the legends of his land's romance; 
Eager to hope, but not less linn to bear, 
Acquainted with all feelings save despair. 
Placed in the Arab's clime, he would have been 
As held a rove* as the sands have son, 
And braved their thirst with as enduring lip 
As Ishmael wafted on his desert-ship ;' 
Fix'd upon Chili's shore, a proud Cacique; 
On Hellas' mountains, a rebellious Greek; 
Born in a tent, perhaps a Tamerlane ; 
Bred to a throne, perhaps unfit to reign. 
For the same soul thai rends its path to sway, 
If rear'd to such can find no f irther prey 
Beyond itself, and must retrace its way, 8 
Plunging for pleasure into pain ; the same 
Spirit which made a Nero, Home's woial shame, 



1 The "ship of the desert" is 'he oriental figure lor tan 
camel or dromedary ; ami thev deserve the metaphor well ; the 
former for his endurance, the latter for his swiftness. 
2 " Lucullus, when frugality could charm. 
Hail warned turnips in Ins Sabine fuini. ' — I'vM 



4G3 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



An humbler state and discipline of heart 
Had formed his glorious namesake's counterpart : ' 
But grant his vices, grant them all his own, 
flow small their theatre without a throne ! 

IX. 
Thou smilest, — these comparisons seem high 
To those who scan all things with dazzled eye; 
Link'd with the unknown name of one whose doom 
Has nought to do with glory or with Rome, 
With Chili, Hellas, or with Araby. 
Thou smilest ! — smile ; 't is better thus than sigh ; 
Yet such he might have been ; he was a man, 
A soaring spirit ever in the van, 
A patriot hero or despotic chief, 
To form a nation's glory or its grief, 
Born under auspices which make us more 
Or less than we delight to ponder o'er. 
But these are visions ; say, what was he here? 
A blooming boy, a truant mutineer, 
The fair-hair' d Tor<]uil, free as ocean's spray, 
The husband of the bride of Toobonai. 

X. 
By Neuha's side he sate, and watch'J the waters,— 
Neuha, the sun-flower of the Island daughters, 
High-born (a birth at which the herald smiles, 
Without a 'scutcheon for these secret isles) 
Of a long race, the valiant and the free, 
The naked knights of savage chivalry, 
Whose grassy cairns ascend along the shore, 
And thine, — I 've seen, — Achilles ! do no more. 
She, when the thunder-bearing strangers came 
In vast canoes, begirt with bolts of flame, 
Toppi'd with tall trees, which, loflier than the palm, 
Secm'd rooted in the deep amidst its calm ; 
But, when the winds awaken'd shot forth wings 
Broad as the cloud along the horizon flings, 
And svvay'd the waves, like cities of the sea, 
Making the very billows look less free ; — 
She, with her paddling oar and dancing prow, 
Shot through the surf, lrke reindeer through the snow, 
Swift gliding o'er the breaker's whitening edge, 
Light as a Nereid in her ocean-sledge, 
And gazed and wonder'd at the giant hulk 
Which heaved from wave to wave its trampling bulk : 
The anchor dropp'd, it lay along the deep, 
Like a huge lion in the sun asleep, 
While round it swarm'd the proas' flitting chain, 
Like summer-bees that hum around his mane. 

XI. 

The white man landed ; — need the rest be told ? 
The New World stretch'd its dusk hand to the old ; 
Each was to each a marvel, and the tie 
Of wonder warm d to better sympathy. 
Kind was the welcome of the sun-born sires, 
And kinder still their daughters' gentler fires. 

1 The Consul Nero, who made the unequalled march which 
deceive. 1 Hannibal, and defeated Asdrubal ; thereby accom- 
plishing an achievement almns! unrivalled in military annals. 
The Brat intelligence of his return, to Hannibal, was the sight 
of Asdrubafu head thrown into his camp. When Hannibal 
Haw this, he exclaimed, with a sigh, that " Rome would now 
be the mistress of the world." And yet to this victory of Nero's 
it might lie owing that his imperial namesake reigned at all! 
But the infamy of one has eclipsed the glory of the other. 
VVhon the name of " Nero " is heard, who thinks of the Con- 
sul 7 Uut sucn are human things 



Their union grew: the children of the storm 

Pound beauty link'd with many a dusky form; 

While these U) tur.i admired the paler glow, 

Which scem'd so white in climes that knew no sn* ', 

The chase, the race, the liberty to roam, 

The soil where every cottage show'd a home ; 

The sea-spread net, the lightly-launch'd canoe, 

Which stemm'd the studded Archipelago, 

O'er whose blue bosom r^se the starry isles ; 

The healthy slumber, carn'd by sportive toils ; 

The palm, the loftiest Dryad of the woods, 

Within whose bosom infant Bacchus broods, 

While eagles scarce build higher than the crest 

Winch shadows o'er the vineyard in her breast ; 

The cava feast, the yam, the cocoa's root, 

Which bears at once the cup, and milk, and fruit; 

The bread-tree, which, without the ploughshare, yij.uj 

The unreap'd harvest of unfurrow'd fields, 

And bakes its unadulterated loaves 

Without a furnace in unpurchased groves, 

And flings off" famine from its fertile breast, 

A priceless market for the gathering guest ; — 

These, with the luxuries of seas and woods, 

The airy joys of social solitudes, 

Tamed each rude wanderer to the sympathies 

Of those who were more happy if less wise, 

Did more than Europe's dicipline had done, 

And civilized civilization's son ! 

XII. 

Of these, and there was many a willing pair, 

Neuha and Torquil were not the least fair : 

Both children of the isles, though distant far; 

Bqth l">rn beneath a sea-presiding star; 

Both ni'urish'd amidst nature's native scenes, 

Loved to the last, whatever intervenes 

Between us and our childhood's sympathy, 

Which still reverts to what first caught the eye. 

IT:' who first met the Highlands' swelling blue, 

Will love each peak that shows a kindred hue, 

Hail in each crag a friend's familiar face, 

And clasp the mountain in his mind's embrace. 

Long have I roam'd through lands which are not mine, 

Adored the Alp and loved the Apennine, 

Revered Parnassus, and beheld the steep 

Jove's Ida and Olympus crown the deep: 

But 'twas not all long ages' lore, nor all 

Thar nature held me in their thrilling thrall; 

The infant rapture still survived the boy, 

And Locb-na-gar with Ida look'd o'er Trey,' 

Mix'd Celtic memories with the Phrygian mount, 

And Highland linns with Castalie's clear fount. 

Forgive me, Homer's universal shade ! 

Forgive me, Phoebus ! that my fancy stray'd ; 

The North and Nature taught me to adore 

Your scenes sublime from those beloved before. 



1 When very young, about eight years of" age, afleran attack 
of the scarlet lever nt Aberdeen, I was removed by medical 
advice into the Highlands. Here 1 passed occasionally MM 
sun liners, and from this period 1 dale iny love of mountain, us 
Countries. I can never forget the effect a few years afterwards 
ill England, of the only thing i had long seen, even If] min- 
iature, of a mountain, in the Malvern Hills. After I returned 
to Cheltenham, I used to watch them every afternoon at sun- 
set, with a sensation which I cannot describe. This \\n- boj isjfa 
enough; but I was then only thirteen year of age, and it was 
in the holidays 



THE ISLAND. 



469 



XIII. 

The love, which m..* ,'h all things fond and fair, 

The youlh, which mak„ "Hie rainbow of the air, 

The dangers past, that in; v '-.ven man enjoy 

The pause in which he ceases .o destroy, 

The mutual beauty, which the sternest fee! 

Strike to their hearts like lightning to the steel, 

United the half savage and the whole, 

The maid and boy, in one absorbing soul. 

No more the thundering memory of ihe fight 

Wrapp'd liis wean'd bosom in its dark delight; 

No more the irksome restlessness of rest 

Disturb'd him like the eagle in her nest, 

Whose whetted beak and far-pervading eye 

Darts for a victim over al! the sky ; 

His heart was tamed to that voluptuous state, 

At once elysian and effeminate, 

Which leaves no laurels o'er the hero's urn ; — 

These wither when for aught save blood they burn ; 

Vet, when their ashes in their noOk are laid, 

Doth not the myrtle leave as sweet a shade? 

Had Caesar known but Cleopatra's kiss, 

Rome had been free, the world had not been his. 

And what have Cisrr's deeds and Ciesar's fame 

Done for the earth? We feel them in our shame: 

The gory sanction of his glory stains 

The rust which tyrants cherish on our chains. 

Though glorv, nature, reason, freedom, bid 

Roused millions do what single Brutus did, — 

Sweep these mere mock-birds of the despot's song 

From the tall bough where they have perch'd so long,- 

Sti'l are we hawk'd at by such mousing owls, 

And take for falcons those ignoble fowl ;, 

When but a word of freedom would dispel 

These bugbears, as their terrors show too well. 

XIV. 
Rapt in the find forget fulness of 

Neiilr.t, the S h Sea girl, was all a wife, 

With no distracting world to call her off 
From love ; with no society to BCoff 
At the new transient flame ; no babbling crowd 
Of coxcoinbrv in admiration load, 
Or with adulterous whisper to alloy 
Her duty, and her glory, and her joy ; 
With faith and fc Iiml^ naked as her form, 
She stood as stands a rainbow in a storm, 
Changing its hues with bright varh 'v, 
But still expanding lovelier o'er the sky, 
Mow Yr its arch may swell, its colours move, 
The cloud-compelling harbinger of love. 

XV. 

Here, in this grotto of the wave-worn shore, 
They pa ss'd the tropic's re I meridian o'er ; 
K.r long the hour-— i 1 ev never paused o'er time, 

ereal ehmie, 
Which ilen's the daily pittance of our span, 
And points and mocks with iron laugh at man. 
What del m'd they of tin 1 future or the past ? 
The present, like il ■ m fa*t ; 

Their hour-glass was the sea-san I, and the tide, 
I rxtth billow, saw their moments glide ; 

Their clock the sun in his unbounded tower ; 
They reckon d not, whese day was but an hour; 
- s ~ 



The nightingale, their only vesper-bell, 
Sung sweetly to the rose the day's farewell ;' 
The broad sun set, but not with lingering sweep, 
As in the north he mellows o'er the deep, 
But fiery, full, and fierce, as if he left 
The world for ever, earth of light bereft, 
Plunged with red forehead down along the wave, 
As dives a hero headlong to his grave. 
Then rose they, looking first along the skies, 
And then, !br light, into each other's eyoe, 
Wondering that summer show'd so brief a sun, 
And asking if indeed the day were done ? 

XVI. 
And let not this seem strange ; the devotee 
Lives not in earth, but in his ccstasv ; 
Around him days and worlds are heedless driven, — 
His soul is gone before his dust to In ;u i u. 
is love Yss potent > No — his path is trod, 
Alike uplift d gloriously to God ; 
Or link'd to all we know of heaven below, 
The other better self, whose joy or woe 
Is more than ours ; the all-absorbing flame 
Which, kindled by another, grows the same, 
Wrapt in one blaze ; the pure, yet funeral pile, 
Where gentle hearts, like Bramins, sit and smile. 
How often we forget all time, when lone, 
Admiring nature's universal throne, 
Her woods, her wilds, her waters, the intense 
Reply of hers to our intelligence ! 
Live not the stars and mountains ? Are the waves 
Without a spirit? Are the dropping caves 
Without a feeling in their silent tears ? 
No, no : — they woo and clasp us to their spheres, 
Dissolve this clog and clod of clay before 
Its hour, and merge our soul in the great shore. 
Strip off this fond and false identity! — 
Who thinks of self, when gazing on the sky? 
And who, though gazing lower, ever thought, 
In the young moments ere the heart is taught 
Time's lesson, of man's baseness or his own? 
All nature is his realm, and love his throne. 

XVIL 
Neuha arose, and Tormiil : twilight's hour 
Cam sad and softly to their rocky bower, 

Which, kindling by degrees its dewy spars, 
Echo'd their dim light to the mustering stars. 
Slowly the pair, partaking nature's calm, 
Sought out their cottage, built beneath the palm; 
Now smiling and now silent, as the scene ; 
Lovely as love — the spirit ! when serene. 
The Ocean scarce spoke louder wiih his swell 
Than breathes his mimic murmnrer in the shell, 2 



1 The now well-known story of the loves of the niclitingale 
ami res", need not be more than alluded to. being sufficiently 
familiar to the Western as to the Eastern re 

3 !i' the readi r will • : 'I on hra 

chimney-piece, he will be aware of what is alluded to. If tlm 
text should appear obscure, he will find in " Gi lur " the same 
idee bettet expressed in two lines. — The poem r never reyd, 
Inn have heard the lines quoted by a more recondito u ulet> 

who nems to he of a different opinion from the t'.ilitur of llio 
Quarterly Review, who qualified it, in Ins answer to the 
Critical Reviewer of his Journal, as ti-sh of the worst and 
most insane description. It is to Vr. Landor, the autlioi 
of (.'ehir. so en.-iiiti d. and of some I, aim poems, which iim 
with Martial or Catullus in obscenity, thai the immaculate 
Mr. Boutbcv addictm his declamation against impurity ; 



470 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



As, far divided from his parent deep, 
The sea-born infant cries, and will not sleep, 
Raising his little plaint in vain, to rave 
For the broad bosom of his nursing wave : 
The woods droop'd darkly, as inclined to rest, 
The tropic-bird wheel'd rock-ward to his nest, 
And the blue sky spread round them like a lake 
Of peace, where piety her thirst might slake. 

XVIII. 

But through the palm and plantain, hark, a voice ! 

Not such as would have been a lover's choice 

In such an hour to break the air so still ! 

No dying night-breeze, harping o'er the hill, 

Striking the strings of nature, rock and ln-c. 

Those best and earliest lyres of harmony, 

With echo for their chorus ; nor the alarm 

Of the loud war-whoop to dispel the charm ; 

Nor the soliloquy of the hermit owl, 

Exhaling all his solitary soul, 

The dim though large-eyed winged anchorite, 

Who peals his dreary ptean o'er the night ; — 

But a loud, long, and naval whistle, shrill 

As ever startled through a sea-bird's bill ; 

And then a pause, and then a hoarse " Hillo ! 

Torquil ! my boy! what cheer? Ho, brother, ho !" 

"Who hails?" cried Torquil, following with his eye 

The sound. " Here 's one !" was all the brief reply. 

XIX. 

But here the herald of the self-same mouth 

Came breathing o'er the aromatic south, 

Nor like a " bed of violets " on the gale, 

Bui such as wafts its cloud o'er grog or ale, 

Borne from a short frail pipe, which yet had blown 

Its gentle odours over either zone, 

And, puff'd where'er winds rise or waters roll, 

Had wafted smoke from Portsmouth to the Pole, 

Opposed its vapour as the lightning flash'd, 

And reek'd, 'midst mountain billows unabash'd, 

To iEolus a constant sacrifice, 

Through every change of all the varying skies. 

And what was he who bore it? — I may err, 

But deem him sailor or philosopher. 1 

Sublime tobacco ! which from east to west 

Cheers the tar's labour or the Turkman's rest; 

Which on the Moslem's ottoman divides 

His hours, and rivals opium and his brides ; 

Magnificent in Stamboul, but less grand, 

Though not less loved, in Wapping or the Strand ; 

Divine in hookas, glorious in a pipe, 

When tipp'd with amber, yellow, rich, ard ripe ; 

Like other charmers, wooing the caress 

More dazzlingly when daring in full dress ; 

Vet thy true lovers more admire by far 

Thy naked beauties — Give me a cigar! 

XX. 

Through the approaching darkness of the wood 
A human figure broke the solitude, 
Fantastically, it may be, array'd, 
A seaman in a savage masquerade ; 
Si<ch as appears to rise from out the deep, 
When o'er the Line the merry vessels sweep, 



And the rough Saturnalia of the tar 
Flock o'er the deck, in Neptune's borrow'd car;' 
And, pleased, the god of ocean sees, his name 
Revive once more, though but in mimic game 
Of his true sons, who riot in a breeze 
Undreamt of in his native Cycladcs. 
Still the old god delights, from out the main, 
To snatch some glimpses of his ancient reign. 
Our sailor's jacket, though in ragged trim, 
His constant pipe, which never yet burn'd dim, 
His foremast air, and somewhat rolling gait, 
Like his dear vessel, spoke his former state ; 
But then a sort of kerchief round his head, 
Not over tightly bound, or nicely spread ; 
And, stead of trowsers (ah ! too early torn ! 
For even the mildest woods will have their thorn) 
A curious sort of somewhat scanty mat 
Now served for inexpressibles and hat ; 
His naked feet and neck, and sunburnt face, 
Perchance might suit alike with either race. 
His arms were all his own, our Europe's growth, 
Which two worlds bless for civilizing both ; 
The musket swung behind his shoulders, broad 
And somewhat stoop'd by his marine abode, 
But brawny as the boar's ; and, hung beneath, 
His cutlass droop'd, unconscious of a sheath, 
Or lost or worn away ; his pistols were 
Link'd to his belt, a matrimonial pair — 
(Let not this metaphor appear a scofT, 
Though one nnss'd fire, the other would go off); 
These, with a bayonet, not so free from rust 
As when the arm-chest held its brighter trust, 
Completed his accoutrements, as night 
Survey'd him in his garb heleroc'.ite. 

XXI. 

" What cheer, Ben Bunting ?" cried (when in full view 

Our new acquaintance) Torquil ; " Aught of new ?" 

" Ey, ev," quoth Ben, " not new, but news enow ; 

A strange sail in the offing." — " Sail ! and how? 

What ! could you make her out ? It cannot be ; 

I 've seen no rag of canvas on the sea." 

" Belike," said Ben, "you might not from the bay 

But from the bluff-head, where I watch'd to-day, 

I saw her in the doldrums ; for the wind 

Was light and baffling." — " When the sun declined 

Where lay she? had she anchor'd?" — " No, but stiil 

She bore down on us, till the wind grew still." 

" Her flag ?" — " I had no glass ; but, fore and aft 

Egad, she seem'd a wicked-looking craft." 

" Arm'd ?" — " I expect so — sent on the look-out ; — 

'T is time, belike, to put. our helm about." 

" About? — What e'er may have us now in chase, 

We '11 make no running fight, for that were base ; 

We will die at our quarters, like true men." 

" Ey, ey ; for that, 't is all the same to Ben." 

" Does Christian know this ?" — "Ay ; he 's piped iJ 

hands 
To quarters. They are furbishing the stands 
Of arms ; and we have got some guns to bear, 
And scaled them. You are wanted." — "That 's but fair} 
And if it were not, mine is not the soul 
To leave my comrades helpless on the shoal. 



I Hobbi •<, the Hither of Locke's and other philosophy, was 
11 inveterate smoker, — even to pipes beyond computation. 



1 This rough but jovial ceremony, used in crossing the 
Line, has been bo often ;uid so well described, that it need no. 
be more than alluded to. 



THE ISLAND. 



471 



My Neuha ! ah ! and must my fate pursue 

Not me alone, but one so sweet and true ? 

But whatsoe'er betide, ah! Neuha, now 

Unman me not ; the hour will not allow 

A tear ; I'm thine, whatever intervenes!" 

u Right," quoth Ben, " that will do for the marines."' 



CANTO III. 



i. 

The fight was o'er: the flashing through the gloom, 

Which robes the cannon as he wings a tomb, 

Had ceased ; and sulphury vapours upwards driven 

Had left the earth, and but polluted heaven : 

The rattling roar which rung in every volley 

Had left die valleys to their melancholy ; 

No more (hey shriek'd their horror, boom for boom ; 

The strife was done, the vanquish'd had their doom ; 

The mutineers were crush'd, dispersed, or ta'en, 

Or lived to deem the happiest were the slain. 

Few, few, escaped, and these were hunted o'er 

The isle they loved beyond their native shore. 

Nn further home was theirs, it seem'd, on earth, 

Once renegades to that which gave them birth ; 

Track'd like wild beasts, like them they sought the wild, 

As to a mother's bosom flies the child ; 

But vainly wolves and lions seek their den, 

And still more vainly men escape from men. 

II. 

Beneath a rock whose jutting base protrudes 

Far over ocean in his fiercest moods, 

When scaling his enormous crai., the wave 

Is hurl'd down headlong like the foremost brave, 

And falls bach on the foaming crowd behind, 

Which fight beneath the banners of the wind, 

But now at rest, a little remnant drew 

Together, bleeding, thirsty, faint, and few; 

But still their weapons in their hands, and still 

With something of the pride of former wil!, 

As men not all unused to meditate, 

And strive much more than wonder at their fate. 

Their present lot was what they had foreseen, 

And dared as what' was likely to have been ; 

Yet still the lingering hope, which deem'd their lot 

Not pardon'd, but unsought-for or forgot, 

Or trusted that, if sought, their distant caves 

Might still be miss'd amidst that world of waves, 

Had wean'd their thoughts in part from what they saw 

And felt — the vengeance of their country's law. 

Their sra-'TO'ii isle, their guilt-won paradise, 

No more could shield their virtue or their vice : 

Their bc'ter feelings, if such were, were thrown 

Back on themselves, — their sins remain'd alone. 

Proscribed even in their second country, they 

Were lost ; in vain the world before them lav ; 

All outlets seem'd secured. Their new allies 

Had fought and bled in mutual sacrifice ; 

But what avail'd the club and spear ami arm 

Df Hercules, against the sulphury charm, 



1 "That will do for the marines, but the sailors won't be- 



The magic of the thunder, which destroy'd 
The warrior ere his strength could be employ'd ? 
Dug, like a spreading pestilence, the grave 
No less of human bravery than the brave !' 
Their own scant numbers acted all the few 
Against the many oft will dare am! do ; 
But though the choice seems native to die free, 
Even Greece can boast but one Thermopylae, 
Till noic, when she has forged her broken chain 
Back to a sword, and dies and lives again ! 

m. 

Beside the jutting rock the few appcar'd, 

Like the last remnant of the red-deer's herd ; 

Their eyes were feverish, and their aspect worn, 

But still the hunter's blood was on their horn, 

A little stream came tumbling from the height, 

And straggling into ocean as it might, 

Its boundin" crystal frolick'd in the ray, 

And gush'd from cleft to crag with saliless spray ; 

Close on the wild wide ocean, yet as pure 

And fresh as innocence, and more secure, 

Its silver torrent glitter'd o'er the deep, 

As the shy chamois' eye o'erlooks the steep, 

While far below the vast and sullen swell 

Of ocean's Alpine azure rose and fell. 

To this young spring they rush'd,— all feelings first 

Absorb'd in passion's and in nature's thirst, — 

Drank as they do who drink their last, and threw 

Their arms aside to revel in its dew ; 

Cool'd their scorch'd throats, and wash'd the gory staiu* 

From wounds whose only bandage might be chains ; 

Then, when their drought was quench'd, look'd sav5 

round, 
As wondering how so many still were found 
Alive and fetterless : — but silent all, 
Each sought his fellow's eyes, as if to call 
On him for language which his lips denied, 
As though their voices with their cause had died. 

IV. 

Stern, and aloof a little from the rest, 
Stood Christian, with his arms across his chest. 
The ruddy, reckless, dauntless hue, once spread 
Along his cheek, was livid now as lead ; 
His light-brown locks, so graceful in their flow, 
Now rose like startled vipers o'er his brow. 
Still as a statue, with Ids lips compress'd 
To stifle even the breath wi'Jun his breast, 
Fast by the rock, all menacing but mute, 
He stood ; and, save a slight beat of his foot, 
Which deepen'd now and then the sandy dint 
Beneath his heel, his form seetn'd turn'd to flinu 
Some paces further, Torqnil lenn'd his head 
Against a bunk, and spoke not, but he bled,— 
Not mortally — his worst wound was within : 
His brr.w was pale, his blue eyes sunken in, 
And blood-drops, sprinkled o'er his yellow hair, 
Show'd that his faintness came not from despair, 
But nature's ebb. Beside him was another, 
Rough as a bear, but willing as a brother, — 



] Archidamus, Kins of Sparta, and son of Aeesilaus, whp* 
he saw a machine invented for the easting of stones and dan*. 



licve it," is an old saying, and one of the few fragments of exclaimed that it was " the grave of valour." The same ste 
former jealousies which oUll survive (in jest only) between ! has been told of some knights, on the first application ufg-m 
these gallant services. I powder ; but the original anecdote is in Plutarcn. 



472 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Ben Bunting, who essay'd to wash, and wipe, 
And bind Ins wound — then calmly lit his pipe — 
A trophy which survived a hundred lights, 
\ : on which hod cbeerM ten thousand nights. 
The fourth and last of this deserted group 
Wall;'. I up an 1 rjown— at times would stand, then stoop 
To pick a pebble up — then let it drop — 
Then hurrv as in haste— then quickly stop — 
riii'n casl his eyes on his companions — then 
Half whistle half a hum', ami pause again — 
And then In- former movements would redouble, 
With something betwejen carelessness and '.rouble. 
This is a long description, bul applies 
To scarce five minutes pasl before the eyes; 
But yet what minutes ! Moments like to these 
Rend men's lives into immortalities. 



At length dark ^kyscrape, a mercurial man, 

Who flutter'd over all things like a fan, 

More brave than firm, and more disposed to dare 

And die at once than wrestle with despair, 

Exclaim'd " God damn !" Those syllables intense,- 

Nuclcus of England's native eloquence, 

As the Turk's " Allah !" or the Roman's more 

Pagan " Proh Jupiter !" was wont of yore 

To give their first impressions such a vent, 

By way of echo to embarrassment. 

Jack was embarrass''!,— never hero more, 

And as he knew not what to say, he swore ; 

Nor swore in vain: the long congenial sound 

Revived Den Bunting from his pipe profound ; 

He drew it from his mouth, and look'd full wise, 

But merely added to the oath his eyes; 

Thus rendering the imperfect phrase complete — 

A peroration I need not repeat. 

VI. 

But Christian, of a higher order, stood 

Like an extinct volcano in his mood; 

Silent, and sal, and savage, — with the trace 

Of passion reeking from his clouded face; 

Till h f i his sombre eye, 

It glanced on Torquil who lean'd faintly by. 

"An I is it thus?" he cried, "unhappy boy! 

An I thee, too, thee my madness must destroy." 

I [e said, and strode to where young Torquil stood, 

Y"et dabbled with Ins lad ■ly-llowing blood ; 

Seized his hand wistfully, but did not press, 

And shrunk as fearful of his own caress ; 

Inquired into his state, and, when he heard 

The wound was slighter than he deem'd or fear'd, 

A moment's brightness pass'd along his brow, 

As much as such a moment would allow. 

"Yes," he exclaim'd, "we are taken in the toil, 

But not a coward or a common spoil ; 

Dearly they have bought us— dearly still may buy,- 

And I must fall ; but have yon strength to fly? 

»T would be some comfort still, could you survive; 

Our dwindled band is nqw too few to strive. 

Oh! for a sole canoe! though but a shell, 

To bi e Jo where a hope may dwell! 

Tot me, my lot is what I sought; to be, 

In life or deal!,, the fearless and the free." 



VII. 
Even as he spoke, around the promontory, 
Which nodded o'er the billows high and hoary, 
A dark speck dotted ocean : on it flew, 
Like to the shadow of a roused sea-mew : 
Onward it came — and, lo ! a second follow'd — 
Now seen — now hid — where ocean's vale was hollow 'd, 
And near, and nearer, till their dusky crew 
Presented well-known aspects to the view, 
Till on the surf their skimming paddles play, 
Buoyant as wings, and Bitting through the sprav ; 
Now perching on the wave's high curl, and now 
Dash'-d downward in the thundering (bain below, 
Which flings it broad and boiling, sheet on sheet, 
And slings its high Hakes, shiver'd into sleet: 
But floating still through surf and swell, drew nigh 
The barks, like small birds through a louring sk .-. 
Their art seera'd nature — such the skill to sweep 
The wave, of these born playmates of the deep. 

VIII. 
And who the first that, springing on the strand, 
Leap'd like a Nereid from her shell to land, 
With dark but brilliant skin, and dewy eye 
Shining with love, and hope, and constancy? 
Neuha, — the fond, the faithful, the adored, 
Her heart on Torquil's like a torrent pour'd ; 
And smiled, and wept, and near and nearer cTasp'd, 
As if to be assured 't was him she grasp'd ; 
Shudder'd to see his vet warm wound, and then-. 
To find it trivial, smiled and wept again. 
She was a warrior's daughter, and could bear 
Such sights, and feel, and mourn, but col desps 1 " 1 . 
Her lover lived, — nor foes nor fears could blight 
That full-blown moment in its all delight : 
Joy trickled in her tears, joy fill'd the sob 
That rock'd her heart till almost heakd to thn • 
And paradise was breathing in the sigh 
Of nature's child and nature's ecstacy. 

IX. 

The sterner spirits who beheld that meeting 

Were not unmoved ; who are when hearts are gr *ig7 

Even Christian gazed upon the maid and boy 

With d arless eye, but yet a gloomy joy 

Mix'd with those bitter thoughts the soul arrays 

In hopeless visions of our better days, 

When all 's gone — to the rainbow's latest ray. 

" And but for me !" he said, ami turn'd away ; 

Then gazed upon the pair, as in his den 

A lion looks upon his cubs again ; 

And then relapsed into his sullen guise, 

As heedless of his further destinies. 

X. 

But brief their time for good or evil thought ; 

The billows round the promontory brought 

The plash of hostile oars — Alas ! who made 

That sound a dread? All round them seem'd arroy'd 

Against them save the bride of Toobonai : 

She, as she caught the first glimpse o'er the bay, 

Of the arm'd boats which hurried to complete 

The remnant's ruin with their flying feet, 

Bcckon'd the natives round her to their prows, 

Embark'd their guests, and launeh'd their light canoes; 



THE ISLAND. 



473 



In one placed Christian and his comrades twain ; 
But she and Torquil must not part again. 
She fix'd him in her own — Away ! away ! 
They clear the breakers, dart along the bay, 
And towards a group of islets, such as bear 
The sea-bird's nest and seal's surl-hollow'd lair, 
They skim the blue tops of the billows; fast 
They flew, and fast their fierce pursuers chased. 
They gain upon them — now they lose again. — 
Again make way and menace o'er the main; 
And now the two canoes in chase divide, 
And follow different courses o'er the tide, 
To bailie the pursuit — Away! away ! 
As life is on each paddle's flight to-day, 
And more than life or lives to NeuhaH love 
I r, ights the frail bark, and urges to the cove — 
And now the refuge aud the foe are nigh — 
Yet. yet a moment ! — Fly, thou light ark, fly ! 



CANTO IV 



i. 

Whith as a white sail on a dusky sea, 
When half the horizon 's clouded and half free, 
Fluttering between the dun wave and the sky, 
Is hope's last gleam in man's extremity. 
Her anchor parts ; but still her snowy sail 
Attracts our eye amidst the rudest gale : 
Though every wave she climbs divides us more, 
The heart still follows from the loneliest shore. 

II. 

Not distant from the isle of Toobonai, 
A black rock rears its bosom o'er the spray, 
The haunt of birds, a desert to mankind, 
Where the rough seal reposes from the wind, 
And sleeps unwieldy in his cavern dun, 
Or gambols with huge frolic in the sun ; 
There shrilly to the passing oar is heard 
The startled echo of the ocean bird, 
Who rears on its bare breast her callow brood, 
The feather'd fishes of the solitude. 
A narrow segment of the yellow sand 
On one side forms the outline of a strand ; 
Here the young turtle, crawling from his shell 
Steals to the deep wherein his parents dwell ; 
Chipp'd by the beam, a nursling of the day, 
But hatch'd for ocean by the fostering ray ; 
The rest was one bleak precipice, as e'er 
Gave mariners a shelter and del p 

it to make the saved regret the deck 
Which late went down, and envy the lost wreck. 
Such was the stern asylum Neuha chose 
To shield her lover from his following foes; 
Bui all iis secret was not told ; she knew 
In this a treasure hidden from the view. 

III. 

Ere the canoes divided, near the spot, 
The men that maun'd what held her Torquil's lot, 
By her command removed, to strengthen more 
The skiff which wafted Christian from the shore. 
This he would have opposed: but with a smile 
She pointed calmly to the craggv isle, 



And bade him " speed and prosper." She would tako 

The rest upon herself for Torquil's sake. 

They parted with |his* added aid; afar 

The proa darted like a shooting star, 

And gain'd on the pursuers, who now steer'd 

Right on the rock which she and Tprquil tt( ;n-'d. 

They pull'd; her arm, though delicate, was free 

And firm as ei 

And yielded scarce tfl Torquil's manlier strength. 

The prow now almost lay within its length 

Of the crag's steep, Inexorable li 

With nought but soundless waters for its base; 

Within a hundred boats' length wi 5 th,e foe, 

And uo'v whai ' 

This Torquil ask'd « i;h half-upbraiding eve, 

Which said — "lias Neuha brought me here to die? 

Is this a place of safety, or a grave, 

And yon huge rock the tombstone of the wave ?" 

IV. 

They rested on their paddles, and i 

Ne'uha, and, pointing to the s foes, 

Crii d, " Torquil, follow me, and fear! fi How 1" 

Then plunged at once into the ocean's hoi! 

There was no time to pause — the foes were near — 

Chains in his eye and menace in his ear : 

With vigour they pull'd on, and as they came, 

Hail'd him to yield, and by his forfeit name. 

Headlong he leapM — to him the swimmer's skill 

Was native, and now all his hope from ill ; 

But how or where ? He dived, and rose in more; 

The boat's crew ImkM amazed o'er sea a ■d shore 

There was no landing on that precipice, 

Steep, harsh, and slippery as a berg of ice. 

They watch'd awhile to see h'nn float again, 

But not a trace rebubbled from the main : 

The wave roil'd on, no ripple on its 

Since their first" plunge, recall'd a single trace ; 

The little whirl which eddied, and slight foam, 

That whiten'd o'er what seem'd their latest home, 

While as a sepulchre above the pair, 

Who left no marble (mournful as an heir), 

The quiet proa, wavering o'er the tide, 

Was all that told of Torquil and his 1 

And but for this alone, the whole might Si em 

The vanish'd phantom of a seaman's dream. 

They paused and seareh'd in vain, then pull'd awa). 

Even superstition now forbade their stay. 

lid he had not plunged into the wave, 
Bui vanish'd like a corpse-lighl from a grav<_ ; 
Others, that something supernatural 
Glared in his figure, more than mortal lali ; 
While a!! agreed, that in his cheek and eye 
There was the dead hue of < U rnily. 
Still as their oars receded from the crag, 

Round every weed a moment would they lag, 

Expectani of som< token of ilair prey ; 

But no — he 'd melted from them like the spray. 

V. 
And where was he, the pilgrim of the deep. 

rig the Nerei l .' Had they ceased to wcei> 
For eve 1 coral caves, 

Wrung life and pity from the softening waves 1 
Did they with ocean's hidden sovereigns dwell. 
And sound with mermen the fantastic shell? 



474 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Did Neulia widi the mermaids comb her hair, 
Flowing o'er ocean as it strcam'd in air? 
Or had they perish'd, and in silence slept 
Beneath llie gulf wherein they boldly ieap'd ? 

VI. 
Young Neuha plunged into the deep, and he 
Follow'd : her track beneath her native sea 
Was as a native's of the clement, 
So smoothly, bravely, brilliantly she went, 
Leaving a streak of light behind her Keel] 
Which struck and flash'd like an amphibious steel. 
Closely, and scarcely less expert to trace 
The depths where divers hold the pearl in chase, 
Torquil, the nursling of the northern seas, 
Pursued her liquid steps with art and ease. 
Deep — deeper for an instant Neuha led 
The way — then upward soar'd — and, as she spread 
Her arms, and flung the foam from off her locks, 
Laugh d) and the sound was answer'd by the rocks. 
They had gairi'd a central realm of earth again, 
Hut look'd for tree, and field, and sky, in vain. 
Around she pointed to a spacious cave, 
Whose only portal was the keyless wave, 1 
(A hollow archway by the sun unseen, 
Save through the billows' glassy veil of green, 
In some transparent ocean holiday, 
When all the tinny people are at play), 
Wiped with her hair the brine from Torquil's eyes, 
And clapp'd her hands with joy at his surprise ; 
Led urn to where the rock appear'd to jut 
And firm a something like a Triton's hut, 
For al was darkness for a space, till day 
Through clefts above let in a sober'd ray ; 
As in some old cathedral's glimmering aisle 
The dusty monuments from light recoil, 
Thus sadly in their refuge submarine 
The vault drew half her shadow from the scene. 

VII. 

Forth from her bosom the young savage drew 

A pine torch, strongly girded with gnatoo ; 

A plantain leaf o'er all, the more to keep 

Its latent sparkle from the sapping deep. 

This mantle kept it dry ; then from a nook 

Of the same plantain leaf, a flint she took, 

A few shrunk wither'd twigs, and from the blade 

Of Torquil's knife struck fire, and thus array'd 

The grot with torchlight. Wide it was and high, 

And show'd a self-born Gothic canopy ; 

The arch uprear'd by nature's architect, 

The architrave some earthquake might erect ; 

The. buttress from some mountain's bosom hurl'd, 

When the poles crash'd and water was the world ; 

Or harden'd from some earth-absorbing fire, 

While yet the globe reek'd from its funeral pyre; 

The fretted pinnacle, the aisle, the nave, 2 

Were there, all scoop'd by darkness from her cave. 



1 i If .this cave (which is no fiction) the original will be found 
in the 9tb chapter of Mariner's Account of tlic Tonga Islands. 
I have taken the poetical lil«Tiy to transplant it to Toobonai, 
the I i-t island where any distinct account is left of C'hristiaji 
and his comrades. 

2 Ths may seem too minute for the general outline (in 
Mariner's Account) from winch it is taken. But few men have 
travelled without teeing something of the kind — on land, thai 
u Without adverting to Elora, in Munyo Park's last ournal 



Then', with a little tinge of phantasy, 
Fantastic faces moped and mow'd on high, 

And then a mitre or a shrine would fix 
The eye upon its seeming crucitix. - 
Thus .Nature play'd with the stalactites, 
And built herself a chapel of the seas 

VIII. 

And Neuha took her Torquil by the hand, 
And waved along the vault her kindled brand, 
And led him into each recess, and show'd 
The secret places of their new abode. 
Nor these alone, for all had been prepared 
Before, to soothe the lover's lot she shat 
The mat for rest; for dress the fresh gnatoo, 
And sandal-oil to fence against the dew; 

For food the cocoa-nut, the yam, the bread 
Born of the fruit ; for board the plantain spread 
With its broad leaf, or turtie-shel! which bore 
A banquet in the iesh if/cover'd o'er; 

The gourd with water recent from the rill, 
Tin ripe banana from the mellow hill ; 
A pine-torch pile to keep undying light, 
And she herself, as beautiful as night, 
To fling her shadowy spirit o'er the scene 
And make their subterranean world serene. 
Sic had ton si en, since first the stranger's sail 
Drew to their isle, that force or flight migiit fail, 
And forni'd a refuge of the rocky den 
For Torquil's safety from his countrymen; 
Each dawn had walled there her light canoe, 
Laden with all the golden fruits that grew ; 
Each eve had seen her gliding through the hour 
With all could cheer or dl ok their sparry bower, 
And now she spread her little store with smiles, 
The happiest daughter of the loving isles. 

IX. 

She, as he gazed with grateful wonder, press'd 
Her shelter'd love to her impassion'd breast; 
And, suited to her soft caresses, told 
An elden tale of love, — for love is old, 
Old as eternity, but not outworn 
With each new being born or to be born : ' 
How a young Chief, a thousand moons ago, 
Diving for turtle in the depths below, 
Had risen, in tracking fast his ocean prey, 
Into the cave which round and o'er them lay ; 
How, in some desperate feud of after time, 
He shelter'd there a daughter of the clime, 
A foe beloved, and offspring of a foe, 
Saved by his tribe but for a captive's woe ; 
IIiw, when the storm of war was still, he led 
His island clan to where the waters spread 
Their deep green shadow o'er the rockv door, 
Then dived — it seem'd as if to rise no more : 
His wondering mates, amazed wilhin their barli 
Or deem'd him mad, or prey to the blue shark ; 



(if my memory do r.ot err, for there are eight yenrs sine- 1 rend 
the hook) he mentions having met with a rock or mountain 
so exactly resembling a Gothic cathedral, that only minute 

inspection could convince him that it was a work of nature. 
1 The reader will recollect the e| igram of the Creek Anthol 
ogy, or its translation into most of the modern languages' 

" Whoe'er thou an, thy master see, 

He was, or is, or is to he." 



THE ISLAND. 



47,5 



Row'd round in sorrow the sea-girded rock, 

Then paused upon their paddles from the shock, 

When, fresh and springing from the deep, they saw 

A goddess rise — so deem'd they in their awe ; 

And their companion, glorious by her side, 

Proud and exulting in his mermaid bride : 

And how, when undeceived, the pair they bore, 

^ ith sounding conchs and joyous shouts to shore; 

How they had gladly lived and calmly died, 

And why not also Torquil and his bride? 

Not mine to tell the rapturous caress 

Which follow'd wildly in that wild recess 

This tale ; enough that all within that cave 

Was love, though buried strong as in the grave 

Where Abelard, through twenty years of death, 

\\ hen Eloisa's form was lower'd beneath 

Their nuptial vault, his arms outstretch'd, and press'd 

The kindling ashes to his kindled breast. 1 

The waves without sang round their couch, their roar 

As much unheeded as if life were o'er; 

V\ itliin, their hearts made all their harmony, 

Love's broken murmur and more broken sigh. 

X. 
And they, the cause and sharers of the shock 
W Inch left them exiles of the hollow rock, 
Where were they ? O'er the sea for life they plied, 
To seek from heaven the shelter men denied. 
Another course had been their choice — but where ? 
The wave which bore them still, their foes would bear, 
Who, disappointed of their former chase, 
In search of Christian now renew'd their race. 
Eager with anger, their strong arms made way, 
Like vultures baffled of their previous prey. 
They gain'd upon them, all whose safety lay 
In some bleak crag or deeply-hidden bay : 
No further chance or choice remain'd ; and right 
For the first further rock which met their sight 
They steer'd, to take their latest view of land, 
And yield as victims, or die sword in hand ; 
DisniissM the natives and their shallop, who 
Would still have battled for that scanty crew ; 
But Christian bade them seek their shore again, 
Nor add a sacrifice which were in vain ; 
For what were simple bow and savage spear 
Against the arms which must be wielded here? 

XI. 
rhey landed on a wild but narrow scene, 
Where few but Nature's footsteps yet had been ; 
Prepared their arms, and with that gloomy eye, 
Stem and sustain'd, of man's extremity, 
When hope is gone, nor glory's self remains 
To cheer resistance against death or chains, — 
They stood, the three, as the three hundred stood 
Who dyed Thermopyls with holy blood. 
But, ah ! how different ! 't is the cause makes all, 
Degrades or hallows courage in its fall. 
O'er them no fame, eternal and intense, 
Blazed through the clouds of death and beckon'd hence; 
No grateful country, smiling througli her tears, 
Begun the praises of a thousand years ; 
No nation's eyes would on their tomb be bent, 
No heroes envy them their monument ; 



1 The tradition is attached to the story oCEIoisa, thnt when 
het body was lowered into die crave of Abelard (who had 
been buried twenty years) he opened his arras to receive her. 



However boldly their warm blood was spilt, 
Their life was shame, their epitaph was guilt. 
And this they knew and felt, at least the one, 
The leader of the band he had undone ; 
Who, born perchance for better things, had set 
His life upon a cast which linger' d yet : 
But now the die was to be thrown, and all 
The chances were in favour of his fall : 
And such a fall ! But still he faced the shock, 
Obdurate as a portion of the rock 
Whereon he stood, and (ix'd his levell'd gun, 
Dark as a sullen cloud before the sun. 

XII. 

The boat drew nigh, well arm'd, and firm the crew 

To act whatever duty bade them do ; 

Careless of danger, as the onward wind 

Is of the leaves it strews, nor looks behind : 

And yet perhaps they rather wish'd to go 

Against a nation's than a native fie, 

And felt that this poor victim of self-will, 

Hriton no more, had once been Britain's still. 

They hail'd him to surrender — no reply ; 

Their arms were poised, and glitter'd in the sky. 

They hail'd again — no answer ; yet once more 

They offer'd quarter louder than before. 

The echoes only, from the rocks rebound, 

Took their last farewell of the dying sound. 

Then flash'd the flint, and blazed the vo'leying flame, 

And the smoke rose between them and their aim, 

While the rocks rattled with the bullets' knell, 

Which peal'd in vain, and flatten'd as they fell ; 

Then flew the only answer to be given 

By those who had lost all hope in earth or heaven. 

After the first fierce peal, as they pull'd nigher, 

They heard the voice of Christian shout, "Now fire!" 

And, ere the word upon the echo died, 

Two fell ; the rest assail'd the rock's rough side, 

And, furious at the madness of their foes, 

Disdain'd all further efforts, save to close. 

But steep the crag, and all without a path, 

Each step opposed a bastion to their wrath ; 

While placed 'midst clefts the least accessible, 

Which Christian's eye was train'd to mark full well, 

The three maintain'd a strife which must not yield, 

In spots where eagles might have chosen to build. 

Their every shot told ; while the assailant fell, 

Dash'd on the shingles like the limpid shell ; 

But still enough survived, and mounted still, 

Scattering their numbers here and 'here, until 

Surrounded and commanded, though not nigh 

Enough for seizure, near enough to die, 

The desperate trio held aloof their fate 

But by a thread, like sharks who have gorged the bait, 

Yet to the very last they battled well, 

And not a groan inform'd their foes who fell. 

Christian died last — twice wounded ; and once nioro 

Mercy was offer'd when they saw his gore ; 

Too late for life, but not too late to die, 

With though a hostile hand to close his eye. 

A limb was broken, and he droop'd along 

The crag, as doth a falcon reft of voting. 

The sound revived him, or appear'd to wane 

Some passion which a weaklv gesture spake 

He beckon'd to the foremost who drew nigh, 

But, as they ncar'd. he rear'd his weaoon hien— 



476 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



His last ball had been ;\im\I, lull from his breast 

licitton of his vest, 1 
Down the tube dash'd it, levell'd, fired, and smiled 
As Ins foe fell ; then, like a serpent, coil'd 
His wounded, weary form, to where the steep 
Look'd desperate as himself along the deep ; 
Caal one glance back, and clench' d his hand, and shook 
Hi': last rage 'gainst the earth which he forsook; 
Then plunged: the rock belovy received like glass 
His body crush'd into one gory mass, 
With scarce a shred to tell of human form, 
Or fragment for the sea-bird or the worm ; 
A fair-hair'd scalp, besmear'd with blood and weeds, 
Yet reek'd, the remnant of himself and deeds; 
Some splinters of his weapons (to the last, 
As long as hand could hold, he held them fast) 
Yet glittered, but at distance — hurl'd away 
To rust beneath the dew and dashing spray. 
The rest was nothing — save a life nispent, 
And soul — but who shall answer where it went ? 
'T is ours to bear, not judge the dead ; and they 
Who doom to hell, themselves are on the way, 
Unless these bullies of eternal pains 
Arc pardon d their bad hearts for their worse brains. 

XIII. 

The deed was over ! All were gone or ta'en, 

The fugitive, the captive, or the slain. 

Chain' d on the deck, where once, a gallant crew, 

rhev stood with honour, were (he wretched few 

Survivors of the skirmish on the isle ; 

But the last rock left no surviving spoil. 

Cold lay they where they fell, and weltering, 

While o'er them flapp'd the sea-birds' dewy wing, 

Now wheeling nearer from the neighbouring surge, 

And screaming high their harsh and hungry dirge : 

But ca.m and careless heaved the wave below, 

Eternal with unsympathetic flow ; 

Far o'er its face the dolphins sported on, 

And sprung the flying-fish against the sun, 

Till its dried wing relapsed from its brief height, 

To gather moisture for another flight. 

XIV. 

'T was morn ; and Neuha, who by dawn of day 
Swam smoothly forth to catch the rising ray, 
And watch if aught approach'd the amphibious lair 
Where lay her lover, saw a sail in air: 
It flapp'd, it filled, and to the growing gale 
Bent its broad arch : her breath began to fail 
With fluttering fear, her heart beat thick and high, 
While yet a doubt sprung where its course might lie : 
But no ! it came not ; fast and far away 
The shadow lessen'd as it clcar'd the bay. 



1 In ThihoulCs Jlccounlof Frrtlrrick If. of Prussia, there 
is a singular relation of.a young Frenchman, who, with his 
in i-i i 38, appeared to ho of some rank, lie enlisted, and de- 
serted at &cweidirftz ; and, alter a desperate resistance, was 
leiakrn, having killed an officer, w ho attempted to seiz" him 
after be was wounded, by the discharge of his musket loaded 
with a button of his uniform. Some circumstances on his 
court-martial raised a great interest amongst his judged who 

wished In discover his real situation in life, whirh he offered 
ro disclose, but to the Knit: only, to whom he request 
mission to write. This was refused, and Frederick was filled 
with the greatest indignation, from baffled curiosity, or some 
siher motive, when he understood that his request had been de- 
sign.' -<»e Thibault's work, vol. ii. — (I quote from memory). 



Site gazed, and flung the sea-foam from her eyes, 

To watch as tor a rainbow in the .-Lies. 

On the horizon verged the distant deck, 

Dimiftish'd, dwindled to a very speck — 

Then vanished. All was ocean, till was 

Down plunged she through the cave to rouse her boy, 

Told all she had sei n, and all she hope I, an 1 till 

That happy love could a.ugur or re,' all ; 

Sprung forth again, with Torquil following 

His bounding Nen id over the broad sea ; 

Swam round the rock, to where a shallow cleft 

Hid ihe canoe thaj Neuha there- had left 

Drilling along the tide, without an oar, 

That eve the sti ■ ■ ., . .. ■ ■ ', ■ ; 

Cut when these vanish'd, she pursued her prow, 

Regain'd, and urged to where they found it now : 

Nor ever did more love ami joy embark, 

Than now was wafted in that slender ark. 

XV. 

Again their own shore rises on the view, 

No more polluted with a hostile hue ; 

No sullen ship lay bristling o'er the foam, 

A floating dungeon : — all was hope and home ! 

A thousand proas darted o'er the bay, 

With sounding bells, and heralded their way ; 

The chiefs came down, around the people pour'd, 

And welcomed Torquil as a son restored ; 

The women throiig'd, embracing and embraced 

By Neuha, asking where they had been chased, 

And how escaped ? The tale was told ; and then 

One acclamation rent the sky again ; 

And from that hour a new tradition gave 

Their sanctuary the name of " Neuha's cave." 

A hundred tires, far flickering from the height, 

Blazed o'er the general revel of the night, 

The feast in honour of the ;ruest, return'd 

To peace and pleasure, perilously eani'd ; 

A night succeeded by such happy days 

As only the yet infant world displays. 



APPENDIX. 



EXTRACT FROM THE VOYAGE 
BY CAPTAIN BLIGH. 

On the 27th of December, it blew a severe storm of 
wind from the eastward, in the course of which we suf- 
fered greatryi One sea broke away the spare yards 
and spars out of the starboard main-chains ; another 
broke into the ship, and stove all the boats. Several 
casks bf beer thai had been lashed on deck, broke loose, 
and were washed overboard; and it was not without 
great risk and difficulty that we were able to secure the 
boats from being washed away entirely. A great quan- 
tity of our bread was also damaged, and rendered use- 
less, for the sea had stove in our stern, ami filled the 
cabin with water. 

On the 5th of January, 17SS, we saw the island of 
Teneriffe about twelve leagues distant, and next day, 
being Sunday, came to an anchor in the road of Santa 
Cruz. There we took in the necessary supplies, and, 
having finished our business, sailed on the 10th. 

I now divided the people into three watches, and <.'ava 
the charge of the third watch to Mr. Fletcher Christian 



THE ISLAND. 



471 



one of the mates. I have always considered this a de- 
sirable regulation wncn circumstances will admit of 
it, and I am persuaded that unbroken rest not only con- 
tributes much towards the health of the ship's company, 
out enables them more readily to exert themselves in 
cases of sudden emergency. 

As I wished to proceed to Otaheitc without stopping, 
I reduced the allowance of bread to two-thirds, and 
caused the water for drinking to be filtered through 
drip-stone-, bought at Teneriffe for that purpose. I 
now acquainted the ship's company of the object of the 
. and gave assurances of certain promotion to 
every one whose endeavours should merit it. 

On Tuesday the 26th of February, being in south 
latitude 29° 38', and 11° 11' west longitude, we bent 
new sails, and made other necessary preparations for 
encountering the weather that was to be expected in a 
nigh latitude. Our distance from the coast of Brazil 
was about 100 leagues. 

On the forenoon of Sunday, the 2d of March, after 
seeing that every person was clean, divine service was 
performed, according to my usual custom on this day : 
I gave to Mr. Fletcher Christian, whom I had before 
directed to take charge of the third watch, a written 
order to act as lieutenant. 

The change of temperature soon be<ran to be sensi- 
bly felt ; and, that the people might not suffer from their 
own negligence, I supplied them with thicker clothing, 
as better suited to the climate. A great number of 
whales of an immense size, with two spout-holes on 
the back of the head, were seen on the 11th. 

On a complaint made to me by the master, I found it 
necessary to punish Matthew Quintal, one of the sea- 
men, with two dozen of lashes, for insolence and muti- 
nous behaviour, which was the first time that there was 
any occasion for punishment on board. 

We were off Cape St. Diego, the (astern part of the 
Terrc de Fuego, and the wind being unfavourable, I 
thought it more advisable to go round to the eastward 
of Staten-larid than to attempt passing through Straits 
leMaire. We passed New Year's Harbour and Cape St. 
John, and on Monday the 31st were in latitude 60° 1' 
south. But the wind became variable, and we had bad 
weather. 

Storms, attended with a great sea, prevailed until the 
12th of April. The ship began to leak, and required 
pumping every hour, which was no more than we had 
reason to expect from such a continuance of gales of 
wind and high seas. The decks also became so leaky 
that it was necessary to allot the great cabin, of which 
[ made little use except in fine weather, to thosepeople 
who had not births to hang their hammocks in, and by 
this means the ! n decks was less crowded. 

With all this bad weather, we had the additional mor- 
tification to find, at the end of every day, that we were 
losing ground; fir, notwithstanding our utmost exer- 
tions, and keeping on the m»<' advantageous tacks, wc 
did little better than drift before the wind. On Tuesday 
the 22d of 'April, we had eight down ort the sick list, 
and the rest of the people, though m fc&od health, were 
gteatly fatigued ; but I saw, with much concern, that it 
was impossiblt tage 'his way to the Society 

I , lor we had now been thirty days in a l( mpes- 

tuous ui-can. Thus tin- season was too far advanced for 
us in expeel better weather to enable us to double Cape 
Horn; and, from these and other considerations, I or- 
dered the helm to be put a- weather, and bore away lor 
2T 



the Cape of Good Hope, to the great joy of every one 
on board. 

We came to an anchor on Friday the 23d of May, in 
Simon's Bay, at the Cape, after a tolerable run. Tho 
ship required complete caulking, f)r she had become so 
leaky, that wc were obliged to pump hourly in our pas- 
sage from Cape Horn. The sails and rigging also re- 
quired repair, and, on examining the provisions, a con- 
siderable quantity was found damaged. 

Having remained thirty-eight days at this place, and 
my people having received all the advantage that could 
be derived from refreshments of every kind that could 
be met with, we sailed on the 1st of July. 

A gale of wind blew on the 20th, with a high sea ; 
it increased after noon with such violence, that the ship 
was driven almost forecastle under before we could get 
the sails clewed up. The lower yards were lowered, 
and the top-gallant-mast got down upon deck, whi«*h re- 
lieved her much. We lay-to all night, and in the morn- 
ing bore away under a reefed foresail. The sea still 
running high, in the afternoon it became very unsafe 
to stand on ; we therefore lay-to all night, without any 
accident, excepting that a man at the steerage was thrown 
over the wheel and much bruised. Towards noon the 
violence of the storm abated, and we again bore away 
under the reefed foresail. 

In a few days we passed the island of St. Paul, where 
there is good fresh water, as I was informed by a Dutch 
captain, and also a hot spring, which boils fish as com- 
pletely as if done by a fire. Approaching to Van Die- 
men's land, we had much bad weather, with snow and 
hail, but nothing was seen to indicate our vicinity, on 
the 13th of August, except a seal, which appeared at 
the distance of twenty leagues from it. We anchored 
in Adventure Bay on Wednesday the 20th. 

In our passage hither from the Cape of Good Hope, 
the winds were chiefly from the westward, with very 
boisterous weather. The approach of strong southerly 
winds is announced by many birds of the albatross or 
petercl tribe ; and the abatement of the gale, or a shift 
of wind lo the norlhward, by their keeping away. The 
thermometer also varies five or six degrees in its height, 
when a change of these winds may be expected. 

In the land surrounding Adventure Bay are many 
forest trees one hundred and fifty feet high ; we saw 
one which measured above thirty-three feet in girth. 
We observed several eagles, some beautiful blue-plu- 
maiged herons, and parroquots in great variety. 

The natives not appearing, we went in search of them 
towards Cape Frederic-Henry. Soon after, coining to 
a grapnel, close io the shore, f >r it was impossible to 
land, we heard their voices, lik? the cackling of geese, 
ami twenty persons came out of the woods. We threw 
trinkets ashore tied up in parcels, which they would not 
Open OUt until I made an appearance of leaving them: 
they thea did so, ami, taking the articles cut, put them on 
their heads. On first coming in sight, they made a 
prodigious clattering in tlrir speech, and held their arms 
over their heads. They spoke so quick, that it was im- 
possible to catch one single word they ottered. Then 
colour is of a 'lull black ; their skin scarifieu about the 
breast and shoulders. One was distinguished by Ins 
body being coloured with red ochre, but all the' othcaa 
were painted black, with a kind of soot, so thickly l.ua 
over their faees and shoulders, that it was difficult to 
ascertain what they were like. 

On Thursday the 4th of September, wc sailed out o* 



Adventure Bav, steering first towards the east-south- | circumstances sufficiently proved; fur to the friendly 
east and then to the northward of cast, when, on the I and endearing hehaviour of these people may be as- 



19th, we came in sight of a cluster of small rocky is: 
aods, which I named Bounty Isles. Soon afterwards 
we frequently observed the sea, in the night time, to be 
covered by luminous' spots, caused by amazing quanti- 
ties of small blubbers, or medusae, which emit a light, 
like the blaze of a candle, from the strings or filaments 
extending from them, while the rest of the body con- 
tinues perfectly dark. 

We discovered the island of Otaheite on the 25th, 
and, before casting anchor next morning in Matavai 
Bay, such numbers of canoes had come off", that, after 
the natives ascertained we were friends, they came on 
board, and crowded the deck so much, that in ten min- 
utes I could scarce find my own people. The "hole 
distance which the ship had run, in direct and contrary 
courses, from the time, of leaving England until reach- 
ing Otaheite, was twenty-seven thousand and eighty- 
six miles, which, on an average, was one hundred and 
eight miles each twenty-four hours. 

Here we lost our surgeon on the 9lh of December. 
Of late he had scarcely ever stirred out of the cabin, 
though not apprehended to be in a dangerous state. 
Nevertheless, appearing worse than usual in the even- 
ing, he was removed where he could obtain more air, but 
without any benefit, for he died in an hour aflerwards. 
This unfortunate man drank very hard, and was so 
averse to exercise, that lie would never be prevailed on 
to take half a dozen turns on deck at a time, during all 
the course of the voyage. He was buried on shore. 

On Monday, the fifth of January, the small cutter was 
missed, of which I was immediately apprized. The 
(•hip's company being mustered, we found three men 
absent, who had carried it off. They had taken with 
them eight stand of arms and ammunition ; but with 
regard to their plan, every one on board seemed to be 
quite ignorant. I therefore went on shore, and engaged 
all the chiefs to assist in recovering both the boat and 
the deserters. Accordingly, the former was brought 
back in the course of the day, by five of the natives ; 
but the men were not taken until nearly three weeks 
afterwards. Learning the place whore they were, in a 
different quarter of the island of Otaheite, I went thither 
in the cutter, thinking there would be no great difficulty 
in securing them with the assistance of the natives. 
However, they heard of my arrival ; and when I was 
Hear a house in which they were, they came out want- 
ing their fire-arms, and delivered themselves up. Some 
of the chiefs had formerly seized and bound these de- 
serters ; but had been prevailed on, by fair promises of 
returning peaceably to the ship, to release them. But 
finding an opportunity again '" get possession of their 
arms, they set the natives at defiance. 

The object of the voyage being now completed, all 
the bread-fruit plants, to the number of one thousand 
and fifteen, were got on board on Tuesday, the 31st of 
March. Besides these, we had collected many other 
p'ants, some of them bearing the fines! fruits in the 
world; and valuable, from affording brilliant dyes, and 
for various properties besides. At sunset of the 4th of 
April, we made sail from Otaheite, bidding farewell to 
an is.and where for twenty-three weeks we had been 
treated with t ne utmost affection and regard, and which 
Reem -I t< :rease in proportion to our stay. That 



cribed the motives inciting an event that effected the 
ruin of our expedition, which there was every reason to 
believe, would have been attended with the most favour- 
able issue. 

Next morning we got sight of the island Huaheine ; 
and a double canoe soon coming alongside, containing 
ten natives, I saw among them a young man who re- 
collected me, and called me by my name. I had been 
here in the year 1780, with Captain Cook, in the Res- 
olution. A few days after sailing from this island, the 
weather became squally, and a thick body of black 
clouds collected in the east. A water-spout was in a short 
time seen at no great distance from us, which appeared 
to great advantage from the darkness of the clouds be- 
hind it. As nearly as I could judge, the upper part was 
about two feet in diameter, and the lower about eight 
inches. Scarcely had I made these remarks, w hen I ob- 
served that it was rapidly advancing towards the ship. 
We immediately altered our course, and took in all the 
sail-; except the foresail ; soon after which it passed 
within ten yards of the stern, with a rustling noisi , bat 
without our feeling the least effect from its being so 
near. It seemed to be travelling at the rate of about 
ten miles an hour, in the direction of the wind, and it 
dispersed in a quarter of an hour after passing us. It 
is impossible to say what injury we should have re- 
ceived had it passed directly over us. Masts, I imagine, 
might have been carried away, but I do not apprehend 
that it would have endangered the loss of the ship. 

Passing several islands on the way, we anchored at 
Annamooka, on the 23d of April ; and an old lame 
man called Tepa, whom I had known here in 1777, and 
immediately recollected, came on board, along w ith 
others, from different islands in the vicinity. They 
were desirous to see the ship, and, on being taken 
below, where the bread-fruit plants were arranged, 
they testified great surprise. A few of these being 
decayed, we went on shore to procure some in their 
place. 

The natives exhibited numerous marks of the pecu- 
liar mourning which they express on losing their rela- 
tives ; such as bloody temples, their heads being de- 
prived of most of the hair, and, what was worse, al- 
most the whole of them had lost some of their fingers 
Several fine boys, not above six years old, had lost both 
their little fingers ; and several of the men, besides 
these, had parted with the middle finger of the right 
hand. 

The chiefs went off with me to dinner, and we car 
ried on a brisk trade for yams ; we also got plantains 
and bread-fruit. But the yams were in great abundance, 
and very fine and large. One of them weighed above 
forty-five pounds. Sailing canoes came, some of" w Inch 
contained not less than ninety passengers. Such a num- 
ber of them gradually arrived from different islands, 
that it was impossible to get any thing done, the mul- 
titude became so great, and there was no chief of suf- 
ficient authority lo command the whole. I therefore 
ordered a watering party, then employed, to. come on 
board, and sailed on Sunday, the 26th of April. 

We kept near the island of EotOO all the afternoon 
of Monday, in hopes that some canoes would come off 
to the ship, but in this we were disappointed. The 



we were not insensible to their kindness, the succeeding, wind being northerly, we steered tu the westward in the 



THE ISLAND. 



479 



evening, to pass south of Tofoa ; and I gave directions 
for this course to lie continued during the night. The 
master had the first watch, the gunner the middle 
watch, arid Mr. Christian 'he morning watch. This 
was i he turn of duty for the night. 

Hithertd (lie voyage had advanced in a course of 
uninterrupted prosperity, and had been attended with 
ejreumstances equally pleasing and satisfactory, But 
a very different scene was now to be disclosed : a con- 
spiracy had been formed, which was to render all our 
past labour productive only of misery and distress; 
ami it had been concerted with so much secrecy and 
circumspection, that no one circumstance escaped to 
betray the impending calamity. 

On the nighi of Monday, the watch was set as I have 

I. Just before sunrise, on Tuesday morning, 

while I was vet asleep, Mr. Christian, with the inaster- 

ai-arms, gunner's mate, and Thomas Burkitt, seaman, 

<-a into my cabin, and, setaatg me, tied my hands 

with a cord behind my back; threatening me with 
instant death if I spoke or made the least noise. I 
nevertheless called out as loud as I could, in hopes of 
assistance; but the officers not of their party were 
already secured by sentinels at their doors. At my 
own cabin-door wore three men, besides the four within: 
all except Christian had muskets and bayonets; he had 
only a cutlass. I was dragged out of bed, and forced 
on dcok in my shirt, suffering great pain in the mean 
time from the tightness with which my hands were 
tied. On demanding the reason of such violence, the 
only answer was abuse for not holding my tongue. The 
master, the gunner, surgeon, master's mate, and Nelson 
the gardener, were kept confined below, and the fore- 
hatchway was guarded by sentinels. The boatswain 
and carpenter, and also the clerk, wore allowed to 
come on deck, where they saw me standing abaft the 
mizen-mast, with my hands tied behind my back, unaer 
b guard, with Christian at their head. The boatswain 
was then ordered to hoist out the launch, accompanied 
by a threat, if he did not do it instantly, to take care 

ok HIMSELF. 

The boat being hoisted out, Mr. Hay ward and Mr. 
Hallett, two of the midshipmen, and Mr. Samuel, the 
clerk, were ordered into it. I demanded the intention 
of giving this order, and endeavoured to persuade the 
people near me not to persist in such acts of violence; 
but i! was to no effect ; for the constant answer was, 
"Hold your tongue, sir, or you arc dead this moment." 

The master had by this rime sent, requesting that he 
might come on deck, which was permitted; but he was 
soon ordered back again to his cabin. My exertions 
to turn the tide of affairs were continued ; when Chris- 
tian, changing the cutlass he held for a bayonet, and, 
holding me by the cord about my hands with a strong 
gripe, threatened me with immediate death if I would 
not be quiet; and the villains around me had their 
pieces cocked and bayonets fixed. 

(' run individuals were called on to get into the 
boat, and were hurried over the ship's side ; whence 1 
concluded, that along with them I was to be set adrift. 
Another effort to bring about a change produced noth- 
ing but menaces of having my brains blown out. 

The boatswain and those seamen who were to 
be put into the boat, were allowed to collect twine, 
canvas, lines, sails, cordage, an eight-and-tw-jnty gal- 



lon cask of water ; and Mr. Samuel got 150 pounds of 
bread, with a small quantity of rum and wine; also a 
quadrant and compass ; but he was prohibited, on pain 
of death, to touch any map or astronomical book, and 
any instrument, or any of my surveys and drawings. 

The mutineers having thus forced those of the s< a- 
men whom they wished to get rid of into the boat, 
Christian directed a dram to be served to each of his 
crew. I then unhappily saw that nothing could be 
done to recover the ship. The officers were next called 
on deck, and forced oyer (he ship's side into the boat, 
while I was kept apart from everyone abaft the mizen- 
mast. Christian, armed uith a bayonet, held the cord 
fastening my hands, and the guard around me stood 
with their pieces cocked; but on my daring the un- 
grateful wretches to fire, they uncocked them. Isaac 
Martin, one of them, I saw, had an inclination to assist 
me; and as he fed mc with shaddock, my lips being 
quite parched, we explained each other's sentiments by 
looks. But this was observed, and he was removed. 
He then got into the boat, attempting to leave tin- ship; 
however, he was compelled to return. Some others 
were also kept contrary to their inclination. 

It appe'ared to me, that Christian was some time in 
doubt whether he should keep the carpenter or his 
mates. At length he determined for the latter, and the 
carpenter was ordered into the boat. He was permitted, 
though not without opposition, to take his tool-chest. 

Mr. Samuel secured myjournals and commission, with 
some important ship-papers; this he did with great reso- 
lution, though strictly watched. He attempted to save 
the time-keeper, and a box with my surveys, drawings, 
and remarks for fifteen years past, which were very 
numerous, when he was hurried away with — " Damn 
your eyes, you are well off to get what you have." 

Much altercation took place among the mutinous crew 
during the transaction of this whole affair. Some swore, 
" I '11 be damned if he does not find his way home, if he 
gets any thing with him," meaning me ; and w hen the 
carpenter's chest was carrying aw ay, " Damn my eyes, 
he will have avessel built in a month;" while Others ridi- 
culed the helpless situation of the boat, which was very 
deep in the water, and had so little room for those who 
were in her. As for Christian, he seemed as if medi- 
tating destruction on himself and every one else. 

I asked for arms, but the mutineers laughed at me, 
and said I was well acquainted with the people among 
whom I was going; four cutlasses, however, were thrown 
into the boat, after we were veered astern. 

The officers and men being in the boat, they only 
waited for me, of which the master-at-arms informed 
Christian, who then said, "Come, Captain Bligh, your 
officers and men are now in the boat, and you must go 
with them; if you attempt to make the least resistance, 
you will instantly be put to death;" and without further 
ceremony, I was forced over the side by a tribe of armed 
ruffians, where they untied my hands. Being in the 
boat, we were veered astern by a rope. A few p.eces 
of pork were thrown to us, also the four cutlasses. The 
armorer and carpenter then called out to me to remeni 
her that they had no hand in the transaction. Aftei 
having been kept some time to make sport for these 
ig wretches, and having undergone much ridi 
cule, we were at length cast adrift in the open ocean. 

Eighteen persons were with me in the boat,— tl* 



4U0 



BYRON'S WORKS 



master, acting surgeon, botanist, gunner, boatswain, 
carpenter, master, and quarter-master's mate, two, quar- 
ter-masters, the Bail-maker, two cook';, my clerk, the 

butcher, ami a boy. There remained on board, Fletcher 

Christian, the master's male ; Peter Haywood, Edward 
Young, George Stewart, midshipmen ; the master-at- 
arms, gunner's mate, boatswain's mate, gardener, ar- 
morer, carpenters mate, carpenter's crew, and four- 
teen seamen, being altogether the most able intn of the 
ship's company. 

Having little or no wind, we rowed pre' 
the island of Tofoa, which -ea I about tea 

leagues distant. The ship while in sight steerc I west- 
north-west, but. this I considered only as a feint, for 
when we were sent away, " Huzza for Otaheite !" was 
frequently heard among the mutineers. 

Christian, the chief of them, was of a respectable 
family in the north of England, This was the third 
voyage he had made with me. Notwithstanding the 
roughness with which I u as treated, the remembrance of 
past kindness produced some remorse in him. While 
they were forcing me out ofthe ship, I asked him whether 
this was a proper return for the many instances he had 
experienced of my friendship ? lie appeared disturbed 
at. the question, and answered, with much emotion, 
"That — Captain Bligh — that is the thing — I am in 
hell — I am in hell." His abilities to take charge ofthe 
third watch, as I had so divided the ship's company, 
were fully equal to the task. 

Haywood was also of a respectable family in the 
north of England, and a young man of abilities, as well 
as Christian. These two had been objects of my partic- 
ular regard and attention, and I had taken great pains 
to instruct them, having entertained hopes that, as pro- 
fessional men, they would have become a credit to their 
country. Young was well recommended; and Stewart 
of creditable parents in the Orkneys, at which place, on 
the return ofthe Resolution from the South Seas in 1780, 
we received so many civilities, that in consideration of 
these alone I should gladly have taken him with me. 
But he had always borne a good character. 

When I had time to reflect, an inward satisfaction 
prevented the depression of my spirits. Yet, a few 
hours before, my situation had been peculiarly flatter- 
ing ; I had a ship in the most perfect order, stored with 
every necessary, both for health and service ; the object 
ot the voyage was attained, and two-thirds of it now 



completed. The remaining part had every prospec o/ 
success. 

It will naturally be asked, what could be the cause of 
such a revolt? In answer, I pan only conjecture that the 

mutineers had flattered themselves with the bope of a 
happier life among the Otaneitans than they could pos- 
sibly enjoy in England ; which, joined to some female 
us, most probably occasioned the whole trans- 
action. 

The women of Otaheite are nandsome, mild, and 
cheerful in manners and conversation j possessed of 
great sensibility, and have sufficient delicacy to make 
them be admired and beloved. The chiefs were so much 
attached to our people, that they rather encouraged 
their stay among them than otherwise, and even made 
them promises of large possessions. Under these, and 
many other concomitant circumstances, it ought hardly 
to be the subject of surprise that a set of sailors, most 
<>f them void of connexions, should be led away, where 
they had the power of fixing themselves in the midst 
of | lenty, in one ofthe finest islands in the world, where 
there was no necessity To labour, and where the allure- 
ments of dissipation are beyond any conception that 
can be formed of it. The utmost, however, that a com- 
mander could have expected* was desertions such as 
have already happened more or less in the South Seas, 
and not an act of open mutiny. 

But the secrecy of this mutiny surpasses belief. Thir- 
teen of the party who were now with me had always 
lived forward among the seamen ; yet neither they, nor 
the messmates of Christian, Stewart, Haywood, and 
Young, had ever observed any circumstance to excite 
suspicion of what was plotting; and it is not wonderful 
if I fell a sacrifice to it, my mind being entirely free 
from suspicion. Perhaps, had marines been on board 
a sentinel at my cabin-door might have prevented it ; 
for I constantly slept with the door open, that the officer 
ofthe watch might have access to me on all occasions. 
If the mutiny had been occasioned by any grievances, 
either real or imaginary, I must have discovered symp- 
toms of discontent, which would have put me on my 
guard; but it was far otherwise. Wilh Christian, in 
particular, I was on the most friendly terms ; thai very 
day he was engaged to have dined with- me; and the 
preceding night he excused himself from supping with 
me e)ii pretence of indisposition, for which I felt con- 
cerned, having no suspicions of his honour or integrity. 



&\\t ®&t ot 23VOUK ; 

OR, 

CARMEN SECULARE ET ANNUS HAUD MIRABILIS. 



"lmpar Congrcssus Achilli." 



I. 

The " good ( Id times" — all times, when old, are good — 

Are gone ; the present might be, if they would ; 

Great things have been, and are, and greater still 

Want li.ue of mere mortals but their will: 

A wider Bpace, a greener field is given 

J'o thos« who blay their "tricks before high Heaven." 



I know not if the angels weep, but men 

Have wept enough — for what? — to weep again. 

II. 
All is exploded — be it good or bad. 
Reader! remember when thou wcrt a lad, 
Then Pitt was all; or, if not all, so much, 
His very rival almost deem'd him such. 



THE AGE OF BRONZE. 



481 



Wo, we bave seen the intellectual race 

Of giants stand, like Tigris, face to fact — 

Atl-.os and 1 .In, with a dashing 

Of eloquence 1 i tween, which flow'd all free, 

As the deep billows of the ^Egean mar 

Betwixt the Hellenic and Phrygian siiorc. 

But where are they — the rivals ! — a few feet 

Of sullen earth divide each windlngrshi et. 

How peaceful and how powerful is the grave, 

\\ liicli hushes all ! a calm, unstormy wave 

W huh overowjeeps the « orl I. The theme is old 

Of "dust to dust," hut half its tale untold. 

Time tempers not its. terrors — still the worm 

W bids its cold folds, the tomb preserves its form; — 

Varied above, but still alike below ; 

The urn may shine, the ashes will not glow. 

Though Cleopatra's mummy cross the sea, 

O'er which from empire she lured Antony ; 

Though Alexander's urn a show be grown 

On shores he wept to conquer, though unknown — 

How vain, how worse than vain, at leng'h appear 

The madman's wish, the Macedonian's tear. 

He wept fir worlds to conquer — half the earth 

Know.; not his name, or but his death and birth 

And desolation; while Ins native Greece 

Hath all of desolation, save its peace. 

He "wept for worlds to conquer J" he who ne'er 

Conceived the globe he panted not to spare! 

With even the busy Northern Isle unknown, 

Which holds his urn, and never knew his throne. 

HI. 
But where is he, the modern, mightier far, 
Who, born no king, made monarchs draw his car; 
The new Sesostris, whose unharness'd kings, 
Freed from the bit, believe themselves with wings 
And spum the dust o'er which they erawl'd of late, 
Chain'd to the chariot of the chieftain's state'/ 
Yes! where is he, the champion and the child 
Of all that 's great or little, wise or w ill ] 
Whose game was empires, and whose stakes were 

thrones ; 
Whose table, earth — whose dice were human bones? 
Behold the grand result in yon lone isle, 
And, as thy nature urges, weep or smile. 
Sigh to behold the eagle's lofty rage 
Re lined to nibble at bis narrow cage ; 
Smile to survey the Queller of the Nations 
Now daily squabbling o'er disputed rations ; 
Weep to perceive him mourning, as he dines, 
O'er cuftail'd dishes and o'er stinted wines; 
O'er petty quarrels upon petty things — 
Is this the man who scourged or feasted kings? 
Behold ' ; which his fortune hangs, 

A surgeon's statement and an earl's harangues! 
A bust delay'd, a book refused, can shake 
The sleep of him who kept the world awake. 
Is this indeed the Tamer of the Great, 
Now slave of all could teaze or irritate— 
The paltrv jailor and the prying spy, 
The staring stranger with his note-hook nigh? 
Plunged in a dungeon, he had still been great ; 

How low, how little, was this middle state, 
Between, a prison and a palace, where 
How few could feel for what he had to bear! 
T 2 1)0 



eoiuplaint — my lord presents !.: 
His food and wine were doled buWlul] ^'ill : 
\ ain «as Ins sickness, — never was a crime 
So free from homicide — to doubt 's a CI 
And the stin surgeon, who maintam'd his cause, 
Hath losl his place, ami gain'd die worl i's applause. 
But smile — though ah the pangs of brain an 1 heart 
1 di fy, the lardy ai.l ol art ; 

Though, save the few fon I friends, and imaged face 

Of that fair boy his sire shall ne'( r embl ace", ' 

None stand by Ins low bed — thouj mind 

He wavering, which long awed tujd awes mankind',—* 

Smile — tortile fetler'd eagli break.- Ins chain, 
And higher worlds than this are his 

IV. 
How, if that soaring sen it still retain 
A conscious twilight of his blazing reign, 
How must he smile, on looking doAvn, to see 
The little that he was and sought to be ! 
\\ hat though his name a wider empiri I! 
Than his ambition, though with scarce a bound: 
Though first in glorv, deepest in revi rse, 
He tasted empire's blessings, and its curse; 
Though kings, rejoicing in their late escape 
From chains, would gladly be their tyrant's ape : 
How must lie smile, and tern to von 1 an- gravje, 
The proudest sea-mark that o'ertops the wave ! 
What though his jailor, duteous to the last, 
Scarce deem'd the coffin's lead could keep him fast, 
Refusing one poor line along the lid 
To date the birth and death of all it hid, 
That name shall hallow the ignoble shore, 
A talisman to all save him who bore: 
The fleets that sweep before the eastern blast 
Shall hear their sea-boys hail it from the mast ; 
When Victory's Gallic column shall but rise, 
Like Potupev's pillar, in a desert's skies, 
The rocky isle that holds or held his dust 
Shall crown, the Atlantic like the hero's bust, 
And mighty Nature o'er his obsequies 
Do more than niggard Envy still denies. 
But what are these to him? Can glory's lust 
Touch the freed spirit of the«fetter'd dust? 
Small care hath he of what his tomb consists, 
Nought if he sleeps — nor more if he exists: 
Alike the better-seeing shade will smile 
On the rude cavern of the rockv isle, 
As if his ashes (bund their latest home 
In Rome's Pantheon, or Gaul's mimic dome. 
He wall's not this ; but France shall foci the want 
Of this last consolation, though so scant ; 
Hoi- honour, fame, and faith, demand his bones, 
To rear amid a pyramid of thrones ; 
Or carried onward, in the battle's van, 
To form, like GuesclinV dust, her talisman. 
But be as it is, the time may conic 
His name shall beat the alarm like Ziska's drum. 

V. 
Oh, Heaven ! of which he was in power a feature , 
Oh, earth! of which be was a noble creature; 
Thou isle! to he rcmember'd long and well, 
That saw'st the unfledged eaglet chip his shell! 



] Queselin died iinrin^ thd rioge of a city- it ganmnderetL 

and the kr\< w.rc brought and la'il upon Ins liter, .» fia\ <im 
place might apnea: rendered to his ashes. 



482 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Ye Alps, which view'd him in his dawning flights 
Hover the victor of a hundred lights ! 

Thou Rome, who saw'rt thy Cesar's deeds outdone! 

Alas! why paas'd he too the Rubicon ? 

The Rubicon of man's awaken'd rights, 

To herd with vulgar kings and parasites ? 

Egypt! from whose all dateless tombs arose 

Foi ; ;.tten Pharaohs from their long repose, 

And shook within her pyramids to hear 

A new Cambyses thundering in their ear ; 

While the dark shades of forty ages stood 

Like startle.l giants by Nile's famous Hood ; 

Or from the pyramid's tail pinnacle 

Beheld the desetl peopled, as from hell, 

With clashing hosts, who slrew'd the barren sand 

To re-manure the uncultivated land ! 

Spain! which, a moment mindless of the Cid, 

Hi In Id his banner flouting thy Madrid ! 

Austria! which saw thy twice-ta'cn capital 

Twice spared, to be the traitress of his fall ! 

Ye race of Frederic! — (Frederics but in name 

Ami falsehood — heirs to all except his faun- ; 

Who, crush'd at Jena, crauch'd at Berlin* fell, 

Fust, and but rose to follow ; ye who dwell 

Where Kosciusko dwelt, remembering yet 

The unpaid amount of Catherine's bloody debt! 

Poland ! o'er which the avenging angel pass'd, 

But left thee as he found thee, still a waste : 

Forgetting all thy still enduring claim, 

Thy lotted people and extinguish'd name ; 

Thy sigh for freedom, thy long-flowing tear, 

That sound that crashes in the tyrant's ear: 

Kosciusko! on — on — on — the thirst of war 

Gasps for the gore of serfs and of their czar ; 

The half-barbaric Moscow's minarets 

Gleam in the sun, but 't is a sun that sets ! 

Moscow ! thou limit of his long career, 

For which rude Charles had wept his frozen tear 

To see in vain — he saw thee — how ! with spire 

And palace fuel to one common fire. 

To this the soldier lent his kindling match, 

To this the peasant gave his cottage thatch, 

To this the merchant flung his hoarded store, 

The prince his hall — and Moscow was no more ! 

Sublimest of volcanos ! Etna's flame 

Pales before thine, and quenchless HecTa's tame; 

Vesuvius shows his blaze, an usual sight 

For gasping tourists, from his hackney 'd height: 

Thou stand's! alone unriyall'd, till the fire 

To come, in which ail empires shall expire. 

Thou other element ! as strong and stern 

To teach a lesson conquerors will not learn, 

Whose icy wing flapped o'er the faltering foe, 

Till fell a hero with each flake of snow ; 

How did thy numbing beak and silent fang 

Pierce, till hosts pensh'd with a single pang! 

In vain shall Seine look up along his banks 

For the gay thousands of his dashing ranks; 

In vain shall Frame recall beneath her vines 

Her youth— their blood flows faster than her wines, 

«>r stagnant ia their human ice remains 

In frozen mummies on the polar plains. 

In vain will Italy's broad sun awaken 

llei offspring chill'd — its beams are now forsaken. 

Of all the' trophies gather'd from the war, 

What shall return ? The conqueror's broken car ! 



The conqueror's yet unbroken heart ! Again 
The horn of Roland sounds, and not in vain. 
Liit/cn, where fell the Swede of victory, 
Beholds him conquer, but, alas! not die : 
Dresden surveys three despots fly once more 
Before their sovereign*, — sovereign, as be.ore ; 
Km there exhausted Fortune quits their field, 
And Leipsic's treason bids the unvanquistt'd yield ; 
The Saxon jackal leaves the lion's side 
To turn the bear's, and wolf's, and fox's guide ; 
And backward to the den of his despair 
The forest monarch shrinks, but finds no lair ! 
Oh ye! and each, and all ! oh, France ! who found 
Thy.long fair fields ptoUgh'd up as hostile ground, 
Disputed foot by foot, till treason, still 
His only victor, from Montmartre's hill 
Look'd down o'er trampled Paris, and thou, isle, 
Which see'st Etruria from thy ramparts smile, 
The momentary shelter of his pride, 
Till, woo'd by danger, his yet weeping bride; 
Oh, France ! retaken by a single man !:, 
Whose path was through one long triumphal arch! 
Oh, bloody and most bootless Waterloo, 
Which prove how fools may have their fortune' too, 
Won, half by blunder, half by treachery ; 
Oh, dull Saint Helen ! with thy jailor nigh — 
Hear! hear! Prometheus' from his rock appeal 
To earth, air, ocean, all that felt or feel 
His power and glory, all who yet shall hear 
A name eternal as the rolling y6ar ; 
He teaches them the lesson taught so long, 
So oft, so vainly — learn to do no wrong ! 
A single step into the right had made 
This man the Washington of worlds betray'd ; 
A single step into the wrong has given 
His name a doubt to all the winds of heaven , 
The reed of fortune and of thrones the rod, 
Of fame the Moloch or the demi-god ; 
His country's Cassar, Europe's Hannibal, 
Without their decent dignity of fall. 
Yet vanity herself had better taught 
A surer path even to the fame he sought, 
By pointing out on history's fruitless page, 
Ten thousand conquerors for a single sage. 
While Franklin's quiet, memory climbs to heaven, 
Calming the lightning which he thence hath riven, 
Or drawing from the no less kindled earth 
Freedom and peace to that which boasts his birth* 
While Washington 's a watch-word, such as ne'ei 
Shall sink while there 's an echo left to air : 
While even the Spaniard's thirst of gold and war 
Forgets Pizarro to shout Bolivar ! 
\ ; i< ! why must the same Atlantic wave 
Which wafted freedom gird a tyrant's grave, — 
The king of kings, and yet of slaves the slave, 
Who burst the chains of millions to renew 
The very fetters which his arm broke through, 
And crush'd the rights of Europe and his own 
To flit between a dungeon and a throne ? 

VI. 

But 'twill not be — the spark's awaken'd — Id ! 
The swarthy Spaniard feels his former glow : 



1 I refer the reader to the first address of Prometheus in 
,i:>i -liylus, H hen lie is left alone by his attendants, and befo. • 
the arrival of the Chorus of Sea-nymphs. 



THE AGE OF BRONZE. 



483 



The same high spirit which beat bark the Moor 
Through eight long ages of alternate gore, 
I!, .,\, <_-, n ,| where? in that avenging clime 
Where Spain was once synonymous with crime, 
Where Cortes' am! Pizarro's banner lieu-, 
The infant world redeetns her name of u iV«W." 
'T is the old aspiration breath* 1 afresh, 
To kindle souls within degraded flesh, 
Such as repulsed the Persian from the shore 
Where Greece wu — No ! she still is Greece once more. 
One common cause mikes myriads of one breast! 
Slaves of the east, or HeloB of the west ; 
On Aii lis' and on Athos' peaks unfurl'/}, 
The self-same standard streams o.\ r either world: 
The Athenian wears again Haronodius' sword; 
The Cnili chief abjures ins foreign lord ; 
The Spartan knows himself once more a Greek ; 
young Fre< donj plumes (he crest of each Gacique; 
Debating despots, hemtn'd on either shore, 
Shrink vainly from the roused Atlantic'* roar : 
Through Calpe's strait the rolling tubs advance, 
Swi ep lightly by the half-taihed land of France, 
Dash o'er ihe old Spaniard's cradfe, and would fain 
Unite Ausonia to the mighty main : 
But driven from thence awhile, yel not for aye, 
Break o'er the ^Egean, mindful of tlie day 
Of Salamis — 'here, there the waves arise, 
Not to be lull'd by tyrant victories. 
Lone, lost, abandoned in their utmost need 
By Christians unto whom they gave their creed, 
The desolated lands, the ravaged isle, 
The foster'd feud encouraged to beguile, 
The aid evaded, and the cold delay, 

g'd but in the hope to make a prev ; — 
These, these shall tell the tale, and Greece can show 
The false friend worse than the infuriate foe. 
But tins is well: Greeks only should free Greece, 
Not the barbarian, with his mask of pca.ee. 
How should the autocrat of bondage be 
The king of serfs, and set the nations i'reel 
Better still serve the haughty Mussulman, 
Than swell the Cossaque's prowling caravan ; 
Better still toil tor masters, than await, 
The slave of slaves, before a Russian gate, — 
Number'd by hordes, a human capital, 
A live estate, existing but for thrall, 
Lotted by thousands as a meet reward 
For the first courtier in the czar's regard ; 
While their immediate owner never tastes 
His sleep, sans dreaming of Siberia's wastes; 
Better succumb even to their own despair, 
And drive the camel than purvey the bear. 

VII. 

But not alone within the hoariest clime, 

Where freedom dates her birth with that of time ; 

And not alone where plunged in night, a crowd 

Of Incas darken to a dubious cloud, 

The dawn revives ; renown'd, romantic Spain 

Holds hack the invader from her soil again. 

Not now (lie Roman tribe nor Punic horde, 

Demand her fields as lists to prove the sword; 

Not now the Vandal or the Visigoth 

Pollute the plains, alike abhorring both ; 

Nor old Pclavo on his mountain rears 

The warlike, fathers of a thousand years. 



That seed is sown and reap'd, as oft the Moor 
Sighs to remember on his dusky shore. 

Long in the peasant's song or poet's page 

Flas dwell ihe memory of Abencerage, 

The Zegri, and the captive victors, flung 

Back to the barbarous realm from whence they sprung. 

Bui these are gone — their faith, their sword , their sway 

Yel left more anti-ehristian foes than ■ 

The bigot monarch and the butcher priest, 

The inquisition, with her bnnring feast, 

The faith's red " auto," fed with human fuel, 

While sat the Catholic Moloch", calmly cruel, 

Enjoying, with inexorable eve, 

That fiery festival of agony .' 

The stern or feeble gpVereig^ one or both 

By turns; the haughtiness whose pride was sloth; 

The long-di gi heratc noble ; the debased 

Hidalgo, and ;hr peasant loss dfegraccd 

But more degraded ; the unpeopled realm ; 

The once proud navy which forgot the hi Im ; 
The once impervious phalanx disarray'd; 

The idle forgo that fbrm'd Toledo's blade ; 
The foreign wealth that flow'd on every shorn, 
Save hers who eani'd it with the natives' gore ; 

The very language, which might vie with H j's, 

And once was known to nations like their homes, 

Neglected or forgotten : — such was Spain; 

But such siie is not, nor shall be a 

These worst, these home invaders, felt and feel 

The new Numantine soul of old Castile. 

Dpi up again! undaunted Tauri.lor ! 

The hull of Phalaris renews his roar : 

Mount, chivalrous Hidalgo! hot in vain 

Revive the cry — " lago ! and close Spain !'" 

Yes, close her v. nil your armed bosoms round, 

And form the barrier which Napoleon found,— 

The exterminating war; the desert plain ; 

The streets without a tenant, save the slain ; 

The wild Sierra, with its wilder troop 

Of vulture-plumed guerillas, on the stoop 

For their incessant prey ; the desperate wall 

Of Saragossa, mightiest m her fall ; 

The man nerved to a spirit, and the maid 

■\\ aving her more than Amazonian blade ; 

The knife of Arragon, 3 Toledo's steel ; 

The famous lance of chivalrous Castile; 

The unerring rifle of the Catalan ; 

The Andalusian courser in the van ; 

The torch to make a Moscow of Madrid ; 

And in each heart the spirit of the Cid : — 

Sucfa have been, such shall be, such are. Advance, 

And win— not Spain, but thine own freedom, Franco 

VIII. 
But !o ! a congress! What, that hallow'd name 
Which freed ihe Atlantic .' May we hope the S atne 
For outworn Europe ? With the sound arise, 
Like Samuel's shade to Saul's monarchic eyes, 
The prophets of young freedom, summon'd far 
From climes of Washington and Bolivai ; 
Henry, the fbrest-born Demosthenes, 
Whose thunder shook the Philip of ihe seas • 

1 "St. lano : and close Spain !" tho old Spanish war it? 

2 The Arragonians are peculiarly dexterous iii the oaf ->l 
this weapon, aud displayed it particularly in fennel French 
word. 



4S4 



BYltONS WORKS 



Ainl sioic Franklin's energetic shale, 

Robed in the lightnings which his hand allay'd ; 

And Washington, tin; tyrant-tamer, wake, 

I'd bid us blush for these old chains, or break. 

But who compose this senate of the few 

That should redeem the many? Who renew 

This Consecrated name, (ill now assigri'd 

To councils held to benefit mankind .' 

Who now assemble at the holy call 1 — 

Tlie bless'd alliance which says three are all! 

An earthly trinity ! which wears the shape 

Of Heaven's, as man is mimick'd by the ape. 

A pious unity ! in purpose one, 

To melt three fools to a Napoleon. 

Why, Egypt's gods were rational to these; 

Their dogs and oxen knew their own degrees, 

And, quiet in their kennel or their shed, 

Cared little, so that they were duly fed: 

But these, more hungry, must have something more — 

The power to bark and bite, to toss and gore. 

Ah, how much happier were good /Ksop's frogs 

Thau we! for ours are animated logs, 

With ponderous malice swaying to and fro, 

And crushing nations with a stupid blow, 

All dully anxious to leave little work 

Unto the revolutionary stork. 

IX. 

Thrice bless'd Verona ! since the holy three 

Willi their imperial presence shine on thee; 

Honour'd by them, thy treacherous site forgets 

The vaunted tomb of "all the Capulets;" 

Thy Scaligers — for what wjs " Dog «the Great," 

** Can' Grande" (which I venture to translate) 

To these sublimer pugs? Thy poet too, 

Catullus, whose old laurels yield to new; 

Thine amphitheatre, where Romans sate ; 

And Dante's exile, shclter'd by thy gate ; 

Thy good old man, 1 whose world was all within 

Thy wall, nor knew the country held him in : 

Would that the royal guests it girds about 

Were so far like, as never to get out ! 

Ay, shout ! inscribe ! rear monuments of shame, 

To teli oppression that the world is tame ! 

Crowd to the theatre with loyal rage — 

The comedy is not upon the stage ; 

The show is rich in ribbonry and stars — 

Then gaze upon it through thy dungeon bars ; 

Clasp thy permitted palms, kind Italy, 

For thus much still thy fetter'd hands are free ! 



Resplendent sight ! behold the coxcomb czar, 

The autocrat of waltzes and of war ! 

As eager for a plaudit as a realm, 

And just as lit for flirting as the helm ; 

A Calmuck beauty with a Cossack wit, 

And generous spirit when 'tis not frost-bit ; 

Now half-dissolving to a liberal thaw, 

But harden'd back whene'er the morning's raw; 

"\ ilh no objection to true liberty, 

Except that it would make the nations free. 

How well the imperial dandy prates of peace, 

How fain, if Greeks would be his slaves, free Greece! 



I Tlio famous old man of Verona. 



How nobly gave he back the Poles their Diet, 
Then told pugnacious Poland to be quiet ! 

How kindly would he send the mild Ukraine, 
With all her pleasant pulks, to lecture Spain; 
How royally show «'X in proud Madri 1 
His goodly person, from the south long hid, — 
A Slessing cheaply purchased, the world knows, 
By having Muscovites Ibr friends or foes. 

I, thou namesake of great Philip's son I 
La Harpe, thine Aristotle, beckons on ; 
And that which Scythia was to him of yore, 
Find with thy Scythians on Iberia's shore. 
Yet think upon, thou somewhat aged vouth, 
Thy predecessor on the banks of Pruth : 
Thou hast to aid thee, should his lot be thme, 
Many an old woman, but no Catherine. 1 
Spain too hath rocks, and rivers, and defiles — 
The bear may rush into the lion's toils. 
Fatal to Goths are Xefes Sunny fields ; 
Think'st thou to thee Napoleon's victor yields ? 
Better reclaim thy deserts, turn thy swords 
To ploughshares, shave and wash thy Bashkir hordes 
Redeem thy realms from slavery and the knout, 
Than follow headlong in the fatal roqte, 
To infest the clime, whose skies and laws are pure, 
With thy foul legions. Spain wants no manure ; 
Her soil is fertile, but she feeds no foe; 
Her vultures, too, were gorged not long ago : 
And wouldst thou furnish them with fresher prey ? 
Alas ! thou wilt not conquer, but purvey. 
I am Diogenes, though Russ and Hun 
Stand between mine and many a myriad's sun; 
But were I not Diogenes, I \l Wandt r 
Rather a worm than such an Alexander ! 
Be slaves who will, the Cynic shall be free; 
His tub hath tougher walls than Sinope : 
Still will he hold his lantern up to scan 
The face of monarchs for an '* honest man." 

XI. 

And what doth Gaul, the all-prolific land 
Of in plus ultra Ultras and their band 
Of mercenaries? and her noisy Chambers; 
And tribune which each orator first clambers, 
Before he finds a voice, and, when 't is found, 
Hears "the lie" echo fir his answer round 1 

Our British Commons sometimes deign to hear; 
A Gallic senate hath more tongue than ear ; 
Even Constant, their sole master of debate, 
Must fight next day, his speech to vindicate. 
But this costs little to true Franks, who had rather 
Combat than listen, were it to their father. 
What is the simple standing of a shot, 
To listening long and interrupting not ? 
Though this was not the method of old Rome, 
When Tully fuhnined o'er each vocal dome, 
Demosthenes has sanction'd the transaction. 
In saying eloquence meant " Action, action !" 

XII. 

But where 's the monarch? hath he dined ? or yet 
Groans beneath indigestion's heavy debt ? 



1 The dexterity of Catherine extricated IVter (culled tht 
Grent by courtesy) wlien surrounded by thw Mussuliuuiis on 
the banks of the river Truth. 



THE AGE OF BRONZE. 



435 



Have revolutionary pales risen, 

And turn'd the royal entrails to a prison? 

Have discontented movements stirr'd the troops? 

Or have no movements follovv'd traitorous Soups ? 

Have Carbonaro cooks not carbonadoed 

Each course enough 1 or doctors dire dissuaded 

Ri pletion ! All ! in thy dejected looks 

I read all 's treason in her cooks ! 

Good classic ! is it, canst thou say, 



Desirable to be the " .'" 

Why wouldst thou leave calm 's green abode, 

A ' >i. i.iii table and Horatian ode, 

To rule a people who evil] no( be. ruled, 

And love much rather to be scourged than school'd? 

Ah ! thine was not the temper or the taste 

For thrones — the table sees thee belter placed: 

A mild Epicurcf.n, [brm'd, at best. 

To be a kind host and as good a guest. 

To talk of letters, and to know by heart 

One half the p<>< I'tf, "'' the gourrnand's art; 

A scholar always, now and then a wit, 

An I gentle when digestion may permit — 

But not to govern lands enslaved or free; 

The gout was martyrdom enough for thee ! 

xin. 

Shall noble Albion pass without a phrase 

From a bold Briton in her wonted praise ? 

u Arts — arms — and George — and glory and the isles — 

And happy Britain — wealth and freedom's smiles — 

White cliffs, that held invasion far aloof — 

Contente 1 subjects, all alike tax-proof — 

Proud Wellington, with eagle beak so corl'd, 

That nose, the hook where he suspends the world !' 

And Waterloo — and trade — and (hush! not yet 

A syllable of imposts or of debt) 

And ne'er (enough) lamented >' tlereagh, 
Whose pen-knife slit a goose-quill 't other day — 
And "pilots who have weather'd every storm, — 
(But no, not even for rhyme's sake, name reform)." 
These are the themes thus sung so oft before, 
Methinks we need not sing them any more ; 
Found in so many volumes fir and near, 
There's no occasion you should find them here. 
Y. I something may remain, perchance, to chime 
With reason, anil, what 's stranger still, with rhyme ; 
Even ibis thy genius, Canning! may permit, 
Who, bred a Statesman, still was born a wit, 
And never, even in that dull house, couldst tame 
To urileaven'd prose thine own poetic flame; 
I . our best, our only orator, 

Even I can praise thee — Tories do no more, 
Nay, not so much ; — tiny hate thee, man, because 

- upholds them than it awes. — 
The hounds will gather to their huntsman's hollo, 
And, where he leads, the duteous pack will follow : 
But not fir love mistake their yelling cry, 
Their ogy ; 

Less faithful fir than the four-footed pack, 
A dubious scent would lure the bipeds back. 

-girths, are not yet quite secure, 

Nor royal stallion's feet extremely sure ; 



1 " Naso suspcnilit ailunco." — Horace. 
The Roman app icn it to one who merely was imperious to 
l\is acquaintance. 



The unwieldy ol I white horse is apt at last 
To stumble, kirk, and now and thou slick list 

With Ins great self and rider in the mud ; 
Bui what of that.' tin- animal shows blood. 

XIV. 

Alas ! the country ! — how shall tongue or pen 
Bewail her now uncountry gentlemen ! 
The last to bid the cry of warfare 6 ase, 
The first to make a malady of peace. 
For what were 1 all these country patriots born? 

To hunt and voic, an i raise the | rice of - n ! 

Hut corn, like every mortal thing, must fall — 

ivin s, conquerors, and mark:!., most ol' all. 

A . must ye fill with every ear of 

.\ ny would you trouble Buonaparte's reign? 

lie- was your great Triptolemus; his vie 

Destroy'd but realms, and still maintain'd your puces; 

I;.- ampllfie, I, to every lord's content, 

The grand agrarian alchymy — high roil. 

Why did the Tyrant stumble on the Tartars, 

And lower wheat to such desponding quarters? 

Why did you chain him on yon isle so lour / 

The man was worth much more upon his throne. 

True, blood and treasure boundlessly were spilt, 

But what of that? the Gaul may bear the guilt ; 

But bread was high, the farmer paid his way, 

And acres told upon the appointed day. 

But where is now the goodly audit ale? 

The purse-proud tenant never known to fail? 

The farm which never yet was left on hand ? 

The marsh reclaimed to most improving land ? 

The impatient hope of the expiring lease? 

The doubling rental ? What an evil's peace ! 

In vain the prize excites the ploughman's skill, 

In vain the commons pass their patriot bill ; 

The landed interest — (you may understand 

The phrase much better leaving out the land) 

The land's self-interest groans from shore to sl.orc 

For fear that plenty should attain the poor. 

Up ! up again : ye rents, exalt your notes. 

Or else the ministry will lose their voles, 

And patriotism, so delicately nice, 

Her loaves will lower to the market price ; 

For ah ! " the loaves and fishes," once so high, 

Are gone — their oven closed, their ocean dry ; 

And nought remains of all the millions sju-i.t , 

Excepting to grow moderate and content. 

They who are not so had their turn — an I fern 

About still flows from fortune's equal urn ; 

Now let their virtue be its own reward, 

And share the blessing's which themselves pr_'[ ,erj. 

Sec these inglorious Cincinnati swarm, 

Farmers of war, dictators of the farm ! 

Their ploughshare was the sword in hireling I'.nus, 

Thtir Gelds manured by gore of other I. 

Safe in their barns, these Sabine tillers sent 

Their brethren out to battle — wrrj 

Year after year limy voted cent, per mil. 

Blood, sweat, and tear-wrong millions — why? for rent • 

They roar'd, they dined, they drank, they swore ti>e» 

i.i. ant 
To die for England — why then live? fir I'r.t ! 
The peace lias ma de one general malcontent 

Of these high-market patriots; war was rent' 
Their love of country, millions all miapent. 



436 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



How reconcile? — by reconciling rent. 

And will thev not repay tlie treasures lent? 

No: down with every thing, and up with rent! 

Their £ood, ill, health, wealth, joy, or discontent, 

Being, end, cum, religion — Rent, rent, rent ! 

Thou sold'st thy birthright, Esau ! for a mess: 

Thou shouldst have gotten more or eaten less: 

Now thou hast swillM thy pottage, thy demands 

Are idle ; Israel says the bargain stands. 

Such, landlords, was your appetite for war, 

Anl, gorged with blood, you grumble at a scar! 

What, would they spread their earthquake even o'er cash? 

And when land crumbles, bid firm paper crash? 

So rent mav rise, bid hank and nation fall, 

And found on 'Change a foundling hospital ! 

Lo, mother church, while ail religion writhes, 

LiVe Niobe, weeps o'er her offspring, tithes ; 

The prelates go to — where the saints have gone, 

Anil proud pluralities subside to one ; 

Church, state, and faction, wrestle in the dark, 

Toss'd by the deluge in their common ark. 

Shorn of her bishops, banks, and dividends, 

Another Babel soars — but Britain ends. 

And whv '! to pamper the self-seeking wants, 

And prop the hill of these agrarian ants. 

" Go to these ants, thou sluggard, and be wise ;" 

Admire their patience through each sacrifice, 

Till taught to feel the lesson of their pride, 

The price of taxes and of homicide ; 

Admire their justice, which would fain deny 

The debt of nations : pray, who made it high ? 

XV. 

Or turn to sail between those shifting rocks, 

The new Symplegades — the crushing Stocks, 

Where Midas might again his wish behold 

In real paper or imagined gold. 

That magic pa' ace of Alcina shows 

More wealth than Britain ever had to lose, 

Were all her atoms of unleavened ore, 

And all her pebbles from Pactolus' shore. 

There Fortune plays, while Rumour holds the stake, 

And the world trembles to bid brokers break. 

How rich is Britain ! not indeed in mines, 

Or peace, or plenty, corn, or oil, or wines ; 

No land of Canaan, full of milk and honey, 

Nor (save in paper shekels) ready money: 

But let us not to own the truth refuse, 

Was ever Christian land so rich in Jews ? 

Those parted with their teeth to good King John, 

And now, ye kings ! they kindly draw your own ; 

All states, all things, all sovereigns, they control, 

And waft a loan " from Indus to the Pole." 

The banker — broker — baron — brethren, speed 

To aid these bankrupt tyrants in their need. 

Nor these alone ; Columbia feels no less 

Fresh speculations follow each success ; 

And philanthropic Israel deigns to drain 

Her mild per centage from exhausted Spain. 

Not without Abraham's seed can Russia march — 

'T .* gofd, not steel, that rears the conqueror's arch. 

Two Jews, a chosen people, can command 

In every realm their scripture-promised land : 

Two Jews keep down the Romans, and uphold 

The accursed Hun, more brutal than of old : 



Two Jews — but not Samaritans — direct 
The world, with all the spirit of their sect. 
What is the happiness of earth to them ? 
A congress forms their "Now Jerusalem," 
Where baronies and orders both invite — 
Oh, holy Abraham ! dost thou see the sight ? 
Thy followers mingling with these royal swine, 
Who spit not "on their Jewish gaberdine," 
But honour them as portion of the show — 
(Where now, oh, Pope ! is thy f irsaken toe ? 
Could it not favour Judah with some kirks ? 
Or has it ceased to "kick against the pricks?") 
On Shylock's shore behold them stand afresh, 
To cut from nations' hearts their " pound of tlcsh." 

XVI. 
Strange sight this congress ! destined to unite 
All that 's incongruous, all that 's opposite. 
I speak not of the sovereigns — they 're alike, 
A common coin as ever mint could strike : 
Hut those who sway the puppets, pull the strings. 
Have more of motley than their heavy kings. 
Jews, authors, generals, charlatans, combine, 
While Europe wonders at the vast design : 
There Metternich, power's foremost parasite, 
Cajoles ; there Wellington forgets to tight ; 
There Chateaubriand forms new books of mart its ;' 
Anil subtle Greeks intrigue for stupid Tartars, - 
There Montmorency, the sworn foe to charters, 
Turns a diplomatist of great eclat, 
To furnish articles for the "Debats ;" 
Of war so certain — yet not quite so sure 
As his dismissal in the "Moniteur." 
Alas ! how could his cabinet thus ei r .< 
Can peace be worth an ultra-minister? 
He falls indeed, — perhaps to rise again, 
" Almost as quickly as he conquer'd Spain." 

XVII. 

Enough of this — a sight more mournful woos 

The averted eye of the reluctant muse. 

The imperial daughter, the imperial bride, 

The imperial victim — sacrifice to pride ; 

The mother of the hero's hope, the boy, 

The young Astvanax of modern Ti oy ; 

The still pale shadow of the loftiest queen 

That earth has yet to see, or e'er hath seen: 

She flits amidst the phantoms of the hour, 

The theme of pity, and the wreck of power. 

Oh, cruel mockery ! could not Austria spare 

A daughter? What did France's widow there? 

Her fitter place was by St. Helen's wave — 

Her only throne is in Napoleon's grave. 

But, no, — she still must hold a petty reign, 

Flank'd by her formidable chamberlain ; 

The martial Argus, whose not hundred eyes 

Must watch her through these paltry pageantries. 

What though she share no more, and shared in vain, 

A sway surpassing that of Charlemagne, 

Which swept from Moscow to the Southern seas, 

Vet still she rules the pastoral realm of cheese, 



1 Monsieur Chntoaulirianil, who tins not forgotten ihc ruithoi 
in the minister, received a handsome compliment at Verona 

from a literary sovereign: "Ah ! Monsieur C , "re you 

related in that Chateaubriand who — who — who has written 
something (ecrit quelqie chose)?" ft is said ihnt the Autlu*. 
of Atala repented him for a moment of his legitimacy. 



THE VISION OF JUDGMENT. 



487 



'Where Parma views the traveller resort 

TVi note the trappings of her mimic court. 

Hut she appears ! Verona sees her shorn 

Of all her beams — while nations gaze and mourn — 

Ere yet her hushand's ashes have had time 

To chill in their inhospitable clime, 

(If e'er those awful ashes can grow cold — 

But no, — their embers soon will burst the mould) ; 

She comes ! — the Andromache (but not Racine's, 

Nor Homer's) ; lo ! on Pyrrhus' arm she leans! 

Fes ! the right arm, yet red from Waterloo, 

Which cut her lord's half-shattcr'd sceptre through, 

Is offer'd and accepted ! Could a slave 

Do more ? or less ? — and he in his new grave ! 

Her eye, her cheek, betray no inward strife, 

And the .Cr-empress grows as Ex a wife ! 

So much for human ties in royal breasts ! 

Why spare men's feelings, when their own are jests ? 



XVIII. 

But, tired of foreign follies, I turn home, 

And sketch the group — the picture 's yet to come. 

My Muse 'gan weep, but, ere a tear was spilt, 

She caught Sir William Curtis in a kilt! 

While throng'd the Chiefs of every Highland clan 

To hail their brother, Vich Ian Alderman ! 

Guildhall grows Gael, and echoes with Erse roar, 

While all the Common Council cry, " Claymore !" 

To see proud Albyn's tartans as a belt 

Gird the gross sirloin of a City Celt, 

She burst into a laughter so extreme, 

That I awoke — and lo ! it was no dream ! 



Here, reader, will we pause : — if there 's no harm in 
This first — you'll have, perhaps, a second " Carmen 



BY QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS. 

SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENTITLED BY THE AUTHOR OF " WAT TYLER. 



A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel! 
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word. 



I. 

Saint Peter sat by the celestial gate, 
His keys were rusty, and the lock was dull, 

So little trouble had been given of late ; 
Not that the place by any means was full, 

But since the Gallic era " eighty-eight," 

The devils had taken a longer, stronger pull, 

And " a pull altogether," as they say 

At sea — which drew most souls another way. 

II. 

The angels all were singing out of tune, 
And hoarse with having little else to do, 

Excepting to wind up the sun and moon, 
Or curb a runaway young star or two, 

Or wild colt of a comet, which too soon 

Broke out of bounds o'er the ethereal blue, 

Splitting some planet with its playful tail, 

As boats arc sometimes by a wanton whale. 

III. 

The guardian seraphs had retired on high, 
Finding their charges past all care below ; 

Terrestrial business fill'd nought in the sky 
Save the recording angel's black bureau; 

Who found, indeed, the facts to multiply 
With such rapidity of vice and woe, 

That he had stripp'd otT both his wings in quills, 

And yet was in arrear of human ills. 



TV. 

His business so augmented of late years, 

That he was forced, against his will, no doubt, 

(Just like those cherubs, earthly ministers), 
For some resource to turn himself about, 

And claim the help t-f his celestial peers, 
To aid him ere he should be quite worn out 

By the increased demand for his remarks : 

Six angels and twelve saints were named his clerka. 



This was a handsome board — at least for heaven ; 

And yet they had even then enough to do, 
So many conqueiors' cars were daily driven, 

So many kingdoms fitted up anew ; 
Each day, too, slew its thousands six or seven, 

Till at the crowning carnage, AVatrrloo, 
They threw their pens down in divine disi_'ii<t — 
The page was so besmear'd with blood and dusi 

VI. 

This by the way ; 't is not mine to record 

What angels shrink from: even iuc very de^il 

On this occasion his own work abhorr'd, 
So surfeited with the infernal revel : 

Though he himself had sharpen'd every 3wom, 
It almost quench'd his innate thirst of evil. 

(Here Satan's sole good work deserves insertion 

'T is, that he has both generals in reversion). 



488 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



VII. 
i years of hollow peace, 
Win, h nli do better, hell as wont, 

An I heaven non< — they tipnu the tyrant's lease, 

With nothing but new names inscribed upon't; 
'T will one (Jay finish : meantime they increase, 

"Witl i Is and ten horns," and all in front, 

Like s.iiii John's foretold beasts ; hut ours are burn 
Less formidable in the head than horn. 

VIII. 

In the first year of freedom's second dawn 

Died George the Third ; although no tyrant, one 

Who shielded tyrant , till each sense withdrawn 
Left him nor menial nor external sun: 

A better fanner ne'er brush'd dew from lawn, 
A worse king never left a realm undone! 

He died — hut lefi lus subjects still behind, 

One half as mad — and t'other no less blind. 

IX. 

He died ! — his death made no great stir on earth ; 

His burial male some pomp; there was profusion 
Of velvet, gilding, brass, and no great dearth 

Of aughl but tears — save those shed by collusion; 
For these things may be bought at their true worth: 

Of elegy there was the due infusion — 
Bought also ; and the torches, cloaks, and banners, 
Heralds, and relics of old Gothic manners, 

X. 

Form'd a sepulchral melo-drame. Of all 

The fools who flock'd to swell or see the show, 
Who cared about the corpse? The funeral 

Made the attraction, and the black the woe. 
Fherethrobb'd not there a thought which pierced the pall; 

And when the gorgeous coffin was laid low 
It seem'd the mockery of hell to fold 
The rottenness of eighty years in gold. 

XI. 

So mix his body with the dust ! It might 
Return to what it must far sooner, were 

The natural compound left alone to fight 
Its way back into earth, and fire, and air ; 

But the unnatural balsams merely blight 
What nature made him at his birth, as bare 

A-- the mere million's base unmummied clay — 

Vf.i ail his spices but prolong decay. 

XII. 

He '» (lead — and upper earth with him has done : 
He 's buried ; save the undertaker's bill, 

Or lapidary scrawl, the world is gone 
For him, unless lie left a German will ; 

Bui where 's the proctor who will ask his son ? 
In whom his qualities are reigning still, 

Except that household virtue, most uncommon, 

Of constancy to a bad ugly woman. 

XIII. 
" God, save the king !" It is a large economy 

In God to save the like ; but if he will 
Be Mtvine, all the better ; for not one am I 

Oi those who think damnation better still: 
I hardly know too if not quite alone am I 

In this small hope of bettering future ill 
I5v circumscribing, with sumc slight restriction, 
Flic <:lt rnity of hell's hot jurisdiction. 



XIV. 

I know this is unpopular; I know 

'T is blasphemous ; I know one may he damn'd 
For bopilig no one else may e'er be so; 

I know my catechism ; I know we arc cramm'd 
With the best doctrines till we quite o'erflow ; 

I knoiv thai all save England's church have shamm'i. 
And that the Other twice two hundred churches 
And synagogue's have made 1 purchase. 

XV. 
God help us all ! God help me, too ! I am, 

God knows, as helpless as the devil can wish, 
And not a whit mere difficult to damn 

Than is to bring to land a late-hook'd fish, 
Or to the butcher to purvey the lamb ; 

Not that I 'm lit for such a noble dish 
As one day will be that immortal fry 
Of almost every body bora to die. 

XVI. 
Saint Peter sat by the celestial irate, 

And nodded o'er his keys : when lo ! there came 
A wondrous noise he had not heard of late — 

A rushing sound of wind, and stream, and flame ; 
In short, a roar of things extremely great, 

Which would have made aught save a saint exclaim ; 
But he, with first a start and then a wink, 
Said, "There's another slar gone out, I think '" 

XVII. 
But ere he could return to his repose, 

A cherub flapp'd his right wing o'er his eyes — 
At which Saint Peter yawn'd, and rubb'd his nose ; 

" Saint porter," said the angel, " prithee rise !" 
Waving a goodly wing, which glow'd, as glows 

An earthly peacock's tail, with heavenly dyes: 
To which the saint replied, " Well, what \s the matter? 
Is Lucifer come back with all this clatter ?" 

XVIII. 
"No," quoth the cherub ; "George the Third is dead." 
" And who is George the Third ?" replied the aposllei. 
" Whai Gcmge ? what Third?" "The King of Eng~ 
land," said 
The angel. " Well ! he won't find kings to jostle 
Him on his way ; but docs he wear his head ? 
Because the last we saw here had a tussle, 
And ne'er would have got into Heaven's good graces, 
Had he not flung his head in all our faces. 
XIX. 

" He was, if I remember, king of : 

That head of his, which could not keep a crown 
On earth, vet ventured in my face to advance 
A claim to those of martyrs — like my own: 
If I had had my sword, as I had once 

When I cut ears off", I had cut him down ; 
But having but my keys, and not my brand, 
I only knock'd his head from out his hand. 

XX. 
" And then he set up such a headless howl, 

That all the saints came out and took him in ; 
And there he sits by Saint Paul, check by jowl; 

That fellow, Paul— the parvenu ! The skin 
Of Saint Bartholomew, which makes his cowl 
In heaven, and upon earth redeem'd his su. 
So ;l s to make a martyr, never sped 
Better than did this weak and wooden head. 



XXI. 

«• But had it come up here uuon its shoulders, 
There would have been a different talc tu tell : 

The fellow-feeling in the saints beholders 
Seems to have acted on them like a spell, 

And so this very foolish head Heaven solders 
Back on its trunk : it may be very well, 

And Begins the custom here to overthrow 

Whatever has been wisely done below." 

XXII. 

The angel answer'd, " Peter ! do not pout ; 

The king who comes has head and all entire, 
And never knew much what it was about — 

lie did as doth the puppet — by its wire, 
And will be judged like all the rest, no doubt : 

Mv business and your own is not to inquire 
Into such matters, but to mind our cue — 
Which is to act as we are bid to do." 

XXIII. 
While thus they spake, the angelic caravan, 

Arriving like a rush of mighty wind, 
Cleaving the fields of space, as doth the swan 

Some silver stream (say Ganges, Nile, or Inde, 
Or Thames, or Tweed), and 'midst them an old man 

With an old soul, and both extremely blind, 
Halted before the gate, and in his shroud 
Seated their fellow-traveller on a cloud. 

XXIV. 
But, bringing up the rear of this bright host, 

A spirit of a different aspect waved 
His wings, like thunder-clouds above some coast 

Whose barren beach wun frequent wrecks is paved ; 
His brow was like the deep when tempest-tost ; 

Fierce and unfathomable thoughts engraved 
Eternal wrath on his immortal face, 
And where he gazed a gloom pervaded space. 

XXV. 
As he drew near, he Hazed upon the gate, 

Ne'er to be cnter'd more by him or sin, 
With such a "lance of supernatural hate, 

As made Saint Peter wish himself within ; 
He potter'd with his keys at a great rate, 

And sweated through hia apostolic skin : 
Of course his perspiration was but ichor, 
Or some such other spiritual liquor. 

XXVI. 

The verv cherubs huddled altogether, 

Like birds when soars the falcon ; and they felt 

A tingling to the tip of every feather, 
And fonn'd a circle, like Orion's belt, 

Around their poor old charge, who scarce knew whither 
His guards had led him, though they gently dealt 

With royal mines (for, by many Btories, 

And true, we learn the angels all arc Tories). 

XXVII. 

As 'hiii£rs were in this posture, the gate (lew 

Asunder, and trie Hashing of ita 
Flung over spare an universal hue 

Of many-colour'd flame, until its tin:. 
Reach'd even our speck of earth, and made a new 

Aurora borealis s| rea 1 its frinj 
O'er the North Pole; the same seen, when ice-bound, 
By Captain Parry's crews, in " Melville's Sound." 
2 U 67 



XXVIII. 

And from the gate thrown Open issued beaming 

A beautiful and mighty thing of light, 
Radiant with glory, like a banner streaming 

Victorious from some world-o'erlhrowing fight: 
My poor comparison must needs be teeming 

Wiiii earthly likenesses, lor here the night 
Of clay obscures our U'st conceptions, saving 
Johanna Southcote, or Bob Southey raving. 

XXIX. 
'T was the archangel Michael : all men kr.ow 

The make of angels and archangels, 
There's scarce a scribbler has not one to show, 

From the fiends' leader to the angels 1 prince. 
There also are s< altar-pieces, though 

I really can't say thai they much 
One's inner notions of immortal spirits ; 
But let the connoisseurs explain their merits. 

XXX. 
Michael flew firth in glory and in good ; 

A goodly work of him from whom all glory 
And good arise ; the portal pass'd — he stood ; 

Before him the young cherubs and saint hoqry 
(I say young, begging to be understood 

By looks, not years ; and should be verv sorry 
To state, they were not older than Saint Peter, 
But merely that they seeiu'd a little sweeter). 

XXXI. 

The cherubs and the saint bow'd down before 

That arch-angelic hierarch, the first 
Of essences angelical, who wore 

The aspect of a god ; but this ne'er nursed 
Pride in his heavenly bosom, in whose core 

No thought, save for his Maker's service, durst 
Intrude, however glorified and high; 
He knew him but the viceroy of the sky. 

XXXII. 

He and the sombre silent spirit met — 

They knew each other both for good and ill ; 

Such was their power, that neither could forget 
His firmer friend and future foe; but s!ill 

There was a high, immortal, proud regret 
In cither's eye, as if 't were less their « ill 

Than destiny to make the eternal years 

Their date of war, and their "Champ Clos" the sphere*. 

XXXIII. 

Hut here they were in neutral space: we know 
From Job, that Sathan hath the power to pav 

A heavenly visit thrice a year or so ; 

And th:it " tin- sons of ( ,\. I," like those of clay, 

Must keep him company"; and we might show, 

From the same book, in how polite a way 

The dialogue is held between the powers 

Of good and evil — but 't would lake Up hours. 

WXIV. 
And this is net a theologic I 

To prove with Hebrew ami with Arabic 
If .loii !••■ allegory or a fact, 

But a true narrative ; and thus I pi, k 
From out the whole but Such and BUCfl an art 

As s.-is ;isi !,• the Blightosl though) oftricfcl 
'T is every tittle true, beyond suspicion, 
And accurate as any other viuui.. 



49C 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



xxxv: 

The spirits were in neutral space, before 

The gate of heaven ; like eastern thresholds is 

The place where death's grand cause is argued o'er, 
And souk despatch'd to that world or to this ; 

And therefore Michael and the other wore 
A civil aspect: though they did not kiss, 

Yet still bet ween his Darkness and his Brightness 

There pass'd a mutual glance of great politeness. 

XXXVI. 

The archangel bow'd, not like a modern beau, 

But with a graceful oriental bend, 
Pressing one radiant arm just w here below 

The heart in good men is supposed to tend. 
He turu'd as to an equal, not too low, 

But kindly ; Sathan met his ancient friend 
With more hauteur, as might an old Castilian 
Poor noble meet a mushroom rich civilian. 

XXXVII. 

He merely ber diabolic brow 

An instant ; and then, raising it, he stood 

In act to assert his right or wrong, and show 

Cause why King George by no means could or should 

Make out a case to be exempt from woe 
Cternal, more than other kings endued 

With better sense and hearts, whom history mentions, 

Who long have " paved hell with their good intentions." 

XXXVIII. 

Michaet began : " What wouldst thou with this man, 
Now dead, and brought before the Lord ? What ill 

Hath he wrought since his mortal race began, 

That thou canst claim him ? Speak ! and do thy will, 

If it be just: if in this earthly span 
He hath been greatly failing to fulfil 

His duties as a king and mortal, say, 

And he is thine ; if not, let him have way." 

XXXIX. 

" Michael !" replied the prince of air, " even here, 

Before the gate of Him thou servest, must 
I c.i'nn my subject; and will make appear 

That as he was my worshipper in dust, 
So shall he be in spirit, although dear 

To thee and thine, because nor wine nor lust 
Were of his weaknesses ! yet on the throDe 
lit. reign'd o'er millions to serve me alone. 

XL. 
" Look to our earth, or rather mine; it was 

Once, mure thy Master's: but I triumph not 
In this poor planet's conquest, nor, alas 1 

Need he thou servest envy me my lot: 
With all the myriads of bright worlds which pass 

In worship round him, he may have forgot 
Yon weak creation of such paltry things ; 
I think few worth damnation save their kings, 

XLI. 
" And these but as a kind of quit-rent, to 

Assert my right as lord ; and even had 
I such an inclination, 't were (as you 

Well know) superfluous ; they are grown so bad, 
That hell has nothing belter left, to do 

Than leave them to themselves : so much more mad 
And evil be iln'ir own internal curse, 
Heaven uuuiot make them better, nor I worse. 



XLII. 

" Look to the earth, I said, and say again: 

\\ hen this old, hind, mad, helpless, weak, poor worm 

Began in youth's first bloom and flush to reign, 
The world and he both wore a different form, 

Ami much of earth and all the waterv plain 

Of ocean call'd him kin;;: through many a storm 

His isles had Boated on the abyss of time ; 

For the rough virtues chose them fur their clime. 

XLIII. 

" He came to his sceptre, young ; he leaves it, old: 
Look to the state in which he found his realm, 

And left it ; and his annals, too, behold, 
How to a minion first he gave the helm ; 

How grew upon his heart a thirst for gold, 
The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm 

The meanest hearts ; anil, for the rest, but glance 

Thine eye along America and France ! 

XLIV. 

" 'T is true, he was a tool from first to last 
([ have the workmen safe) ; but as a tool 

So let him be consumed ! From out the past 
Of ages, since mankind have known the rule 

Of monarehs — from the bloody rolls amasa'd 
Of sin and slaughter — from the Cx'sar's school, 

Take the worst pupil, and produce a rei^n 

More drench'd with gore, more cumber'd with the slain. 

XLV. 

" He ever warr'd with freedom and the free : 

Nations as men, home subjects, foreign foes, 
So that they utter'd the word ' Liberty !' 

Found George the Third their iir>i opponent. Whose 
History was ever stain'd as his will be 

With national and individual woes ? 
I grant his household abstinence ; I grant 
His neutral virtues, which most monarehs want ; 

XLVI. 
" I know he was a constant consort ; own 

He was a decent sire, and middling lord. 
All this is much, and most upon a throne ; 

As temperance, if at Apicius' board, 
Is more than at an anchorite's supper shown. 

I grant him all the kindest can accord j 
And this was well for him, but not for those 
Millions who found him what oppression chose. 

XLVII. 

The new world shook him off; the old yet groans 

Beneath what he and his prepared, if not 
Completed : he leaves heirs on many thrones 

To all Ins vices, without what begot 
Coiiiyn ion lor him — his tame virtues; drones 

Who sleep, or despots who have now ; 
A lesson which shall he re-taught them, wake 
Upon the throne of earth ; but let them quake ! 

XLVI1I. 
" Five millions of the primitive, who hold 

The faith whioh makes ye great on eartn, implored 
A pari of that vast (/.'/ they held of old, — 

Freedom to worship — not alone your Lord, 
Michael, but you, and you, Saint 1'eter ! Cold 

Must be your souls, if you have not abhorr'd 
The foe to Catholic participation 
In all the license of a Christian nation. 



THE VISION OF JUDGMENT. 



491 



XL1X. 

' True ! he allow'd them to pray God ; but, as 
A consequence of prayer, refused the law 

Which would have placed them upon the same base 
With those who did not hold the saints in awe." 

But here Saint Peter started from his place, 
And cried, " You may the prisoner withdraw : 

Ere Heaven shall ope her portals to this Guelf, 

While I am guard, may I be damn'd myself! 

L. 

" Sooner will I with Cerberus exchange 

My office (and his is no sinecure) 
Than see this royal Bedlam bigot range 

The azure fields of heaven, of that be sure !" 
" Saint !" replied Sathan, "you do well to avenge 

The wrongs he made your satellites endure ; 
And if to this exchange you should be given, 
I '11 try to coax our Cerberus up to heaven." 

LI. 

Here Michael interposed : " Good saint ! and devil ! 

Pray, not so fast ; you both outrun discretion. 
Saint Peter! you were wont to be more civil: 

Sathan ! excuse this warmth of his expression, 
And condescension to the vulgar's level : 

Even saints sometimes forget, themselves in session. 
Have you got more to say ?" — " No !" — " If you please, 
I '11 trouble you to call your witnesses." 

LH. 

Then Sathan turn'd and waved his swarthy hand, 
Which slirr'd with its electric qualities 

Clouds farther off than we can understand, 
Although we find him sometimes in our skies ; 

Infernal thunder shook both sea and land 
In all the planets, and hell's batteries 

Let otT the artillery, which Milton mentions 

As one of Sathan's most sublime inventions. 

LIII. 

This was a signal unto such damn'd souls 
As have the privilege of their damnation 

Extended far beyond the mere controls 

Of worlds past, present, or to come ; no station 

Is theirs particularly in the rolls 

Of hell assign'd ; but where their inclination 

Or business carries them in search of game, 

They may range freely — being damn'd the same. 

LW. 

They are proud of this — as very well they may, 
It being a sort of knighthood, or gilt key 

Stuck in their loins ; or 'like to an " entree" 
Up the back stairs, or such free-masonry : 

I borrow my comparisons from clay, 

Being clay myself. Let not those spirits be 

Offended with such base low liken < 

We know their posts are nobler far than these. 

LV. 

When the great signal ran from heaven to hell, — 
About ten million times the distance rcckon'd 

From our sun to its earth, as we can tell 
How much time it takes up, even to a second, 

For every ray that travels to dispel 

The fogs of London ; through which, dimly bracon'd, 

The weathercocks are gilt, some thrice a year, 

If that vne summer is not too severe : — 



LVI. 



I say that I can tell — 't was half a minute; 

I know the solar beams take up more time 
Ere, pack'd up for their journey, they begin it ; 

But then their telegraph is less sublime, 
And if they ran a race, they would not win it 

'Gainst Sathan's couriers bound for their own clime 
The sun takes up some years for every ray 
To reach its goal — the devil not half a day. 

LVII. 

Upon the verge of space, about the size 
Of half-a-crown, a little speck appear'd 

(I 've seen a something like it in the skies 
In the iEgean, ere a squall) ; it oear'd, 

And, growing bigger, took another guise ; 
Like an aerial ship it tack'd, and steer'd 

Or was steer'd (I am doubtful of the grammar 

Of the last phrase, which makes the stanza stammer ;— 

LVIII. 

But take your choice) ; and then it grew a cloud. 

And so it was — a cloud of witnesses. 
But such a cloud ! No land e'er saw a crowd 

Of locusts numerous as the heaven saw these ; 
They shadow'd with their myriads space ; their loud 

And varied cries were like those of wild-geese 
(If nations may be liken'd to a goose), 
And realized the phrase of " hell broke loose.'' 

LIX. 

Here crash'd a sturdy oath of stout John Bulh, 
Who damn'd away his eyes as heretofore : 

There Paddy brogued "by Jasus! " "What 's yoir wull?" 
The temperate Scot exclaim'd: the French gho*' & wot e 

In certain terms I sha'nt translate in full, 

As the first coachman will ; and 'midst the \i^_ 

The voice of Jonathan was heard to express, 

" Our President is going to war, I guess." 

LX. 

Besides there were the Spaniard, Dutch, and E ••« , 

In short an universal shoal of shades 
From Otaheite's Isle to Salisbury Plain, 

Of all climes and professions, years and trade. 
Ready to swear against the good king's reign, 

Bitter as clubs in cards are against spades : 
All summon'd by this grand " subpoena," to 
Try if kings may n't be damn'd like me or you. 

LXI. 

When Michael saw this host, he first grew pale, 
As angels can ; next, like Italian twilight, 

He turn'd all colours — as a peacock's tail, 

Or sunset streaming through a Gothic skylight 

In some old abbey, or a trout not stale, 

Or distant lightning on the horizon by night, 

Or a fresh rainbow, or a grand review 

Of thirty regiments in red, green, and blue. 

LXII. 

Then he addrcss'd himself to Sathan : " Why 
My good old friend, for such I deem you. though 

Our different parties make us fight so shy, 
I ne'er mistake you for a personal foe ■ 

Our difference is political, and I 

Trust that, whatever may occur below, 

You know my great respect for you ; and this 

Makes me regret whate'er you do amiss — 



492 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXIII. 
" Why, my dear Lucifer, would you abuse 

Mv call for witnesses ? I did not mean 
That you should half of earth and hell produce; 

'T is even supertluous, since two honest, clean 
True testimonies are enough : we lose 

Our time, nay, our eternity, between 
The accusation and defence : if we 
Hear both, 'twill stretch our immortality." 

LXIV. 

Sathan replied, " To me the matter is 
Indifferent, in a personal point of view : 

1 can have fifty butter souls than this 

With far less trouble than we have gone through 

Already ; and I merely argued his 

Late Majesty of Britain's case with you 

Op ■" a point of form: you may dispose 

Of tun\ ; I 've kings enough below, God knows !" 

LXV. 

Thus spoke the demon (late call'd "multi-faced" 
By multo-scribbling Southey). " Then we '11 call 

One or two persons of the myriads placed 
Around our congress, and dispense with all 

The rest," quoth Michael : " Who may be so graced 
As to speak first ? there 's choice enough — who shall 

It be?" Then Sathan answer'd, "There are many; 

But you may choose Jack Wilkes as well as any." 

LXVI. 

A. merry, cock-eyed, curious looking sprite 
Upon the instant started from the throng, 

Dress'd in a fashion now forgotten quite ; 
For all the fashions of the flesh stick long 

By people in the next world ; where unite 
All the costumes since Adam's right or wrong, 

From E ve's fig-leaf down to the petticoat, 

Almost as scanty, of days less remote. 

LXVII. 

The spirit look'd around upon the crowds 

Assembled, and exclaim'd, " My friends of all 

The spheres, we shall catch cold amongst these clouds ; 
So let's to business : why this general call 1 

If those are freeholders I see in shrouds, 
And 't is for an election that they bawl, 

Behold a candidate with unturn'd-coat ! 

Saint Peter, may I count upon your vote ?" 

LXVI1I. 

" Sir," replied Michael, " you mistake : these things 

Are of a former life, and what we do 
Above is more august ; to judge of kings 

Is the tribunal met ; so now you know." 
41 Then I presume those gentlemen with wings," 

Said Wilkes, " are cherubs ; and that soul below 
Looks much like George the Third ; but to my mind 
A good deal older — Bless me ! is he blind ?" 

LXIX. 
•• lie ;s what you behold him, and his doom 

[fepends upon his deeds," the angel said. 
" If you have aught to arraign in him, the tomb 

Gives license to the humblest beggar's head 
To lift itself against the ioftiest." — " Some," 

Saul Wilkes, " don't wait to see them laid in lead, 
Foi such a hbe.ty — and I, for one, 
Hive told them what I thought beneath the sun." 



LXX. 

"Above the sun repeat, then, what thou hast 

To urge against him," said the archangel. " Why," 

i lie spirit, " since old scores arc past, 
Must I turn evidence .' In faith, not i. 

Besides, 1 heat lam hollow at the last, 

Wiih all his Lords and Commons : m the sk) 
I don't like ripping up old stories, since 
His conduct was but natural in a prince. 

LXXI. 

"Foolish, no doubt, and wicked, to oppress 
A poor unlucky devil without a shilling ; 

But then 1 blame the man himself much less 
Than Bute and Grafton, and shall be unwilling 

To see him punish'd here for their excess, 

Since they were both danin'd long ago, and still in 

Their place below ; for me, I have forgiven, 

And vote his ' habeas corpus' into heaven." 

LXXII. 

" Wilkes," said the devil, "I understand all this ; 

You turn'd to half a courtier ere you died, 
And seem to think it would not be amiss 

To grow a whole one on the other side 
Of Charon's ferry ; you forget that his 

Reign is concluded ; whatsoe'er betide, 
He won't be sovereign more : you 've lost your labour, 
For at the best he will but be your neighbour. 

LXXIII. 

" However, I knew what to think of it, 
When I beheld you, in your jesting way, 

Flitting and whispering round about the spit 
Where Belial, upon duty for the day, 

With Fox's lard was basting William Pitt, 
His pupil ; I knew what to think, I say : 

That fellow even in hell breeds farther ills ; 

I '11 have him gagged — 't was one of his own bills. 

LXXIV. 

" Call Junius !" From the crowd a shadow stalk'd, 
And at the name there was a general squeeze, 

So that the very ghosts no longer walk"d 
In comfort, at their own aerial ease, 

But were all ramm'd, and jamm'd (but to be balk'6, 
As we shall see) and jostled hands and knees, 

Like wind comprcss'd and pent within a bladder, 

Or like a human colic, which is sadder. 

LXXV. 

The shadow came ! a tall, thin, gray-hair'd figure, 

That look'd as it had been a shade on earth ; 
Quick in its motions, with an air of vigour, 

But nought to mark its breeding or its birth : 
Now it wax'd little, then again grew buj 

With now an air of gloom, or savage mirth ; 
But as you gazed upon its features, they 
Changed every instant — to what none could say. 

LXXVI. 
The more intently the ghosts gazed, the less 

Could they distinguish whose the features were ; 
The devil himself seem'd puzzled even to . 

They varied like a dream — now here, now there . 
And several people swore from out the press, 

They knew him perfectly ; and one could swear 
He was his father ; upon which another 
Was sure he was his mother's cousin's brother : 



THE VISION OF JUDGMENT. 



493 



Lxxvn. 

Another, that lie was a duke, or knight, 

An orator, a lawyer, or a priest, 
A nabob, a man-midwife; but the wight 

Mysterious changed his countenance at least 
As oft as they their minds : though in full sight 

He stood, the puzzle only was increased ; 
The man was a phantasmagoria in 
Himself — he was so volatile and thin ! 

LXXVIII. 

The moment that you had pronounced him one, 
Presto ! his face changed, and he was another J 

And when that change was hardly well put on, 
It varied, till I don't think his own mother 

(If that he had a mother) would her son 
Have known, he shifted so from one to t'other, 

Till guessing from a pleasure grew a task, 

At this epistolary "iron mask." 

LXXIX. 

For sometimes he like Cerberus would seem — 
" Three gentlemen at once " (as sagely says 

Good Mrs. Malaprop) ; then you might deem 
That he was not even one • now many rays 

Were flashing round him ; and now a thick steam 
Hid him from sight — like fogs on London days : 

Now Burke, now Tooke, he grew to people's fancies, 

And certcs often like Sir Philip Francis. 

LXXX. 

I 've an hypothesis — 't is quite my own ; 

I never let it out till now, for fear 
Of doing people harm about the throne, 

And injuring some minister or peer 
On whom the stigma might perhaps be blown ; 

It is — my gentle public, lend thine ear ! 
T is, that what Junius we are wont to call, 
Was really, truly, nobody at all. 

LXXXI. 

I don't see wherefore letters should not be 
Written without hands, since we daily view 

Them written without heads ; and books we see 
Are fill'd as well without the latter too ; 

And really, till we fix on somebody 

For certain sure to claim them as his due, 

Their author, like the Niger's mouth, will bother 

The world to say if there be mouth or author. 

LXXXII. 

" And who and what art thou ?" the archangel said. 

"For (hat, you may consult my title-page," 
Replied ibis mighty shadow of a shade: 

" If I have kept my secret half an age, 
I scarce shall I'll it now." — " Canst thou upbraid," 

Continued Michael, " George Ilex, or allege 
Aught further?" Junius answer'd, "You had better 
First ask him for his answer to my letter. 

LXXXIII. 

" Mv charges upon record will outlast 

The brass of both his epitaph and tomb." 

" Repent'st thou not," said M'chael, " of some past 
Evaporation? something which may doom 

Thyself if false, as him if true ? Thou wast 
Too bitter — is it not so ? in thy gloom 

Of passion ?" " Passion !" cried the phantom dim, 

"I loved mv count rv, and I hated him. 
"2 u 2 " 



LXXXIV. 

" What I have written, I have written : let 

The rest be on his head or mine !" So spoke 
Old "nominis umbra;" and, while speaking yet, 

Away he melted in celestial smoke. 
Then Sathan said to Michael, " Don't forget 

To call George Washington, and John Home Tooke, 
And Franklin :" — but at this time there was heard 
A cry for room, though not a phantom stirr'd. 

LXXXV. 
At length, with jostling, elbowing, and the aid 

Of cherubim appointed to that post, 
The devil Asmodcus to the circle made 

His way, and look'd as if his journey cost 
Some trouble. When his burden down he laid, 

"What's this ?" cried Michael; "why, 'tis not a 
ghost !" 
" I know it," quoth the incubur ; " but he 
Shall be one, if you leave the affair to me. 

LXXXVI. 
" Confound the renegado ! I have sprain'd 

My left wing, he 's so heavy ; one would think 
Some of his works about his neck were chain'd. 

But to the point : while hovering o'er the brink 
Of Skiddaw (where, as usual, it still rain'd), 

I saw a taper far below me wink, 
And, stooping, caught this fellow at a libel — 
No less on history than the holy bible. 

LXXXVII. 
" The former is the devil's scripture, and 

The latter yours, good Michael ; so the affair 
Belongs to all of us, you understand. 

I snatch'd him up just as you see him there, 
And brought him off for sentence out of hand : 

I 've scarcely been ten minutes in the air — 
At least a quarter it can hardly be : 
I dare say that his wife is still at tea." 

LXXXVIII. 
Here Sathan said, " 1 know this man of old, 

And have expected him for some time here ; 
A sillier fellow you will scarce behold, 

Or more conceited in his petty sphere : 
But surely it was not worth while to fold 

Such trash below your wing, Asmodeus dear ! 
We had the poor Wretch safe (without being bored 
With carriage) coming of his own accord. 

LXXXIX. 

" But since he 's here, let 's see what he has done.'* 
"Done!" cried Asmodeus, "he anticipates 

The very business you are now Upon, 

And scribbles as if head clerk to the Fates. 

Who knows to what his ribaldry mav run, 

When such an ass as this, like Balaam's, prate:. ?* 

" Let 's hear," (|U0th Michael, " what lie has to sav ; 

You know we're bound to that in CVl rv waj 1'' 

XC. 

Now the bard, glad to ret an audience, which 
By no means often was his case below, 

Began to COUgh, and hawk, and hem, and pitefi 
His voice into that awful note of woe 

To all unhappy hearers within reach 

Of poets when the tide of rhyme 's in flow ; 

But stuck fast with his first li< \ametcr, 

Not one of all whose gouty feet would rftifc 



494 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XCI. 

But ere the spavin'd dactyls could be spurr'd 

Into recitative, in great dismay 
Both cherubim and Seraphim were heard 

To murmur loudly through their long array ; 
And Michael rose ere he could get a word 

Of all his founder'd verses under way, 
And cried, "For God's sake stop, my friend ! 'twere 
best — 
JVon di, non homines, — ' you know the rest." 

XCII. 
A general bustle spread throughout the thronj, 

Which seem'd to hold all verse in detestation ; 
The angels had of course enough of song 

When upon service ; and the generation 
Of ghosts had heard too much in life, not long 

Before, to profit by a new occasion ; 
The monarch, mute till then, exclaini'd "What ! what ! 
J'ye come again ? No more — no more of that !" 

XCIII. 

The tumult grew, an universal cough 

Convulsed the skies, as during a debate, 
When Castlcreagh has been up long enough 

(Befo.e he was first minister of state, 
I mean — the slaves hear now), some cried "off, off," 

As at a farce ; till, grown quite desperate, 
The bard Saint Peter pray'd to interpose 
(Himself an author) only for his prose. 

XCIV. 
The varlet was not an ill-favour'd knave ; 

A good deal like a vulture in the face, 
With a hook nose and a hawk's eye, which gave 

A smart and sharper looking sort of grace 
To his whole aspect, which, though rather grave, 

Was by no means so ugly as his case ; 
But that indeed was hopeless as can be, 
Quite a poetic felony, " de sc." 

xcv. 

Then Michael blew his trump, and still'd the noise 

With one still greater, as is yet the mode 
On earth besides ; except some grumbling voice, 

Which now and then will make a slight inroad 
Upon decorous silence, few will twice 

Lift up their lungs when fairly overcrow'd ; 
And now the bard could plead his own bad cause, 
With all the attitudes of self-applause. 

XCVI. 
lie. stiid — (I only give the heads) — he said, 

He meant no harm in scribbling ; 't was his way 
Upon all topics ; 'twas, besides, his bread, 

Of which he butter'd both sides ; 't would delay 
Too bng the assembly (he was pleased to dread), 

And take up rather more time than a day, 
To name his works — he would but cite a few — 
Wei Tyler — rhymes on Blenheim — Waterloo. 

XCVII. 
He had written praises of a regicide ; 

He had written praises of all kings whatever ; 
Hi' had written for republics, far and wide, 

Aii'l then against them, bitterer than ever; 
For panlisocracy he once had cried 

Aloud, a scheme less moral than 't was clever ; 
Tn- % n grew a hearty anti-jacobin — 
Had turn'ii his coat — and would have turn'd his skin. 



XCVIII. 

lie had sung against all battles, and again 
In their high praise and glory; he had call'd 

Reviewing' "the ungentle craft," and then 
Become as base a critic as e'er crawl'd — 

Fed, paid, and pamper'd by the very men 

By whom his muse and morals had been maul'd . 

He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose 

And more of both than any body knows. 

XCIX. 

He hid written Wesley's life: — here, turning round 
To Sathan, " Sir, I 'm ready to write yours, 

In two octavo volumes, nicely bound, 

With notes and preface, all that most allures 

The pious purchaser; and there's no ground 
For fear, for I can choose my own reviewers : 

So let me have the proper documents, 

That I may add you to my other saints." 

c. 

Sathan bow'd, and was silent. " Well, if you, 

With amiable modesty, decline , 
My offer, what says Michael ? There are few 

Whose memoirs could be render'd more divine. 
Mine is a pen of all work ; not so new 

As it was once, but I would make you shine 
Like your own trumpet ; by the way, my own 
Has more brass hi it, and is as well blown. 

CI. 

" But talking about trumpets, here 's my Vision ! 

Now you shall judge, all people ; yes, you shall 
Judge with my judgment, and by my decision 

Be guided who shall enter heaven or fall! 
I settle all these things by intuition, 

Times present, past, to come, heaven, hell, and all, 
Like King Alfonso ! 2 When I thus see double, 
I save the deity some worlds of trouble." 

CII. 

He ceased, and drew forth an MS. ; and no 
Persuasion on the part of devils, or saints, 

Or angels, now could stop the torrent; so 
He read the first three lines of the contents ; 

But at the fourth, the whole spiritual show 
Hail vanish'd with variety of scents, 

Ambrosial and sulphureous, as they sprang, 

Like lightning, off from his " melodious twang." 5 

cm. 

Those grand heroics acted as a spell : 

The angels stopp'd their ears, and plied their pinions: 
The devils ran howling, deafen'd, down to hell ; 

The ghosts fled, gibbering, for their own dominions 
(For 't is not yet decided w here they dwell, 

And I leave every man to his opinions) ; 
Michael took refuge in his trump — but lo ! 
His teeth were set on edge, — he could not blow ! 



1 See "Life of H. Kukc White." 

2 King Alfonzo, speaking of the Ptoloroean system, sain. 
tlmt "had 1 i i - been consulted at the creation of the world, ho 
would have spared the Maker qonio absurdities." 

:i Bee Aubrey's account of the apparition which disnp- 
peared " with a curious perfume and a melo.iii.us twang ;" 
or see the Antiquary, vol. 1. 



MORGANTE MAGGIORE. 



495 



CIV. 

Saint Peter, who has hitherto been known 

For an impetuous saint, upraised his keys, 
And at the fifth line knock'd the poet down ; 

Win) fill like Phaeton, but more at case, 
Into his lake, for there he did not drown, 

A different web being by the destinii s 
Woven for the Laureate's filial wreath, whene'er 
Reform shall happen either here or there. 

CV. 
He first sunk to the bottom — like his works, 

But soon rose to the surface — like himself: 
For all corrupted things are buoy'd, Like corks, 1 

By their own rottenness, light as an elf, 



I A drowned l»»ly lies lit the bottom til! rotted; it then 
floats, as most people knuw. 



Or wisp that (lits o'er a morass : he lurks, 

It may be, still, like dull books on a shelf, 
In his own den, to scrawl some " Life" or " Vision,'' 
As Welborn says — "the devil turn'd precisian." 

CVI. 

As fir the rest, to come to the conclusion 
Of this true tire am, the telescope is gone 

Which kept my optics free from all delusion, 
And show'd trie what I in my turn have shown : 

All I saw further in the last confusion. 
Was, that King George slipp'd info heaven for one. 

And when the tumult dwindled to a r;i!ni, 

I left him practising the hundredth psalm, 



TRANSLATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF PULCI. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The Morgante Mtfggiore, of the first canto of which 
this translation is offered, divides with the Orlando In- 
namorato the honour of having firmed and suggested 
the style and story of Ariosto. The great defects of 
Boiardo were his treating too seriously the narratives 
of chivalry, and his harsh style. Ariosto, in his con- 
tinuation, by a judicious mixture of the gaiety of Pulei, 
has avoided the one, ami Berni, in his reformation of 
Boiardo's poem, has corrected the other. Pulci maybe 
considered as the precursor and model of Berni al- 
together, as he has partly been to Ariosto, however 
inferior to both his copyists. He is no less the founder 
of a new style of poetry very lately sprung up in Eng- 
land. I allude to that of the ingenious Whistlecrafl. 
The 8(3 1 ions poems on Re ncesvallcs in the same language, 
and more particularly the excellent one of Mr. Merivale, 
are to be traced to the same source. It has never yet 
been decided entirely, whether Pulci's intention was or 
was not to deride the religion, which is one of his fa- 
vourite topics. It appears to me, that such an intention 
would have been no less hazardous to the poet than to 
the priest, particularly in that age and country; and 
the permission to publish the poem, and its reception 
among the classics of Italy, prove that it neither was 
nor is so interpreted. That he intended to ridicule 
the monastic life, and suffered his imagination to plav 
with the simple dulness of his converted giant, seems 
evident enough ; but surely it were as unjust to accuse 
him of irrcligion on this account, as to denounce Fielding 
for his Parson Adams, Barnabas, Thwackum, Supple, 
ami tin: Ordinary in Jonathan Wild, — or Scott, for the 
exquisite use of Ins Covenanters in the "Tales of my 
Landlord." 

In the following translation I have used the liberty 
of the original with the proper names ; as Pulci uses 
Gan, Ganellon, or Ganellone ; Carlo, Carlomagno, or 
Carlomano; Rondel, or Rondello, etc. as it suits his 
convenience, so has the translator. In other respects] 



the version is faithful to the best of the translator's 
ability in combining his interpretation of the one lan- 
guage with the not very easy task of reducing it to 
the same versification in the other. The reader is re- 
quested to remember that the antiquated language of 
Pulci, however pure, is not easy to the generality of 
Italians themselves, from its great mixture of Tuscan 
proverbs ; and he may therefore be more indulgent to 
the present attempt. How far the translator has suc- 
ceeded, and whether or no he shall continue the work, 
are questions which the public will decide. He was 
induced to make the experiment partly by his love for, 
and partial intercourse with, the Italian language, ot 
which it is sn easy to acquire a slight knowledge, and 
with which it is so nearly impossible for a foreigner tc 
become accurately conversant. The Italian language 
is like a capricious beauty, who accords ber smiles to 
all, her favours to few, and sometimes least to those who 
have courted her longest. The translator wished also 
to present in an English dress a part at least of a poem 
never yet rendered into a northern language : at the 
same time that it has been the original of some of the 
most celebrated productions on this side of the Alps, 
as well as of those recent experiments in poetry in 
England which have been already mentioned. 



MORGANTE MAGGIORE. 



CANTO I. 

I. 

I.\- the beginning was the Word next God; 

God was the Word, the Word no less was he; 

This was in the beginning, to my mode 

Of thinking, and without him nought could be • 

Therefore, just Lord! from out thy high abode- 
Benign and pious, bid an angel flee, 

One only, to be my companion, who 

Shall help my famous, worthy, old son" throu°h 



49C BYRON'S 


WORKS. 


II. 


IX. 


And tnou, oh Virgin ! daughter, mother, bride, 


'T was Christmas-day; in Paris all his court 


Of the same Lord, who gave to you each key 


Charles held ; the chief, I sav, Orlando was, 


Of heaven, and hell, and every thing beside, 


The Dane; Astolfo there too did resort, 


The day thy Gabriel said, "All had!" to thee, 


Also Ahsuigl, the gay time to pass 


Since to thy servants pity 's ne'er denied, 


In festival and in triumphant sport, 


With flowing rhymes, a pleasant style and free, 


The much renown'd Smi Di nnis being the cause - 


Be to in v verses then benignly kind, 


Angiolin of Bayonne,and Oliver, 


And to the end illuminate my mind. 


And gentle Bejinghieri too came there: 


III. 


X. 


1 ivas in the season when sad Philomel 


Avolio, and Arino, and Othone 


Weeps with her sister, who remembers and 


Of Normandy, and Richard Paladin, 


Deplores the ancient woes which both befell, 


Wise HarriO, an 1 the ancient SalemOne, 


And makes the nymphs enamour'd, to the hand 


Walter of Lion's Mount, and Kaldovin, 


Of Phaeton by Phcebus loved so well 


Who was the son of the sad GaneHone, 


His car (but temper'd by his sire's command) 


Were there, exciting too much gladness in 


Was given, and on the horizon's verge just now 


The son of Pepin: — when his knights came hither, 


Appear'd, so that Tithonus scratch'd his brow ; 


He groan'd with joy to see them altogether. 


IV. 


XI. 


When I prepared my bark first to obey, 


But watchful fortune lurking, takes good heed 


As it should still obey, trie helm, my mind, 


Ever some bar 'gainst our intents to bring. 


And carry prose or rhyme, and this my lay 


While Charles reposed him thus in word and deed, 


Of Charles the Emperor, whom you will find; 


Orlando ruled court, Charles, and every thing; 


By several pens already praised ; but they • 


Curst. Gan, with envy bursting, had such need 


Who to diffuse his glory were inclined, 


To vent his spite, that thus with Charles the king, 


For all that I can see in prose or verse, 


One day he openly began to say, 


Have understood Charles badly — and wrote worse. 


" Orlando must we always then obey ? 


V. 


XII, 


Leonardo Aretino said already, 


" A thousand times I 'vc been about to say, 


That if, like Pepin, C harles had had a writer 


Orlando too presumptuously goes on ; 


Of genius quick, and diligently steady, 


Here are we, counts, kings, dukes, to own thy sway. 


No hero would in history look brighter ; 


Hamo, and Otho, Ogier, Solomon, 


He in the cabinet being always ready, 


Each have to honour thee and to obey ; 


And in the field a most victorious fighter, 


Hut he has too much credit near the throne, 


Who for the Church and Christian faith had wrought, 


Which we won't suffer, but are quite decided 


Certes far more than yet is said or thought. 


By such a boy to be no longer guided. 


VI. 


XIII. 


You still may see at Saint Liberatore, 


" And even at Aspramont thou didst begin 


The abbey no great way from Manopell, 


To let him know he was a gallant knight, 


Erected in the Abruzzi to his glory, 


And by the fount did much the day to win ; 


Because of the great battle in which fell 


But I know who that day had won the fight 


A pagan king, according to the story, 


If it had not for good Gherardo been : 


And felon people whom Charles sent to hell: 


The victory was Almonte's else ; his sight 


And there are bones so many, and so many, 


He kept upon the standard, and the laurels 


Near them Giusalfa's would seem few, if any. 


In fact and fairness are his earning, Charles. 


VII. 


XIV. 


But the world, blind and ignorant, don't prize 


"If thou rememberest being in Gasconv, 


His virtues as I wish to see them : thou, 


When there advanced the nations out of Spain, 


Florence, by his great bounty don't arise, 


The Christian cause had suffered shamefully. 


And hast, and may have, if thou wilt allow, 


Had not his valour driven them back again. 


All proper customs and true courtesies: 


Best speak the (ruth when there 's a reason why: 


Whate'er thou hast acouired from then till now, 


Know then, oh emperor ! that all complain : 


V\ ith knightly courage, treasure, or the lance, 


As for myself, I shall repass the mounts 


Is sprung from out the noble blood of France. 


O'er which I cross'd with two and sixty counts. 


VIII. 


XV. 


1 welve paladins had Charles, in court, of whom 


" 'T is fit thy grandeur should dispense relief, 


The wirest and most famous was Orlando ; 


So that each here may have his proper part, 


Him traitor Gan conducted to the tomb 


For the whole court is more or less in grief : 


In Ronccsvalles, as the villain pJann'd too, 


Perhaps thou dcem'st this lad a Mars in heait ?" 


While the horn rang so loud, and knell'd the doom 


Orlando one day heard this speech in brief, 


Of their sad rout, though he did all knight can do, 


As by himself it chanced he sate apart : 


And Dante in his comedy has given 


Displeased he was with Gan because he said it, 


To him a happy seat with Charles in heaven. 


But much more still that Charles should give him credit. 



MORGANTE MAGGIORE. 



497 



XVI. 
And with the sword he would have murder'd Gan, 

But Oliver thrust in hetwecn the pair. 
And from his hand extracted Durlindan, 

And thus u! length they separated were. 
Orlando, angry too wi'h Cad 

Wauled hut little to have slain hjm lhc>-e ; 

Then forth alone from Paris went the chit f, 

And burst and maddeii'd with disdain and grief. 

XVII. 

From ErnioUina, consort of the Dane, 
He took Cortana, and tli.n look Rundell, 

And (.11 towards Brara prick'd him nVr the plain J 
And when she saw him coming, Aldabelle 

h'd forth her arms to clasp her lord again: 
Orlando, in whose brain all was not well, 

As " Welcome my Orlando home," she said, 

Raised up his sword to smite her on the head. 

XVIII. 

Like him a fury counsels ; his reTenge 
On Gan in that rash act he seeni'd to take, 

rVhich Aldabella thought extremity strange, 
But soon Orlando found himself awake ; 

and his spouse took his bridle on this change, 
And he dismounted from Ins horse, and spake 

Of every thing which pass'd without demur", 

And then reposed himself some days with her. 

XIX. 

Then full of wrath departed from the place, 
And far as Pagan countries roam'd astray, 

ind while he rode, yet still at every pace 
The traitor Gan rcmember'd by the way ; 

And wandering on in error a long sp i , 
An abbey which in a lone desert lay, 

Midst glens obscure, and distant lands he found, 

Which form'd the Christian's and the Pagan's bound. 

XX. 

The abbot was call'd Clermont, and by blood 
Descended from Arigrante : under rover 

Of a great mountain's brow the abbey stood, 
But certain savage giants look'd him over! 

One Passamont was foremost of the brood, 
And Alabaster and Morgante hover 

Second and third, with agitata slings, and throw 

In daily j< operdy the place below. 

XXI. 

The monks could pass the convent gate no more, 

Nor leave thi ir cells for waU r or tor wood. 
Orlando knock'd, but none would ope, before 

Unto the prior it at length seem'd good ; 
Enter'd, he said that he was taught, to adore 

Him who was born of Mary's holiest blood, 
And was baptized a Christian ; and then show'd 
How to the abbey he had found his road. 

XXII. 
Said the abnot, " You are welcome ; what is mine 

We give '-'"i fix ly, Bince thai you believe 
Willi us in Mary Mother's son divine ; 

And that you may not, cavalier, conceive 
The cause of our delay Bo lei you in 

To be rusticity, you shall r 

The reason why our gate' was barr'd to you ; 
Thus those who m suspicion live must do. 
68 



XXIII. 
"When hither to inhabit first we c 
These mountains, albeit thai they are obscure, 

As you perceive, yet without fear or blame 
They seem'd to promise an asylum sure : 

From Bavage brutes alone, too tierce to lane, 
'T was lit our quiet dwelling to secure ; 

Bill now, if here we'd stay, we needs musl guard 

Against domestic beasts with watch and ward. 

XXIV. 
"These make us stand, in fact, upon the H itch, 

For late there have appcar'd three giants rough j 
What natiqn or what kingdom hove the bati h 

I know not, but thev are all of savage stuff; 
When force and malice with some gi tikis match, 

You know, they can do all — We are not enough: 
And these so much our orisons derange, 
I know not what to do till matters ch 

XXV. 

" Our ancient fathers living the desert in, 

For just and holy works were duly fe i ; 
Think not they lived on locusts Bole, '( is C( rtain 

That manna was rain'd down from heaven instead ; 
But here 't is fit we keep on the alert in 

Our bounds, or taste the stones showcr'd down foi 
bread, 
From off" yon mountain daily raining faster, 
And rlung by Passamont and Alabaster. 

XXVI. 
"The third, Morgante, 's savages! by far ; he 

Plucks up pines, beeches, poplar-trees, and oaks, 
And (lings them, our community to bury, 

And all thai I can do hut more provokes." 
While thus they parley in the cemetery, 

A stone from one of their gigantic strokes, 
Which nearly crusli'd Bonded, came tumbling over, 
So that he look a long leap under cover. 

XXVII. 

" For God's sake, cavalier, come in with 

The manna 's falling now," the abbot cried : 
"This fellow does not wish my horse should feed, 

Dear abbot," Roland unto him r< 
"Of restiveness he'd cure him had he need : 

That stone seems with good-will and aim applied." 
The holy father said, " I don't deceive ; 
They '11 one day fling the mountain, I believe." 

XXVIII. 
Orlando bade them take care of Rondello, 

And also made a breakfast of his own : 
" Abb.it," he said, "I warn" to lin 1 thai fellow 

Who flung at my good horse yon cornor-slone." 
Saiil the abbot, " Le| not my advice seem shallow, 

As to a brother dear I speak alone ; 
I would dissna le you, baron, from this strife, 

As knowing sure that you will lost 

XXIX. 

"That Passamont has in his hand three darts — 
Such slings, clubs, ballast-stones; that yield you musi, 

Von know thai giants have much stouter hi arts 
Than us, with reason, in proportion just • 

If jo vou will, guard well against their arts, 
For these are very barbarous and robust. " 
Orlando answer'd, "This I '11 see, be sure, 
And walk the wild on foot to be secure." 



198 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



XXX. 

The abbot sign'd the great eross on his front, 
" Then go you with God's benison and mine ;" 

Orlando, after he had scaled the mount, 
As (lie abbot had directed, kept the line 

Ri:dit to the usual haunt of Passamont; 
Who, seeing nim alone in this design, 

SurveyM him lore and aft with eyes observant, 

Then asked him, "If lie wish'd to stay as servant?" 

XXXI. 

And promised him an office of great ease ; 

But, said Orlando, " Saracen insane ! 
I comic to kill vou, if it shall so please 

God, not to serve as footboy in your train; 
Von with his monks so oft have broke the peace — 

Vile dog ! 't is past his patience to sustain." 
The giant ran to fetch his arms, quite furious, 
When he received an answer so injurious. 

XXXII. 

And being return'd to where; Orlando stood, 

Who hail not moved him from the spot, and swinging 

The cord, he liurl'd a stone with strength so rude, 
As show'd a sample of his skill in slinging ; 

[. roll'd on Count Orlando's helmet good 

And luad, and set both head and helmet ringing, 

So that he sweon'd with pain as if he died, 

But more than dead, he seem'd so stupified. 

XXXIII. 

Then Passamont, who thougnt him slain outright, 

Said, "I will go, and, while he lies along, 
Disarm me : why such craven did I fight ?" 

But Christ his servants ne'er abandons long, 
I', pei tally Orlando, such a knight, 

As to desert would almost be a wrong. 
While the giant goes to put off* his defences, 
Orlando has recall'd his force and senses : 

XXXIV. 
And loud he sh luted, " Giant, where dost go ? 

Thou thought'st me doubtless for the bier outlaid ; 
To the right about — without wings thou 'rt too slow 

To fly my vengeance — currish renegade ! 
'T was but by treachery thou laid'st nic low." 

The giant his astonishment bctray'd, 
And turn'd about, ami stopp'd his journey on, 
And then he stoop'd to pick up a great stone. 

XXXV. 
Orlando had Ccrtana bare in hand, 

To split the head in twain was what he schemed — 
Cortana clave the skull like a true brand, 

And pagan Passamont died unredeeni'd. 
Yet harsh and haughty, as he lay he bann'd, 

Ami most devoutly Macon still blasphemed; 
But while his crude, rude blasphemies he heard, 
Orlando lhank'd the Father and the Word, — 

XXXVI. 
raving, " What grace to me thou 'st given! 

And F to thee, oh Lord, am ever bound. 
I know my life was saved by thee from heaven, 

Since by the giant I was fairly down'd. 
All things by thee are measured just and even ; 

Our power without thine aid would nought be found : 
1 prav tin e take heed of mo, till I can 
A' least '•eturn once more to Carloman." 



XXXVII. 

And having said thus much, he went his way ; 

And Alabaster he found out below, 
Doing the verv best that in him lay 

To root from out a oanii a pick or iwo. 
Orlando, when he rearh'd him, loud 'gan say, 

" How tliink'st thou, glutton, such a stone to throw ?" 
When Alabaster heard his deep voice ring, 
He suddenly betook him to his sling, 

XXXVIII. 
And liurl'd a fragment of a size so large, 

That if it had in fact fullill'd its mission, 
And Roland not avail'd him of his targe, 

Then' would have been no need of a physician. 
Orlando set himself in turn to charge, 

And in his bulky bosom made incision 
With all his sword. The lout fell ; but, o'erthrown, h» 
However by no means forgot Macone. 

XXXIX. 

Morgante had a palace in his mode, 

Composed of branches, logs of wood, and earth, 
Am! stretch'd himself at ease in this abode, 

And shut himself at night within his birth. 
Orlando knock'd, and knock'd again, to goad 

The giant from his sleep ; and he came forth, 
The door to open, like a crazy thing, 
For a rough dream had shook him slumbering. 

XL. 

He thought that a fierce serpent had attack'd him, 

And Mahomet he call'd, but i\Iahoinct 
Is nothing worth, and not an instant back'd him ; 

But praying blessed Jesu, lie was set 
At liberty from all the fears which rack'il him; 

And to the gate he came with great regret — 
"Who knocks here ?" grumbling all the while, said he • 
" That," said Orlando, " you will quickly see." 

XLI. 
" I come to preach to you, as to your brothers, 

Sent by the miserable monks — repentance; 
For Providence divine, in you and others, 

Condemns the evil done by new acquaintance. 
'T is writ on high — your wrong must pay another's; 

From heaven itself is issued out this sentence ; 
Know then, that colder now than a pilaster 
I left your Passamont and Alabaster." 

XLII. 
Morgante said, " O gentle cavalier! 

Now by thy God say me no villany ; 
The favour of your name I fain would hear, 

And if a Christian, speak for courtesy." 
Replied Orlando, " So much to yonr car 

I by my faith disclose contentedly ; 
Christ I adore, who is the genuine Lord, 
And, if you please, by you may be adored." 

XLIII. 
The Saracen rejoin'd in humble tone, 

"I have had an extraordinary vision; 
A savage serpent fell on me alone. 

And Macon would not pity my condition; 
Hence to thy God, who lor ye did atone 

I "[ion the cross, preferr'd I my petition J 
His timely succour set me safe and free, 
And I a Chris'ian am disposed to be." 



MORGANTE MAGGTORE. 



499 



XLIV. 

Orlando answer'd, " Baron just and pious, 
If this good wish your heart can really move 

To the true God, who will not then deny us 
Eternal honour, you will go above. 

And, if you please, as friends we will ally us, 
And I will love you with a perfect love. 

Your idols are vain liars full of fraud, 

The only true God is the Christian's God. 

XLV. 

" The Lord descended to the virgin breast 

Of Mary Mother, sinless and divine ; 
If you acknowledge the Redeemer blest, 

Without whom neither sun or star can shine, 
Abjure bad Macon's false and felon test, 

Your renegade (rod, and worship mine, — 
Baptize yourseU with zeal, since you repent." 
To which Morgante answer'd, "I'm content." 

XLVI. 

And then Orlando to embrace him flew, 

And made much of his convert, as he cried, 
'-To the abbey I will gladly marshal you>" 

To whom Morgante, " Let us go," replied; 
" I to the friars have for peace to sue." 

Which thing Orlando heard with inward pride, 
Saving, " My brother, so devout and good, 
Ask the abbot pardon, as I wish you would : 

XLVII. 
" Since God has granted your illumination, 

Accepting you in mercy for his own, 
Humility should be your first oblation." 

Morgante said, " For goodness' sake make known — 
Since that your God is to be mine — your station, 

And let your name in verity be shown ; 
Then will I every thing at your command do." 
On which the other said, he was Orlando. 

XLVIII. 
"Then," quoth the giant, "blessed be Jesu, 

A thousand times with gratitude and praise ! 
Oft, perfect baron ! have I heard of you 

Through all the different period of my days : 
And, as I said, to be your vassal too 

I wish, for your great gallantry always." 
Thus reasoning, they continued much to say, 
And onwards to the abbey went their way. 

XLIX. 
And by the way, about the giants dead 

Orlando with Morgante reason'd : " Be, 
For their decease, I pray you, comforted, 

And since it is God's pleasure, pardon me; 
A thousand wrongs unto the monks they bred, 

And our true scripture soundeth openly — 
Good is rewarded, and chastised the ill, 
Which the Lord never faileth to fulfil: 

L. 
" Because his love of justice unto all 

Is «uch, he wills his judgment should devour 
All who have sin, however great or small ; 

But good he well remembers to restore : 
Nor without justice holy could we call 

Him, whom I now require you to adore: 
All men must make his will their wishes sway, 
And quickly and spontaneously obey. 



LI. 

" And here our doctors are of one accord, 

Coming on this point to the same conclusion — 

That in their thoughts who praise in heaven the Lord 
If pity e'er was guilty of intrusion 

For their unfortunate relations stored 

In hell below, and damn'd in great confusion, — 
Their happiness would be reduced to nought, 
And thus unjust the Almighty's self be thought. 

LII. 

" But they in Christ have firmest hope, and all 
Which seems to him, to them too must appear 

Will done; nor could it otherwise befall; 
lie never can in anv purpose err : 

If sire or mother suffer endless thrall, 

They don't disturb themselves for him or her; 

What pleases God to them must joy inspire; — 

Such is the observance of the eternal choir." 

LID. 
" A word unto the wise," Morgante said, 
"Is wont to be Snough, and you shall see 

How much I grieve about mv brethren dead ; 

And if the will of God seem good to me, 
Just, as you tell me, 't is in heaven obev'il — 

Ashes to ashes, — merrv let us be ! 
I will cut off the hands from both their trunks. 
And carry them unto the holy monks. 

LIV. 
" So that all persons may be sure and certain 

That they are dead, and have no further feat 
To wander solitary tins desert in, 

And that they may perceive mv spirit clear 
By the Lord's grace, who hath withdrawn the curtate 

Of darkness, making his bright realm appear." 
He cut his brethren's hands off at these words, 
And left them to the savage beasts and birds. 

LV. 
Then to the abbey they went on together, 

Where waited them the abbot in ureal doubt. 
The monks, who knew not yet the fact, ran thitner 

To their superior, all in breathless rout, 
Saying, with tremor, " Please to tell us whether 

You wish to have this person in or out 7" 
The abbot, looking through upon the <;iant, 
Too greatly fear'd, at first, to be compliant. 

LVI. 
Orlando, scein<; him thus agitated, 

Said quickly, "Abbot, be thou of good cheer; 
He Christ believes, as Christian must be rated, 

And hath renounced bis Macon false;" which hni» 
Morgante with the hands corroborated, 

A proof of both the giants' late quite clear: 
Thence, with due thanks, the abbot God adored, 
Saying, "Thou hast contented me, oh Lord !" 

LYII. 
He gazed ; Morgante's height he calculate. I, 

And more than once contemplated his size, 
And then he said, " Oh giant celebrated, 

Know, that no more my wonder will arise, 
How you could tear and thug the trees you late dia. 

When I behold your farm with my own eyes. 
You now a true and perfect friend will show 
Yourself to Christ, as once you were a fo« 



500 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LVIII. 

"And one of our apostles, Saul once named, 
Long persecuted sore the faith of Christ, 

Till one day by the Spirit being inflamed, 

1 Why dust thou persecute me thus?' said Christ; 

And then from his otli.'iice he was reclaim'd, 
And went for ever after preaching Christ ; 

And of the faith became a trump, whose sounding 

O'er the whole earth is echoing and rebounding. 

LIX. 

*' So, my Morgante, you may do likewise ; 

He who repents, — thus writes the Evangelist, — 
Occasions more rejoicing in the skies 

Than ninety-nine of the celestial list. 
You may be sure, should each desire arise 

With just zeal for the Lord, that you '11 exist 
Among the happy saints for evermore ; 
But you were lost and damn'd to hell before !" 

LX. 

And thus great honour to Morgante paid 
The abbot : many days they did repose. 

One day, as with Orlando they both stray'd, 

And saunter'd here and there, where'er they chose. 

The abbot show'd a chamber where array'd 
Much armour was, and hung up certain bows ; 

And one of these Morgante for a whim 

Girt on, though useless, he believed, to him. 

LXI. 

There being a want of water in the place, 

Orlando, like a worthy brother, said, 
" Morgante, I could wish you in this case 

To go for water." " You shall be obey'd 
In all commands" was the reply, "straightway." 

Upon his shoulder a great tub he laid, 
And went out on his way unto a fountain, 
Where he was wont to drink below the mountain. 

LXII. 
Arrived there, a prodigious noise he hears, 

Which suddenly along the forest spread ; 
Whereat from out his quiver he prepares 

An arrow for his bow, and lifts his head ; 
And lo! a monstrous herd of swine appears, 

And onward rushes with tempestuous tread, 
And to the fountain's brink precisely pours, 
So that the giant 's join'd by all the boars. 

LXIII. 
Morgante at a venture shot an arrow, 

Which pierced a pig precisely in the ear, 
And pass'd unto the other side quite through, 

So that the boar, defunct, lay tripp'd up' near. 
Another, to revenge his fellow farrow, 

Against the giant rush'd in fierce career, 
And reach'd the passage with so swift a foot, 
Morgante was not now in time to shoot. 

lxiv. 

Perceiving that the pig was on him close, 
He gave him such a punch upon the head 1 

Ai tloor'd him, so that he no more arose — 
Smashing the very bone ; and he fell dead 

(faxt to tnt other. Having seen such blows, 
The other pigs along the valley fled ; 

Morgante on his neck the bucket took, 

Full from th« spring which neither swerved nor shook. 



LXV. 

The tun was on one shoulder, ami there were 
The hogs on t'other, and he brush'd apace 

On to the abbey, though by no means near, 
Nor spilt one drop of water in his race. 

Orlando, seeing him so soon appear 

With the dead boars, and with thai brimful vase, 

MarveU'd to see his Strength so very great ; — 

So did the abbot, and set wide the gate. 

LXVI. 

The monks, who saw the water fresh and good, 
Rejoiced, but much more to perceive the pork ; 

All animals are glad at sight of food : 

They lay their breviaries to sleep, and work 

Willi greedy pleasure, and ill such a mood, 
That the flesh needs no salt beneath their fork; 

Of rankness and of rot there is no fear, 

For all the fasts are now left in arrear. 

LXVII. 

As though they wish'd to burst at once, they ate ; 

And gorged so that, as if the bones had l>< i n 
In water, sorely grieved the dog and cat, 

Perceiving that they all were pick'd too clean. 
The abbot, who to all did honour great, 

A few days after this convivial scene, 
Gave to Morgante a line horse well train'd, 
Which he long time had for himself maintam'd. 

LXVIII. 

The horse Morgante to a meadow led, 
To gallop, and to put him to the proof, 

Thinking that he a back of iron had, 

Or to skim eggs unbroke was light enough ; 

Hut the horse, sinking with the pain, fell dead, 
And burst, while cold on earth lay head and hoof 

Morgante said, " Get up, thou sulky cur !" 

And still continued pricking with the spur. 

LXIX. 

But finally he thought fit to dismount, 

And said, "I am as light as any feather, 
And ho has burst — to this what say you, count ?" 

Orlando answer'd, " Like a ship's mast rather 
You seem to me, and with the truck for from : — 

Let him go ; fortune wills that we together 
Should march, but you on foot, Morgante, still." 
To which the giant answer'd, " So I will. 

LXX. 
" When there shall be occasion, you shall see 

How I approve my courage in the fight." 
Orlando said, " I really think you'll be, 

If it should prove God's will, a goodly knight, 
Nor will you napping there discover me : 

But never mind your horse, though out of sight 
'T were best to carrv him into some wood, 
If but the means or way I understood." 

LXXI. 

The giant said, " Then carry him I will, 
Since that to carrv me he was so slack — 

To render, as the gods do, good for ill ; 

But lend a hand to place him on my hack." 

Orlando answer'd, "I.' my counsel still 
May weigh, Morgante, do not undertake 

To lift or carry this dead courser, who, 

As you have done to him, will do to you. 



MORGANTE 


MAGGIORE. 50 1 


LXXII. 


LXXIX. 


"Take care he don't revenge himself, though dead, 


"We can indeed but honour you with masses, 


As Nessus did of old bryond all cure ; 


And sermons, thanksgivings, and patcr-nosters, 


I don't know if the fart you 've hoard or read, 


Hot suppers, dinners (lilting Other phlCI B 


Bo< lie will make you burst, you may he sure." 


In verily much rather than the cloisters); 


" But Kelp him on my back,'' Morgante said, 


Hut such a love tor you mv heart embraces, 


"And you shall see what weighl I can endure: 


For thousand virtues which your bosom losters, 


In place, mv gentle Roland, of this palfrey, 


That wheresoe'er von go, I too shall be, 


With all the bulls, I'd carry yonder belfry." 


And, mi the oilier part, you rest with me. 


LXXIII. 


LXXX. 


The abbot said, " The steeple may do well, 


"This may involve a seeming contradiction, 


But, for the hells, you've broken them, I wot." 


But you, 1 know, are sage, and tied, and taste, 


Morgante answer'd, "Let them pay in hell 


And understand my speech with full conviction. 


The penalty, who lie dead in yon grot :" 


For your just pious deeds may you he graced 


And hoisting up the horse from where he I'll, 


With the Loid's great reward and benediction, 


He said, "Now look if I the gout have got, 


By whom you were directed to this waste: 


Orlando, in the lens — or if I have force ;" — 


To his high mercy is our freedom due, 


And then he made two gambols with the horse. 


For which we render thanks to him and you. 


LXXIV. 


LXXXI. 


Moigante was like any mountain framed ; 


" You saved at once our life and soul : such fear 


So if he did this, 'tis no prodigy ; 


The giants caused us, that the way was lost 


But secretlv himself Orlando blamed, 


By which we could pursue a fit career 


Because he was one of his family ; 


In search of Jesus and the saintly host; 


And, fearing that he might be hurt or maim'd, 


And your departure breeds such sorrow here, 


Once more he hade him lay his burthen by: 


That comfortless we all are to our cost ; 


" Put down, nor bear him further the desert in." 


Rut months and years you could not stay in sloth, 


Morgante said, "I'll carry him for certain." 


Nor are you form'd to wear our sober cloth ; 


LXXV. 


LXXX1I. 


He did ; and stow'd him in some nook away, 


" But td*bear arms and wield the lance ; indeed, 


And to the abbey then return'd with speed. 


With these as much is done as with this cowl, 


Orlando said, "Why longer do we stay; 


In proof of which the scripture you may read. 


Morgante, here is nought to do indeed." 


This giant up to heaven may bear his soul 


The abbot by the hand he took one day, 


By your compassion ; now in peace proceed. 


And said with great respect, he had agreed 


Your state and name I seek not to unroll, 


To leave his reverence ; but for this decision 


But, if I'm ask'd, this answer shall be given, 


He wish'd to have his pardon and permission. 


That here an angel was sent down from heaven. 


LXXV1. 


LXXXIII. 


The honours they continued to receive 


"If you want armour or aught else, go in, 


Perhaps exceeded what bis merits claim'd: 


Look o'er the wardrobe, and take what you choosn. 


He said, "I mean, and quickly, to retrieve 


And cover with it o'er this giant's skin." 


The lost days of time past, which may be blamed ; 


- Orlando answer'd, " If there should lie loose 


Some days ago I should have ask'd your leave, 


Some armour, ere our journey we begin, 


Kind father, hut I really was ashamed, 


Which might be turn'd to my companion's use, 


And know not how to show my sentiment, 


The gift would be acceptable to me." 


So much I see you with our stay content. 


The abbot said to him, " Come in and see." 


LXXVII. 


LXXXIV. 


" Put in my heart I bear through every clime, 


And in a certain closet, where the wall 


The abbot, abbey, and this solitude — 


Was cover'd with old armour like a crust, 


So much I love you in so short a time ; 


The abbot said to them, " I give you all." 


For me, from heaven reward you with all good, 


Morgante rummaged piecemeal from the dust 


The God so true, the eternal Lord sublime ! 


The whole, which, save one cuirass, was too small, 


Whose kingdom at the last hath open stood: 


And that too had the mail inlaid with rust. 


Meanwhile we stand expectant of your blessing, 


They wonder'd how it fitted him exactly, 


And recommend us to your prayers with pressing." 


Win -h ue'er had suited others so compactly. 


LXXVIII. 


LXXXV. 


Now when the abbot Count Orlando heard', 


'T was an immeasurable giant's, who 


His heart grew soft with inner tenderness, 


I!v the great Miw rif Argante Fell 


Such fervour in his bosom bred each word ; 


Before the abbey many yea 


And, " Cavalier," he said, " if I have less 


The story on the wall was ngured well , 


Courteous and kind to your great worth appear'd, 


In the last moment of the abbey's foe. 


Than fits me for such gentle blood to express, 


Who long had waged a war Implacable'' 


I know I 've done too little hi this case ; 


Precisely as the war OCCUrr'd thev drew bun, 


Put blame our ignorance, and this poor place. 


And there was Milo as he overthrew him. 


2 V 





M)2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LXXXVI. 

Seeing this history, Count Orlando said 
In his own heart " Oh God ! who in the sky 

Know'sl nil limits, bow was Milo hither led, 
Who calmed the giant in this place to die?" 

And certain letters, weeping, then he read, 
So that he could not keep his visage dry, — 

As I will tell in the ensuing story. 

From evil keep you, the high King of Glory ! 



Note 1. Page 600, line 57. 
He save him such a punch upon tlio head. 
"Gli dette in sulla testa un gran punzone." It is 
strange that Pulci should have literally anticipated the 
technical terms of my old friend ami master, Jackson, 
and the art which he has carried to its highest pitch, 
"A punch on the head," or, "a punch in theheadj' 
" un punzone in sulla testa," is the exact and frequent 
phrase of our best pugilists, who iittle dream that they 
are talking the purest Tuscan. 



malty, 



AN APOSTROPHIC HTIVIN. 



Qualis in Eurotie ripis, aut per ju?a Cynthi, 
Exeicet Diana choros. VIRGIL. 

Pucli on Eurota's hanks, or Cynthia's height, 
Diana seems: and so she charms the sight, 
When in the dance thergraceful goddess leads 
The (juire of nymphs, ami overtops their heads. 
DKYDKiVS VIRGIL. 



TO THE PUBLISHER. 



Sir, 
I am a country gentleman of a midland county. I 
•night have been a parliament-man for a certain bo- 
rough, having had the offer of as many votes as 
General T. at the general election in 1812. 1 But I 
<vas all for domestic happiness ; as, fifteen years ago, 
on a visit to London, I married a middle-aged maid 
of honour. We lived happily at Hornem Hall till 
last season, when my wife and I were invited by the 
Countess of Waltzavvay (a distant relation of my spouse) 
lo pass the winter in town. Thinking no harm, and 
our girls being come to a marriageable (or as they call 
it, marketable) age, and having besides a chancery suit 
inveterately entailed upon the family estate, wc came 
up in our old chariot, of which, by the by, my wife 
grew so much ashamed in less than a week, that I was 
obliged to buy a second-hand barouche, of which I 
m'i'lil mount the box, Mrs. H. says, if I could drive, 
but never see the inside — that place being reserved 
for the Honourable Augustus Tiptoe, her partner- 
general and opera-knight. Hearing great praises of 
Mrs. II. 's dancing (she was famous for birth-night min- 
uets in the latter end of the last century), I unbooted, 
and went to a ball at the Countess's, expecting to see 
a country dance, or, at most, cotillons, reels, and all 
the old paces to the newest tunes. But, judge of my 
surprise, on arriving, to see poor dear Mrs. Hornem 
will, her arms half round the loins of a huge hussar- 
looking gentleman I never set eyes on before ; and his, 
13 say irutn, rather more than half round her waist, 
urning lound, and round, and round, to a d d see- 



saw up and down sort of tunc, that reminded me of 
the "black joke," only more "qffettuoso," till it made 
me quite giddy with wondering they were not so. By 
and by they stopped a bit, and I thought they would 
sit or fall down: — but, no ; with Mrs. H.'s hand on his 
shoulder, " quam •.familiariter" 2 (as Terence said when 
I was at school), they walked about a minute, and then 
at it again, like two cock-chafers spitted on the same 
bodkin. I asked what all this meant, when, with a 
loud laugh, a child no older than our Wilhelmina (a 
name I never heard but in the Vicar of Wakefield, 
though her mother would call her after the Princess 
of Swappenbach), said, " Lord, Mr. Hornem, can't you 
see they arc valtzing," or waltzing (I forget which); and 
then up she got, and her mother and sister, and away 
they went, and round-abouted it till supper-time. Now 
that I know what it is, I like it of all things, and so 
does Mrs. H. (though I have broken my shins, and four 
times overturned Mrs. Hornem's maid in practising the 
preliminary steps in the morning). Indeed, so much do 
I like it, that having a turn for rhyme, tastily displayed 
in some election ballads, and songs in honour of all the 
victories (but till lately I have had little practice in that 
wav), I sat down, and with the aid of W. F. Esq., and 
a few hints from Dr. B. (whose recitations I attend, and 
am monstrous fond of Master B.'s manner of deliv< ring 
Ins father's late successful D. L. address), I composed 
the following hymn, wherewithal to make my senti- 
ments known to the public, whom, nevertheless, 1 
heartily aespise as well as the critics. 

am, Sir, yours, etc., etc. 

HORACE HORNEM. 



WALTZ. 



503 



WALTZ. 



Muse of the many-twinkling feet ! 3 whose charms 

Are now extended up from legs to arms ; 

Terpsichore ! — too long misdeem'd a maid — 

Reproachful term — bestow'd but to upbraid — 

Henceforth in all the bronze of brightness shine, 

The least a vestal of the virgin Nine. 

Far be from thee and thine the name of prude ; 

Mock'd, yet triumphant ; sneer'd at, unsubdued ; 

Thy legs must move to conquer as they fly, 

If but thy coats are reasonably high ; 

Thy breast — if bare enough — requires no shield ; 

Dance forth — sans armour thou shalt take the field, 

And own — impregnable to most assaults, 

Thy not too lawfully begotten " Waltz." 

Hail, nimble nymph ! to whom the young hussar, 
The whisker'd votary of waltz and war — 
His night devotes, despite of spur and boots, 
A sight unmatch'd since Orpheus and his brutes : 
Hail, spirit-stirring Waltz ! — beneath whose banners 
A modern hero fought for modish manners ; 
On Hounslow's heath to rival Wellesley's 4 fame, 
Coek'd — fired — and miss'd his man — but gain'd his aim: 
Hail, moving muse ! to whom the fair one's breast 
Gives all it can, and bids us take the rest. 
Oh ! for the flow of Busby, or of Fitz, 
The tatter's loyalty, the former's wits, 
To " energize the object I pursue," 
And give both Belial and his dance their due ! — 

Imperial Waltz ! imported from the Rhine 
(Famed for the growth of pedigrees and wine), 
Long be thine import from all duty free, 
And hock itself be less estcem'd than thee ; 
In some few qualities alike — f >r hock 
Improves our cellar — thou out living stock. 
The head to hock belongs — thy subtler art 
Intoxicates alone the heedless heart: 
Through the full veins thy gentler poison swims, 
And wakes to wantonness the willing limbs. 

Oh, Germany ! how much to thee we owe, 
As heaven-born Pitt can testify below ; 
Ere cursed confederation made thee France's, 

And only left us thy d d debts and dances ; 

Of subsidies and Hanover bereft, 

We bless thee still — for George the Third is left ! 

Of kings the best — and last, not least in worth, 

For graciously begetting George the Fourth. 

To Germany, and highnesses serene, 

Who owe us millions — don't wc owe the queen? 

To Germany, what owe we not besides ? 

So oft bestowing Brunswickers and brides ; 

Who jiaid for vulgar, with her royal blood, 

Prawn from the stem of each Teutonic stud : 

Who sent us — so be pardon'd all her faults — 

A dozen dukes — some kings — a queen — and Waltz. 

But peace to her — her emperor and diet, 
Though now transferr'd to Buonaparte's " fiat ;" 
Back to mv theme — O Muse of motion ! say, 
How first to Albion found thy Waltz her way ? 



Borne on the breath of hyperborean gales, 
From Hamburg's port (while Hamburg yel had mails) 
Ere yet unlucky fame — compell'd to creep 
To snowy Gottenburg — was chill'd to sleep ; 
Or, starting from her slumbers, dcign'd arise, 
Heligoland ! to stock thy mart with lies ; 

While unburnt Moscow s yet had news to scud, 

Nor owed her fiery exit to a frit od, 

She cairn — Waltz came — and with her certain sets 

Of true despatches, and as true gazettes; 

Then flamed of Austerlitz the blest despatch. 

Which Moniteur nor Morning Post can match; 

And — almost crush'd beneath the glorious news - 

Ten plays, and forty tales of Kotzebue-'s ; 

One envoy's letters, six composers' airs, 

And loads from Frankfort and from Leipsic fairs ; 

Meincr's four volumes upon womankind, 

Like Lapland witches to insure a wind; 

Brunck's heaviest tome for ballast, and to back ii, 

Of Heyne, such as should not sink the packet. 

Fraught with this cargo — and her fairest freight, 

Delightful Waltz, on tiptoe for a mate, 

The welcome vessel reach'd the genial strand, 

And round her flock'd the daughters of the land. 

Not deceut David, when, before the ark, 

His grand pas-seul excited some remark , 

Not love-lorn Quixote, when his Sancho thought 

The knight's fandango friskier than it ought ; 

Not soft Hcrodias, when with winning tread 

Her nimble feet danced off" another's head ; 

Not Cleopatra on her galley's deck, 

Display'd so much of lee:, or more of neck. 

Than thou, ambrosial Waltz, when first the moon 

Beheld thee twirling to a Saxon tune ! 

To you — ye husbands of ten years ! whose brows 

Ache with the annual tributes of a spouse ; 

To you of nine years less — who only bear 

The budding sprouts of those that you skill wear, 

\\ ith added ornaments around them rollM, 

Of native brass, or law-awarded gold ; 

To you, ye matrons, ever on the watch 

To mar a son's, or make a daughter's match ! 

To you, ye children of — whom chance accords — 

Always the ladies, and sometimes their lords ; 

To you — ye single gentlemen ; who 

Torments for life, or pleasures for a week ; 

As Love or Hymen your endeavours guide, 

To gain your own, or snatch another's bride; 

To one and all the lovely stranger came, 

And every ball-room echoes with her name. 

Endearing Waltz — to thy more melting tune 
Bow, Irish jig, and ancient rigadoon ; 
Scotch reels, avaunt ! and country-dance, forego 

Y • f iture claims to each fantastic toe ; 

Waltz — Waltz a!on< — both legs, and arms demands. 

Liberal of feet, and lavish of her hands ; 

Hands which may freely range in public sight 

Where ne'er before — but — pray "put out the light." 

Methinks the glare of yondei chandelier 

Shines much too far — or I am much too near ; 

And true, though strange — Waltz whispers this rcniirt 

" My slippery steps are safest in the dark !" 

Hut here the muse with due decorum Halts, 

And lends her longest petticoat to Waltz. 



.501 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Observant travellers! of every time ; 
JTe quartos ! puWish'd upon every clime ; 
() say, shall dull Romaika's heavy round, 
Fandango's wriggle, or Bolero's bound; 
('.in Egypt's Almas'— tantalizing group — 
Columbians caperers to the warlike whoop — 
Can aunlit from cold Kamtschatka to Cape Norn 
Willi Waltz compare, or after Waltz be borne? 
Ab, no! from Morier's pages down to Gait's, 
Each tourist pens a paragraph for " Waltz." 

Shades of those belles, whose reign began of yore, 
With George the Third's — and ended long before — 
Though in your daughters' daughters yet you thrive, 
Rurst from your lead, and be yourselves alive ! 
Bark to the ball-room speed your spectred host : 
Fool's Paradise is dull to that you lost. 
No treacherous powder bids conjecture quake; 
No still" starch'd stays make meddling fingers ache; 
(Transferr'd to those ambiguous things that ape 
Goats in their visage,' women in their shape); 
No damsel faints when rather closely press'd, 
lint mure riri'«in« seems when most caress'd ; 
Superfluous hartshorn, and reviving salts, 
Uoth bank h'd by the sovereign cordial "Waltz." 

Seductive Waltz! — though on thy native shore 
Even Werter's self proclaim'd thee half a whore j 
Werter — to decent vice though much inclined, 
Vet warm, not wanton ; dazzled, but not blind — 
Though gentle Genlis, in her strife with Stael, 
Would even proscribe thee from a Paris ball ; 
Hie fashion bails — from countesses to queens, 
And maids and valets waltz behind the scenes ; 
Wide and more wide thy witching circle spreads, 
And turns — if nothing else — at least our heads ; 
With thee even clumsy cits attempt to bounce 
And cockneys practise what they can't pronounce. 
Gods ! how the glorious theme my s'rain exalts, 
And rhyine finds partner rhyme in praise of "Waltz - ." 

Blost was the time Waltz chose for her <Uhul ; 

The court, the R 1, like herself, were new ; 3 

New face for friends, for fjes some new rewards, 
New ornaments for black and royal guards ; 
New laws to bang the rogues that roar'd for bread; 
New coins (most new q ) to follow those that fled ; 
New victories — nor can we prize them less, 
Though .Tcnky wonders at his own success ; 
New wars, because the old succeed so well, 
That most survivors envy those who fell ; 
New mistresses — no — old — and yet 't is true, 
Though they be ol I, the thing is something new ; 
Each new, quite new — (except some ancient tricks I0 ), 
New white-sticks, gold-sticks, broom-sticks, all new 

sticks ! 
With vests or ribands — deck'd alike in hue, 
New troopers strut, new turncoats blush in blue: 
So saith the muse — my — ' ', what say you ? 
S.icb was the time when Waltz might best maintain 
her new pr< f. -men's in tnis novel reign ; 
S ich was the time, nor ever yet « as such, 
[loops are no morr, and petticoats not much; 
Morals and minuets. virtue and her stays, 
And toll-tab; powder — all have had their days. 



The ball begins — the honours of the house 

First duly done by daughter or by spouse, 

Some potentate — or royal or serein — 

Willi K — t's gay grace, or sapient G — st — r's mien, 

Leads forth (he ready dame, v. hose rising Bush 

Mighl once have been mistaken lor a blush. 

From where the garb just leaves the bosom free, 

That spot where hearts l2 were once supposed to be ; 

Round all the confines of the yielded waist, 

The strangest hand may wander undisplaced ; 

The lady's in return may grasp as much 

As princely paunches offer to her touch. 

Pleased roand the chalky floor how well they trip, 

One hand reposing on the royal hip ; 

The other to the shoulder no less royal 

Ascending with affection truly loyal : 

Thus front to front the partners move or stand, 

The foot may rest, but none withdraw the hand ; 

And all in turn may follow in their rank, 

The Earl of — Asterisk — and Lady — Blank ; 

Sir — such a one — with those of fashion's host, 

For whose blest surnames — vide " Morning Post ;" 

(Or if for that impartial print too late, 

Search Doctors' Commons six months from my dat2'— 

Thus all and each, in movement swift or slow, 

The genial contact gently undergo ; • 

Til! some might marvel, with the modest Turk, 

If "nothing follows all this palming work ?"" 

True, honest Mirza — you may trust my rhyme — 

Something does follow at a fitter time ; 

The breast thus publicly resign'd to man, 

In private may resist him if it can. 

O ye ! who loved our grandmothers of yore, 
F-tz — t — k, Sh-r-d-n, and many more ! 
And thou, my prince, whose sovereign taste and will 
It is to love the lovely beldames still ; 

Thou, ghost of Q ! whose judging sprite 

Satan may spare to peep a single nigUt, 
Pronounce — if ever in your days of bliss — 
Asmodeus struck so bright a stroke as this ; 
To teach the young ideas how to rise, 
Flush in the cheek and languish in the eyes ; 
Rush to the heart and lighten through the frame, 
With half-told wish and ill-dissembled flame; 
For prurient nature still will storm the breast — 
IVIio, tempted thus, can answer for the rest? 

But ye — who never felt a single thought 
For what our morals are to be, or ought ; 
Who wisely wish the charms you view to reap, 
Say — would you make those beauties quite so cheap? 
Hoi from the hands promiscuously applied, 
Round the slight waist ; or down the glowing side; 
Where were the rapture then to clasp the form, 
From this lewd grasp, and lawless contact warm? 
At once love's most endearing thought resign, 
'1'n press the hand so press'd by none but thine; 
To gaze upon that eve which never met 
Another's ardent look without regret • 
Approach the Up which all, without restraint, 
Come near enough — if not to touch — to taint ; 
If such thou lovest — love her then no more, 
Or giv< — like her — caresses to a score ; 
Her mind with these is gone, and with it go 
The little led behind it to bestow. 



WALTZ. 



505 



Voluptuous Waltz ! and dare I thus blaspheme ? 

Thy bard forgot thy praises were his theme. 

Terpsichore forgive! — at every ball 

My wife now waltzes — and my daughters shall; 

My son (or stop — 't is needless to inquire — 

These little aceidcnts should ne'er transpire ; 

Some ages hence our genealogic tree 

Will wear as green a bough for him as me), 

Waltzing shall rear, to make our name amends, 

Grandsons for me — in heirs to all his friends. 



NOTES. 



Note 1. Page 502, line 4. 
State of the poll (last day) 5. 

Note 2. Page 502, line 6. 
My Latin is all forgotten, if a man can be said to have 
forgotten what he never remembered ; but I bought 
my title-page motto of a Catholic priest for a three 
shilling bank token, after much haggling for the even 
sixpence. I grudged tne money to a Papist, being all 
for the memory of Perceval, and " No Popery ;" and 
quite regretting the downfall of the Pope, because we 
can't burn him any more. 

Note 3. Page 503, line 1. 
" Glance their many-twinkling feet." — Gray. 
Note 4. Page 503, line 21. 
To rival Lord W.'s, or his nephew's, as the reader 
pleases: — the one gained a pretty woman, whom he 
deserved, by fighting for ; and die other has been fight- 
ing in the Peninsula many a long day, " by Shrewsbury 
clock," without gaining any thing in that country but 
the title of" the Great Lord," and " the Lord," which 
savours of profanation, having been hitherto applied 
only to that Being, to whom " Te Deums" for carnage 
are the rankest blasphemy. — It is to be presumed the 
general will one day return to his Sabine farm, there 
" To tame the genius of the Btubbom plain, 
Jllniost as quickly as he conquor'd Spain!" 

The Lord Peterborough conquered continents in a 
summer ; we do more — we contrive both to conquer 
and lose them in a shorter season. If the " great Lord's" 
Cincinnatian progress in agriculture be no speedier 
than the proportional average of time in Pope's couplet, 
it will, according to the farmer's proverb, be " plough- 
ing with dogs." 

By the by — one of this illustrious person's new titles 
is forgotten — it is, however, worth remembering — "Sul- 
vador del mundo .'" credite, posteri ! If this be the 
appellation annexed by the inhabitants of the Peninsula 
to the name of a man who has not yet saved them — 
query — are they worth saving even in this world'/ for, 
according to the mildest modifications of any Christian 
creed, those three words make the odds much against 
them in the next. — " Saviour of the world," quotha ! — 
it were to be wished that he, or any one else, could save 
a comer of it — his country. Yet this stupid misnomer, 
although it shows the near connexion between super- 
stition and impii ly, bo tar has its use, that it proves 
there can be little to dread from those Catholics (in- 
quisitorial Catholics too) who can confer such an ap- 
pellation on ^Protestant. I suppose next year he will 
be entitled the " Virgin Mary :" if so, Lord George Gor- 
2 v 2 69 



don himself would have nothing to object to such liberal 
bastards of our Lady of Babylon. 

Note 5. Page 503, line 7. 
The patriotic arson of our amiable allies cannot be 
sufficiently commended — nor subscribed for. Amongst 
other details omitted in the various despatches of our 
eloquent ambassador, he did not state (being too much 
occupied with the exploits of Colonel C , in swim- 
ming rivers frozen, and galloping over roads impas- 
sable), that one entire province perished by famine in 
the most melancholy manner, as follows : — In General 
Rostopchin's consummate conflagration, the consump- 
tion of tallow and train oil was so great, that the market 
was inadequate to the demand : and thus one hundred 
and thirty-three thousand persons were starved to death, 
by being reduced to wholesome diet ! The lamplighters 
of London have since subscribed a pint (of oil) a-piece, 
and the tallow-chandlers have unanimously voted a 
quantity of best moulds (four to the pound) to the re- 
lief of the surviving Scythians — the scarcity will soon, 
by such exertions, and a proper attention to the quality 
rather than the quantity of provision, be totally alle- 
viated. It is said, in return, that the untouched Ukraine 
has subscribed sixty thousand beeves for a day's meal 
to our suffering manufacturers. 

Note 6. Page 504, line 5. 

Dancing girls — who do for hire what Waltz doth 
gratis. 

Note 7. Page 504, line 20. 

It cannot be complained now, as in the Lady Baus- 
siere's time, of the " Sieur de la Croix," that there be 
"no whiskers;" but how far these are indications of 
valour in the field, or elsewhere, may stilt be question- 
able. Much may be and hath been avouched on both 
sides. In the olden time philosophers had whiskers 
and soldiers none — Scipio himself was shaven — Han- 
nibal thought his one eye handsome enough without 
a beard; but Adrian, the Emperor, wore a beard 
(having warts on his chin, which neither the Empress 
Sabina, nor even the courtiers, could abide) — Turenne 
had whiskers, Marlborough none — Buonaparte is un- 

whiskered, the R whiskered ; " argal" greatness of 

mind and w hiskers may or may not go together : but 
certainly the different occurrences, since the grow th of 
the last-mentioned, go further in behalf of whiskers 
than the anathema of Anselm did against long hair in 
the reign of Henry I. 

Formerly, red was a favourite colour. See Lodowick 
Barrey's comedy of \ldm Alley, 1661, act I. scene 1. 

" Taffeta. Now, for a wager — What colour'd beard 
comes next by the window ? 

"Adriuna. A black man's, I think. 

" Taffeta. I think not so : I think a red, for that is 
most in fashion.'" 

There is " nothing new under the sun ;" but red, 
then a favourite, has now subsided into a favourite 1 * 
colour. 

Note 8. Page 504, line 40. 

An anachronism — Waltz, and the battle of Austerliti 
are before said to have opened the ball together : the 
bard means (if he means any tiling), Waltz was not so 

much in vogue till the K 1 attained the acme of 

his popularity. Waltz, the comet, whiskers, and (he 
new government, illuminated heaven and earth, in all 



506 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



their glory, much about the same time ; of these the 
comet only has disappeared ; the other three continue 
to astonish us still. — Printer's Devil. 

Note 9. Page 504, line 44. 
Amonest others a new ninepence — a creditable coin 
now forthcoming, worth a pound, in paper, at the fairest 
calculation. 

Note 10. Page 504, line 51. 

" Oh that right should thus overcome might /" Who 
does not remember the "delicate investigation" in the 
" Merry Wives of Windsor ?" 

" Ford. Pray you come near : if I suspect without 
cause, why then make sport at me ; then let me be 
your jest ; I deserve it. How now ? whither bear you 
this? 

" Mrs. Ford. What have you to do whither they bear 
it? — you were best meddle with buck- washing." 

Note 11. Page 504, line 56. 

The gentle, or ferocious reader, may fill up the blank 

as he pleases — there are several dissyllabic names at Iu3 



service (being already in the R t's) : it would not be 

fair to back any peculiar initial against the alphabet, 
as every month will add to (lie list now entered for the 
sweepstakes — a distinguished consonant is said to be 
the favourite, much against the wishes of the knowing 
ones. 

Note 12. Page 504, line 74. 

" We have changed all that," says the Mock Doctor, 
"'tis all gone — Asmodeus know? where. A fur ail, it 
is of no great importance how women's hearts are dis- 
posed of; they have nature's privilege to distribute them 
as absurdly as possible. But there are also some men 
with hearts so thoroughly bad, as to remind us of those 
phenomena often mentioned in natural history; viz. a 
mass of solid stone — only to be opened by force — and 
when divided, you discover a toad in the centre, lively, 
and with the reputation of being venomous." 
Note 13. Page 504, line 94. 

In Turkey, a pertinent — here, an impertinent and 
superfluous question — literally put, as in the text, by 
a Persian to Morier, on seeing a waltz in Pera. — V <dt 
Morier's Travels. 



Efie HUiwcut of Sa&eo* 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



At Ferrara (in the library) are preserved the original 
MSS. of Tasso's Gierusalemme and of Guarini's Pastor 
Fido, with letters of Tasso, one from Titian to Ariosto ; 
and the inkstand and chair, the tomb and the house of 
the latter. But as misfortune has a greater interest for 
posterity, and little or none for the contemporary, the cell 
where Tasso was confined in the hospital of St. Anna 
attracts a more fixed attention than the residence or the 
monument of Ariosto — at least it had this effect en me. 
There are two inscriptions, one on the outer gate, the 
second over the cell itself, inviting, unnecessarily, the 
wonder and the indignation of the spectator. Ferrara is 
much decayed and depopulated ; the castle still exists en- 
tire ; and I saw the court where Parisina and Hugo were 
beheaded, according to the annal of Gibbon. 



THE LAMENT OF TASSO. 



i. 

Long years! — It tries the thrilling frame to bear 

And eagle-spirit of a child of song — 

Long years of outrage, calumny and wrong ; 

Imputed madness, prison'd solitude, 

And the mind's canker in its savage mood, 

When the impatient thirst of light and air 

Parches the heart ; and the abhorred grate, 

Marring the sunbeams with its hideous shade, 

Works through the throbbing eye-ball to the brain 

With a hot sense of heaviness and pain ; 

And bare, at once, cantivity riisplay'd 

feianos scoffing tnrougn the never-open'd gate, 

Which nothing through its bars admits, save day 



And tasteless food, which I liave eat alone 

Till its unsocial bitterness is gone ; 

And I can banquet like a beast of prey, 

Sullen and lonely, couching in the cave 

Which is my lair, and — it may be — my grave. 

All this hath somewhat worn me, and may wear, 

But must be borne, I stoop not to despair ; 

For I have battled with mine agony, 

And made me wings wherewith to overfly 

The narrow circus of my dungeon wall, 

And freed the Holy Sepulchre from thrall ; 

And revell'd among men and things divine, 

And pour'd my spirit over Palestine, 

In honour of the sacred war for him, 

The God who was on earth and is in heaven, 

For he hath strengthen'd me in heart and limb. 

That through this sufferance I might be forgiven, 

I have employ'd my penance to record 

How Salem's shrine was won, and how adored. 

II. 

But this is o'er — my pleasant task is done : 
My long-sustaining friend of many years! 
If 1 do blot thy final page with tears, 
Know that my sorrows have wrung from me none. 
But thou, my young creation ! my soul's child ! 
Which ever playing round me came and smiled, 
And woo'd me from myself with thy sweet sight, 
Thou too art goru — and so is my delight: 
And therefore do I weep and inly bli ed 
Willi this last bruise upon a broken reed. 
Thou too art ended — what is left me now? 
For I have aflguish yet to bear — and how? 
I know not (hat — but in the innate force 
Of my own spirit shall be found resource. 
1 1 have not sunk, for I had no remorse, 



THE LAMENT OF TASSO. 



507 



Nor cause for such : they call'd me mad — and why ? 

Oh Leonora ! wilt not thou reply ? 

I was indeed delirious in my heart 

To lift my love so lofty as thou art ; 

But still my frenzy was not of the mind ; 

I knew my fault, and feel my punishment 

Not less because I suffer it unbent. 

That thou wert beautiful, and I not blind, 

Hath been the sin which shuts me from mankind ; 

But let them go, or torture as they will, 

My heart can multiply thine image still ; 

Successful lovo may sate itself away, 

The wretched are the faithful ; 't is their fate 

To have all feeling save the one decay, 

And every passion into one dilate, 

As rapid rivers into ocean pour ; 

But ours is fathomless, and hath no shore. 

III. 

Above me, hark ! the long and maniac cry 

Of minds and bodies in captivity. 

And hark ! the lash and the increasing howl, 

And the half-inarticulate blasphemy ! 

There be some here with worse than frenzy foul, 

Some who do still goad on the o'er-labour'd mind, 

And dim the little light that 's left behind 

With needless torture, as their tyrant will 

Is wound up to the lust of doing ill : 

With these and with their victims am I class'd, 

'Mid sounds and sights like these long years have pass'd; 

'Mid sights and suunds like these my life may close : 

So let it be — for then I shall repose. 

IV. 

I have been patient, let me be so yet ; 
I had forgotten half I would forge*, 
But it revives— oh ! would it were my lot 
To be forgetful as I am forgot !— 
Feel I not wroth with those who bade me dwell 
In this vast lazar-housc of many woes ? 
Where laughter is not mirth, nor thought the mind, 
Nor words a language, nor ev'n men mankind ; 
Where cries reply to curses, shrieks to blows, 
And each is tortured in his separate hell — 
For we are crowded in our solitudes — 
Many, but each divided by the wall, 
Which echoes Madness in her babbling moods ; — 
While all can hear, none heed his neighbour's call- 
None ! save that One, the veriest wretch of all, 
Who was not made to be the mate of these, 
Nor bound between distraction and disease. 
Feel I not wroth with those who placed me here ? 
Who have debased me in the minds of men, 
Debarring me the usage of my own, 
Blighting my life in best of its career, 
Branding my thoughts as things to shun and fear? 
Would I not pay them back these pangs again, 
And teach them inward sorrow's stifled groan? 
The struggle to be calm, and cold distress, 
Which undermines our stoical success ? 
No ! — still too proud to be vindictive — I 
Have pardnn'd princes' insults, and would die. 
Yes, sister of my sovereign ! for thy sake 
I weed all bitterness from out my breast, 
It hath no business where thou art a guest; 



Thy brother hates — but I can not detest, 
Thou piticst not — but I can not forsake. 

V. 

Look on a love which knows not to despair, 
But all unquench'd is still my better part, 
Dwelling deep in my shut and silent heart 
As dwells the gather'd lightning in its cloud, 
Encompass'd with its dark and rolling shroud, 
Till struck, — forth flies the all-ethereal dart ! 
And thus at the collision of thy name 
The vivid thought still flashes through my frame, 
And for a moment all things as they were 
Flit by me ; — they are gone — I am the same. 
And yet my love without ambition grew ; 
I knew thy state, my station, and I knew 
A princess was no love-mate for a bard ; 
I told it not, I breathed it not, it was 
Sufficient to itself, its own reward ; 
And if my eyes reveal'd it, they, alas ! 
Were punish'd by the silentness of thine, 
And yet I did not venture to repitie. 
Thou wert to me a crystal-girded shrine, 
Worshipp'd at holy distance, ana around 
Hallow'd and meekly kiss'd the saintly ground , 
Not for thou wert a princess, but that love 
Had robed thee with a glory, and array'd 
Thy lineaments in beauty that dismay'd — 
Oh ! not dismay'd — hut awed, like One above , 
And in that sweet severity there was 
A something which all softness did surpass — 
I know not how — thy genius master'd mine — 
My star stood still before thee : — if it were 
Presumptuous thus to love without design, 
That sad fatality hath cost me dear ; 
But thou art dearest still, and I should be 
Fit for this cell, which wrongs me, but for thee. 
The very love which lock'd me to my chain 
Hath lighten'd half its weight ; and for the rest, 
Thougli heavy, lent me vigour to sustain, 
And look to thee with undivided breast, 
And foil the ingenuity of pain. 

VI. 

It is no marvel — from my very birtn 

My soul was drunk with love, which did pervade 

And mingle with whate'er I saw on earth ; 

Of objects all inanimate I made 

Idols, and out of wild and lonely flowers, 

And rocks, whereby they grew, a paradise, 

Where I did lay me down within the shade 

Of waving trees, and dream'd uncounted hours 

Though I was chid for wandering ; and the wise 

Shook their white aged heads o'er me, and said 

Of such materials wretched men were made, 

And such a truant bey would end in woe, 

And that the only lesson was a blow ; 

And then they smote me, and I did not weep, 

But cursed them in my heart, and to my haunt 

Return'd and wept alone, and dream'd again 

The visions which arise without a sleep. 

And with my years my soul began to pant 

With feelings of strange tumult and soft pain, 

And the whole heart exhaled into one want, 

But undefined, and wandering, till the day 



503 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



I found the tiling I sought — and that was thee ; 
And then I lust my being all to be 
Absorb'd in thine — the world was past away — 
Tliuu didst annihilate the earth to me ! 

VII. 

I loved all solitude — but little thought 
To spend I know not what of life, remote 
From all communion with existence, save 
The maniac and his tyrant ; had I been 
Their fellow, many years ere this had seen 
My mind like theirs corrupted to its grave ; 
But who hath seen me writhe, or heard me rave ? 
Perchance in such a cell we suffer more 
Than the wreck'd sailor on his desert shore ; 
The world is all before him — mine is liere, 
Scarce twice the space they must accord my bier. 
What though he perish, he may lift his eye 
And with a dying glance upbraid the sky — 
I will not raise my own in such reproof, 
Although 't is clouded by my dungeon roof. 

VIII. 

Yet do I feel at times my mind decline, 
But with a sense of its decay : — I see 
Unwonted lights along my prison shine, 
And a strange demon, who is vexing me 
With pilfering pranks and petty pains, belovy 
The feeling of the healthful and the free ; 
But much to one, who long hath suffer'd so, 
Sickness of heart, and narrowness of place, 
And all that may be borne, or can debase. 
I thought mine enemies had been but man, 
But spirits may be leagued with them — all earth 
Abandons — Heaven forgets me ; — in the dearth 
Of such defence the powers of evil can, 
It may be, tempt me further, and prevail 
Against the outworn creature they assail. 
Why in this furnace is my spirit proved 
Like stee! in tempering fire ? because I loved ! 
Because I loved what not to love, and see, 
Was more or less than mortal, and than me. 



IX. 

I once was quick in feeling — that is o'er ; — 

My scars are callous, or I should have dash'd 

My brain against these bars as the sun flash'd 

In mockery through them ; — if I bear and bore 

The much I have recounted, and the more 

Which hath no words, 't is that I would not die 

And sanction with self-slaughter the dull lie 

Which snared me here, and with the brand of shame 

Stamp madness deep into my memory, 

And woo compassion to a blighted name, 

Sealing the sentence which my foes proclaim. 

No— it shall be immortal ! — and I make 

A future temple of my present cell, 

Which nations yet shall visit for my sake. 

While thou, Fcrrara ! when no longer dwell 

The ducal chiefs within thee, shalt fall down, 

And crumbling piecemeal view thy hearthless halls, 

A poet's wreath shall be thine only crown, 

A poet's dungeon thy most far renown, 

While strangers wonder o'er thy unpeopled walls ! 

And thou, Leonora ! thou — who wert ashamed 

That such as I could love — who blush'd to hear 

To less than monarchs that thou couldst be dear, 

Go ! tell thy brother that my heart, untamed 

By grief, years, weariness — and it may be 

A taint of that he would impute to me, 

From long infection of a den like this, 

W T here the mind rots congenial with the abyss,— 

Adores thee still ; — and add — that when the towers 

And battlements which guard his joyous hours 

Of banquet, dance, and revel, are forgot, 

Or left untended in a dull repose, 

This — this shall be a consecrated spot ! 

But thou — when all that birth and beauty throws 

Of magic round thee is extinct — shall have 

One half the laurel which o'ershades my grave. 

No power in death can tear our names apart, 

As none in life could rend thee from my heart. 

Yes, Leonora ! it shall be our fate 

To be entwined for ever — but too late ! 



2£?ct)veto J8tlofttes* 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The subsequent poems were written at the request 
of my friend, the Hon. D. Kinnaird, for a selection of 
Hebrew Melodies, and have been published, with the 
music, arranged by Mr. Braham and Mr. Nathan. 



HEBREW MELODIES. 



SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY. 
Shf walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies ; 



And all that 's best of dark and t>right 

Meet in her aspect and her eyes : 
Thus mellow'd to that tender light 

Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 
One shade the more, one ray the less, 

Had half impair'd the nameless grace 
Which waves in every raven tress, 

Or softly lightens o'er her face ; 
Where thoughts serenely sweet express 

How pure, how dear their dwclling-pluco. 

And on that check, and o'er that brow, 

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 
The smiles that win, the tints that glow, 

But tell of days in goodness spent, 
A mind at peace with all below, 

A heart whose love is innocent ' 



HEBREW MELODIES. 



509 



THE HARP THE MONARCH MINSTREL 

SWEPT. 
The harp the monarch minstrel swept, 

The king of men, the loved of Heaven, 
Which Music hallow'd while she wept 

O'er tones her heart of hearts had given. 

Redoubled be her tears, its chords are riven ! 
It sofien'd men of iron mould, 

It gave them virtues not their own ; 
No ear so dull, no soul so cold, 

That felt not, fired not to the tone, 

Till David's lyre grew mightier than his throne ! 

It told the triumphs of our king, 

It wafted our glory to our God ; 
It made our gladden'd valleys ring, 

The cedars bow, the mountains nod ; 

Its sound aspired to heaven, and there abode ! 
Since then, though heard on earth no more, 

Devotion and her daughter Love 
Still bid the bursting spirit soar 

To sounds that seem as from above, 

In dreams that day's broad light can not remove. 



IF THAT HIGH WORLD. 

If that high world, which lies beyond 

Our own, surviving love endears ; 
If there the cherish'd heart be fond, 

The eye the same, except in tears — 
How welcome those untrodden spheres ! 

How sweet this very hour to die ! 
To s?ar from earth, and find all fears 

Lost in thy light — Eternity ! 

It must be so : 't is not for self 

That we so tremble on the brink ; 
And striving to o'erleap the gulf, 

Yet cling to being's severing link. 
Oh ! in that future let us think 

To hold each heart the heart rhat shares, 
With them the immortal waters drink, 

And soul in soul grow deathless theirs ! 



THE WILD GAZELLE. 

The wild gazelle on Judah's hills 

Exulting yet may bound, 
And drink from all the living rill3 

That gush on holy ground j 
Its airy step and glorious eye 

May glance in tameless transport by : — 

A step as fleet, an eye more bright, 

Hath Judah witness'd there ; 
And o'er her scenes of lost delight 

Inhabitants more fair. 
The cedars wave on Lebanon, 
But Judah's statelier maids are gone ! 

More blest each palm that shades those plains 

Than Israel's scatter'd race ; 
For, taking root, it there remains 

In solitary grace : 
It cannot quit its place of birth, 
It will not live in other earth. 



But we must wander witheringly, 

In other lands to die ; 
And where our fathers' ashes be, 

Our own may never lie: 
Our temple hath not left a stone, 
And Mockery sits on Salem's throne. 



OH! WEEP FOR THOSE. 

On ! weep for those that wept by Babel's stream, 
Whose shrines are desolate, whose land a dream ; 
Weep for the harp of Judah's broken shell: 
Mourn — where their God hath dwelt the godless dwell' 

And where shall Israel lave her bleeding feet ? 
And when shall Zion's songs again seem sweet? 
And Judah's melody once more rejoice 
The hearts that lcap'd before its heavenly voice ? 

Tribes of the wandering foot and weary breast, 
How shall ye flee away and be at rest ? 
The wild-dove hath her nest, the fox his cave, 
Mankind their country — Israel but the grave ! 



ON JORDAN'S BANKS, 

On Jordan's banks the Arab's camels stra), 

On Sion's hill the False One's votaries pray, 

The Baal-adorer bows on Sinai's steep — 

Yet there — even there — Oh God ! thy thunders sircp , 

There — where thy finger scorch'd the tablet stone - 
There — where thy shadow to thy people shone ! 
Thy glory shrouded in its garb of fire : 
Thyself — none living see and not expire ! 

Oh ! in the lightning let thy glance appear ! 
Sweep from his shiver'd hand the oppressor's spear . 
How long by tyrants shall thy land be trod? 
How long thy temple worshipless, Oh God ? 



JEPHTILVS DAUGHTER. 
Since our country, our God — Oh ! my sire ! 
Demand that thy daughter expire ; 
Since thy triumph was bought by thy vow- 
Strike the bosom that 's bared for thee now ' 

And the voice of my mourning is o'er, 
And the mountains behold me no more : 
If the hand that 1 love lay me low, 
There cannot be pain in the blow ! 

And of this, oh, my father! be sure — 
That the blood of thy child is ;i* [Hire 
As the blessing I beg ere it flow, 
And the last thought that soothes me below 

Though the virgins of Salem lament, 
Be the judge and the hero unbent ! 
I have won the great battle for thee. 
And my father and country arc free ! 

When this blood of thy giving hath gu<=h'j 
When the voice that thou lovcst is hush'd, 
Let my memory still be thy pride. 
And forget not I smiled as I dietf . 



510 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



OH! SNATCH'D AWAY IN BEAUTY'S 

BLOOM. 
On ! snatch'd away in beauty's bloom, 
On thee shall press no ponderous tomb ; 
But on thy turf shall roses rear 
Their leaves, the earliest of the year ; 
And the wild cypress wave in tender gloom : 

And oft by yon blue gushing stream 
Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head, 

And feed deep thought with many a dream, 
And lingering pause and lightly tread : 
Fond wretch ! as if her step disturb'd the dead! 

Away ! we know that tears are vain, 
That death nor heeds nor hears distress : 

Will this unteach us to complain? 
Or make one mourner weep the less ? 

And thou — who lell'st me to forget, 

Thy looks arc wan, thine eyes are wet. 



MY SOUL IS DARK. 

Mr soul is dark. — Oh ! quickly string 

The harp I yet can brook to hear ; 
And let thy gentle fingers fling 

Its melting murmurs o'er mine ear. 
If in this heart a hope be dear, 

That sound shall charm it forth again ; 
l r in these eyes there lurk a tear, 

'T will flow, and cease to burn my brain : 

But bid the strain be wild and deep, 

Nor let thy notes of joy be first : 
I tell thee, minstrel, I must weep, 

Or else this heavy heart will burst ; 
For it hath been by sorrow mirst, 

And ached in sleepless silence long ; 
And now 't is doom'd to know the worst, 

And break at once — or yield to song. 



I SAW THEE WEEP. 
I saw thee weep — the big bright tear 

Came o'er that eye of blue ; 
And then methoughtit did appear 

A violet dropping dew ; 
I saw thee smile — the sapphire's blaze 

Beside thee ceased to shine, 
It could not match the living rays 

That fill'd that glance of thine. 

As clouds from yonder sun receive 

A deep and mellow die. 
Which scarce the shade of coming eve 

Can banish from the sky, 
Those smiles unto the moodiest mind 

Their own pure joy impart ; 
Their sunshine leaves a glow behind 

That lightens o'er the heart. 



THY DAYS ARE DONE. 

Th v days are done, thy fame begun ; 
T/iV country's s'rains record 



The triumphs of her chosen son, 
The slaughters of his sword ! 

The deeds he did, the fields he won, 
The freedom he restored ! 

Though thou art fall'n, while we are free 
Thou shalt not taste of death ! 

The generous blood that flow'd from thee 
Disdain'd to sink beneath : 

Within our veins its currents be, 
Thy spirit on our breath : 

Thy name, our charging hosts along, 

Shall be the battle-word ! 
Thy fall, the theme of choral song 

From virgin voices pour'd ! 
To weep would do thy glory wrong ; 

Thou shalt not be deplored. 



SONG OF SAUL BEFORE HIS LAST 
BATTLE. 

Warriors and chiefs ! should the shaft or the sword 
Pierce me in leading the host of the Lord) 
Heed not the corse, though a king's, in your path : 
Bury your steel in the bosoms of Gath ! 

Thou who art bearing my buckler and bow, 
Should the soldiers of Saul look away from the foe, 
Stretch me that moment in blood at thy feet ! 
Mine be the doom which they dared not to meet. 

Farewell to others, but never we part, 
Heir to my royalty, son of my heart ! 
Bright is the diadem, boundless the sway, 
Or kingly the death, which awaits us to-day ! 



SAUL. 

Thou whose spell can raise the dead, 
Bid the prophet's form appear. 

" Samuel, raise thy buried head ! 
King, behold the phantom seer !" 

Earth yawn'd ; he stood the centre of a cloud : 
Light changed its hue, retiring from his shroud: 
Death stood all glassy in his fixed eye ; 
His hand was wither'd and his veins were dry ; 
His foot, in bony whiteness, glitter'd there, 
Shrunken and sinewless, and ghastly bare : 
From lips that moved not and unbreathing frame, 
Like cavern'd winds, the hollow accents came. 
Saul saw, and fell to earth, as falls the oak, 
At once, and blasted by the thunder-stroke. 

"Why is my sleep disquieted? 
Who is he that calls the dead ? 
Is it thou, oh king? Behold, 
Bloodless are these limbs, and cold : 
Such are mine ; and such shall be 
Thine, to-morrow, when with me : 
Ere the coming day is done, 
Such shalt thou be, such thy son. 
Fare thee well, but (or a day ; 
Then we mix our mouldering clay. 
Thou, thy race, lie pale and low, 
I lerced by shafts of many a bow : 



HEBREW MELODIES. 


511 


And the falchion by thy side 


An age shall fleet like earthly year ; 




To thy heart, thy hand shall guide : 


Its years as moments shall endure. 




Crownless, breathless, headless fall, 


Away, away, without a wing, 




Son and sire, the house of Saul!" 


O'er all, through all, its thoughts shall 


fly; 




A nameless and eternal thing, 
Forgetting what it was to die. 








"ALL IS VANITY, SAITH THE PREACHER." 








Fame, wisdom, love, and power were mine, 


VISION OF BELSIIAZZAR. 




And health and youth possess'd me ; 


The king was on his throne, 




My goblets hhish'd from every vine, 


The satraps throng'd the hail ; 




And lovely forms caress'd me ; 


A thousand bright lamps shone 




I sunn'd my heart in beauty's eyes, 


O'er that high festival. 




And felt my soul grow tender; 


A thousand cups df gold, 




All earth can give, or mortal prize, 


In Judah deera'd divine — 




Was mine of regal splendour. 


Jehovah's vessels hold 

The godless heathen's wine ! 




I strive to number o'er what days 






Remembrance can discover, 


In that same hour and hall, 




Which all that life or earth displays 


The fingers of a hand 




Would lure me to live over. 


Came forth against the wall, 




There rose no day, there rol'.'d no hour 


And wrote as if on sand : 




Of pleasure unembitter'd ; 


The fingers of a man ; — 




And not a trapping ucek'd my power 


A solitary hand 




That gall'd not while it glitter'd. 


Along the letters ran, 

And traced them like a wano. 




The serpent of the field, by art 






And spells, is won from harming; 


The monarch saw, and shook, 




But that which coils around the heart, 


And bade no more rejoice ; 




Oh ! who hath power of charming ? 


All bloodless wax'd his look, 




It will not list to wisdom's lore, 


And tremulous his voice. 




Nor music's voice can lure it; 


" Let the men of lore appeat, 




But there it stings for evermore 


The wisest of the earth, 




The soul that must endure it. 


And expound the words of fear, 






Which mar our royal mirth." 
Chaldea's seers are good, 




WHEN COLDNESS WRAPS THIS SUFFER- 


ING CLAY. 


But here they have no skill : 
And the unknown letters stood, 




When coldness wraps this suffering clay, 


Untold and awful still. 




Ah, whither strays the immortal mind ? 


And Babel's men of age 




It cannot die, it cannot stay, 


Are wise and deep in lore ; 




But leaves its darken'd dust behind. 


But new they were not sage, 




Then, uncmbodied, doth it trace 


They saw — but knew no more 




By steps each planet's heavenly way? 






Or fill at once the realms of space, 


A captive in the land, 




A thing of eyes, that all survey? 


A stranger and a youth, 
He heard the king's command, 




Eternal, boundless, undecay'd, 


He saw that writing's truth. 




A thought unseen, hut seeing all, 


The lamps around were bright, 




All, all in earth, or skies display'd, 


The prophecy in view ; 




Shall it survey, shall it recall : 


He read it on that night, — 




Each fainter trace that memory holds, 


The morrow proved it true. 




So darkly of departed years, 






In one broad glance the soul beholds, 


•* Belshazzar's grave is made, 




And all, that was, at once appears. 


His kingdom pass'd away, 
He in the balance weigh'd, 




Before creation peopled earth, 


Is light and worthless clay. 




Its eve shall roll through chaos back ; 


The shroud, his robe of state, 




And where the furthest heaven had birth, 


His canopy, the stone ; 




The spirit trace its rising track. 


The Medc is at his gate* 




And where the future mars or makes, 


The Persian on his throne!" 




Its glance dilate o'er all to be, 
While sun is qlicnch'd or system breaks, 








Fix'd in its own eternity. 


SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS' 




Above or love, hope, hate, or fear, 


Sun of the sleepless ! melancholy star ! 




It lives all passu ulcss and pure : 


Whose tearful beam glows tremulously far, 





12 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



That show'st the darkness thou canst not dispel, 

Mow like art thou to jqy renjember'd well! 

So gleams the past, the light of Other (lays, 

Which shines, hut warms not with its powerless rays : 

A night-beam sorrow watcheth to behold, 

Distinct, but distant — clear — but, oh how cold! 



WERE MY BOSOM AS FALSE AS THOU 
DEEM'ST IT TO BE. 

Were my bosom as false as thou deem'st it to be, 

I need not have wander'd from far Galilee; 

It was but abjuring my creed to efface 

The curse which, thou say'st, is the crime of my race. 

If the bad never triumph, then God is with thee! 

If the slave only sin, thou art spotless and free ! 

If the exile on earth is an outcast on high, 

Live on in thy faith, but in mine I will die. 

I have lost for that faith more than thou canst bestow, 

As (he God who permits thee to prosper doth know; 

In his hand is my heart and my hope — and in thine 

The land and the life which for him I resign. 



HEROD'S LAMENT FOR MARIAMNE. 

Oh, Mariamne ! now for thee 

The heart for which thou bled'st is bleeding ; 
Revenge is lost in agony, 

And wild remorse to rage succeeding. 
Oh, Mariamne ! where art thou? 

Thou canst not hear my bitter pleading: 
Ah, couhlst thou — thou wouldst pardon now, 

Though Heavcci were to my prayer unheeding 

And is she dead ? — and did they dare 

Obey my frenzy's jealous raving? 
My wrath but doom'd my own despair: 

The sword that smote her 's o'er me waving.- 
But thou art cold, my murder'd love ! 

And this dark heart is vainly craving 
For her who soars alone above, 

And leaves my soul unworthy saving. 

She 's gone, who shared my diadem ! 

She sunk, with her my joys entombing ; 
I swept that flower from Judah's stem 

Whose leaves for me alone were blooming. 
And mine 's the guilt, and mine the hell, 

This bosom's desolation dooming ; 
And I have earn'd those tortures well, 

Which unconsumed are still consuming ! 



ON THE DAY OF THE DESTRUCTION OF 
JERUSALEM BY TITUS. 

From the last hill that looks on thy once holy dome 
I beheld thee, oh Sion ! when render'd to Rome: 
T was thy last sun went down, and the flames of thy fall 
^lash'd back on the last glance I gave to thy wall. 

I look'd for thy temple, I look'd for my home, 

And to'got for a moment my bondage to come ; 

I beheld but the death-fire that fed on thy fane, 

And the fast-fetter'd hands that made vengeance in vain. 



On many an eve, the high spot whence I gazed 
Had reflected the last beam of day as it blazed ; 

vVhile*] Sl 1 mi the height, and beheld the decline 

Of the rays from the mountain that shone on thy shrine. 

And now on that mountain I stood on that day, 
But I mark'd not the twilight beam melting away; 
Oh! would that the lighting had glared in its stead, 
And the thunderbolt burst on the conqueror's head! 

But the gods of the Pagan shall never profane 
The shrine where Jehovah disdain'd not to reign ; 
And scalter'd and scorn'd as thy people may be, 
Our worship, oh Father ! is only for thee. 



BY THE RIVERS OF BABYLON WE SAT 
DOWN AND WEPT. 

We sat down and wept by the waters 
Of Babel, and thought of the day 

When our foe, in the hue of his slaughters, 
Made Salem's high places his prey ; 

And ye, oh her desolate daughters ! 
Were scatter'd all weeping away. 

While sadly we gazed on the river 
Which roll'd on in freedom below, 

They demanded the song ; but, oh never 
That triumph the stranger shall know ! 

May this right hand be wither'd for ever, 
Ere it string our high harp for the foe ! 

On the willow that harp is suspended, — 
Oh Salem ! its sound should be free ; 

And the hour when thy glories were ended, 
But left me that token of thee: 

And ne'er shall its soft tones be blended 
With the voice of the spoiler by me ! 



THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. 

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, 
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold ; 
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, 
When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. 
Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, 
That host with their banners at sunset were seen : 
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown, 
That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown. 
For the angel of death spread his wings on the blast, 
And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd ; 
And the eyes of the sleepers wax'd deadly and chill, 
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still. 
And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, 
But through it there roll'd not the breath of his pride: 
And the foam of hi? gasping lay white on the turf, 
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf. 
And there lay the rider distorted and pale, 
Willi the dew on his brow and the rust on his mail ; 
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone, 
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown. 
And the widows of Ashur arc loud in their wail, 
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal ; 
Ami the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, 
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord 5 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



513 



FROM JOB. 

A spirit pass'd before me: I beheld 

The face of immortality unveil'd — 

Deep sleep came down on every eye save mine — 

And there it stood, — all formless — but divine: 

Along my bones the creeping flesh did quake ; 

And as my damp hair stiifen'd, thus it spake : 



" Is man more just than God ? Is man more pure 
Than he who deems even seraphs insecure? 
Creatures of clay — vain dwellers in the dust! 
The moth survives you, and are ye more just? 
Tilings of a day ! you wither ere the night, 
Heedless and blind to wisdom's wasted light !"' 



ifttecrUautoug |!orm&. 



ODE 



NAFOLEON BUONAPARTE. 



" Expendc Annibalem: — quot libras in duce summo 
lm-emes!" JUVKNAL, Sat X. 



"The Emperor Xepos was acknowledged by the Senate, 
by the Italians, and by the provincials of (laid ; his moral vir- 
tues and military talents were loudly celebrated; and those 
who derived any private benefit from his government an- 
nounced in prophetic strains the restoration of public felicity. 



1'y this shameful abdication, be protracted his life a few 
yeais, in a very ambiguous statu, between an emperor and 

an exile, tdl " 

GIBUO.VS Decline and Fall, vol. vi. p. 220. 



ODE TO NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE. 

Tis done — but yesterday a king! 

And arm'd with kings to strive — 
And now thou art a nameless tiling, 

So abject — yet alive ! 
Is this the man of thousand thrones, 
Who strew'd our earth with hostile bones? 

And can he thus survive? 
Since he, miscall'd the morning star, 
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far. 

Ill-minded man ! why scourge thy kind, 

Who bow'd so low the knee ? 
By gazing on thyself grown blind, 

Thou taught'st the rest to see. 
With might unqucstion'd, — power to save; — 
Thine only gift hath been the grave 

To those that worshipp'd thee ; 
Nor, till thy fall, could mortals guess 
Ambition's less than littleness ! 

Thanks for that lesson — it will teach 

To after-warriors more 
Than high philosophy can preach, 

And vainly preach'd before. 
That sdcII upon the minds of men 
Breaks never to unite again, 

That led them to adore 
Those pagod things of sabre-sway, 
With fronts of brass, and feet of clay. 
2 W 70 



The triumph and the vanity, 

The rapture of the strife — ' 
The earthquake shout of Victory, 

To thee the breath of life ; 
The sword, the sceptre, and that sway 
\\ Inch man scem'd made but to obey, 

Wherewith renown was rile — 
All quell'd ! — Dark spirit ! w hat must be 
The madness of thy memory ! 

The desolator desolate ! 

The victor overthrown ! 
The arbiter of others' fate 

A suppliant for his own ! 
Is it some yet imperial hope 
That with such change can calmly cope? 

Or dread of death alone? 
To die a prince — or live a slave — 
Thy choice is most ignobly brave ! 

He 5 who of old would rend the oak 

Dream'd not of the rebound ; 
Chain'd by the trunk he vainly broke, — 

Alone — how look'd he r ound ? — 
Thou, in the sternness of thy strength, 
An equal deed hast done at length, 

And darker fate hast found : 
He fell, the forest-prowlers' prey : 
But thou must eat thy heart away! 

The Roman, 5 when his burning heart 

Was slaked with blood of Rome, 
Threw down the dagger— dared de| art, 

In savage grandeur, home. 
He dared depart, in utter scorn 
Of men that such a yoke had borne, 

Yet left him such a doom ! 
His only glory was that hour 
Of self-upheld abandon'd power. 

The Spaniard, 4 when the lust of swa| 
Had lost its quickening spell, 

Cast crowns for rosaries away, 
An empire for a cell ; 

A strict accountant of his beads, 

A subtle disputant on creeds, 
His dotage trilled well: 



1 Certaminia gatidin, the expression of Attila. in i,u m> 
raogue to his army, previous to the battle of Clialuna, give* 
in < 'n>-ii)dorus. 

2 Milo. 

3 ByDa. 

4 Chailcs V 



614 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Yet better had he never known 

A bigot's shrine, nor despot's throne. 

But thou — from thy reluctant hand 

The thunderbolt is wrung — 
Too late thou leavest the high command 

To which thy weakness clung ; 
All evil spirit as thou art, 
ll is enough to grieve the heart, 

To see thine own unstrung ; 
To think that God's fair world hath been 
The footstool of a thing so mean ; 

And earth hath spilt her blood for him, 

Who thus can hoard his own ! 
And monarchs bow'd the trembling limb, 

And thank'd him for a throne! 
Fair freedom ! we may hold thee dear, 
When thus thy mightiest foes their fear 

In humblest guise have shown. 
Oh ! ne'er may tyrant leave behind 
A brighter najnc to lure mankind ! 

Thine evil deeds are writ in gore, 

Nor written thus in vain — 
Thy triumphs tell of fame no more, 

Or deepen every stain. 
If thou hadst died as honour dies, 
Some new Napoleon might arise, 

To shame the work, -gain — 
But who would soar the solar height, 
To set in such a starless night ? 

Wcigh'd in the balance, hero dust 

Is vile as vulgar clay ; 
Thy scales, mortality ! are just 

To all that pass 1 away ; 
But yet, methought, the living great 
Some higher sparks should animate 

To dazzle and dismay ; 
Nor deem'd contempt could thus make mirth 
Of these, the conquerors of the earth. 

And she, proud Austria's mournful flower, 

Thy still imperial bride ; 
How bears her breast the torturing hour ? 

Still clings she to thy side ? 
Must she too bend, must she too share 
Thy late repentance, long despair, 

Thou throneless homicide ? 
If still she loves thee, hoard that gem, 
'T is worth thy vanish'd diadem ! 

Then haste thee to thy sullen isle, 

And gaze upon the sea ; 
That element may meet thy smile, 

It ne'er was ruled by thee ! 
Or trace with thine all idle hand, 
In loitering mood, upon the sand, 

That earth is now as free ! 
That Corinth's pedagogue hath now 
Transferr'd his by-word to thy brow. 

rhou Timor ! in his captive's cage 1 
What thoughts will there be thine, 

While brooding in thy prison'd rage? 
But one — " The world was mine :" 

l The ougo of Iiajiiz>;t, by order of Tamerlane. 



Unless, like he of Babylon, 

All sense is with thy sceptre gone, 

Life will not long confine 
That spirit pour'd so widely forth — 
So long obey'd — so little worth ! 

Or like the thief of fire from heaven, 

Wilt thou withstand the shock? 
And share with him, the unforgiven, 

His vulture and his rock / 
Forcdoorn'd by God — by man accurst, 
And that last act, though not thy worst, 

The very fiend's arch mock ;' J 
He in his fall preserved his pride, 
And, if a mortal, had as proudly died ! 

MONODY 

ON THE 

DEATH OF THE RIGHT HON. It. B. SilF.RIDAN 

SPOKEN AT DRURY-LANE THEATRE. 

When the last sunshine of expiring day 

In summer's twilight weeps itself away. 

Who hath not felt the softness of the hour 

Sink on the heart, as dew along the fldwi r 1 

With a pure feeling which absorbs and awes 

While Nature makes that melancholy pause, 

Her breathing moment on the bridge where Time 

Of light and darkness forms an arch sublime, 

Who hath not shared that calm so still and deep, 

The voiceless thought which would not speak but weet» 

A holy concord — and a bright regret, 

A glorious sympathy with suns that set? 

'T is not harsh sorrow — but a tenderer woe, 

Nameless, but dear to gentle hearts below, 

Felt without bitterness — but full and clear, 

A sweet dejection — a transparent tear, 

Unniix'd with worldly grief or selfish stain, 

Shed without shame — and secret without pain. 

Even as the tenderness that hour instils 

When summer's day declines along the hills, 

So feels the fulness of our heart and eyes 

When all of genius which can perish dies. 

A mighty spirit is eclipsed — a power 

Hath pass'd from day to darkness — to whose hour 

Of light no likeness is bequcath'd — no name, 

Focus at once of all the rays of fame ! 

The flash of wit — the bright intelligence, 

The beam of song — the blaze of eloquence, 

Set with their sun — but still have left behind 

The enduring produce of immortal Mind ; 

Fruits of a genial morn, and glorious noon, 

A deathless part of him who died too soon. 

But small that portion of the wondrous whole, 

These sparkling segments of that circling soul, 

Which all embraced — and hghteu'd over all, 

To cheer — to pierce — to please — or to appal. 

From the charni'd council to the festive board 

Of human feelings the unbounded lord; 

In whose acclaim the loftiest voices vied. 

The praised, the proud, who made his praise \\\0-- pride. 



1 Prometheus. 

1 "The fiend's nroh mnrk — 
To lip a wanton, and suppose hei chute." 

Shaksptart 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



515 



VVnen the loud cry of trampled Hindostan 

Arose to Heaven in her appeal from man, 

His was the thunder — his the avenging rod, 

The wrath — the delegated voice of God ! 

JVhich shook the nations through his lips — and blazed 

Pill vanquished senates trembled as they praised. 

And here, oh ! here, where, yet all young and warm, 

The gay creations of his spirit charm, 

The matchless dialogue — the deathless wit, 

Which knew not what it was to intermit ; 

The glowing portraits, fresh from life that bring 

Home to our hearts the truth from which they spring; 

These wondrous beings of his fancy, wrought 

To fulness by the fiat of his thought, 

Here in their first abode vou still may meet, 

Bright with the hues of his Promethean heat ; 

A halo of the light of other days, 

Which still the splendour of its orb betrays. 

But should there be to whom the fatal blight 

Of failing wisdom yields a base delight, 

Men who exult when minds of heavenly tone 

Jar in the music which w as born their own, 

Still let them pause — Ah ! little do they know 

That what to them seem'd vice might be but woe. 

Hard is his fate on whom the public gaze 

Is fix'd for ever to detract or praise ; 

Repose denies her requiem to his name, 

And Folly loves the martyrdom of Fame. 

The secret enemy, whose sleepless eye 

Stands sentinc 1 — accuser — judge — and spy, 

The foe — the fool — the jealous — and the vain, 

The envious who but breathe in others' pain — 

Behold the host ! delighting to deprave, 

Who track the steps of glory to the grave, 

Watch every fault that daring genius owes 

Half to the ardour which its birth bestows, 

Distort the truth, accumulate the lie, 

And pile the pyramid of calumny ! 

These are his portion — but if join'd to these 

Gaunt Poverty should league with deep Disease, 

If the high spirit must forget to soar, 

And stoop to strive with misery at the door, 

To soothe indignity — and face to face 

Meet sordid rage — and wrestle with disgrace, 

To find in hope but the renew'd caress, 

The serpent-fold of further faithlessness, — 

If such maybe the ills which men assail, 

What marvel if at last the mightiest fail? 

Breasts to whom all the strength of feeling given 

Bear hearts electric — charged with fire from heaven, 

Black with the rude collision, inly torn, 

By clouds surrounded, and on whirlwinds borne, 

Driven o'er the louring atmosphere that must 

Thoughts which have turn'd to thunder — scorch — and 

burst. 
But far from us and from our mimic scene 
Such things should be — if such have ever been ; 
Ours be the gentler wish, the kinder task, 
To give the tribute Glory need not ask, 
To mourn the vanish'd beam — and add our mite 
Of praise in payment of a long delight. 

1 See Fox, Burke, and Pitt's eulogy on Mr. Sheridan's speech 
on the charges exhibited against Mr. Hastings in the House of 
Commons. Mr. I'iu entreated the House to adjourn, to give 
timi; for a calmer consideration nf the question than could 

ben occur alter the immediate effect of Uiut oration. 



Ye orators ! whom yet our council J i Id, 
Mourn for the veteran hero of your field ! 
The worthy rival of the wondrous Three! 1 
Whose words were sparks of immortality ! 
Ye bards ! to whom the Drama's Muse is dear 
lie was your master — emulate him h n ! 
Ye men of wit and social eloquence ! 
He was your brother — bear his ashes hence! 
While powers of mind almost of boundless range. 
Complete in kind — as various in their change, 
While eloquence — wit — poesy — and mirth, 
That humbler harmonisi of care on earth, 
Survive within our souls — while lives our sense 

Of pride in merit's proud prc-emi ence, 
Long shall we seek his likeness- -Ion;; m vain, 
And turn io all of bin: which mav remain, 
Sighing that Nature form'd hnl one SBch man, 
And broke the die — in moulding Sheridan ! 



THE IRISH AVATAR. 

Ere the Daughter of Brunswick is cold in her grav*, 
And her ashes still float to their home o'er the tide, 

Lo ! George the triumphant speeds over the wave, 
To the long-cherish'd Isle which he loved like his — 
bride. 

True, the great of her bright and brief era arc gone, 
The rainbow-like epoch where Freedom could pause 

For the few little years, out of centuries won, 

Which betray'd not, or crush'd not, or wept not her 
cause. 

True, the chains of the Catholic clank o'er his rags, 
The castle still stands, and the senate's no mere, 

And the famine, which dwelt on her freedomless crags 
Is extending its steps to her desolate shore. 

To her desolate shore — where the emigrant stands 
For a moment to gaze ere he flies from his hearth : 

Tears fall on his chain, though it drops from his hands, 
For the dungeon he quits is the place of his birth. 

But he comes! the Messiah of royalty comes! 

Like a goodly Leviathan roll'd from the waves ! 
Then receive him as best such an advent becomes, 

With a legion of cooks, and an army of slaves ! 

He comes in the promise and bloom of three-score, 
To perform in the pageant the sovereign's part — 

But long live the Shamrock which shadows him o'er! 
Could the Green in his hat be transfcrr'd to his heart ' 

Could that long-wither'd spot but be verdant again, 
And a new spring of noble affections arise — 

Then might Freedom forgive thee t his dance in thy chain, 
And this shout of thy slavery which saddens the skies. 

Is it madness or meanness which clings to thee now? 

Were he God — as he is but the commonest clay, 
With scarce fewer wrinkles than sins on his brow — 

Such servile devotion might shame him away. 

Av, roar in his train ! let thino orators lush 
Their fanciful spirits to pamper his pride — 

Not thus did thy Grattax indignantly flash 
His soul o'er the freedom implored and denied. 



1 Fox. I'itt, Burke. 



5 1 6 



BYRON S WORKS. 



Ever glorious Grattan ! the best of the good ! 

So simple in heart, so sublime in the rest ! 
With all which Demosthenes wanted, endued, 

And his rival or victor in all he possess'd. 

Ere Tui.i.y arose in the zenith of Rome, 

Though unequall'd, preceded, the task was begun — 

But Grattan sprung up like a god from the tomb 
Of ages, the first, last, the saviour, the One ! 

With the skill of an Orpheus to soften the brute ; 

With the fire of Prometheus to kindle mankind ; 
Even Tyranny listening sate melted or mute, 

And corruption shrunk scorch'd from the glance of 

his muni. 

But back to our theme ! Back to despots and slaves ! 

Feasts furnish'd by Famine ! rejoicings by Pain ! 
True Freedom but welcomes, while slavery still raves, 

When a week's Saturnalia hath loosen'd her chain. 

Let the poor squalid splendour thy wreck can afford 
(As the bankrupt's profusion his ruin would hide) 

Gild over the palace, Lo ! Erin, thy lord! 
Kiss his foot with thy blessings denied ! 

Or if freedom past hope be extorted at last, 
If the Idol of Brass find his feet are of clay, 

Must what terror or policy wring forth be class'd 
With what monarchs ne'er give, but as wolves yield 
their prey ? 

Each brute hath its nature, a king's is to reign, — 
To reign ! in that word see, ye ages, comprised, 

The cause of the curses all annals contain, 

From Cesar the dreaded, to George the despised ! 

Wear, Finoal, thy trapping! O'Connel, proclaim 
His accomplishments ! His . .' .' and thy country 
convince 
Half an age's contempt was an error of Fame, 

And that "Hal is the rascaliest sweetest young 
Prince !" 

Will thy yard of blue riband, poor Fingal, recall 
The fetters from millions of Catholic limbs? 

Or, has it not bound thee the fastest of all 

The slaves, who now hail their betrayer with hymns ? 

Ay ! " Build him a dwelling !" let each give his mite ! 

Till, like Babel, the new royal dome hath arisen! 
Let thy beggars and Helots their pittance unite— 

And a palace bestow for a poor-house and prison ! 

Spread—spread, for Vitellius, the royal repast, 
Till the gluttonous despot be stuff'd to the gorge ! 

And the roar of his drunkards proclaim him at last 
The Fourth of the fools and oppressors call'd 
"George!" 

Let the tab'.es be loaded with feasts till they groan ! 

Till they groan like thy people, through ages of woe ! 
Let the wine flow around the old Bacchanal's throne, 

Like their blood which has flow'd, and which yet has 
to flow. 

But let not his name be thine idol alone — 
On his right hand behold a Sejanus appears ! 

Thine own Castlereagh ! let him still be thine own! 
A. wretch, never named but with curses and jeers ! 



Till now, when the Isle which should blush for his birth, 
Deep, deep as the gore which he shed on her soil, 

Seems proud of tne reptile which craw I'd from her earth, 
And for murder repays him with shouts and a smile ! 

Without one single ray of her genius, without 
The fancy, the manhood, the fire of tier race — 

The miscreant who wed misnt p.unge Erin in doubt 
If she ever gave oirtn .o a being so base. 

If she did — let her .ong-ooastea proverb be hush'd, 
Which procla'ms tnat from Erin no reptile can 
spring — 

See the cold-blooded serpent, with venom fill flush'd, 
Still warming its folds in the breast of a King ! 

Shout, drink, feast, and flatter ! Oh ! Erin, how low 
Wirt thou sunk by misfortune and tyranny, till 

Thy welcome of tyrants hath plunged thee below 
The depth of thy deep m a deeper gulf still. 

My voice, though bu* '.mmble, was raised for thy right, 
My vote, as a freeman's, still voted thee free, 

This hand, though but feeble, would arm, in thy fight, 
And this heart, though outworn, had a throb still 
for thee ! 

Yes, I loved thee and thine, though thou art not my 
land, 

I have known noble hearts and great souls in thy sons, 
And I wept with the world o'er the patriot band 

Who are gone, but I weep them no longer as once. 

For happy are they now reposing afar, — 

Thy Grattan, thy Curran, thy Sheridan, all 

Who, for years, were the chiefs in the eloquent war, 
Ami redeein'd, if they have not retarded, thy fall. 

Yes, happy are they in their cold English graves ! 

Their shades cannot start to thy shouts of to-day, — 
Nor the steps of enslavers and chain-kissing slaves 

Be slamp'd in the turf o'er their fetterless clay. 

Till now I had envied thy sons and their shore, 

Though their virtues were hunted, their liberties fled, 

There was something so warm and sublime in the core 
Of an Irishman's heart, that I envy — thy dead. 

Or, if aught in my bosom can quench for an hour 
My contempt for a nation so servile, though sore, 

Which though trod like the worm will not turn upon 
Power, 
'Tis the glory of Grattan, and genius of Moore ' 

Sevt. \&th, 1821. 



THE DREAM. 
I. 

Our life is twofold : sleep hath its own world, 
A boundary between the things misnamed 
Death and existence ; sleep hath its own world, 
And a wide realm of wild reality, 
And dreams in their developement have breath, 
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy ; 
They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts, 
They take a weight from off our waking toils, 
They do divide our being ; they become 
A portion of ourselves as of our time, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



5\i 



And look like heralds of eternity : 
Tliey pass like spirits of the past,— they speak 
Like sibyls of the future ; they have power — 
The tyranny of pleasure and of pain ; 
They make us what we were not — what they will, 
And shake us with the vision that 's gone by, 
The dread of vanish'd shadows — Are they so? 
Is not the past all shadow ? What are they? 
Creations of the mind? — The mind can make 
Substance, and people planets of its own 
Willi beings brighter than have been, and give 
A breath to forms which can outlive all flesh. 
I would recall a vision which I dream'd 
Perchance in sleep — for in itself a thought, 
A slumbering thought, is capable of years, 
And curdles a long life into one hour. 

II. 

I saw two beings in the hues of youth 
Standing upon a bill, a gentle hill, 
Green and of mild declivity, the last 
As 't were the cape of a long ridge of such, 
Save that there was no sea to lave its base, 
But a most living landscape, and the wave 
Of woods and corn-fields, and the abodes of men 
Scattcr'd at intervals, and wreathing smoke 
Arising from such rustic roofs ; — the hill 
Was crown'd with a peculiar diadem 
Of trees, in circular array, so fix'd, 
Not by the sport of nature, but of man : 
These two, a maiden and a youth, were there 
Gazing — the one on all that was beneath 
Fair as herself— but the boy gazed on her ; 
And both were young, and one was beautiful : 
And both were young, yet not alike in youth. 
As the sweet moon on the horizon's verge, 
The maid was on the eve of womanhood ; 
The boy had fewer summers, but his heart 
Had far outgrown his years, and to his eye 
There was but one beloved face on earth, 
And that was shining on him ; he had look'd 
Upon it till it could not pass away ; 
He had no breath, no being, but in her's ; 
She was his voice ; he did not speak to her, 
But trembled on her words ; she was his sight, 
For his eye f illow'd hers, and saw with hers, 
Which colour'd all his objects ; — he had ceased 
To live within himself; she was his life, 
The ocean to the river of his thoughts, 
Which terminated all : upon a tone, 
A touch of hers, his blood would ebb and flow, 
And his cheek change tempestuously — his heart 
Unknowing of its cause of agony. 
But she in these fond feelings had no share : 
Her sighs were not for him ; to her he was 
Even as a brother — but no more ; 't was much, 
For brotherless she was, save in the name 
Her infant friendship had bestow'd on him ; 
Herself the solitary scion left 
Of a time-lionour'd race. — It was a name 
Which pleased him, and yet pleased him not — and why? 
Time taught him a deep answer — when she loved 
Another ; even now she loved another, 
And on the summit of that hill she stood 
Looking afar if yet her lover's steed 
Kept pace with her expectancy, and flew. 
2 w 2 



III. 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 

There was an ancient mansion, and before 

Its walls there was a steed caparison'd: 

Within an antique oratory stood 

The boy of whom I spake ; — he was alone, 

And pale, and pacing to and fro; anon 

He sate him down, and seized a pen, and traced 

Words which I could not guess of: then he lean'd 

His bow'd head on bis hands, and shook as 't were 

With a convulsion — then arose again, 

And with his teeth and quivering bands did tear 

What be bad written, but he shed no tears. 

And he did calm himself, and fix his brow 

Into a kind of quiet: as he paused, 

The lady of his love re-enter'd there ; 

She was serene and smiling then, and yet 

She knew she was by him beloved, — she knew, 

For quickly comes such knowledge, that his heart 

Was darken'd with her shadow, and she saw 

That he was wretched, but she saw not all. 

He rose, and with a cold and gentle grasp 

He took her hand ; a moment o'er his face 

A tablet of unutterable thoughts 

Was traced, and then it faded as it came ; 

He dropp'd the hand he held, and with slow steps 

Retired, but not as bidding her adieu, 

For they did part witli mutual smiles : he pass'd 

From out the massy gate of that old hall, 

And mounting on his steed he went his way, 

And ne'er repass'd that hoary threshold more. 

IV. 

A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The boy was sprung to manhood : in the wilds 
Of fiery climes he made himself a home, 
And his soul drank their sunbeams ; he was girt 
With strange and dusky aspects ; he was not 
Himself like what he had been ; on the sea 
And on the shore he was a wanderer. 
There was a mass of many images 
Crowded like waves upon me, but lie was 
A part of all ; and in the last he lay 
Reposing from the noontide sultriness, 
Couch'd among fallen columns, in the shade 
Of ruin'd walls that had survived the names 
Of those who rear'd them ; by his sleeping side 
Stood camels grazing, and some goodlv steeds 
Were fasten'd near a fountain ; and a man 
Clad in a flowing garb did watch the while, 
While many of his tribe slumber'd around : 
And they were canopied by the blue sky, 
So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful, 
That God alone was to be seen in heaven. 



A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The lady of his love was wed with one 
Who did not love her better : in her home, 
A thousand leagues from bis, — her native home. 
She dwelt, begirt with growing infancy, 

ters and sons of beauty, — but behold' 
Upon her face there was the tint of grief, 
The settli 1 shadow of an inward strife, 
And an unquiet drooping of the eye, 
As if its lid were charged with unshed tears. 



J18 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



What could her grief be ? — she had all she loved, 
And he who had so loved her was not there 
To trouble with bad hopes, or evil wish, 
Or ill-repress'd affliction, her pure thoughts. 
What could her grief be? — she had loved him not, 
Nor given him cause to deem himself beloved, 
Noi could he be a part of that which prcy'd 
Upon her mind — a spectre of the past. 

VI. 
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The wanderer was return'd. — I saw him stand 
Before an altar — with a gentle bride ; 
Her face was fair, but was not that which made 
The star-light of his boyhood ; — as he stood 
Even at the altar, o'er his brow there came 
The self-same aspect, and the quivering shock 
That in the antique oratory shook 
His bosom in its solitude ; and then — 
As in that hour — a moment o'er his face 
The tablet of unutterable thoughts 
Was traced, — and then it faded as it came, 
And he stood calm and quiet, and he spoke 
The fitting vows, but heard not his own words, 
And all things reel'd around him ; he could see 
Not that which was, nor that which should have been- 
But the old mansion, and the accustom'd hall, 
And the remember'd chambers, and the place, 
The day, the hour, the sunshine and the shade, 
All things pertaining to that place and hour, 
And her who was his destiny came back, 
And thrust themselves between him and the light : 
What business had they there at such a time ? 

VII. 
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The lady of his love ; — oh ! she was changed 
As by the sickness of the soul ; her mind 
Had wander'd from its dwelling, and her eyes, 
They had not their own lustre, but the look 
Which is not of the earth ; she was become 
The queen of a fantastic realm ; her thoughts 
Were combinations of disjointed things ; 
And forms, impalpable and unperceived 
Of others' sight, familiar were to hers. 
And this the world calls frenzy ; but the wise 
Have a far deeper madness, and the glance 
Of melancholy is a fearful gift; 
What is it but the telescope of truth? 
Which strips the distance of its phantasies, 
And brings life near in utter nakedness, 
Making the cold reality too real ! 

VIII. 
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. 
The wanderer was alone as heretofore, 
The beings which surrounded him were gone, 
Or were at war with him ; he was a mark 
Far blight and desolation, compass'd round 
W'tli hatred and contention ; pain was mix'd 
In all which was served up to him, until, 
Like to the Pontic monarch of old days, 1 
He fed on poisons, and they had no power, 
JJut wore a kind of nutriment; he lived 
Through that which had been death to many men, 
And made, him friends of mountains : with the stars 



1 Milnrictutcs of i'ontua. 



And the quick spirit of the universe 

He held his dialogues ; and they did teach 

To him the magic of their mysteries ; 

To him the book of night was open'd wide, 

And voices from the deep abyss reveal'd 

A marvel and a secret — Be it so. 

IX. 
My dream was past ; it had no further change. 
It was of a strange order, that the doom 
Of these two creatures should be thus traced out 
Almost like a reality — the one 
To end in madness — both in misery. 



ODE. 
I. 



Oh Venice ! Venice ! when thy marble walls 

Are level with the waters, there shall be 
A cry of nations o'er thy sunken halls, 
A loud lament along the sweeping sea ! 
If I, a northern wanderer, weep for thee, 
What should thy sons do ? — any thing but weep : 
And yet they only murmur in their sleep. 
In contrast with their fathers — as the slime, 
The dull green ooze of the receding deep, 
Is with the dashing of the spring-tide foam, 
That drives the sailor shipless to his home, 
Are they to those that were ; and thus they creep. 
Crouching and crab-like, through their sapping streeu. 
Oh ! agony — that centuries should reap 
No mellower harvest ! Thirteen hundred years 
Of wealth and glory turn'd to dust and tears ; 
And every monument the stranger meets, 
Church, palace, pillar, as a mourner greets ; 
And even the Lion all subdued appears, 
And the harsh sound of the barbarian drum, 
With dull and daily dissonance, repeats 
The echo of thy tyrant's voice along 
The soft waves, once all musical to song, 
That heaved beneath the moonlight with the throng 
Of gondolas — and to the busy hum 
Of cheerful creatures, whose most sinful deeds 
Were but the overheating of the heart, 
And flow of too much happiness, which needs 
The aid of age to turn its course apart 
From the luxuriant and voluptuous flood 
Of sweet sensations battling with the blood. 
But these are better than the gloomy errors, 
The weeds of nations in their last decay, 
When vice walks forth with her unsoften'd terrors, 
And mirth is madness, and but smiles to slay ; 
And hope is nothing but a false delay, 
The sick man's lightning half an hour ere death, 
When faintness, the last mortal birth of pain, 
And apathy of limb, the dull beginning 
Of the cold staggering race which death is winning, 
Steals vein by vein and pulse by pulse away ; 
Yet so relieving the o'ertortured clay, 
To him appears renewal of his breath, 
And freedom the mere numbness of his chain ;- 
And then he talks of life, and how agair. 
He feels his spirit soaring — albeit wcax, 
And of the fresher air, which he would seek ; 
And as he whispers knows not that he gasps, 
That his thin finger feels not what it clasps. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



519 



And so the film comes o'er him — and the dizzy 
Chamber swims round and round — and shadows busy, 
At which he vainly catches, flit ana gleam, 
Till the last rattle chokes the strangled scream, 
And all is ice and blackness, — and the earth 
That which it was the moment ere our birth. 

II. 

There is no hope for nations ! Search the page 

Of many thousand years — the daily scene, 
The flow and ebb of each recurring age, 
The everlasting to be which hath been, 
Hath taught us nought or little : still we lean 
On things that rot beneath our weight, and wear 
Our strength away in wrestling with the air ; 
For 't is our nature strikes us down : the beasts 
Slaughter'd in hourly hecatombs for feasts 
Are of as high an order — they must go 
Even where their driver goads them, though to slaughter. 
Ye men, who pour your blood for kings as water, 
What have they given your children in return ? 
A heritage of servitude and woes, 
A blindfold bondage where your hire is blows. 
What ? do not yet the red-hot ploughshares burn, 
O'er which you stumble in a false ordeal, 
And deem this proof of loyalty the real ; 
Kissing the hand that guides you to your scars, 
And glorying as you tread the glowing bars ? 
All that your sires have left you, all that time 
Bequeaths of free, and history of sublime, 
Spring from a different theme ! — Ye see and read, 
Admire and sigh, and then succumb and bleed ! 
Save the few spirits, who, despite of all, 
And worse than all, the sudden crimes cngender'd 
By the down-thundering of the prison-wall, 
And thirst to swallow the sweet waters tender'd, 
Gushing from freedom's fountains — when the crowd, 
Madden'd with centunes of drought, are loud, 
And trample on each other to obtain 
The cup which brings oblivion of a chain 
Heavy and sore, — in which long yoked they plough'd 
The sand, — or if there sprung the yellow grain 
'T was not for them, their necks were too much bow'd, 
And their dead palates chew'd the cud of pain : — 
Yes ! the few spirits — who, despite of deeds 
Which they abhor, confound not with the cause 
Those momentary starts from Nature's laws, 
Which, like the pestilence and earthquake, smite 
But for a term, then pass, and leave the earth 
With all her seasons to repair the blight 
With a few summers, and again put forth 
Cities and generations — fair, when free — 
For, tyranny, there blooms no bud for thee ! 

III. 

Glory and empire ! once upon these towers 

Willi freedom — godlike triad ! how ye sate ! 
The league of mightiest nations, in those hours 
When Venice was an envy, might abate, 
But did not quench, her spirit — in her fate 
All were enwrapp'd: the feasted monarchs knew 

And loved their hostess, nor could learn to hate, 
Although they humbled — with the kingly few 
The many felt, for from all days and climes 
She was the voyager's worship ; — even her crimes 



Were of the softer order — born of love, 
She drank no blood, nor fatten'd on the dcau, 
But gladden'd where her harmless conqucsis spread, 
For these restored the cross, that from above 
Hallow'd her sheltering banners, which incessant 
Flew between earth and the unholy crescent, 
Which, if it waned and dwindled, earth may thank 
The city it has clothed in chains, whicn clank 
Now, creaking in the ears of those who owe 
The name of freedom to her glorious struggles ; 
Yet she but shares with them a common woe, 
And call'd the " kingdom " of a conquering foe, — 
But knows what all — and, most of all, we know — 
With what set gilded terms a tyrant juggles ! 

IV. 

The name of commonwealth is past and gone 

O'er the three fractions of the groaning globe ; 
Venice is crush'd, and Holland deigns to own 

A sceptre, and endures the purple robe ; 
If the free Switzer yet bestrides alone 
His chainless mountains, 't is but for a time, 
For tyranny of late is cunning grown, 
And in its own good season tramples down 
The sparkles of our ashes. One great clime, 
Whose vigorous offspring by dividing ocean 
Are kept apart and nursed in the devotion 
Of freedom, which their fathers fought for, and 
Bequeath'd — a heritage of heart and hand, 
And proud distinction from each other land, 
Whose sons must bow them at a monarch's motion, 
As if his senseless sceptre were a wand 
Full of the magic of exploded science — 
Still one great clime, in full and free defiance, 
Yet rears her crest, unconquer'd and sublime, 
Above the far Atlantic ! — She has taught 
Her Esau-brethren that the haughty flag, 
The floating fence of Albion's feebler crag, 
May strike to those whose red right hands have bought 
Rights cheaply earn'd with blood. Still, still, for ever 
Better, though each man's life-blood were a river, 
That it should flow, and overflow, than creep 
Through thousand lazy channels in our veins, 
Damm'd like the dull canal with locks and chains, 
And moving, as a sick man in his sleep, 
Three paces, and then faltering : — better be 
Where the extinguish'd Spartans still are free, 
In their proud charnel of Thermopylae, 
Than stagnate in our marsh, — or o'er the deep 
Fly, and one current to the ocean add, 
One spirit to the souls our fathers had, 
One freeman more, America, to thee ! 



WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM. 

As o'er the cold sepulchral sione 

Some name arrests the passer-by ; 
Tims, when thou view's! this page alone, 

May mine attract thy pensive eye! 

And wnen by thee ll/ it nunc a read, 
Perchance in some succeeding yeat, 

Reflect on me as on the dead, 

And think my heart is buried nere 
September 14(/i, 1809. 



590 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



ROMANCE MUY DOLOROSO 

DEL 

SITIO Y TOMA DE ALHAMA, 
EL CUAL DECIA EN ARABIGO ASI. 



Paseabase el Rey moro 
Por la ciudad cle Granada, 
Desde la pucrta dc Elvira 
Hasta la de Bivarambla. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Cartas le fueron venidas 
Que Alhama era ganada. 
Las cartas echo en el fuego, 

Y al mensagero matara. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Descavalga de una mula, 

Y en un caballo cavalga. 
Por el Zacatin arriba 
Subido se habia al Alhambra. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Como en el Alhambra estuvo, 
Al mismo putito mandaba 
Que se toquen las trompetas 
Con anafiles de plata. 

Ay de mi, Alhama! 

Y que atambores de guerra 
Apriesa toquen alarma ; 
Por que lo origan sus Moros, 
Los de la Vega y Granada. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Los Moros que el son oyeron, 
Que al sangriento Marte llama, 
Uno a uno, y dos & dos, 
Ln gran escuadron formaban. 
Ay de mi, Alhama! 

Alii habl6 un Moro viejo ; 
Do esta manera hablaba : — 
" i Para que nos llamas, Rey? 
I Para que es esta llamada ?" 
Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

" Habeis de saber, amigos, 
Una nueva desdichada: 
Que cristianos, con braveza, 
Ya nos han tornado Alhama." 
Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Alii nablrt un v^jo Alfaqui, 
De barba crecida y cana : — 
■• Bien se tc emplea, buen Rey; 
Buen Rey, bien se te emplcaba. 
Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

" Mataste ics Bcncerrages, 
Que r-an la llor de Granada ; 
Cogiste tas tornadizos 
i)i: Cordova 'a nomDrada. 

Av de mi, Alhama ! 



A VERY MOURNFUL BALLAD 

ON THE 

SIEGE AND CONQUEST OF ALHAMA, 

JVhich, in the Arabic language, is to the following 

purport. 

[The effect of the original ballad (which existed both in 
Spanish and Arabic) was such thai it was forbidden to be 
eung by the Moors, on pain of death, within Granada. J 

The Moorish king rides up and down 
Through Granada's royal town ; 
From Elvira's gates to those 
Of Bivarambla on he goes. 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 

Letters to the monarch tell 
How Albania's city fell ; 
In the fire the scroll he threw, 
And the messenger he slew. 

Woe is me, Alhama ( 

He quits his mule, and mounts his horse, 
And through the street directs his course ; 
Through the street of Zacatin 
To the Alhambra spurring in. 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 

When the Alhambra walls he gain'd, 
On the moment he ordain'd 
That the trumpet straight should sound 
With the silver clarion round. 

Woe is me, Alhama! 

And when the hollow drums of wai 
Beat the loud alarm afar, 
That the Moors of town and plain 
Might answer to the martial strain, 
Woe is me, Alhama ! 

Then the Moors, by this aware 
That bloody Mars recall'd them there, 
One by one, and two by two, 
To a mighty squadron grew. 

Woe is me, Albania ! 

Out then spake an aged Moor 
In these words the king before, 
"Wherefore call on us, oh king? 
What may mean this gathering?" 
Woe is me, Alhama ! 

" Friends ! ye have, alas ! to know 
Of a most disastrous blow, 
That the Christians, stern and bold, 
Have obtain'd Alhama's hold." 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 

Out then spake old Alfaqui, 
With liis beard so white to see, 
" Good king, thou art justly served, 
Good king, this thou has', deserved. 
Woe is me, Alhama! 

" By thee were slain, in evil hour, 
The Abencerrage, Granada's flower; 
And strangers were received by thee 
Of Cordova the chivalry. 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS- 



52' 



For eso mereces, Rev, 
Una pena bien doblada ; 
Que te pierdas tu y el reino, 

Y que so pie.rda Granada. 

Ay de mi, Alhania! 

Si no se respctan leyes, 
Es ley que todo sc pierda ; 

Y que se pierda Granada, 

Y que te pierdas en ella. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Fuego por los ojos vierte, 
El Rey que esto oyera, 

Y como el otro de leyes 
De leyes tambien hablaba. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Sabe un Rey que no hay leyes 
De darle a Reyes disguslo. — 
Eso dice el Rey moro 
Relinchando de colcra. 

Ay de mi, Alhama! 

Moro Alfaqui, Moro Alfaqui, 
El de la veilida barba, 
El Rey te nianda prendcr, 
"or la perdida de Alhama. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Y cortarte la cabeza, 

Y poncrla en el Alhambra, 
Per que a li castigo sea, 

Y otros tiemblen en miralla. 

Ay de mi, Alhania! 

Caballeros, hombres buenos, 
Decid de mi parte al Rey, 
Al Rey moro de Granada, 
Como no le devo nada. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

De aberse Alhama perdido 
A mi me pesa en el alma ; 
Que si el Rey perdio su tierrj 
Otro mucho mas perdiera. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Perdicran hijos padres, 
y easadoa las casadas: 
Las cosas que mas amara 
Perdi6 uno y otro fama. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Perdi una hija doncella 
Que era la flor d' esta tierra ; 
Cien doblas daba por ella, 
No me las estiino en nada. 

Ay de mi, Alhama ! 

Dicicndo asi al hacen Alfaqui, 
Le cortaron la cabeza, 
Y la elevan al Alhamhra, 
Asi como el Rey lo manda. 

Ay de mi, Alhama! 



" And for this, oh king ! is sent 
On thee a double chastisement, 
Thee and thine, thy crown and realm, 
One last wreck shall overwhelm. 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 

" He who holds no laws in awe, 
He must perish by the law ; 
And Granada must be won, 
And thyself with her undone." 

Woe is me, Alhama ! 

Fire flash'd from out the old Moor's eyes, 
The moi. arch's wrath began lo rise, 
Because he answer'd, and because 
He spake exceeding well of laws. 
Woe is me, Alhania ! 

" There is no law to say such things 
As may disgust the ear of kings :'' — 
Thus, snorting with his choler, said 
The Moorish king, and doom'd him dead. 
Woe is me, Alhania 

Moor Alfaqui ! Moor Alfaqui ! 
Though thy beard so hoary be, 
The king hath sent lo have thee seized, ' 
For Albania's loss displeased. 

Woe is me, Alhama! 

And to fix thy head upon 
High Alhambra's loftiest stone ; 
That this for thee should be the law, 
And others tremble when they saw. 
Woe is me, Alhania ! 

u Cavalier ! and man of worth ! 
Let these words of mine go forth ; 
Lei the Moorish monarch know, 
That to him I nothing owe : 

Woe is me, Albania ! 

u Rut on my soul Alhama weighs, 
And on my inmost spirit preys ; 
And if the king his land hath lost, 
Yet others may have lost the most. 
Woe is me, Alhama ! 

" Sires have lost their children, wives 
Their lords, and valiant men their lives, 
One what best his love might claim 
Hath lost, another wealth or fame. 
Woe is me, Albania ! 

"I lost a damsel in that hour, 
Of all the land the loveliest (lower , 
Doubloon a hu ■ Ired I would pay, 
And think her ransom cheap that dav." 
Woe is me, Alhania! 

And as these things the old Moor said. 
They sever'd from the trunk his head ; 
And to the Alhambra's wall with speed 
T was carried, as the king decreed. 
Woe is me, Alhama' 



71 



522 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Hombres, iiinos y mugeres, 
Lloran tan grande perdida. 
Lloraban todaa las damas 
Cuantas en Granada habia. 
Ay de mi, Albania ! 

Pur las callcs y vcntanas 
Mucbo Into parccia ; 
Llora cl Rey como fcmbra, 
Qu' cs mucbo lo que perdia. 
Ay de mi, Albania ! 



SONETTO DI VITTORELLI. 
PER MONACA. 

Simctto compnsto in nome di un genitnrc, a eni era rrorta 
I'.oco innanzi una figlia appena maiiuita; e direttu al geui- 
turc della sacra tposa. 

Di due vagbe donzelle, oneste, accorte 

Lieti e miseri padri il ciel ne feo ; 

II ciel, che degne di pill nobil sorte, 

L' una e 1' altra vegL'cndo, ambo chiedo 
La mia fu tolta da veloce morte 

A le fumanti tede d' Irnerleo : 

La tua, Francesco, in sugeUate porte 

Eterna prigionicra or si rendco. 
Ma tu almeno potrai dc la gelosa 

Irremeabil soglia, ove s' asconde 

La sua tencra udir voce pietosa. 
Io verso un fiunie d' amarissim' onda, 

Co rro a quel marmo in cui la figlia or posa, 

Batto e ribatto, ma nessun rispunde. 



STANZAS, 



WRITTEN IN PASSING THE AMIiRACIAN GULF, 
NOVEMBER 14, 1809. 

Through cloudless skies, in silvery sheen, 
Full beams the moon on Actiuin's coast, 

And on tbese waves, for Egypt's queen, 
The ancient world was won and lost. 

And now upon the scene. I look, 

The azure grave of many a Roman ; 

Where stern Ambition once forsook 
His wavering crown to follow woman. 

Florence ! whom I will love as well 

As ever yet was said or sung 
(Since Orpheus sang his spouse from hell), 

Whilst thou art fair and I am young ; 

Sweet Florence ! those were pleasant times, 
When worlds were staked for ladies' eyes : 

Nad bards as many realms as rhymes, 
Thy charms might raise new Antonies. 

Though Pate forbids such things to be, 
Yet, by thine eyes and ringlets curl'd ! 

I en nno; lose a world for thee, 

Hu* would not lose thee f or a world. 



And men and infants therein weep 
Their loss, so heavy and so deep ; 
Granada's Indies, all she rears 
Within her walls, burst into tears. 
Woe is me, Alhama ! 

And from the windows o'er tin 1 walls 
The sable web of mourning falls ! 
The king weeps as a woman o'er 
His loss, for it is much and sore. 

Woe is uie, Albania ! 



TRANSLATION FROM VITTORELLI. 
ON A NUN. 

Sonnet composed in the name of a father, whose daughtei 
had recently died shortly alter her marriage; and ai 
to the lather of her who had I . be veil. 

Of two fair virgins, modest though admired, 

Heaven made us happy, and now, wretched sires, 
Heaven for a nobler doom their worth desires, 

And gazing upon ritlitr, both required. 

Mine, while the torch of Hymen newly fired 
B ic mnes extinguish'd, soon — too soon expires . 
But thine, within the closing grate retired, 
Eternal captive, to her God aspires. 

But Ihuu at least from out the jealous door, 
Which shuts between your never-meeting ryes, 
May'st hear her sweet and pious voice once more : 

/ to the marble, where my daughter lies, 

Rush, — the swoln flood of bitterness I pour, 

And knock, and knock, and knock — but none replies. 



STANZAS, 

Composed October 11th, 180!), during the night, in a thunder 
storm, when the guides had lost the road lo Zitza. near the 
range of mountains formerly called Pindus, in Albania 

Ciiii.l and mirk is the nightly blast, 

Where Pindus' mountains rise, 
And angry clouds are pouring fast 

The vengeance of the skies. 

Our guides arc gone, our hope is lost, 

And lightnings, as they play, 
But show where rocks our path have crost, 

Or gild the torrent's spray. 

Is yon a cot I saw, though low ? 

When lightning broke the gloom — 
How welcome were its shade ! — ah ! no ' 

'T is but a Turkish tomb. 

Through sounds of foaming water-fails, 

I hear a voice exclaim — 
My way-worn countryman, who calls 

On distant England's name. 

A shot is fired — bv foe or friend ? 

Another — 't is to tell 
The mountain peasants to descend, 

Arid lead us where thev dwell. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



55*3 



Oh ! who in such a night will dare 

To tempt the wilderness ? 
And who 'mid thunder-peals can hear 

Our signal of distress I 

And who that heard our shouts would rise 

To try the dubious road ? 
Nor rather deem from nightly cries 

That outlaws were abroad. 

Clouds burst, skies flash, oh, dreadful hour ! 

More fiercely pours the storm ! 
Vet here one thought has still the power 

To keep my bosom warm. 

While wandering through each broken path, 

O'er brake and craggy brow : 
While elements exhaust their wrath, 

Sweet Florence, where art thou ? 

Not on the sea, not on the sea, — 
Thy bark hath long been gone : 

Oh, may the storm that pours on me 
Bow down my head alone ! 

Full swiftly blew the swift Siroc 

When last I press'd thy lip ; 
And long ere now, with foaming shock, 

Impell'd thy gallant ship. 

Now thou art safe ; nay, long ere now 

Hast trod the shore of Spain : 
'T were hard if aught so fair as thou 

Should linger on the main. 

And since I now remember thee 

In darkness and in dread, 
As in those hours of revelry 

Which mirth and music sped ; 

Do thou amidst the fair white walls, 

If Cadiz yet be free, 
At times from out her latticed halls 

Look o'er the dark-blue sea ; 

Then think upon Calypso's isles, 

Endear'd by days gone by ; 
To others give a thousand smiles, 

To me a single sigh. 

And when the admiring circle mark 

The paleness of thy face, 
A half-form'd tear, a transient spark 

Of melancholy grace, 

Again thou 'It smile, and blushing shun 

Some coxcomb's raillery ; 
Nor own for once thou thought'st of one, 

Who ever thinks on thee. 

Though smile and sigh alike arc vain, 

When sever'd hearts repine ; 
My spirit flies o'er mount and main, 

And mourns in search of thine. 



TO * * + 

Oh Lady! when I left the shore, 
The distant shore which gave me birth, 

I hardly thought to grieve once more, 
To quit another spot on cvth : 



Yet here, amidst this barren isle, 

Where panting nature droops the head, 
Where only thou art seen to smile, 

I view my parting hour with dread. 
Though far from Alhin's craggy shore, 

Divided by the dark-blue main ; 
A few, brief, rolling seasons o'er, 

Perchance I view her cliffs again : 
But wheresoe'er I now may roam, 

Through scorching clime and varied sea, 
Though time restore me to my home, 

I ne'er shall bend mine eyes on thee : 
On thee, in whom at once conspire 

All charms which heedless hearts can move, 
Whom but to see is to admire, 

And, oh ! forgive the word — to love. 
Forgive the word, in one who ne'er 

With such a word can more offend ; 
And since thy heart I cannot share, 

Believe me, what I am, thy friend. 
And who so cold as look on thee, 

Thou lovely wanderer, and be less ? 
Nor be, what man should ever be, 

The friend of beauty in distress ? 
Ah ! who would think that form had past 

Through danger's most destructive path, 
Had braved the dcath-wing'd tempest's blast, 

And 'scaped a tyrant's fiercer wrath '/ 
Lady ! when I shall view the walls 

Where free Byzantium once arose ; 
And Stamboul's oriental halls 

The Turkish tyrants now enclose ; 
Though mightiest in the lists of fame 

That glorious city still shall be ; 
On me 't will hold a dearer claim 

As spot of thy nativity : 
And though I bid thee now farewell, 

When 1 behold that wondrous scene, 
Since where thou art I may not dwell, 

'T will soothe to be where thou hast been. 
September, 1809. 



WRITTEN AT ATHENS, 

JANUARY 16, 1810. 

The spell is broke, the charm is flown ! 

Thus is it with life's fitful fever ! 
We madly smile when we should groan ; 

Delirium is our best deceiver. 

Each lucid interval of thought 

Recalls the woes of Nature's charter, 

And he that acts as wise men ought, 

But lives, as saints have died, a martyr. 

WRITTEN BENEATH A PICTURE. 

Dear object of defeated care ! 

Though now of love and thee bereft, 
To reconcile me with despair 

Thine image and my tears are left. 

'T is said with sorrow time can cope ; 

But this, I feel, can ne'er be true : 
For by the death-blow of m\ hope, 

My incmBry immortal grew. 



524 



BYRON S WORKS. 



u-ritTEN AFTER SWIMMING FROM SESTOS 
TO ABYDOS," BAY 9, 1810. 

If, in (he month of dark December, 

Leander, who was nightly wont 
(What maid will not the tale remember ?) 

To cross thy stream, broad Hellespont! 
if, when the wintry tempest roar'd, 

lie sped to Hero, nothing Loth, 
And thus of old thy current pour'd, 

Fair Venus ! how I pity both ! 
For me, degenerate modern wretch, 

Though in the genial month of May, 
My dripping limbs I faintly stretch, 

And think I 've done a feat to-day. 
But since he cross'd the rapid tide, 

According to the doubtful story, 
To woo, — and — Lord knows what beside, 

And swam for love, as I for glory ; 
T were hard to say who fared the best : 

Sad mortals ! thus the gods still plague you ! 
He lost his labour, I my jest, 

For he was drown'd, and I 've the ague. 



Ziori [iov, <r«f ayarrS).* 
ATHENS, 1810. 

Maid of Athens, ere we part, 
Give, oh, give me back my heart ! 
Or, since that has left my breast, 
Keep it now, and take the rest ! 
Hear my vow before I go, 
Z.ti>7} //ou, ad; dyairw. 



1 On the 3d of May, 1810, while the Salsette (Captain Bathurat) 
was lying in the Dardanelles, Lieutenant Ekenhead of that 
frigate and the writer of these rhymes swam from the Euro- 
pean shore to the Asiatic — by-the-by, from Abydos to Sestos 
would have been more correct. The whole distance from the 
place whence we started to our landing on the other side, in- 
cluding the length we were carried by the current, was com- 
puted by those on board the frigate at upwards of four Eng- 
Rsh miles; though the actual breadth is barely one. The 
rapidity of the current is such that no boat can row directly 
across, and it may in some measure be estimated from the cir 
cumstance of the whole distance being accomplished by one 
of the parties in an hour and live, and by the other in an hour 
and ten minutes. The water was extremely cold, from the 
melting of the mountain-snows. About three weeks before, 
in April, we had made an attempt, but having ridden all the 
way from the Troad the same morning, and the water being 
ot an icy dullness, we found it necessary to postpone the 
completion till the frigate anchored below the castles, when 
we swam the straits, as just stated, entering a considerable 
way above the European, and landing below the Asiatic fort. 
Chevalier says that a young Jew swam the same distance for 
his mistress; and Oliver mentions its having been done by a 
Neapolitan; but our consul, Tarragona, remembered ni ithi I 
ol theso circumstances, and tried to dissuade us from the at- 
tempt. A number of the Salsctle's crew were known to have 
accomplished a greater distance; and the only thing that mo 
prised me was, that, as doubts had been entertained of the truth 
of Leander's story, no traveller had ever endeavoured to ascer- 
tain its practicability. 

2 Zoe mow, sas agapo, or Zt'ort pav, crnj ayanio, a Romaic 
expression of tenderness : if I translate it I shall affront the 
i a, as it may seem that I supposed they could not ; and 
if I On not, I may affront the ladies. For fear of any miscon- 
struction on the part of the latter, I shall do so, begging 
pardon of the learned. It means. "My life, I love you!" 
which sounds very pret'ily in all languages, and is as much 
mi fashion in Greece at this day as, Juvenal tells us, tho two 
first words were amongst the Roman ladies, whose erotic ex- 
pressions were ad llelleni/.ed. 



By those tresses unconfined, 
Woo'd by each iEgean wind; 
By those Lids whose jetty fringe 
Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge, 
By those wild eves like the roe, 
Zuh] /iiw, oa( iyanS. 

By that lip I long to taste ; 
By that zouc-encircled waist ; 
By all the token-flowers 1 that tell 
What words can never speak so well ; 
By love's alternate joy and woe, 
Zw7j finTt, ais aya~T). 

Maid of Athens ! I am gone : 
Think of me, sweet ! when alone. — 
Though I fly to Istambol, 2 
Athens holds my heart and soul: 
Can I cease to love thee / No ! 
Zwij fiaT< t ctig aydrrijj. 



TRANSLATION OF THE FAMOUS GREEK 
WAR-SONG, 

AtVTC 77U(t'£{ Tuiv 'EAA(/»'Wr, 

Written byRiga, who perished in the attemptto revolutionizi 
Greece. The following translation is as literal as th» audio* 
could make it in verse; it is of the same measure as thato 
the original. 

Sons of the Greeks, arise ! 

The glorious hour 's gone forth, 
And, worthy of such ties, 

Display who gave us birth. 

CHORUS. 

Sons of Greeks, let us go 

In arms against the foe, 
Till their hated blood shall flow 

In a river past our feet. 

Then manfully despising 

The Turkish tyrant's yoke, 
Let your country see you rising, 

And all her chains are broke. 
Brave shades of chiefs and sages, 

Behold the coming strife ! 
Hellenes of past ages, 

Oh, start again to life ! 
At the sound of my trumpet, breaking 

Your sleep, oh, join with me! 
And the scven-hill'd 3 city seeking, 

Fight, conquer, till wc 're free. 

Sons of Greeks, etc. 

Sparta, Sparta, why in slumbers 

Lethargic dost thou lie ? 
Awake, and join thy numbuif 

With Athens, old ally ! 



1 In the East (where ladies are not taught to write. Its! thry 
should scribble assignations) Mowers, cinders, pebbles, etc., 
convey the Sentiments of the parties by that universal deputy 
of Mercury — an old woman. A cinder says, " I burn for 'he*;' 
a hunch of Bowers tied with hair, " Take me and fly ;' but 
pebble declares — whut nothing else can. 

2 Constantinople. 

3 Constantinople. «' 'EtrruAo</>oj." 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



525 



Leonidas recalling, 

That chief of ancient song, 
Who saved ye once from falling, 

The terrible, the strong ! 
Who made that bold diversion 

In old Thermopylae, 
And warring with the Persian 

To keep his country (rce ; 
With his three hundred waging 

The battle, long he stood, 
And, like a lion raging, 

Expired in seas of blood. 

Sons of Greeks, etc. 



TRANSLATION OF THE ROMAIC SONG, 

" MrftlXJ fl££ Vit' TTfplGuXl 

'QpaiaTUTt) Xaijifi," etc. 

Die sons from which this is taken is a great favourite with the 
young girls of Athens of all classes. Their manner of sing- 
ing it is by verses in rotation, the whole number present join- 
ing in the chorus. I have heard it frequently at our "^upoi" 
in the winter of 1810-11. The air is plaintive and pretty. 

I enter thy garden of roses, 

Beloved and fair Haidee, 
Each morning when Flora reposes, 

For surely I sec her in thee. 
0!i, lovely ! thus low I implore thee, 

Receive this fond truth from my tongue, 
Which utters its song to adore thee, 

Yet trembles for what it has sung: 
As the branch, at the bidding of nature, 

Adds fragrance and fruit to the tree, 
Through her eyes, through her every feature, 

Shines the soul of the young Haidee. 

But the loveliest garden grows hateful, 

When love has abandon'd the bowers ; 
Bring me hemlock — since mine is ungrateful, 

That herb is more fragrant than flowers. 
The poison, when pour'd from the chalice, 

Will deeply embitter the bowl ; 
But when drunk to escape from thy malice, 

The draught shall be sweet to my soul. 
Too cruel ! in vain I implore thee 

My heart from these horrors to save : 
Will nought to my bosom restore thee? 

Thtn open the gates of the grave. 

As the chief who to combat advances, 

Secure of his conquest before, 
Thus thou, with those eyes for thy lances, 

Hast pierced through my heart to its core. 
Ah, tell me, my soul ! must I perish 

By pangs which a smile Would dispel ? 
Would the hope, which thou once bad'st me cherish, 

For torture repay me too well ? 
Now sad is the garden of roses, 

Beloved but false Haidee! 
There Flora all wither'd reposes, 

And mourns o'er thine absence with me. 



ON PARTING. 

The kiss, dear maid ! thy lip has left, 
Shall never part from mine, 
2X 



Till happier hours restore the gift 
Untainted back to thine. 

Thy parting glance, which fondly beams, 

An equal love may see : 
The tear that from thine eyelid streams 

Can weep no change in me. 

1 ask no pledge to make me blest, 

In gazing when alone ; 
Nor one memorial for a breast, 

Whose thoughts are all thme own. 

Nor need I wri'.e — to tell the tale 

My pen were doubly weak : 
Oh ! what can idlt words avail, 

Unless the heart could speak ? 

By day or night, in weal or woe, 

That heart, no longer free, 
Must bear the love it cannot show, 

Aiid silent ache for thee. 



TO THYRZA. 

Without a stone to mark the spot, 

And say, what truth might well have said, 
By all, save one, perchance forgot, 

Ah, wherefore art thou lowly laid ? 
By many a shore and many a sea 

Divided, yet beloved in vain ; 
The past, the future fled to thee 

To bid us meet — no — ne'er again ! 
Could this have been — a word, a look, 

That softly said, "We part in peace,'' 
Had taught my bosom how to brook, 

With fainter sighs, thy soul's release. 
And didst thou not, since death for thee 

Prepared a light and pangless dart, 
Once long for him thou ne'er shall see, 

Who held, and holds thee in his heart? 
Oh ! who like him had watch'd thee here? 

Or sadly mark'd thy glazing eye, 
In that dread hour ere death appear, 

When silent sorrow fears to sigh, 
Till all was past ? But when no more 

'T was thine to reck of human woe, 
Affection's heart-drops, gushing o'er, 

Had flow'd as fast — as now they flow 
Shall they not How, when many a day 

In these, to me, deserted towers, 
Ere call'd but for a time away, 

Affection's mingling tears were ours ? 
Ours too the glance none saw beside ; 

The smile none else might understand , 
The whispcr'd thought of h 

The pressure of the thrilling hand ; 
The kiss so guiltless and refined, 

That love each warmer wish forbore " 
Those eyes proclaim'd so pure a mind. 

Even passion blush'd to plead for moie 
The tone, that taught me to rejoice, 

When prone, unlike ihee, to repine, 
The song celestial from thy voice, 

But sweet to me from none but thine ; 



526 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



The pledge we wore — I wear it still, 

But where is thine? — ah, where art thou? 
Oft have I borne the weight of ill, 

But never bent beneath till now ! 
Well hast thou left in life's best bloom 

The cup of woe for me to drain. 
If rest alone be in the tomb, 

I would not wish thee here again ; 
But if in worlds more blest than this 

Thy virtues seek a fitter sphere, 
Impart some portion of thy bliss, 

To wean me from mine anguish here. 
Teach me — too early taught by (hce ! 

To bear, forgiving and forgiven : 
On earth thy love was such to me, 

It fain would form my hope in heaven ! 



STANZAS. 

Away, away, ye notes of woe ! 

Be silent, thou once soothing strain, 
Or I must flee from hence, for, oh ! 

I dare not trust those sounds again. 
To me they speak of brighter days — 

But lull the chords, for now, alas! 
I must not think, I may not gaze 

On what I am, on what I was. 

The voice that made those sounds more sweet 

Is hush'd, and all their charms are fled ; 
And now their softest notes repeat 

A dirge, an anthem o'er the dead ! 
Yes, Thyrza ! yes, they breathe of thee, 

Beloved dust ! since dust thou art ; 
And all that ence was harmony 

Is worse than discord to my heart ! 

'T is silent all ! — but on my ear 

The well-remember'd echoes thrill ; 
I hear a voice I would not hear, 

A voice that now might well be still ; 
Yet oft my doubting soul 'twill shake : 

Even slumber owns its gentle tone, 
Till consciousness will vainly wake 

To listen, though the dream be flown. 

Sweet Thyrza ! waking as in sleep, 

Thou art but now a lovely dream ; 
A star that trembled o'er the deep, 

Then turn'd from earth its tender beam. 
But he who through life's dreary way 

Must pass, when heaven is veil'd in wrath, 
Will long lament the vanish'd ray 

That scatter'd gladness o'er his path. 



TO THYRZA. 

One struggle more, and I am free 

From pangs that rend my heart in twain, 
One last long sigh to love and thee, 

Then back lo busy life again. 
It suits me wel! to mingle now 

With things that never pleased before: 
Though every joy is fled below, 

W hat future grief can touch me more? 



Then bring me wine, the banquet bring ; 

Man was not form'd to live alone : 
I'll be that light unmeaning ib'ug 

That smiles with all and weeps with none. 
It was not thus in days more dear, 

It never would have been, but thou 
Hast fled, and left me lonely here ; 

Thou 'rt nothing, all are nothing now. 

In vain my lyre would lightly breathe ! 

The smile that sorrow fain would wear, 
But mocks the woe that lurks beneath, 

Like roses o'er a sepulchre. 
Though gay companions o'er the bowl 

Dispel a while the sense of ill ; 
Though pleasure fires the maddening soul, 

The heart — the heart is lonely still ! 

On many a lone and lovely night 

It soothed to gaze upon the sky ; 
For then I deem'd the heavenly light 

Shone sweetly on thy pensive eye ; 
And oft I thought at Cynthia's noon, 

When sailing o'er the JE.gca.xi wave, 
41 Now Thyrza gazes on that moon — " 

Alas, it gleam'd upon her grave ! 

When stretch'd on fever's sleepless bed, 

And sickness shrunk my throbbing veins, 
"'T is comfort still," I faintly said, 

"That Thyrza cannot know my pains:' 
Like freedom to the time-worn slave, 

A boon 't is idle then to give, 
Relenting Nature vainly gave 

My life when Thyrza ceased to live ! 

My Thyrza's pledge in better days, 
When love and life alike were new, 

How different now thou meet'st my gaze ! 
How tinged by time with sorrow's hue! 

The heart that gave itself with thee 
• Is silent — ah, were mine as still ! 

Though cold as even the dead can be, 
It feels, it sickens with the chill. 

Thou bitter pledge ! thou mournful token ! 

Though painful, welcome to my breast! 
Still, still, preserve that love unbroken, 

Or break the heart to which thou 'rt prest' 
Time tempers love, but not removes, 

More hallow'd when its hope is fled: 
Oh ! what are thousand living loves 

To that which cannot quit the dead ? 



EUTHANASIA. 

When time, or soon or late, shall bring 
The dreamless sleep that lulls the dedd, 

Oblivion ! may thy languid wing 
Wave genlly o'er my dying bed! 

No band of friends or heirs be there, 
To weep or wish the coming blow ; 

No maiden, with dishcvell'd hair, 
To feel, or feign, decorous woe. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



5 L >< 



But silent let me sink to earth, 
With no officious mourners near: 

I woulJ not mar one hour of mirtli, 
Nor startle friendship with a fear. 

Yet Love, if Love in such an hour 
Could nobly check its useless sighs, 

Might then exert its laics! power 
In her who lives and him who dies. 

'T were sweet, my Psyche, to the last 
Thy features still serene to sec : 

Forgetihl of its struggles past, 

Even Pain itself should smile on thee. 

But rain the wish — for Beauty still 

Will shrink, as shrinks the ebbing breath ; 

Ami woman's tears, produced at will, 
Deceive in life, unman in death. 

Then lonely lie my latest hour, 
Without regret, without a groan ! 

For thousands death hath ceased to lour, 
And pain been transient or unknown. 

a Ay, but to die, and go," alas ! 

Where all have gone, and all must go! 
To be the nothing that I was 

Ere bom to life and living woe ! 

Count o'er the joys thine hours have seen, 
Count o'er thy days from anguish free, 

And know, whatever thou hast been, 
'T is something better not to be. 



STANZAS. 

dea! quanto minus est cum reliijuis ven>ari quasi hli memii 

Amd thou art dead, as young and fair 

As aught of mortal birth ; 
And form so soft, and charms so rare, 

Too soon rcturn'd to earth ! 
Though Earth received them in her bed, 
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread 

In carelessness or mirth, 
There is an eye which could not brook 
A moment on that grave to look. 

I will not ask where thou liest low, 

Nor gaze upon the spot ; 
There flowers or weeds at will may grow, 

So I behold them not : 
It is enough for me to prove 
That what I loved, and long must .ove, 

Like common earth can rot ; 
To me there needs no stone to tell, 
'T is nothing that I loved so wed. 

Yet did I love thee to the last 

As fervently as thou, 
Who didst not change through all the past, 

And canst not alter now. 
The love where death has set his seal, 
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal, 

Nor falsehood disavow : 
And what were worse, thou canst not see 
Or wrong, 01 change, or fault in me. 



The belter days of life were ours ; 

The worst can be but mine ; 
The sun that cheers, the storm that lours, 

Shall never more be thine. 
The silence of that dreamless sleep 
I envy now too much to weep; 

Nor need I to repine 
That, all those charms have pass'd away, 
I might have watch'd through long decay. 

The flower in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd 

Must fall the earliest prey ; 
Though by no hand untimely snatch'd, 

The leaves must drop away: 
And yet it were a greater grief 
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf, 

Than see it pluck'd to-day; 
Since earthly eye but ill can bear 
To trace the change to foul from fair. 

I know not if I could have borne 
To see thy beauties fade ; 

The night that Ibllow'd such a morn 

Had worn a deeper shade : 
Thy day without a cloud hath past, 
And thou wert lovely to the last ; 

Extinguish'd, not decay'd ; 
As stars that shoot along the sky 
Shine brightest as they fall from high. 

As once I wept, if I could weep, 

My tears might well be shed, 
To think I was not near to keep 

One vigil o'er thy bed ; 
To gaze, how fondly ! on thy face, 
To fold thee in a faint embrace, 

Uphold thy drooping head ; 
And show that love, however vain, 
Nor thou nor I can feel again. 

Yet how much less it were to gain, 

Though thou hast left me free, 
The loveliest things that still remain, 

Than thus remember thee ! 
The all of thine that cannot die 
Through dark and dread eternity, 

Returns again to me, 
And more thy buried love endears 
Than aught, except its living years. 



STANZAS. 

If sometimes in the haunts of men 

Thine image from my breast may fade, 
The lonely hour presents again 

The semblance of thy gentle shade : 
And now that sad and silent hour 

Thus much of thee can still restore, 
And sorrow unobserved may pour 

The plaint she dare not speak beiore. 

Oh, pardon that in crowds awhile, ■ 
I waste one thought I owe to thee, 

And, sclf-condemn'd, appear to smile, 
Unfaithful to thy memory ! 



•>?s 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Nor deem that memory less dear, 
That then I seem not to repine ; 

I would not fools should overhear 

One sigh that should be wholly thine. 

If not the goblet pass unquafT'd, 

It is not drain'd to banish care, 
The cup must hold a deadlier draught 

That brings a Lethe for despair. 
And could oblivion set my soul 

From all her troubled visions freflj 
I 'd dash to earth the sweetest bowl 

That drown'd a single thought of thee. 

For wert thou banish'd from my mind, 

Where could my vacant bosom turn ? 
And who would then remain behind 

To honour thine abandoned urn ? 
No, no — it is my sorrow's pride 

That last dear duty to fulfil ; 
Though all the world forget beside, 

'T is meet that I remember still. 

For well I know, that such had been 

Thy gentle care for him, who now 
Unmoum'd shall quit this mortal scene, 

Where none regarded him, but thou : 
And, oh ! I feel in that was given 

A blessing never meant for me ; 
Thou wert too like a dream of heaven, 

For earthly love to merit thee. 

March Ulh, 1812. 



ON A CORNELIAN HEART WHICH WAS 
BROKEN. 
Ill-fated heart! and can it be 

That thou shouldst thus be rent in twain ? 
Have years of care for thine and thec 
Alike been all employ'd in vain ? 

Yet precious seems each shatter'd part, 
And every fragment dearer grown, 

Since he who wears thee feels thou art 
A fitter emblem of his own. 



TO A YOUTHFUL FRIEND. 

This poem and the following were written some years ago. 

Few years have pass'd since thou and I 
Were firmest friends, at least in name, 

And childhood's gay sincerity 

Preserved our feelings long the same. 

But now, like me, too well thou know'st 

What trifles oft the heart recall ; 
And those who once have loved the most 

Too soon forget they loved at all. 

And such the change the heart displays, 
So frail is early friendship's reign, 

A month's brief lapse, perhaps a day's, 
Will view thy mind estranged again. 



If so, it never shall be mine 

To mourn the loss of such a heart ; 

The fault was Nature's fault, not thine, 
Which made thee fickle as thou art. 

As rolls the ocean'?: changing tide, 
So human feelings ebb and flow ; 

And who would in a breast confide 
Where stormy passions ever glow ? 

It boots not that, together bred. 

Our childish days were days of joy; 

IMy spring of life has quickly fled ; 
Thou, too, hast ceased to be a boy. 

And when we bid adieu to youth, 

Slaves to the specious world's control 

We sigh a long farewell to truth ; 
That world corrupts the noblest soul. 

Ah, joyous season ! when the mind 
Dares all things boldly but to lie ; 

When thought, ere spoke, is unconfined, 
And sparkles in the placid eye. 

Not so in man's maturer years, 
When man himself is but a tool ; 

When interest sways our hopes and fears, 
And all must love or hate by rule. 

With fools in kindred vice the same, 
We learn at length our faults to blend, 

And those, and those alone, may claim 
The prostituted name of friend. 

Such is the common lot of man : 
Can we then 'scape from folly free? 

Can we reverse the general plan, 
Nor be what all in turn must be ? 

No, for myself, so dark my fate 

Through every turn of life hath been j 

Man and the world I so much hate, 
I care not when I quit the scene. 

But thou, with spirit frail and light, 
Wilt shine awhile, and pass away; 

As glow-worms sparkle through the night 
But dare not stand the test of day. 

Alas ! whenever folly calls 

Where parasites and princes meet, 

(For cherish'd first in royal halls, 
The welcome vices kindly greet), 

Even now tnou 'rt nightly seen to add 
One insect to the fluttering crowd ; 

And still thy trifling heart is glad, 
To join the vain and court the proud. 

There dost thou glide from fair to fair, 
Still simpering on with eager haste, 

As flies along the gay parterre, 

That taint the flowers they scarcely laste 



Bu! say, what nymph will prize the flame 
Which seems, as marshy vapours move, 

To flit along from dame to dame, 
An ignis-fatuus gleam of love? 

What friend for thee, howe'er inclined, 
Will deign to own a kindred care? 

Who will debase his manly mind, 
For friendship every fool may share? 

In time forbear; amidst the throng 
No more so base a thing be seen ; 

No more so idly pass along : 

Be something, any thing, but — mean. 



To ****** 

Well ! thou art happy, and I feel 
That I should thus be happy too ; 

For still my heart regards thy weal 
Warmly, as it was wont to do. 

Thy husboid 's blest — and 't will impart 
Some pangs to view his happier lot : 

But let them pass — Oh ! how my heart 
Would hate him, if he loved then not ! 

When late I saw thy favourite child, 
I thought my jealous heart would break ; 

But when the unconscious infant smiled, 
I kiss'd it, for its mother's sake. 

I kiss'd it, and repress'd my sighs, 

Its father in its face to see ; 
But then it had its mother's eyes, 

And they were all to love and me. 

Mary, adieu ! I must away : 

While thou art blest, I '11 not repine ; 

B'\' near thee I can never stay ; 
My heart would soon again be thine. 

I deem'd that time, I deem'd that pride 
Had quench'd at length my boyish flame ; 

Nor knew, till sea'ed bv thy side, 
My heart in all, save hope, the same. 

Vet was I calm : I knew the time 

My breast would thrill before thy look ; 

But now to tremble were a crime — 
We met, and not a nervo was shook. 

[ saw thee gaze upon my face, 
Yet meet with no confusion there : 

One only feeling couldst thou trace— 
The sullen calmness of despair. 

Away ! away ! my early dream 
Remembrance never must awake : 

Oh ! whore is Lethe's fabled stream? 
My foolish heart, be still, or break. 



FROM THE PORTUGUESE. 
In moments to delight devoted, 

"My life!" with tenderest tone, you cry; 
Dear words on which my heart had doted, 
If youth could neither fade nor die. 
2x2 72 



To death even hours like these must rol. ; 

Ah ! then repeat those accents never ; 
Or change "mvlifo" into "my soul!" 

W Inch, like my love, exists for ever. 



IMPROMPTU, IN REPLY TO A FRIEND. 

WheK from the heart whore Sorrow sits, 

Her dusky shadow mounts too high, 
And o'er the changing aspect flits, 

And clouds the brow, or fills the eve ; 
Heed not that gloom, which soon shall sink: 

My thoughts their dungeon know too well ; 
Back to my breast the wanderers shrink 

And droop within their silent cell. 



ADDRESS, 

SrOKEN AT THE OPENING OF r> P. I' R V- T. A NK 
THEATRE, SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1812. 

In one dread night our city saw, and sigh'd, 
Bow'd to the dust, the Drama's tower of pride : 
In one short hour beheld the blazing fane, 
Apollo sink, and Shakspcare cease to rcinn. 

Ye who beheld, (oh ! sight admired and mourn'd, 
Whose radiance mock'd the ruin it adorn'd !) 
Through clouds of fire, the massy fragments riven, 
Like Israel's pillar, chase the night from heaven ; 
Saw the long column of revolving flames 
Shake its red shadow o'er the startled Thames, 
While thousands, throng'd around the burning dome, 
Shrank back appall'd, and trembled for their home, 
As glared the volumcd blaze, and ghastly shone 
The skies with lightnings awful as their own, 
Till blackening ashes and the lonely wall 
Usurp'd the Muse's realm, and mark'd her fall ; 
Say — shall this new, nor less aspirin" pile, 
Rear'd where once rose the mightiest in our isle, 
Know the same favour which the former knew, 
A shrine for Shakspcare— worthy him and you 7 

Yes — it shall be — the magic of that name 
Defies the scythe of time, the torch of (lame • 
On the same spot still consecrates the scene, 
And bids the Drama be where she hath been : 
This fabric's birth attests the potent spell — 
Indulge our honest pride, and say, How well ! 

As soars this fane to emulate the last, 
Oh ! might we draw our omens from the pas.'. 
Some hour propitious to our prayers mnv boast 
Names such as hallow still the dome we lost. 
On Drury first your Siddons' thrilling art 
O'erwhelm'd the gentlest, storm'd the sternest te.irV 
On Drury, Garrick's latest laurels grew • 
Here vour last tears retiring Roseius drew, 
Sigh'd his last thanks, and wept his last adieu 
But still for living wit the wreaths mav bloom 
That only waste their odours o'er the tomb. 
Such Drury claim'- 1 „nd claims— nor vou refuse 
One tribute to . .vive his slumbering muse : 
With garlands deck your own Menander's head! 
Nor hoard vour honours idly for the dead I 



Dear are the days which made our annals bright, 
Ere Garrick fled, or Brinsley ceased to write. 
Heirs to th< ir labours, like all high-born heirs, 
Vain of our ancestry, as they of theirs ; 
While tliua remembrance borrows Banquo's glass, 
To claim the sceptre 1 shadows as they pass, 
And we the mirror hold, where imaged shine 
Immortal names, emblayon'd on our line, 
Pause — ere their feebler offspring you condemn, 
Reflect how hard the task to rival them ! 

Fr'unds of the stage ! to whom both players and plays 

Must sue alike for pardon or for praise, 

Whose judging voice and eye alone direct 

The boundless power to cherish or reject; 

If e'er frivolity has led to fame, 

And made us blush that you forbore to blame; 

If e'er the sinking stage could condescend 

To soothe the sickly taste it dure not mend, 

AH past reproach may present scenes refute, 

And censure, wisely loud, be justly mute! 

Oh ! since your fiat stamps the drama's laws, 

Forbear to mock us with misplaced applause ; 

So pride shall doubly nerve the actor's powers, 

And reason's voice be echo'd back by ours ! 

Tins greeting o'er, the ancient rule obey'd, 

The Drama's homage by her herald paid, 

Receive our welcome too, whose every tone 

Springs from our hearts, and fain would win your own, 

The curtain rises — may our stage unfold 

Scenes not unworthy Dairy's days of old ! 

Britons our judges, Nature for our guide, 

Siill may we please — long, long may you preside! 



That beam hath sunk ; and now thou art 

A blank ; a thing to count and rinse 
Through each dull, tedious trifling part, 

Winch all regret, yel all rehearse. 
One scene even thou cans) not deform; 

The limit of thy sloth or speed, 
Winn future wanderers bear the storm 

Which we shall sleep too sound to heed: 
And I can smile to think how weak 

Thine efforts shortly shall be shown, 
When all the vengeance thou canst wreak 

Must fall upon — a nameless stone ! 



TO TIME. 



Time ! on whose arbitrary wing 

The varying hours must flag or fly, 
Whose tardy winter, fleeting spring, 

But drag or drive us on to die — 
Hail thou ! who on my birth bestow'd 

Those boons to all that know thee known j 
Yet better I sustain thy load, 

For now I bear the weight alone. 
I would not one fond heart should share 

The bitter moments thou hast given ; 
And pardon thee, since thou couldst" spare, 

All that I loved, to peace or heaven. 
To them be joy or rest, on me 

Thy future ills shall press in vain ; 
I nothing owe but years to thee, 

A debt already paid in pain. 
Tet e'en that pain was some relief; 

It felt, but stid forgot thy power: 
The active agony of grief 

Retards, but never counts the hour. 
In joy I 've sigh'd to think thy flight 

Would soon subside from swift to slow ; 
Thv cloud could overcast the light, 

But could not add a night to woe; 
For then, however drear and dark, 

My soul was suited to thy sky ; 
line star alone shot forth a spark 

To prove the*— not Eternity. 



TRANSLATION OF A ROMAIC LOVE SONG 

An ! Love was never yet without 

The pang, the agony, tile i 

Which rends my hear! with ceaseless sigh, 

While day and night roll darkling by. 

Without one friend to hear my woe, 
I faint, 1 die beneath the blow. 
That Love had arrows, well I knew : 
Alas ! 1 find them poison'd too. 

Birds, yet in freedom, shun the net, 
Winch Love around your haunts hath se 
Or, circled by his fatal lire, 
Your hearts shall burn, your hopes expire. 

A bird of free and careless wing 
Was I, through many a smiling spring; 
But caught within the subtle snare, 
I burn, and feebly flutter there. 

Who ne'er have loved, and loved in vain, 
Can neither feel nor pity pain, 
The cold repulse, the look askance, 
The lightning of love's angry glance. 

In flattering dreams I deein'd thee mine ; 
Now hope, and he who hoped, decline; 
Like melting wax, or withering (lower, 
I feel my passion, and thy power. 

My light of life ! ah, tell me why 
That pouting lip, and alter'd eve? 
My bird of love ! my beauteous mate ! 
And art thou changed, and canst thou hate ? 

Mine ryes like wintry streams o'erflow : 
What wretch with me would barter woe? 
My bird ! relent : one note could give 
A charm, to bid thy lover live. 

My curdling blood, my maddening brain, 
In silent anguish I sustain ! 
And still thy heart, without partaking 
One pang, exults — while mine is breaking 

Pour me the poison ; fear not thou ! 
Thou canst not murder more than now: 
I 've lived to curse my natal day, 
And love, that thus can lingering slay. 

My wounded soul, my bleeding breast, 
Can patience preach thee into rest '/ 
Alas ! too late I dearly know, 
That joy is harbinger of woe. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



53] 



A SONG. 

Thou art not false, but thou art fickle, 
To those thyself so fondly sought ; 

The tears that thou hast forced lo trickle 
Are doubly bitter from that thought : 

'Tis this which breaks the heart thou grievest, 

Too well thou lov'st — too soon thou leavest. 

The wholly false the heart despises, 

And spurns deceiver and deceit ; 
But she who not a thought disguises, 

Whose love is as sincere as sweet, — 
When she can change who loved so truly, 
It feels what mine has felt so newly. 

To dream of joy and wake to sorrow 
Is doom'd to all who love or live ; 

And if, when conscious on the morrow, 
We scarce our fancy can forgive, 

That cheated us in slumber only, 

To leave the waking soul more lonely. 

What must they feel whom no false vision, 
But truest, tenderest passion wann'd ? 

Sincere, but swift in sad transition, 
As if a dream alone had charm'd ? 

Ah ! sure such Hrief is fancy's scheming, 

And all thy change can be but dreaming ! 



ON BEING ASKED WHAT WAS THE 
"ORIGIN OF LOVE?" 

The "Origin of Love !" — Ah, why 

That cruel question ask of me, 
When thou may'st read in many an eye 

He starts lo life on seeing thee? 

And shouldst thou seek his end to know: 
My heart forebodes, my fears foresee, 

He'll linger long in silent woe; 
But live — until I cease to be. 



REMEMBER HIM, etc. 

Remember him, whom passion's power 
Severely, deeply, vainly proved : 

Remember thou that dangerous hour 

When neither fell, though both were loved. 

That yielding breast, that melting eye, 

Too much invited to be blest : 
That gentle prayer, that pleading sigh, 

The wilder wish reproved, reprcst. 

Oh ! let me feel that all I lost, 

But saved thee all that conscience fears ; 
And blush for every pang it cost 

To spare the vain remorse of years. 

Yet think of this when many a tongue, 
Whose busy accents whisper blame, 

Would do the heart that loved thee wiong, 
And brand a nearly blighted name. 



Think that, whate'er to others, thou 
Ilast seen each selfish thought subdued ; 

I bless thy purer soul even now, 
Even now, in midnight solitude. 

Oh, God ! that we nad met in time, 

Our hearts as fond, thy hind more free; 

When thou hadst loved without a crime, 
And 1 been less unworthy thee 1 

Far may thy days, as heretofore, 
From this our gaudy world be past! 

And, that too bitter moment o'er, 
Oh! may such trial be thy last ! 

This heart, alas ! perverted !unj, 
Itself destroy'd might there destroy, 

To meet thee in the glittering throng, 
Would wake presumption's hope of joy. 

Then to the things whose bliss or woe, 
Like mine, is wild and worthless all, 

That world resign — such scenes forego, 
Where those who feel must surely fall. 

Thy youth, thy charms, thy tenderness, 

Thy soul from long seclusion pure, 
From what even here hath past, may guess, 
What there thy bosom must endure. 

Oh! pardon that imploring tear, 
Since not by virtue shed in vain, 

My frenzy drew from eyes so dear ; 
For me they shall not weep again. 

Though long and mournful must it be, 
The thought that we no more may meet; 

Yet I deserve the stern decree, 
And almost deem the sentence sweet. 

Still, had I loved thee less, mv heart 
Had then less sacrificed to thine ; 

It felt not half so much to part, 

As if its guilt had made thee mine. 



LINES 

INSCRIBED UPON A CUP FORMED FROM A SKC 

Start not — nor deem my spirit flee: 

In me behold the only skull 
From which, unlike a living head, 

Whatever flows is never dull. 

I lived, I loved, I quafT'd, like thee ; 

I died ; let earth my bones resign: 
Fill up — thou canst not injure me ; 

The worm hath fouler lips than thine. 

Better to hold the sparkling jrape, 

Than nurse the carth-wrrm's slimy brooij • 
And circle in the goblet's Bhape 

The drink of gods, than reptiles' food. 

Where once my wit, perchance, hath shunrt 

In aid of others' let me shine ; 
And when, alas! our brains are none. 

What nobler substitute Jian wine? 



.S32 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



"1 



Quaff while thou canst — another race, 

When thou and thine like me are sped, 
May rescue thee from earth's embrace, 

And rhyme and revel with the dead. 
Why not ? since through life's little day 

Our heads such sad effects produce ; 
Rcdcem'd from worms and wasting clay, 

This chance is theirs, to be of use. 
Newstead Abbey, 1S08. 



ON THE DEATH OF SIR PETER PARKER, 
BART. 
There is a tear for all that die, 

A mourner o'er the humblest grave ; 
But nations swell the funeral cry, 
And triumph weeps above the brave. 

For them is sorrow's purest sigh 
O'er ocean's heaving bosom sent : 

In vain their bones unburied lie, 
All earth becomes their monument! 

A tomb is theirs on every page, 

An epitaph on every tongue. 
The present hours, the future age, 

For them bewail, to them belong. 

For them the voice of festal mirth 

Grows hush'd, their name the only sound ; 

While deep remembrance pours to worth 
The goblet's tributary round. 

A theme to crowds that knew them not, 

Lamented by admiring foes, 
Who would not share their glorious lot? 

Who would not die the death they chose ? 

And, gallant Parker ! thus enshrined 
Thy life, thy fall, thy fame shall be; 

And early valour, glowing, find 
A model in thy memory. 

Bui there are breasts that bleed with thee 

In woe, that glory cannot quell ; 
And shuddering hear of victory, 

Where one so dear, so dauntless, fell. 

Where shall they turn to mourn thee less ? 

When cease to hear thy cherish'd name? 
Time cannot teach forgetfulness, 

While grief's full heart is fed by fame. 

Alas ! for them, though not for thee, 
They cannot choose but weep the more ; 

Ueep foi the dead the grief must be 
Who ne'er gave caubc to mourn before. 



TO A LADY WEEPING. 

Weep, daughter of a royal line, 

A sire's disgrace, a realm's decay ; 
Ah, happy ! if each tour of thine 

Could wash a father's fault away ! 
Weep — for thy tears are virtue's tears — 

Auspicious to these suffering isles ; 
And be each drop, in future years, 

Repaid thee bv thv people's smiles ! 
March, 1812. 



FROM THE TURKISH. 
The chain I gave was fair to view, 

The lute I added sweet in sound, 
The heart that olfer'd both was true, 

And ill deserved the fate it found. 

These gifts were charm'd by secret spell 
Thy truth in absence to divine ; 

And they have done their duty well, 
Alas ! they could not teach thee thine. 

That chain was firm in every link, 
But not to bear a stranger's touch ; 

That lute was sweet — till thou couldst think 
In other hands its notes w«re such. 

Let him, who from thy neck unbound 
The chain which shiver'd in his grasp, 

Who saw that lute refuse to Bound, 
Restring the chords, renew the clasp. 

When thou wert changed, they alter'd too ; 

The chain is broke, the music mute : 
'Tis past — to them and thee adieu — 

False heart, frail chain, and silent lute. 



SONNET. 

TO GENEVRA. 

Thine eyes' blue tenderness, thy long fair hair, 
And the wan lustre of thy features — caught 
From contemplation — where serenely wrought, 

Seems sorrow's softness charm'd from its despair — 

Have thrown such speaking sadness in thine air, 
That — but I know thy blessed bosom fraught 
With mines of unalloy'd and stainless thought— 

I should have deem'd thee doom'd to earthly care. 

With such an aspect, by his colours blent, 
When from his beauty-breathing pencil born, 

(Except that thou hast nothing to repent) 
The Magdalen of Guido saw the morn — 

Such seern'sl thou — but how much more excellent! 
Willi nought remorse can claim — nor virtue scorn, 



SONNET. 

TO GENEVRA. 

Thy cheek is pale with thought, but not from woe, 
And yet so lovely, that if mirth could flush 
Its rose of whiteness with the brightest blush, 

My heart would wish away that ruder glow : — 

And dazzle not. thy deep-blue eyes — but oh ! 
While gazing on them sterner eyes will gush, 
And into mine my mother's weakness rush, 

Soil as the last drops round heaven's airy bow. 

For, through thy long dark lashes low depending 
The soul of melancholy gentleness 

Gleams like a seraph from the sky descending, 
Above all pain, yet pitying all distress ; 

At once such majesty with sweetness blending, 
I worship more, but cannot love thee less. 



INSCRIPTION 

ON THE MONUMENT OF A NE Wl'OUNDI. AND DOO 

When some proud son ol man returns to earth, 
Unknown to glory, but upheld by birth, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



533 



The sculptor's art exhausts the pomp of woe, 
And storied urns record who rests below ; 
When all is done, upon the torn!) is seen, 
Not what he was, but what he should have been: 
But the poor dog, in life the firmest friend, 
The first to welcome, fun-most to defend] 
Whose honest heart is still his master's own, 
Who labours, fights, lives, breathes for him alone, 
(Jnhonour'd falls, unnoticed all his worth, 
Denied in heaven the soul he held on earth : 
While man, vain insect ! hopes to be forgiven, 
And claims himself a soli-, exclusive heaven. 
Oh man ! thou feeble tenant of an hour, 
Debai i I by slavery, or corrupt by power, 
Who knows thee well must quit thee with disgust, 
Degraded mass of animated dust ! 
Thy love is lust, thy friendship all a cheat, 
Thy smiles hypocrisy, thy words deceit! 
By nature vile, ennobled but by name, 
Each kindred brute might bid thee blush for shame. 
Ye ! who perchance behold this simple urn, 
Pass on — it honours none you wish to mourn : 
To mark a friend's remains these stones arise — 
I never knew but one, and here he lies. 
Newstcad Abbey, Oct. 30, 1808. 



FAREWELL. 

Farewell ! if ever fondest prayer 

For other's weal avail'd on high, 
Aline will not all be lost in air, 

But waft thy name beyond the sky. 
'T were vain to speak, to weep, to sigh : 

Oh ! more than tears of blood can tell, 
When wrung from guilt's expiring eye, 

Are in that word — Farewell! — Farewell! 
These lips are mute, these eyes are dry ; 

But in my breast, and in my brain, 
Awake the pangs that pass not by, 

The thought that ne'er shall sleep again. 
My soul r.or deigns nor dares complain, 

Though grief and passion there rebel ; 
I only know we loved in vain — 

I only feel — Farewell ! — Farewell ! 



Bright be the place of thy soul! 

No lovelier spirit than thine 
E'er burst from its mortal control. 

In the orbs of the blessed to shine. 
On earth thou wert all but divine, 

As thy soul shall immortally be ; 
And our sorrow may cease to repine, 

When we know that thy God is with thee. 
Liuht be the turf of thy tomb ! 

May its vet lure Like emeralds be: 
There should not be the shadow of gloom 

In aught that reminds us of thee. 
Young Bowers and an evergreen tree 

May spring from the spot of thy rest. 
But nor cypress nor yew let us see ; 

For why should we mourn for the We 1 ? 



When we two parted 
In silence and tears, 

Half broken-hearli I 

To sever for years, 
Pale grew thy cheek and cold, 

Colder thv kiss ; 
Truly that hour foretold 

Sorrow to this. 

The dew of the morning 

Sunk chill on my brow — 
It felt like the warning 

Of what I feel now. 
Thy vows are all broke n, 

And light is thy fame ; 
I hear thy name spoken, 

And share in its shame. 

They name thee before me, 

A knell to mine ear; 
A shudder comes o'er me — 

Why wert thou so dear ? 
They know not I knew thee, 

Who knew thee too well : — 
Long, long shall I rue thee, 

Too deeply to tell. 
In secret we met — 

In silence I grieve, 
That thy heart could forget, 

Thy spirit deceive. 
If I should meet thee 

After long vears, 
How should I greet thee ? 

With silence and tears. 



1808. 



STANZAS FOR MUSIC 

O LacrymariM) fons, tencro socros 
Ducentium ortus ex nnimo: qualer 
Felix ! in inio qui scan litem 
Pectoie to, pia Nymplia, Benrit 

GRAY'S POEMATA 

There 's not a joy the world can give like that it takes 

away, 
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's 

dull decay ; 
'T is not on youth's smoo'h cheek the blush alone, 

which fades so fast, 
But the tender bloom of ha rt is gene, ere youth itself 

be past. 

Then the few whose spirits Coat above the wreck of 

happiness, 
Arc driven o'er the shoals a T g'jiU or ocean of excess : 
The magnet of their coursu m gone, or only points in 

vain 
The shore to which their shhiVJ sail shall never si. etch 

again. 

Then the mortal coldness of the sou! like death itself 

comes down ; 
It cannot fee! for others' woes, it dure r.ot dream us .»wn; 



1 These Verses were given hy Lord Byron to Mr Power 

Strain], who has published them, with very be"' tifuj Liutur U» 

Sir John Stevenson 



o34 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our 
n ars, 

And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the 
ice appears. 

Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth dis- 
tract the breast, 

Through midnight hours that yield no more their for- 
mer hope of rest ; 

'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the min'd turret wreathe, 

All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray 
beneath. 

Oh could I feci as 1 nave felt, — or he what I have been, 
Or weep, as I could once have wept, o'er many a van- 

ish'd scene : 
As springs, in deserts found, seem sweet— all brackish 

though they be, — 
»o, 'midst the wiiher'd waste of life, those tears would 

flow to me. 

1815. 



STANZAS FOR MUSIC. 

There be none of beauty's daughters 

With a magic like thee ; 
And like music on the waters 

Is thy sweet voice to me : 
When, as if its sound were causing 
The charm'd ocean's pausing, 
The waves lie still and gleaming, 
And the lull'd winds seem dreaming. 

And the midnight moon is weaving 
Her bright chain o'er the deep ; 

Whose breast is gently heaving, 
As an infant's asleep : 

So the spirit bows before thee, 

To listen and adore thee ; 

With a full but soft emotion, 

Like the swell of summer's ocean. 



FARE THEE WELL. 



Alas ! thoy had been friends in youth ; 
But whispering tongues can poison truth; 
Anil constancy livc9 in realms above : 

And life is thorny ; and youth is vain: 
And to be wroth with one we love, 

Dc/tli work like madness in the brain- 

But never either found another 

To free the hollow heart from paining — 

They stood aloof, the scars remaining, 

Like cliffs, which had been rent asunder; 
A dreary sea now flows between. 

But neither heat, nor frcst, nor thunder 
Shall wholly do away, I ween. 
The marks of that which once hath been. 

COLERIDGE'S Christabel 



Faiie thee well! and if for ever. 

Still for ever, fare thee well ! 
p'.ven though unforgiving, never 

'Gainst thee shall my heart rebel. 
Would that oreast were bared before thee 

Where thy head so of! hath lain, 



While that placid sleep came o'er thee 

Which thou ne'er canst know again: 
Would that breast, by thee glanced over, 

Every inmosl thought could show! 
Then thou wouldst at last discover 

'T was not well to spurn it so. 
Though the world for this commend tnee— 

Though it smile upon the blow, 
Even its praises must offend thee, 

Founded on another's woe — 
Though my many faults defaced me, 

Could no other arm be found 
Than the one which once embraced me, 

To inflict a cureless wound ? 
Yet, oh yet, thyself deceive not, 

Love may sink by slow decay, 
But by sudden wrench, believe not 

Hearts can thus he torn away : 
Still thine own its life retaineth — 

Still must mine, though bleeding, boat ; 
And the undying thought which paineth 

Is — that we no more may meet. 
These are words of deeper sorrow 

Than the wail above the dead ; 
Both shall live, but every morrow 

Wake us from a widow'd bed. 
And when thou wouldst solace gather, 

When our child's first accents flow, 
Wilt thou teach her to say " Father !" 

Though his care she must forego ? 
When her little hands shall press thee, 

When her lip to thine is prest, 
Think of him whose prayer shall bless thee, 

Think of him thy love had bless'd ! 
Should her lineaments resemble 

Those thou never more may'st see, 
Then thy heart will softly tremble 

With a pulse yet true to me. 
All my faults perchance thou knowest, 

All my madness none can know ; 
All my hopes, where'er thou goest, 

Wither — yet with thee they go. 
Every feeling hath been shaken ; 

Pride, which not a world could bow, 
Bows to thee — by thee forsaken, 

Even my soul forsakes me now ; 
But 't is done — all words are idle — 

Words from me are vainer still ; 
But the thoughts we cannot bridle 

Force their way without the will. — 
Fare thee well ! — thus disunited, 

Torn from every nearer tie, 
Sear'd in heart, and lone, and blighted — 

More than this I scarce can die. 



TO * * * 
When all around grew drear and dark, 

And reason half withheld her ray — 
And hope but shed a dying spark 

Which more misled my lonely way ; 
In that deep midnight of the mind, 

And that internal strife of hear!, 
When, dreading to be deem'd too kind, 

The weak despair — the cold depart: 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



535 



When fortune changed — and love fled far, 
And hatred's shafts flew thick and fast, 

Thou wert the solitary star 
Wliich rose and set not to the last. 

Oh ! blest be thine unbroken light ! 

That watch'd me as a seraph's eye, 
And stood between me and the night, 

For ever shining sweetly nigh. 

And when the cloud upon us came, 

Which strove to blacken o'er thy ray- 
Then purer spread its gentle flame, 
And dash'd the darkness all away. 

Still may thy spirit dwell on mine, 

And teach it what to brave or brook — 

There 's more in one soft word of thine, 
Than in the world's defied rebuke. 

Thou stood'st, as stands a lovely tree, 
That still unbrokc, though gently bent, 

Still waves with fond fidelity 
Its boughs above a monument. 

The winds might rend, the skies might pour, 
But there thou wert — and still wou'.dst be 

Devoted in the stormiest hour 

To shed thy weeping leaves o'er me. 

But thou and thine shall know no blight, 

Whatever fate on me may fall ; 
For heaven in sunshine will requite 

The kind — and thee the most of all. 

Then let the ties of baffled love 
Be broken — thine will never break ; 

Thy heart can feel — but will not move ; 
Thy soul, though soft, will never shake. 

And these, when all was lost beside, 

Were found, and still are fixed, in thee— 

And bearing still a breast so tried, 
Earth is no desert — even to me. 



ODE. 

[FROM THE FRENCH.] 

We do not curse thee, Waterloo ! 
Though freedom's blood thy plain bedew ; 
There 't was shed, but is not sunk — 
Rising from each gory trunk, 
Like the water-spout from ocean, 
With a strong and growing motion — 
It soars and mingles in the air, 
With that of lost Lvbedovehe — 
With that of him whose honour'd grave 
Contains the "bravest of the brave." 
A crimson cloud it spreads and glows, 
But shall return to whence it rose ; 
When 'tis full, 't will burst asunder — 
Never yet was heard such thunder 
As then shall shake the world with wonder- 
Never yet was seen such lightning, 
As o'er heaven shall then be bright'ning ! 
Like the Wormwood star, foretold 
By the sainted seer of old, 



Showering down a fiery 1< od, 

Turning rivers into blooc. 1 

The chief has fallen, but not by you, 
Vanquishers of Waterloo '. 
When the soldier citizen 
Sway'd not o'er his fellow-men — 
Save in deeds that led thenion 
Where glory smiled on freedom's son — 
Who, of all the despots banded, 

With that youthful chief contpeted? 

Who could boast o'er France defeated, 
Till lone tyranny commanded ? 
Till, goaded by ambition's sting, 
The hero sunk into the king i 
Then he fell ; — so perish all, 
Who would men by man enthral ! 

And thou too of the snow-white plume ! 
Whose rcaitn refused thee even a tomb ; 2 
Better hadst thou still been leading 
France o'er hosts of hirelings bleeding, 
Than sold thyself to death and shame 
For a meanly royal name ; 
Such as he of Naples wears, 
Who thy blood-bought title bears. 
Little didst thou deem, when dashing 

On thy war-horse through the ranks, 

Like a stream which hurst its banks, 
While helmets cleft, and sabres clashing, 
Shone and shiver'd fast around thee — 
Of the fate at last which found thee : 
Was that haughty plume laid low 
By a slave's dishonest blow? 
Once as the moen sways o'er the tide, 
It roll'd in air, the warrior's guide ; 
Through the smoke-created night 
Of the black and sulphurous light, 
The soldier raised his seeking eye 
To catch that crest's ascendency,— 
And as it onward rolling rose 
So moved his heart upon our foes. 
There, where death's brief pang was quickest, 
And the battle's wreck lay thickest, 
Strew'd beneath the advancing banner 

Of the eagle's burning crest — 
(There with thunder-clouds to fin her 

IVho could then her wing arrest — 

Victory beaming from her breast ?) 
While the broken line enlarging 

Fell, or fled along the plain : 
There be sure was Murat charging! 

There he ne'er shall charge again ! 



1 See Rev. chap. viii. verso 7, etc. " The first angel sounded 
ami there followed hnil and fire mingled witli blood," etc. 

Vorae H. "And the second angel Bounded, and as it wcro a 
groat mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea; and 
tlir third part of the sea became blood," etc. 

Verne 10. "And tho third angel sounded, and there fell a 
great star from heaven, burning as it wcro n lamp ; and it fell 
upon a third part of the rivers, and upon thu fountains of 
waters." 

Verso 11. "And thenameof the star is called Wormwood; 
and Hie third part of tho waters became wormwood; and 
many men died of ibo waters, becauso they were made 
bitter." 

2 Murat's remains are said to have been torn from the rio»» 
and burnt. 



536 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



O'er glories gone the invaders march, 
Weeps triumph o'er each levell'd arch — 
But let Freedom rejoice, 
With her heart In her voice; 
Put her hand on her sword, 
Doubly shall she he adored ; 
France hath twice too well been taught 
The "moral lesson" dearly bought — 
Iter safety sits not on a throne, 
With Capet or NaI'oi.eon ! 
But in equal rights and laws, 
Hearts and hands in one great cause- 
Freedom, such as God hath given 
Unto all beneath his heaven, 
With their breath, and from their birth, 
Though guilt would sweep it from the earth; 
With a tierce and lavish hand 
Scattering nations' wealth like sand ; 
Pouring nations' blood like water, 
In imperial seas of slaughter ! 

But the heart and the mind, 
And the voice of mankind, 
Shall arise in communion — 

And who shall resist that proud union? 
The time is past when swords subdued — 
Man may die — the soul 's renevv'd: 
Even in this low world of care, 
Freedom ne'er shall want an heir; 
Millions breathe but to inherit 
Her for-ever bounding spirit — 
When once more her hosts assemble, 
Tyrants shall believe and tremble — 
Smile they at this idle threat 7 
Crimson tears will follow yet. 



[FROM THE FRENCH.] 

AH wept, but particularly Savary, and a Polish officer who 
had been exalted from the ranks hy Buonaparte, iieclum; 
to his main's knees ; wrote a letter to Lord Keith, entreat- 
ing permission to accompany bitn, even in the most menial 
capacity, which could not be admitted." 

M ust thou go, my glorious chief, 
Scver'd from thy faithful few? 

Who can tell thy warrior's grief, 
Maddening o'er that long adieu? 

Woman's love and friendship's zeal- 
Dear as both have been to me — 

IrVhat are they to all 1 feel, 
With a soldier's faith, for thee? 

Idol of the soldier's soul ! 

First in fight, but mightiest now: 
Many could a world control : 

Thee alone no doom can bow. 
By thy side for years I dared 

Oeath, and envied those who fell, 
When their dying shout was heard 

Blessing him they served so well. 1 



< At Waterloo, one man was seen, whose left arm was shat- 
•er"<l by a cannon bail, to wrench it off' with the, other, and, 
throwing it up in the air, exclaimed to his comrades, ' Vivo 
'Ernpercui jusqu'a la roort.' There were many other in- 
■utncea of the like: this you may, however, depend on as 
uue .1 private Litter from Brussels. 



Would that I were cold with those, 

Since this hour I live to see ; 
When the doubts of coward foes 

Scarce dare trust a man with thee, 
Dreading each should set thee free". 

Oh! although in dungeons pent, 
All their chains were light to me, 

Gazing on thy soul unbent. 

Would the sycophants of him 

Now so deaf to duty's prayer, 
Were his borrow'd glories dim, 

In his native darkness share? 
Were that world this hour his own, 

All thou calmly dost resign, 
Could he purchase with that throne 

Hearts like those which still are thine? 

My chief, my king, my friend, adieu ! 

Never did I droop before ; 
Never to my sovereign sue, 

As his foes I now implore, 
All I ask is to divide 

Every peril he must brave, 
Sharing by the hero's side 

His fall, his exile, and his grave. 



ON THE STAR OF "THE LEGION OF HONOUR 

[FROM THE FRENCH.] 

Star of the brave ! — whose beam hath shed 

Such glory o'er the quick and dead — 

Thou radiant and adored deceit ! 

Which millions rush'd in arms to greet, — 

Wild meteor of immortal birth ! 

Why rise in heaven to set on earth ? 

Souls of slain heroes form'd thy rays ; 
Eternity flash'd through thy blaze ! 
The music of thy martial sphere 
Was fame on high and honour here ; 
And thy light broke on human eyes 
Like a volcano of the skies. 

Like lava roll'd thy stream of blood, 
And swept down empires with its flood ; 
Earth rock'd beneath thee to her base, 
As thou didst lighten through all space; 
And the shorn sun grew dim in air, 
And set while thou wert dwelling there. 

Before thee rose, and with thee grew, 

A rainbow of the loveliest hue, 

Of three bright colours, 1 each dirine, 

And fit for that celestial sign ; 

For freedom's hand had blended them 

Like tints in an immortal gem. 

One tint was of the sunbeam's dyes ; 
One, the blue depth of seraphs' eyes ; 
One, the pure spirit's veil of white 
Had robed in radiance of its light ; 
The three so mingled did beseem 
The texture of a heavenly dream. 



1 The tricolour. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Star of the brave! thy ray is pale, 
And darkness must again prevail ! 
But, oh thou rainbow of the free ! 
Our tears and blood must flow for thee. 
When thy bright promise Fades away, 
Our life is but a load of clay. 

And freedom hallows with her tread 
The silent cities of the dead ; 
Pot beautiful in death are they 
Who proudly fall in her array ; 
And soon, oh goddess ! may we be 
For evermore with them or thee ! 



NAPOLEON'S FAREWELL. 

[FROM THE FRENCH.] 

Pai r.WEi.L to the land where the gloom of mv glory 

Arc./ and o'ershadow'd the earth with her name — 

She- .ibandons me now, — but the page of her story, 

The brightest or blackest, is fill'd with my fame. 

I have warr'd with a world which vanquish'd me only 

When the meteor of conquest allured me too far ; 

I have coped with the nations which dread me thus 

lonely, 
The last single ca'ptive to millions in war ! 

Fate well to thee, France! when thy diadem crown'u me, 

I made thee the gem and the wonder of earth, — 

But thy weakness decrees I should leave as I found thee, 

Decay'd in thy glory and sunk in thy worth. 

Oh! for the veteran hearts that were wasted 

In strife with the storm, when their battles were won — 

Then the eagle, whose gaze in that moment was blasted, 

Had still soar'd with eyes fix'd on Victory's sun ! 

Farewell to thee, France ! — but when liberty rallies 
Once more in thy regions, remember me then — 
The violet still grows in the depth of thy vallevs ; 
Though wither'd, thy tears will unfold it again : 
Yet, vet I may baffle the hosts that surround us, 
And vet may tny heart leap awake to my voice — 
There are links which must break in the chain that has 

bound us, 
Then turn thee, and call on the chief of thy choice! 



SONNET. 



Rov/SSE ID — Voltaire — our Gibbon — and de Stael — 
Leman !' these names are worthy of thv shore, 
Thy phore of names like these; wert thou no more. 

Their memory thy remembrance would recall : 

To them thy banks were lovely as to all ; 

Bui they I lern lovelier, for the lore 

Of mighty mind in the core 

Of human hearts the ruin of a wad 

Where dwelt the wise and wond'rous ; but bv thee 
low much more, Lake of Beauty ! do we feel, 
In sweetly gliding o'er thv crystal sea, 

'i. ? wild glow of that not ungentle zeal, 
r hich of the heirs of immortality 

Is p. Aid, and makes the breath of glory real ! 



WRITTEN ON A BLANK LEAP OF 
PLEASURES OF MEMORY." 

AnsENT or present, still t 
My friend, what magic spells bclonnf 

As all can tell, who share, like me, 

In turn, thy converse and thy - 
But when thi ho ir shall come, 

By frii 
And " Memory" o'er her Druid's tomb 

Shall weep that aught of thee can die, 
How fondly will she then repay 

Tli-. i i M nt ber shrine, 

And blend, while ages roll away, 

JL i name immortally with thine! 
April 19, 1812. 



537 



the 



1 Qaneva, Forney. Coppct, Lausanne. 
2 V 7'3 



STANZAS TO * + * 

Titoi-oH the day of my destiny's over, 

And the star of my fate hath declined, 
Thy s.ifi heart refused to discover 

The faults which so many could find ; 
Though thy soul with my grief was acquainted, 

It shrunk not to share it with me, 
And the iove which my spirit hath painted , 

It never hath found but in Ihce. 

Then when nature around me is smiling 

The last smile which arswers to mine, 
I do no; believe it beguiling, 

Because it reminds me of thine ; 
And when winds are at war with the ocean, 

As the breasts I believed in with me, 
If their billows excite an emotion, 

It is that they bear me from (Inc. 



Though the rock of my last hope is shivcr'd, 

And its fragments are sunk in the wave, 
Though I feel that my soul is deliver'd 

To pain — it shall not hi; its slave. 
There is many a pang to pursue me : 

They may crush, but they shall not contemn 
They may torture, be* shall not subdue me 

'Tis of thee that I think — not of them. 



• 



Though human, thou didst not deceive me, 

Though woman, thou didst not forsake, 
Thou/' u forboresl to grieve me. 

Though slandor'd, thou never co/ildst shake,- 
Though trusted, thou didst not disclaim me, 

Though parted, it was not to fly, 
Though watchful, 't was not to defame me, 

Nor mule, that the world might belie. 

Yei I blame n it the world, n< 
Nor the war of the many with one — 

1' in-. i fitted to prize it, 

lolly not sooner I 

And if dearly mat error hath cost me, 
And more than I once could !•■ 

I have found that, whatever it lost me, 

! not deprive me of thri. 

From the wreck of the pas', whuh hath pens') o 

Thu^ much I at least may recall, 
It hath taught me that what I most ehcrish'd 

Deserved t" be dearest of all: 



538 



BYRON'S WORKS. 






Iii the deserl a fountain is spt inging, 
In the wide waste there still is a tree, 

And a bird in the solitude singing, 
Wh ; my spirit of thee. 

DARKNESS. 

I had a dream, which was not all a dream. 
'iii- bright sun was eirtinguish'd, unci the stars 
DiJ wander darkling in tin-' ct< rnal space, 
Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth 
Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air ; 
Morn came, and wont — and came, and brought no day 
And men forgot their passions in the dread 
(It tins their desolation; and all hearts 
Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light: 
Ard thev did live by watch-fires — and the thrones, 
The palaces of crowned kings — the huts, 
The habitations of all things which dwell, 
Were burnt for beacons ; cities were consumed, 
And men were gathcr'd round their blazing homes 
To look once more into each other's face : 
Happy were those who dwelt within the eye 
Of the volcanos and thi ir mountain-torch: 
A fearful hope was all the world contain'd ; 
Fores'.s were set on fire — but hour by hour 
They fell and faded— and the crackling trunks 
Extin<mish'd with a crash— and ail was black. 
The brows of men by the despairing light 
Wore an unearthly aspect, as by tits 
The flashes fell upon them ; some lay down 
And hid their eyes and wept ; and some did rest 
Their chins upon their clenched hands, and smiled ; 
And others hurried to and fro, and fed 
Their funeral piles with fuel, ami look'd up 
With mad disquietude mi the dull sky, 
The pall of a past, world ; and then again 
With curses cast them down upon the dust, 
And gnash'd their teeth and howl'd: the wild birds 
shriek'd, 
nd, terrified, did flutter on the ground, 
nd flap their useless wings ; the wiliest brutes 
atnc tame and tremulous ; and vipers crawl'd 
And twined themselves among the multitude, 

: ut stingless — they were slam for food: 
And war, which for a moment was no more. 
Did glut himself again — a meal was nought 
With blood, and each sate sullenly apart, 
Gorging himself in gloom : no love was left ; 
All earth was but one thought — and that was death, 
Immediate and inglorious ; and the pang 
Of famine fed upon all entrails — men 
Diea, and their hones were tombless as their flesh ; 
The meagre by the meagre were devour'd, 
E\tn dogs assail'd their masters, all save one, 
And he was faithful to a corse and kipt 
The birds and beasts and fanush'd men at bay, 
Till hunger clung them, or the dropping dead 
Lured their lank jaws ; himself sought out no food, 
Hut wrth a piteous and perpetual moan 
And a (puck desolate cry, licking the hand 
\\ mcll answer'd not with a caress — he died. 
The crowd was faniish'd by degrees ; but two 
t»f an enormous city did survive, 
And thev were enemies ; they met beside 
The dvmg embers of an altar-place, 



Vd a mass of holy -things 
: they raked up. 

And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton hands 
s, and their feeble breath 

Blew for a little life, and made a flame 
Which was a mockery; then they lifted up 

Their eyes as it grew lighter, ami bi 

Each others' aspects — saw, and. shriek'd, and died — 
Even of their mutual hideousness thoy 
Unknowing who he was upoii whose brow 
Famine had written fiend. The world was void, 

opulous and the powerful was :i lump, 
Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, In' — 
A lump of death — a chaos of hard clay. 
The rivers, lakes, and, ocean, all stood still, 
\ed nothing stirr'd within their silent depths; 
Ships sailorless lav rotting on the ; eo, 
And their masts fell down piecemeal ; as they dropp'ri, 
They slept on the abyss without a surge— 
The waves were deal : the tides were in their grave, 

in their mistress had expired before : 
The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air, 
And the clouds perish'd ; darkness had no need 
Of aid from them — she was the universe. 



CHURCHILL'S GRAVE. 

A FACT LITERALLY KENDEKED. 

! stoop beside the grave of him who blazed 
The comet of a season, and I saw 
The humblest of all sepulchres, and gazed 
With not the less of sorrow than of awe 
On that neglected turf and quiet 
With name no clearer than the names unknown, 
Wh'.cll iay unread around it ; and I ask'd 
The gardener of that ground, why it might be 
Tnai for this plant strangers Ins memory task'd 
L In iugh the thick deaths of half a century; 
And thus he answer'd — "Well, I do not knoiv 
Why frequent travellers turn to pilgrims so; 
He died before my day of sextouship, 
And 1 had not the digging of this grave." 
And is this all/ I thought, — and do we rip 
The veil of immortality, and crave 
I Unow not what of honour and of light 
Through unborn ages, to endure this blight? 
So soon and so successless? As I said, 
The architect of all on which we tread, 
For earth is but a tombstone, did essay 
To extricate remembrance from the clay, 
Whose minglings might confuse a Newton's thoupit 
Were it not that all life must end in one, 
Of which we arc but dreamers; — as he cauglu 
A< 'twere the twilight of a former sun, 
Thus spoke he. — " I believe the man of whom 
You wot, who lies in this tomb, 

Was a most famous writer in Ins day, 

And therefore travellers step from out their way 

To pay him honour, — and myself whate'er 

5four honour pleases" — then most please I I 

From out my pocket's avaricious ncik 

Some certain coins of silver, which as 't were 

Perforce I gave this man, though I cou) I sptrc 

So much but inconveniently; — ye smile, 

I sec ye, ye profane ones ! all the while, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



53!> 



Because my homely phrase the truth would tell. 
You are the fools, not I — for I did dwell 
With a deep thought, and with a soften'd eye, 
On that old sexton's natural homily, 
In which there was obscurity and fame, 
The giory and the nothing of a name. 



PROMETHEUS. 

Titan ! to whose immortal eyes 

The sufferings of mortality, 

Seen in their sad reality, 
Were not as things that gods despise ; 
What was thy pity's recompense ? 
A silent suffering, and intense ; 
The rock, the vulture, and the chain, 
All that the proud can feel of pain, 
The agony they do not show, 
The suffocating sense of woe, 

Which speaks but in its loneliness, 
And then is jealous lest the sky 
Should have a listener, nor will sigh 

Until its voice is ccholess. 

Titan ! to thee the strife was given 
Between the suffering and the will, 
Which torture where they cannot kill ; 
And the inexorable heaven, 
And the deaf tyranny of fate, 
The ruling principle of hate, 
Which for its pleasure doth create 
The things it may annihilate, 
Refused thee even the boon to die '. 
The wretched gift eternity 

Was thine — and thou hast borne it well. 
All that the Thunderer wrung from thee 
Was but the menace which flung back 
On him the torments of thy rack ; 
The fate thou didst so well foresee, 

But would not to appease him tell : 
And in thy silence was his sentence, 
And in his soul a vain repentance, 
And evil dread so ill dissembled 
That in his hand thc^jytfmngs trembled. 



hy^^rcept 



Thy godlike crime iHB' 1 kind, 

To render with thy^^rcepts less 

The sum of human wretchedness, 
And strengthen man with his own mind ; 
But baffled as thou wcrt from high, 
Still in thy patient energy, 

In the endurance, and repulse 
Of thine impenetrable spirit, 

Which earth and heaven could not convulse, 
A mighty lesson we inherit : 

Thou art a symbol and a sign 
To mortals of their tate and force ; 

Like thee, man is Lb part divine, 
A troubled stream from a puro source ; 
And man in portions can foresee 
His own funereal destiny ; 
His wretchedness, and his resistance, 
And his sad unallicd existence : 
To which his spirit may oppose 
Itself— an equal to all woes, , 



And a firm will, and a deep sense, 
Which even in toiture can descry 

Its own concentred recompense, 
Triumphant where it dares defy, 
And making death a victory. 



ODE. 



Oh shame to thee, land of the Gaul! 

Oh shame to thy children and thee ! 
Unwise in thy glory, and base in thy fall, 

How wretched thy portion shall be ! 
Derision snail strike thee forlorn, 

A mockery that never shall die ; 
The curses of hate, and the hisses of scorn, 

Shall burden the winds of thy sky ; 
And proud o'er thy ruin for ever be hurl'd 
The laughter of triumph, the jeers of the world ! 

Oh, where is thy spirit of yore, 

The spirit that breathed in thy dead, 
When gallantry's star was the beacon before, 

And honour the passion that led ? 
Thy storms have awaken'd their sleep, 

They groan from the place of their rest, 
And wrathfully murmur, and sullenly weep, 

To see the foul stain on thy breast ; 
For where is the glory they left thee in trust ? 
'T is scatter'd in darkness, 't is trampled in dust ! 

Go, look to the kingdoms of earth, 

From Indus all round to the pole, 
And something of goodness, of honour, and worth, 

Shall brighten the sins of the soul. 
But thou art alone in thy shame, 

The world cannot liken thee there ; 
Abhorrence and vice have disfigured thy name 

Beyond the low reach of compare ; 
Stupendous in guilt, thou shalt lend us through timo 
A proverb, a by-word, for treachery and crime! 

While conquest illumined his sword, 

While yet in his prowess he stood, 
Thy praises still follow'd the steps of thv lord. 

And welcomed the torrent of blood : 
Though tyranny sat on his crown, 

And wither'd the nations afar, 
Yet bright in thy view was that despot's renown, 

Till fortune deserted his car ; 
Tlien back from the chieftain thou slunkest awav. 
The foremost to insult, the first to betray ! 

Forgot were the feats he had done, 

The toils he had borne in thy cause ; 
Tn^u turned'st to worship a new rising sun, 

And waft other songs of applause. 
But the storm was beginning to lour, 

Adversity clouded his beam ; 
And honour and faith were the brag of an hour, 

And loyalty's self but a dream : — 
To him thou hadst hanish'd thy vows weie restorer!. 
And the first that had scoff'd Acre the first that ad( red. 

What tumult thus burthens the air ? 
Wl at throng thus encircles his throne 7 



S40 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



r is the shout of delight, 't is the millions that swear 
His sceptre shall ru'c them alone. 
Reverses shall brighten their zeal, 
Misfortune shall hallow his name, 
Ami the world that pursues him shall mournfully feel 

How quenchless the spirit and flame 
That Frenchmen will breathe, when their hearts 

are on fire, 
For the hero they love, and the chief they admire ! 

Their hero lias rush'd to the field ; 

His laurels are covcr'd with shade — 
But where is the spirit that never should yield, 

The loyalty never to fade ? 
In a moment desertion and guile 

Abandoned him up to the foe ; 
The dastards thai fteurish'd and grew in his smile 

Forsook and renounced him in woe ; 
And the millions that swore they would perish to save, 
Behe.d h.m a fugitive, captive, and slave ! 

The savage, all wild in his glen, 

Is nobler and better than thou ; 
Thou standest a wonder, a marvel to men, 

Such perfidy blackens thy brow ! 
If thou wert the place of my birth, 

At once from thy arms would I sever ; 
I'd flv to the uttermost parts of the earth, 

And quit thee for ever and ever; 
And thinking of thee in my long after-years, 
Should bu'. kindle my blushes and waken my tears. 

Oh, shame to thee, land of the Gaul ! 

Oh, shame to thy children and thee ! 
[Jr.wise in thy glory, and base in thy fall, 

How wretched thy portion shall be ! 
Derision shall strike thee forlorn, 

And mockery that never shall die ; 
The curses of hate, and the hisses of scorn, 

Shall burthen the winds of thy sky ; 
And proud o'er thy ruin for ever be hurl'd 
The laughter of triumph, the jeers of the world ! 



WINDSOR POETICS. 

Lines composed on the oeeasinn of II. R. H. the P e 

R_ K — t being Been Btaoding betwixt the coffins of Henry 
VIII. and Charles I. in the royal vault at Windsor. 

Fam» v for contemptuous breach of sacred ties, 
By headless Charles, see heartless Henry lies; 
Between them stands another sceptred thing — 
It moves, it reigns — in all but name, a king : 
Charles to his people, Henry to his wife — 
In him the double tyrant starts to life: 
Justice and death have mix'd their dust in vain, 
Each royal vampyre wakes to life again: 
Ah! what can tombs avail — since these disgorge 

The blood and dust of both to mould a G...ge. 

1813. 



A SKETCH FROM PRIVATE LIFE. 

Honest — honest Iapo ! 

If that thou be'et a devil, I cannot kill thee ! 

SHAKSl'EARE. 

Born in the garret, in the kitchen bred, 
Promoted thence to deck her mistress' head; 



Next — fir some gracious service une.xj --est, 
And from its u, be guess'c — 

Raised from the toilet to the table, where 
Her wondering betters wait behind hei cha.il : 
With eye unmoved, and forehead una!. 1, 
She dines from off the plate she lately v. . 1. 
Quick with the tale, and ready with the li , 

lial confidante and general spy ; 
Who could, ye gods! her next employment j less? 
An only infant's earliest governess ! 
She taught the child to road, and taught so veil, 
That she herself, by leaching, leam'd to spe^. 
An adept next in penmanship she grows, 
As many a nameless slander deftly show?: 
What she had made the pupil of her art, 
None kn>»w — but that high soul secured tl'.e he»*t, 
And panted for the trulh it could not hear, 
With longing breast and undeluded ear. 

FoU'd was perversion bv that youthful mind. 
Which flattery fooPd not, baseness could noi blii>J, 
Deceit infect not, near contagion soil, 
Indulgence weaken, nor example spoil, 
Nor master'd science tempt her to look down 
On humbler talents with a pitying frown, 
Nor aenius swell, nor beauty render vain, 
Nor envy ruffle to retaliate pain, 
Nor fortune change, pride raise, nor passion bow, 
Nor virtue teach austerity — till now. 
Serenely purest of her sex that live, 
But wanting one sweet weakness — to forgive ; 
Too shock'd at faults her soul can never know, 
She deems that till could be like her below: 
Foe to all vice, yet hardly virtue's friend — 
For virtue pardons those she would amend. 

But to the theme — now laid aside too long, 
The baleful burthen of this honest song — 
Though all her former functions are no morn, 
She rules the circle which she served before. 
If mothers — none know why — before her quake, 
If daughters dread her for the mother's sake; 
If early habits — those false links which bind, 
, the lofiiest to the meanest mind- 
Have given her po^MMuo deeply to instil 
The angry essenc^B ^B deadly will ; 
If like a snake >h^H ^T within your walls, 
Till the black slime Betray her as she crawls ; 
If like a viper to the heart she wind, 
And leave the venom there she did not find ; 
What marvel that Jhis hag of hatred works 
Eternal evil latent as she lurks, 
To make a Pandemonium where she dwells, 
And reign the Hecate of domestic hells ! 

Sklll'd by a touch to deepen scandal's tints, 
With all the kind mendacity of hints, 
While mingling truth with falsehood, sneers with smiles, 
A thread of candour with a web of wiles ; 
A plain blunt show of briefly-spoken seeming, 
To hide her bloodless heart's soul-hardcn'd scheming; 
A lip of lies, a face form'd to conceal, 
And, without feeling, mock at all who 
With a vile mask the Gorgon woul 
A cheek of parchment, and an ey< 
Mark how the channels of her j 
I Ooze to her skin, and stagnate there to mod 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



541 



r ed like tlie centipede in saffron mail, 
Oi darker greenness of the scorpion's scale, 
(.Fur drawn from reptiles only may we trace 
Congenial colours in that soul or face). 
Look on her features ! and behold her mind, 
As in the mirror of itself defined: 
Look on the picture ! deem it not o'ercharged — 
There is no trait which might not be enlarged ; 
Yet true to " Nature's journeymen," who made 
This monster when their mistress left off trade, — 
This female dog-star of her little skv, 
Where all beneath her influence droop or die. 

Oh ! wretch without a tear — without a thought, 
Save joy above the ruin thou hast wrought — 
The time shall come, nor long remote, when thou 
Shalt feel far more than thou inrlictest now ; 
Feel for thy vile self-loving self in vain, 
And turn thee howling in unpitied pain. 
May the strong curse of crush'd affections light 
Back on thy bosom with reflected blight ! 
And make thee, in thy leprosy of mind, 
As loathsome to thyself as to mankind! 
Till all thy self-thoughts curdle into hate, 
Black as thy will for others would create : 
Till thy hard heart be calcined into dust, 
And thy soul welter in its hideous crust. 
Oh, may thy grave be sleepless as the bed, 
The widow'd couch of fire, that thou hast spread ! 
Then, when thou fain wouldst weary Heaven with praj'cr, 
Look on thine earthly victims — and despair ! 
Down to the dust ! — and, as thou rott'st away, 
Even worms shall perish on thy poisonous clay, 
but for the love I bore, and si ill must bear, 
lo her thy malice from all ties would tear, 
Thy name — thy human name — to every eye 
The climax of all scorn, should hang on high, 
Exalted o'er thy less abhorr'd compeers, 
And festering in the infamy of years. 

March 30, 1816. 



CARMINA BYRONIS IN C. ELGIN. 

Aspice, quos Scoto Pallas concedit henorcs, 
Subter stat nomen, facta euperque vide. 

Scoto miser ! quamvis nbcuisti Palladia axli, 
Infandum facinus vindieat ipsa Venus. 

Pygmalion statuam pro sponsa arsisse rcfertur; 
In statuam rapias, Scotc, sed uxor abest. 



LINES TO MR. MOORE. 

1 he following lines were addressed extempore by Lord Byron 
to his friend Mr. Moore, on the latter's last visit to Italy.] 

My boat is on the shore, 

And my bark is on the sea; 
But, before I go, Tom Moore, 

Here 's a double health to thee. 

Here 's a sigh to those who love me, 
And a smile to those who hate; 

And, whatever sky 's above me, 
He"' 's a heart for every fate. 
2x2 



Though the ocean roar around me, 
Yet it still shall bear me on ; 

Though a desert should surround me, 
It hath springs that may be Won. 

Wcr't the last drop in the wo)', 
And I gasping on the brink, 

Ere my fainting spirit fell, 

'T is to thee that I would drink. 

In that water, as this wine, 

The libation I would pour 
Should be — Peace to thine and mine, 

And a health to thee, Tom Mooke ! 



"ON THIS DAY I COMPLETE MY THIRTY- 
SIXTH YEAR." 

January 22, 1824, Missolon^ht, 
'T is time this heart should be unmoved, 

Since others it hath ceased to move ; 
Yet though I cannot be beloved, 
Still let me love. 

My days are in the yellow leaf; 

The flowers and fi uits of love are gone : 
The worm, the canker, and the grief, 
Are mine alone! 

The fire that on my bosom preys 

Is lone as some volcanic isle ; 
No torch is kindled at its blaze — 
A funeral pile ! 

The hope, the fear, the jealous care, 

The exalted portion of the pain 
And power of love, I cannot share, 
But wear the chain. 

But 't is not thus, and 't is not here 

Such thoughts should shake my soul ; nor not* 
Where glory decks the hero's bier, 
Or binds his brow. 

The sword, the banner, and the fii I ! , 
Glory and Greece around me see! 
The Spartan, borne upon his shield, 
Was not more free. 

Awake! (not Greece, — she is awake!) 

Awake, nay spirit ! think through whom 
Thy life-blood tracks its parent lake, 
And then strike home ! 

Tread those reviving passions down, 

Unwortny manhood ! Unto t] 
Indifferent should the smile or frown 
Of beauty be. 

If thou regrett'st thy youth, why Hie ? 

The land of honourable aeath 
Is here — up to the field, and give 
Away thy breath ! 

Seek out, less often sought than found, 
A soldier's grave — for thee the lest ; 
Then look around, and choose thy ground. 
And take thy rest. 



TO 



( 542 ) 

SUttcr 



**** ****** 



ON 



THE REV. W. L. BOWLES'S STRICTURES 



THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF POPE. 



I'll play at Bawls with the sun aud moon. 

OLD JjONG. 
My mither 's auld, sir, and she lias rather forgotten hereell in 
Bpeaking to my Leddy, thai caona weol hide to be contradickit 

(as 1 ken naebody likes it it" they could help themsells). 

TALES OF MY LANDLORD, Old Mortality, vol. ii 



LETTER. 

Ravenna, February 1th, 1821. 
Dear Sir, 

In the different pamphlets which you have had the 
goodness to send ine, on the Pope and Bowles' contro- 
versy, I perceive that my name is occasionally introduc- 
ed by both parties. Mr. Bowles refers more than once to 
what he is pleased to consider "a remarkable circum- 
stance," not only in his letter to Mr. Campbell, but in 
his reply to the Quarterly. The Quarterly also and Mr. 
Gilchrist have conferred on me the dangerous honour of 
a quotation ; and Mr. Bowles indirectly makes a kind 
of appeal to me personally, by saying, " Lord Byron, 
if he remembers the circumstance, will witness — (wit- 
ness in italic, an ominous character for a testimony 
at present.) 

I shall not avail myself of a " non mi ricordo" even 
after so long a residence in Italy ;— I do " remember 
the circumstance" — and have no reluctance to relate it 
(since called upon so to do) as correctly as the distance 
of time and the impression of intervening events will 
peimitme. In the year 1812, more than three years 
after the publication of " English Bards and Scotch 
Reviewers," I had the honour of meeting Mr. Bowles 
in the house of our venerable host of" Human Life, etc." 
the last Argonaut of Classic English poetry, and the 
Nestor of our inferior race of living poets. Mr. Bowles 
calls this " soon after" the publication ; but to me three 
years appear a considerable segment of the immortality 
of a modern poem. I recollect nothing of "the rest of 
the company going into another room" — nor, though I 
well remember the topography of our host's elegant and 
classically-furnished mansion, could I swear to the very 
room where the conversation occurred, though the 
" taking down the poem" seems to fix it in the library. 
Had it been " taken up," it would probably have been 
in the drawing-room. I presume also that the " re- 
markable circumstance" took place after dinner, as I 
conceive that neither Mr. Bowles's politeness nor appe- 
tite woujd have allowed him to detain " the rest of the 
company" standing round their chairs in the "other 
room" while we were discussing "the Woods of Ma- 
deira" instead of circulating its vintage. Of Mr. Bowles's 
"good-humour" I have a full and not ungrateful recol- 
lection ; as also of hi-; gentlemanly manners and agree- 
able conversation. I speak of the whole, and not of par- 
'lcul.-rs ; for whether he did or did not use the precise 
Tvo^ds printed in the pamphlet, 1 cannot say, nor could 



he with accuracy. Of" the tone of seriousness" I cer 
tainly recollect nothing: on the contrary, I thought Mr. 
Bowles rather disposed to treat the subject lightly; for 
he said (I have no objection to be contradicted if incor- 
rect) that some of his good-natured friends had come to 
him and exclaimed, " Eh ! Bowles ! how came you to 
make the Woods of Madeira," etc. etc. and that he had 
been at some pains and pulling down of the poem to 
convince them that he hud never made " the Woods" 
do any thing of the kind. He was right, and / was 
wrong, and have been wrong still up to this acknow- 
ledgment ; for I ought to have looked twice before I 
wrote that which involved an inaccuracy capable of giv- 
ing pain. The fact was, that although I had certainly 
before read "the Spirit of Discovery," I took the quo- 
tation from the review. But the mistake was mine, and 
not the review's, which quoted the passage correctly 
enough, I believe. I blundered — God knows how — into 
attributing the tremors of the lovers to the "Woods of 
Madeira," by which they were surrounded. And I 
hereby do fully and freely declare and asseverate, that 
the Woods did not tremble to a kiss, and that the lovers 
did. I quote from memory — 

A kiss 

Stole on the list'ning silence, etc. etc. 

They (the lovers) trembled, even as if the power, etc. 

And if I had been aware that this declaration would 
have been in the smallest degree satisfactory to Mr. 
Bowles, I should not have waited nine years to make it, 
notwithstanding that " English Bards and Scotch Re- 
viewers" had been suppressed some time previously to 
my meeting him at Mr. Rogers's. Our worthy host 
might indeed have told him as much, as it was at his 
representation that I suppressed it. A new edition of 
that lampoon was preparing for the press, when Mr. 
Rogers represented to me, that "I was now acrfuamted 
with many of the persons mentioned in it, and with 
some on terms of intimacy ;" and that he knew " ono 
family in particular to whom its suppression would 
give pleasure." I did not hesitate one moment ; it was 
cancelled instantly ; and it is no fault uf mine that u 
has ever been republished. When I left England, in 
April, 1816, with no very violent intentions of troubling 
that country again, and amidst scenes of various kinds 
to distract my attention — almost my last act, 1 ; 
was to sign a power of attorney, to yourself, to prevent 
or suppress any attempts (of which several had been 
made in Ireland) at a republication. It is proper that 1 
should slate, that the persons with whom I was subse- 
quently acquainted, whose names had occurred in that 



LETTER ON BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON POPE. 



513 



'ion, were made mv acquaintances at their own 

di -i . or through the unsought intervention of others. 

I never, to the bestof my knowledge, sought a personal 

ion to any. Some of them to this day I know 

only by correspond! nee; and with our of those it was 

bi 'J 1 ", by myself, in consequi i , however, of a polite 

lion from a third person. 
I bavi M iust;i, ii on these circumstances, 

times been made a subject of bitter 
h to me to have endeavoured to suppress that 
satire. E never shrunk, as those who know m 
I personal consequences which could be attached 

to its publication. Cl' its i ton, as 1 

possessi »ght,] was the best judge and the 

sol.- master. The circumstances which occasioned the 
iion 1 have now stair,!; of the motives, each 
must ju Ige ac :ording to his candour or malignity. M '. 
Bowles docs ine the honour to talk of " noble mind,' 
ami "generous magnanimity;" and till this b 
" the cir turn stance « been explained hail not 

the book been suppressed." I sec no "nobility of 
mind" in an act of simple justice; and I hate the word 
" mngti tniurilg," because I have somi times i en it ap- 
plied to the grossest of impostors by the greatest of 
fools; but I would have " explained the circumstance," 
iioi-.\ ithstanding " the suppr< ssion of the book," if Mr. 
How|.>. ! ex| thai 1 shoul I. As the 

Galbraith" says to" Baillie Jarvie," "Well, the 
devil t "■■ ike and all thai occasioned it." I 

d as groal and greater mistakes made about me 
; tor these last 
ten years, and never cared very much about correcting 
one or the other, at least after the first eight-and-fbrty 
hours ha I gone over them- 

I must now, '■ | say a word or two about Pope, 

of whom you have my opinion more at large in the un- 
pnblishcd li ttcronor/o (for I fbrgel which) the editor of 
"Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine;" — and here I doubt 
that Mr. Bowles will not approve of my sentiments. 

Although I regret having published "English Bards 

ami Scotch Reviewers," the pari which 1 n grel the Icasl 

is that vvhich regards Mr. Bowles with reference to Pope. 

Whilst I was writing that publication, in 1S07 ami 1H0S, 

Mr. Hobhouse was desirous that I should express our 

mutual opinion of Pope, and of Mr. Bowles's edition of 

his works. As I had completed my outline, and fell 

lazy, I requested that he would do so. He did it. His 

on Bowl s's Pope are in the first edition 

of'English Bards and Scotch Reviewers;" am! are quite 

. i than my own in the 

so ond. On reprinting the work, as 1 put my name to 

it, I omitted Mr. Hobhouse'a lines, and replaci 

with my own, by which the work gained loss than Mr. 

id this in t!io preface to the second 

edition. It is man;.' years since I have read that ; in : 

i .iew, Mr. Octavius Gilchrist, am! 
Mr. Bov Lo i'. fresh 

i i i thai of the public. I am grieved to 

say, that in p those lines, I repent of their 

havine I short of what I meant t,. 

upon in editi in of Pope's Works. 

Mr. Be i i "Lord Byron knows he doi s not 

haraoter." I know no Buch thing. I have 
met Mr. B tsionally, in thi v in Lon- 

don; he appeared to me an amiable, well-informed, 
and extremi ly able man. I desire nothing h I 
to dme in company with such a mannered mi 



day in the week: but of "his character" I know noth- 
ing personally; I can only speak of his ma rs, and 

ve my warmest approbation. But I m vcr judge 

from manners, for I once bad in) pocki t pieked by the 

uvilesl gentleman 1 1 ve? met « ith ; and one of the mild- 
est persons I ever saw was All Pacha. Of Mr. B 

' r" I will not do him the injustice to judge 
from the edition of Pope, it' he pp 
nor the justice, should it be otherwise, because I would 
neither become a lit I ii ner, nor ;•. personal 

one. Mr. Bowles the individual, and Mr. Bowles the 
editor, appear the two 

"Ami he himself one antiihi 

I won't say "vile," because it is harsh; nor " mis- 
taken," because it has two syllables top many; but 
every one musl fiU up the Maul; as be pleases. 

What I saw of Mr, How les incri ased my surprise and 
regrel thai he should ever have lent Ins tali nts to such 
a task. If he had been a fool, there would have been 
some excuse for him ; if lie hie I I r a bad 

man, his conduct would have been intelligible ; but he 
is the opposite of all these ; an 1 thinking and fi 
I do of Hope, to me the whole thing is unaccountable. 
However, I must call things by their right names. I 
cannot call his edition of Hope a "candid" work; and 
I siil! think that there is an affectation of that quality 
not only in tiio^e volumes, but iii the pamphlets lately 
published. 

" Why vet he doth deny his prisoners." 

Mr. Bowles says, that "he has seen passages in his 
letters to Martha Blount, which were never published by 
me, and I hope m m r will be by others; which are s< 
as to imply the grossest licentiousness." Is this fair 
play? It may, or it may not be, thai such passages exist ; 
and thai Pope, who was not a monk, although a catholic, 
■-<■ occasionally sinned in word and in deed with 
woman iii his youth ; but is this a sufficient ground for 
such a sweeping denunciation? Win re is the unmar- 
ried Englishman of a certain rank e>f life, who (pro- 
vided he has not taken orders) has not to reproach 
himself between the ages of sixteen and thirty with far 
more licentiousness than has ever yet been traced to 
Hope? Hope lived in the public eye from his youth up- 
wards ; he had all the dunces of his own time for his 
enemies, and, I am sorry to say, some, who have not 
the apology of dulness Ibl detraction, since his death ; 
and vet to what do all their accumulated hints and 
amount ; — to an equivocal liaison with Martha 
Blount, which might arise as much from his infirmities 
as from his passions ; to a hopeless flirtation with Lady 
MaiyW. Montagu; to astory of Cibber's; and to two 
or three coarse passages in his works. IVho could come 
forth clearer from an invidious inquest on a life of fiftj- 
six years? Why arc wc to be officiously reminded of 
sages in his letters, provided that they exist? Is 
Mr. H.ow'.es aware to what such rummaging among 
" li ii. rs" and "stories" might lead:' I have myself seen 
a collection of letters of another eminent, nay, pre- 
eminent, deceased poet, so abominably gross, and elab- 
orately (•■•arse, that I do not believe that '.bey could be 
paralleled in our language. What is more Strange, is, 

that some of these are couched as postscripts* to his 

serious ami sentimental letters, to which are tacked 
either a piece of prose, or some verses, of the most 
hyperbolical indecency. lie himself says, that if "ob- 
scenity (using a much coarser \vurd x be the sin again* 



11 



ON'S WORKS. 



ist, he most certainly 
i <-, an I have 

many besides myself; but would his editor have been 
alluding to them .' '■ 
en provoked me, an ind ator, to 

allude to them, bul tins furthi r attempl at thedcprecia- 
tion of I 

What should we say to an editor of Addison, who 
cited the following passage from Walpole's letters to 
( Montagu? "Dr. Young has published an 

rl of Warwick, 
as he was dying, to show him in « hal peace a Cli 
con! J die; unlu kilyhe died of & mdy: nothing makes 
a Christian die in peace like being maudlin! bul don't 
say this in Gath where you are." Suppose the editor 
introduced it with this preface: "One circumstance is 
mentioned by Horace Walpole, which, if true, wi 
flagitious, Walpole informs Montagu tha 
for the young Earl of Warwick, when dying, I i 
him in what peace a Christian could die; bul u 
he died drunk, etc., etc." Now, although there might 
occur on the subsequent, or on the same page, a faint 
show of disbelief, seasoned with the expression of "the 
same candour" (the same exactly as throughout the 
book), I a that this editor was either foolish or 

false to his trust ; such a st nol to have been 

admitted, except for one brief mark of crushing in- 
dignation, unless *it w< re completely proved. Why the 
words "if true? 'That "if" isnol a pi ace-maker. Why 
talk of " (.'inher's testimony" to his licentiousness? To 
what does this amount? that Pope, when very young, 
was once decoyed by some noblemen and the | 
a house of carnal recreation. Mr. Bowleswasnot always 
a clergyman ; and when he was a very young man, \\ as 
he never seduced into as much? If I were in the humour 
for story-tellin 6 , and relating little anecdotes, I could 
tell a much better story of Mr. Howies than Ci'oher's, up- 
on much better authority, viz. that of Mr. Bowles him- 
self. It was not related by him in my presence, but in 
that of a third person, whom Mr. Ho. vies names oftener 
than once in the course of his replies. This gentleman 
related it to me as a humorous and witty am 
and s lit was, whutever its other characteristics might be. 
Bul should I, from a youthful frolic, brand Mr. Bowles 
with a "libertine sort of love," or with "licentious- 
ness?" is he the less now a pious or a good man for 
not having always been a priest? No such thing; I am 
willing to believe him a good man, almost as good a man 
us Pope, but no better. 

The truth is, that, in these days the grand "primum 
mobile'''' of England is cant; cant political, canl , 
cant religious, cant moral ; but always cant, multiplied 
h all the varieties of life. It is the fashion, and 
while it lasts will be too powerful for those who can 
only exist by taking the tone of the time. I say cant, 
i it is a thing of words, without the smallest in- 
fluence upon human actions; the English being no 
wiser, no better, and much poorer, and more divided 
amongst' themselves, as well as far less moral, than l hey 
we,e before the prevalence of this verbal decorum. 
This hysterical horror of poor Pope's not very uell 
ascertained, and never fully proved amours (for even 
(Jibber owns thai he prevented the somewhat perilous 
adventure in which Pope was embarking) sounds \rvy 
urinous in a controversial pamphlet; but all men of 
itie world who know what life is, or at least what it was 



to them in their youth, must laugh I licrous 

foun lation of the charge of a " libertine sort of 1< ve ;" 
: Vi ill look up', n tho e u ho bring 
forward such charges upon an insulated fact, as fanatics 
or hypocrites, perhaps both. The two arc sometimes 
compounded in a happy mixture. 

Mr. Octavius Gilchi ntly of 

a " second tumbler of hot white-wine u 
does he mean f Is thl re any harm in negus ? or is it 
the worse for being hot? or does Mr. Bowles drink ne- 
gus? I had a betttr opinion of him. I honed thai 
whatever wine he drank was neat ; or at h asl that, like 
nary in Jonathan Wild, " he preferred 
ler as there was nothing against it in scripture." 
I should be sorry to believe that Mr. Bowles was fond 
of negus ; it i< such a "candid" liquor, so like a wishy- 
washy compromise between the passion for wine and 
the propriety of water. But different writers have 
divers tastes. Judge Hlackstone composed his "Com- 
mentaries" (he was a poet too in his youth), with a 
bottle of port before him. Add • ni's convi rsati in was 
not good fur much till he had i I lar dose. 

Perhaps the prescription of these two great men was 
not inferior to the very different one of a soi- 
poet of this day, who, after wandet the hills, 

returns, goes to bed, and dictates his verses, being fed 
by a by-stander with bread and butter, during the opera- 
tion. 

I now come to Mr. Bowles's "invariable principles of 
po. try." The: e Mr. Bowles and someofhis correspond- 
ents pronounce " unanswerable ;" an "unan- 
swered," at hast by Can as to have been 
astoundi d by th : title. The sultan of the time being, 
offered to ally himself to the king of Pra 
I the word league:" which pi i 

; French. Mr. Campbell has no 
need of my alliance, nor shall I presume to ofl r il ; 
but I do hale that word " invariable. n What is there 
of human, be it poetry, philosophy, wit, v. i 
power, glory, mini, matter, life or death, wl 

" invariable ?" Of course I put things divini t'of 

the question. Of ail arrogant baptisms of a book, this 
title to a pamphlet appears tin- nie itly con- 

ceited. It is Mr. Campbell's part to answer the contents 
of this performance, and especially to vindicate his own 

" Ship," which Mr. Howies most triumphantly proclaims 
to have struck to his very first fire. 



" Quoth he, there was a Shin ; 

Now ft me go, thou gray-hair'd loon. 

Or my statt' shall make thee skip ;" 

It is no affair of mine, but having once begun (certainly 
not by my own wish, hut called upon by the fn quetat 
recurrence to my name in the pamphlets), I am like an 
Irishman in a "row," "any body's customer." 1 shall 
therefore say a word or two on the "Ship." 
Mr. Howies asserts that Campbell's "Shipofthe Line" 
derives all its poetry not from u art n but from " nature'" 
"Take away the waves, the winds, the sun, etc., , 
will become a stripe of blue bunting ; and the other a 
piece of coarse canvas on three tall poles." Very true; 
take away "the waves," " the winds," and there will 
be no ship at all, not only for poetical, but for any 
oilier purpose ; and take away "the sun," and we must 
read Mr. Bowles's pamphlet by candle-light Put the 
"poetry" ol the "Ship" does not depend on "the waves," 
etc.; on the contrary, the "Ship of the Line" confers 



LETTER ON BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON TOPE 



tei | ind heightens i : 
hat the "waves and winds," and above 

ill "ill p tetical ; we know it to ■ 

'.i icriptions of them in v< i 

if the wi foam 1 1 j » • » i » thoir I" 

Is wafted only the sea-weed to the shoi ■ 
sun shone neither upon pyramids, nor fleets, nor for- 
tresses, :ams be equall 'I think 
try is at least reciprocal. Take away " tlie 
ship of the line" "swinging round " the u calm water," 
an.! the i 
' look at, partiou irlj 

rking on 
it at all. What "as it atti lousands to the 

launch/ they might have seen the poi lica! "calm water," 
at Wap] ing, or in the "London Dock," or in the Pad- 
dington Canal, or in a horse-pond, or in a si ip-ba in, 01 
in any otlhr vase They might ha vi h( ird 
winds howling through the chinks of a pig-sty, or the 
garret-w - might have seen the sun shining 

on a footman's livery, or on ; ming-pan; but 

could the " calm water," or the w wind,"orthe "sun," 

II, or any of these, " poetical ?" I think not. 
ISIr. Bowles admits "the ship" to be poi deal, but only 
from those accessories : now if the try so as 

to make one thing poetical, they would make other 
things poetical; the more so, as Mr. Bo" les calls a " ship 
of the hue" -a ilhout them, that is to say, its " masts and 
sails and streamers," " blue bunting," and "coarse can- 
vas," and " tall poles." So they are; and pon 

. ' ! man is dust, end flesh is grass, and yet the 
two latter at least are the subjects of much poesy. 

Did Mr. lion les ever gaze upon the sea? 1 presume 
that he has, at least upon a sea-piece. Did any painter 
evi r paint the sea only, without the addition of a ship, 
boat, wreck, or some such adjunct? Is the sea itsi It' a 
more attractive, a more moral, a more poetic tl 
with or without a ves its vast but I 

monotony? Is a storm more poetical without a ship/ 
or, in the poem of the Shipwreck, is it the storm or the 
ship which most intere idly; but 

without the vessel, what should we care for the tempest? 
It would sink into mere descriptive poetry, which in 
itself was in • a high order of that art. 

Ill pon i i . If as entitled to talk of naval mat- 
ters, at fast to poets: — with the exception of Walter 
Scott, Moore, and Souihey, perhaps (who have been 
wum more miles than all the rest of 
them together now living eve* sailed, and have lived 
nths on ship-board ; and during the 
r passed 
a month out ofsight of the ocean : besides being 
up from two years till ten on the brink of it. I recol- 
lect, when anchored o(T Cape SigSPum, in 1810, in an 

frigate, a violent squall coming on at sunset, so 
1 as to make us imagine that the; ship would part 

cable, or drive from her anchorage. Mr. Hobhouse and 
i . and some officers, had bi en up the Dardanclli s 

to Abydos, and were just returned in time. The aspect 
of a storm in the Archipelago is as poetical as need be, 

i being particular!)' short, dashing, and dan 
and the navigation intricate and brol en bj the isles and 
currents. Cape Sigseum,the tumuli of the Troad, Lem- 
I.-, , Ti - 1 los, all a : ociationa of the time. 

I5ut what seemed the most ' 

ment were the numbers (about two hundred) of Greek 
74 



and Turkish craft, which were obli{ i drun" 

he wind, from tl WlC lor 

Tchedos, some tor other isles, - >me for the m lin, and 

I e for eternity. Thi • i little 

in the twilight, 

te waves 

t, with their peculiarly white sails 

ils not bi ing f " ," hut of 

■■: hitc con. mi), skimming along as quickly, hut le< 

..s v, !;.. h hovi em : their evi- 

specks in (he 

i- littit ticsx, as 

contending with the gi nt, which made our 

stout forty-four's teak timbers (she was built in India) 

peei and thi ir m ition, all struck 

m thing far moi i " poi tici I " than the mere 

broad, brawling sea, and the sullen winds, 

could possibly have been without U 

The Ei n, and the port 

of Constantinople the most b »autiful of harbours, and 
yet I cannot but think thai Ih sail of the line, 

some of one hundred and forty guns, rendi red it more 
" poetical " by day in the sun, and by night perhaps still 
more, for the Turks illuminate their vessels of war in a 
manner the most picturesque — and vet all this is arii/i- 
ciur. As for the Euxine, I stood upon the Bymplegades 
— I Sk. od by the broken altar still exposed to the winds 
Upon one of them — I felt all the "poetry" of the situa- 
tion, as I repealed the first lines of Me lea ; but would 
not that " ppetry " have been heigh;, ned by the Argo ? 
It was so even by the appearance of any in 
vessel arriving from Odessa. But Mr. Bowles says, 
"why hring your ship off the stocks?" for no 
that I know, except that ships are built to be lam 
The water, etc., undoubtedly heightens the poetical 
lions, but ii does not make them; and the ship 
pays the obligation : the-, her; the 

el with, the ship — the ship less so 
with mt the water. But even a ship, laid up in dock, is 
a grand an I poetical sight. Even an old boat, keel up- 
wards, wrecked upon the barren sand, is a "poetical" 
(and Wordsworth, who made a poem about a 
washing-tub ami a blind boy, may tell you so as well 
as I) ; w hilsl a long extent of sand and unbroken water 
without the boat, would be as like dull prose as any 
pamphlet lately published. 

What makes the poetrj in the image of the "maride 
waste of Tadmor" or Grainger's "Ode to Solitude," 
so much admired by Johnson 1 Is it the 

the natural object ? The 
" is like all oth< r U astes ; but the " ii'arble" ot 
Palmyra makes the poelry of the passage as of the 
place. 

The beautiful but barren Hymettus, the whole coast 

a, her hills and mountains, Pentelicus, A 

mus, Philopappus, etc-., etc., are in thei.isclves poetical, 

and would be so if the name of Athens, of Athenians, 

an 1 her very ruins, were swept from the earth. But 

am I to be told that the "nature 1 ' of Attica would bo 

tical without the "art "of the Acropolis? of 

Th< sens / and of the still ali Greek and 

glorious monumi nts of her exquisitely artificial genius? 

Ask the traveller what strikes him as most poetical, 

the Parthenon, or the rock on which it stands? The 

,,ni mns of Cape Cokrana, or the C f? Tho 

rocks, at the foot of it, or the recollection thai Fa,coner'» 



ship was bulged upon them. There are a thousand 
I I capes, far more picturesque than those of 

ropolis and Cape Sunium in themselves ; what 
. to a thousand scenes in the wilder parts of 
, of Asia Minor, Switzerland,, or even ofCintra 
ii: Portugal, or to many scenes of Italy, and the Sierras 
of Spain .' 15m it is the "art," the columns, the tem- 
ple ■, the wrecked vessel, which give them their antique 
ami their modern poetry, and nol the spots themselves. 
Withoul them, the spots of earth would be unnoticed 
and unknown; buried, like Babylon and Nineveh, in 
indistinct confusion, without poetry, as without exist- 
but to whatever spot of earth these ruins were 
transported, if they were capable of transportation, 
obelisk, and the sphinx, and the Memnon's 
li ad, then they would still exist in the perfection of 

auty, and in the pride of their poetry, lo 
an I will ever oppose, the robbery of ruins from Athens, 
to instruct the English in sculpture ; but « by did I so? 
The ruins are as poetical in Piccadilly as they were in 
the Parthenon ; but the Parthenon and its rock are less 
so without them. Such is the poetry of art. 

Mr. Howies contends, again, that the pyramids of 
I poeti 1, because of " the association with 

bi II 3,' and that a " pyrami 1 of the sum.: 

dim i ions" would oot be sublime in " Lincoln's Inn 
I " not so, poetical, certainly ; but take away the 

"pyramids," and what is the " desert?" Take away 
h nge from Salisbury plain, and it is nothing 
more than Hounslow Heath, or any other uninclosed 
down. It appears to me that St. Peter's, the Coliseum, 
the Pantheon, the Palatine, the Apollo, the Laocoon, 
the Venus di Medicis, the Hercules, the dying Gladiator, 
the Moses of Michel Angelo, and all the higher works 
of Canova (I have already spoken of those of ancient 
Greece, still extant in that country, or transported to 
England), are as poetical asMontBlanc or MountiEtna, 
is still more so, as they are direct manifestations 
of mind, and presuppose poetry in their very concep- 
tion ; and have, moreover, as being such, a something 
of actual life, which cannot belong to any part of inani- 
mate nature, unless we adopt the system of Spinosa, 
that t'i" world is the deity. There can be nothing more 
poetica' in its aspect than the city of Venice: does this 
depend upon the sea, or the canals ? — 

" The dirt and sea-weed whence proud Venice rose !" 

Is it the canal which runs between the palace and the 
prison, or the " Bridge of Sighs" which connects them, 
that render it poetical ? Is it the " Canal Grande," or 
the Rialto which arches if, the churches which tower 
over it, the palaces which line, and tie' gon lolas which 
*Ude over the waters, that render this city more poetical 
than Borne itself? Mr. Bowles wiil say, perhaps, that 
the Rialto is but marble, the palaces and churches oniy 
Stone, and die gondolas a " coarse " black cloth, thrown 
over some planks of carved wood, with a shining bit of 
fantastically-formed iron at the prow, "vMhtmi" the 
water. And I tell him that without these the water 
would be lothing but a clay-coloured ditch, and who- 
ever says the contrary, deserves to be at the bottom of 

that wbere Pope's heroes are embraced by the mtld- 

There would be nothing to make the canal 
of Vi nice more poetical than that of Paddington, '..ere 
■.I not lor the artificial adjuncts above mentioned, al- 
'jtough it is a perfectly natural canal, formed by the 



sea, and the innumerable islands which constitute the 
site of this extraordinary city. 

The very Cloaca? of Tarquin at Borne arc as po- 
etical as Richmond Hill; many will think no 

way Rome, and leave the Tiber ami lb' 

bills, in the nature of Evander's time ; let Mr. 1' , 

or , ; r. Wordsworth, or Mr. Southey, or any of the 
other " naturals," make a poem upon them, and then 
see which is most poetical, their production, or the 
commonest guide-book which tells you the road from 
St. 1 J ( ter's to the Coliseum, and informs you w bat you 
will see by the way. The ground interests in Virgil, 
becau C it uiiU be Rome, and not because it is Evan- 
der's rural domain. 

Mr. Bowles then proceeds tc press Homer into his 
service, in answer to a remark of Mr. Campbi IPs, til it 
" Homer was a great desenber id" works of art." Mr. 
Bowles contends, that all his great power, even in tins, 
upon their connexion with nature. The 
" shield of Achilles derives its poetical interest from the 
subjects described on it." And from what does th< 
>>{' Achilles derive its interest 1 and the helmet and the 
mail w.rn by Patroclus, and the celestial armour, and 
tin.' very bra;', n greaves of the well-booted Greeks? Is 
it soli ly from the legs, and the back, and the breast, and 
the human body, which they inclose ? In that ca ie, it 
would have been more poetical to have made them fight 
naked ; and Gulley and Gri gson, i < being nearer to a 
state of nature, are m , boxing in a pair of 

drawers, than Hector and Achilles in radiant armour, 
and with heroic weapons. 

Instead of the clash of helmets, and the rushing of 
chariots, and the whizzing of spears, and the glancing 
of swords, and the cleaving of shields, and the pii n ing 
of breast-plates, why not represent the Greeks ami 
Trojans like two savage tribes, tugging and tearing, and 
kicking, and biting, and gnashing, foaming, grinning, and 
gouging, in all the poetry of martial nature, un 
bered with gross, prosaic, artificial arms, an equal su- 
perfluity to the natural warrior, and his natural poet ? 
Is there any thing unnoctical in Ulysses striking the 
horses of Rhesus with his bow (having forgotten his 
thong), or would Mr. Bowles have had him kick them 
with his foot, or smack them with his hand, as being 
more unsophisticated ? 

In Grav's Elegy, is there an image more striking than 
his "shapeless sculpture?" Of sculpture m general, 
it maybe observed, that it is more poetical than nature 
itself, inasmuch as it represents and bodies forth that 
ideal beauty and sublimity which is never to be found 
In actual nature. This at least is the general opinion 
but, always excepting the Venus di Medicis, I differ 
from that opinion, at least as far as regards female 
beauty, fir the head of Lady Charlemont (when I first 
saw her, nine years ago) seemed to possess all that 
sculpture could require for its ideal. I recollect seeing 
something of the same kind in the bead of an Albanian 
girl, who was actually employed in men ling a road in 
the mountains, and in some Greek, and one or two 
Italian faces. But of sublimity, 1 have never si en any 
i Inn" m human nature at all to approach the 
of sculpture, cither in the Apollo, the Moses, or other 
of the sterner works of ancient or modern art. 

Let iis examine a little further this "babble of <_ r reen 
fields," and of bare nature in general, as superior to 
artificial imagery, for the poetical purposes of the line 



LETTER ON BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON POPE. 



547 



arts. In landscape painting, the great artist 
give you a literal copy of a country, but he inv< 
composes one. Nature, in her actual a 
furnish him with such existing scenes as he n 
Even where he presents you with some famous city, or 
celebrate 1 scene from mountain or other nature, it 
must be taken from some particular point of view, and 
with such light, and shade, and distance, etc. as serve 
not only to heighten its beauties, but to shadow its de- 
formities. The poi try of nature alone, exactly as she 
appear , is not - ufficiei I to bear him out. The very sky 
of his painting is not the portrait of the sky of nature ; 
it is a composition of diffen nl I at dif- 

ferent times, and not the whole copied from any 

And why ! Because Nature is not lavish of 
her beauties; they are widely scattered, and occasionally 
displayed, to be selected with can ered with 

difficulty. 
Of sculpture I have just spoken. It is the great 
of the sculptor to heighten nature into heroic 
beauty, i. e. in plain English, to surpass his model. 
When Canova forms a statue, he takes a limb from one, 



length, but of its symmetry ; and, making allowance fo» 
eastern ' id the difficulty of finding a i 

image for a fi male nose in nature, it is perhaps as gooo 

to nature for poetical purposes. 
W hat mak< s a regi * nl of sol tiers a ra n 
of view than the' same mass of mob? Their anas, thoi 
rs, arid the art and artificial sym 
metry of their position and movements. A Hi 
er's ! 'ael, a Mussulman's turban, and a Roman toga 

are more pot tical than the tattooed or untatt 

tocks ni' a New-Saridwich savage, although they were 
\\ William Wordsworth himself like the 
" i liol in his glory." 

I have seen as many mountains as most men, and more 

ity of landsmen : and, to my mind, 

i onvoy, with a few sail <>f the. line to conduct 

them, is as noble and as poetical a prospect as all that 

te nature can pro luce. I pr< fer the " masl of 

it ammiral," with all its tackle, to the Scotch fir 

01 the Alpine tanrien : and think that m [ry/i u been 

made out of it. In wh infinite superiority of 



hand from another, a feature from a thirl, and a "Falconer's Shipwreck," over all i cks,con- 



. it may he, from a fourth, probably at the same 
time improving upon all, as the Greek of old did in 
embodying his Venus. 

Ask a portrait painter to describe his agonies in ac- 
commodating the faces with which Nature and his sil- 
lers have crowded his painting-room to the principles Of 
his art; with the exception of perhaps ten faces in as 
many millions, there is not one which he can venture to 
give without shading much and adding more. Nature 
exactly, simply, barely nature, will make no great artist 
of any kind, and least of all a poet — the most artificial, 
perhaps, of all artists in his very essence. With regard 
to natural imagery, the poets are obliged to take some of 
their host illustrations from art. You say that " a foun- 
tain is as clear or clearer than glass," to express its 
beauty — 

"O f-ms BanduaiiB, Bplendidior vitro !" 
In the speech of Mark Antony, the body of Cassar is 
displayed, but so also is his mantle — 

'You all do know this mantle," etc. 

'Look! in this place ran Cussiiis' dagger through." 

If the poet had said that Cassius had run his Jist 
through the rent of the mantle, it would have had more 
of Mr. Bowles's " nature" to hi Iji it ; hut the artificial 
is more poetical than any natural hand without it. 
In the sublime of sacred poetry, " Who is this thai Cometh 
from Edom7 with dyed gamv nts from Bozrah .'" Would 
" the comer" he poetical without his " dyed garment* ?" 
which strike and startle the spectator, and identify the 
approaching object. 

The mother of Sisera is represented listening for the 
of his chariot." Solomcn, in his Sou.', COfn- 



st? In his admirable application of the terms of his 
art; in a poet-sailor's description of the sailor 1 
fi:' c very terms, by his application, make the 

and reality of his poem. Why .' because 1 he was 
and in the hands of a poet art will not he found less 
ornamental than nature. It is precisely in general na- 
ture, and in Stepping out of his clement, that 1 

fails ; where he digresses to speak of ancient G 
and "such branches of learning." 

In Dyer's Grongar Hill, upon which his fame resrs, 
the \< ry appearance of Nature herse'fis moralized into 
an artificial image : 

"Thus i- Nature's restore wrought, 

To instruct our wanduring thought; 

Thus she dresses green mat gay, 

To disperse our cans away." 
And here also we have the telescope, the misuse o1 
which, from Milton, has rendered Mr. Bowles so lri> 
umphant over Mr. Campbell: 

" So we mistake the future's face. 
Eyed through Hope's « l < luding glass." 
And here a word, en passant, to Mr. Campbell' 

" As yon summits, soft tuid fair, 
Clail in colours of the mi. 
Which, to those who journey near, 
Barren, brown, and rough appear, 

Snll we tieiul '.lie sunn: ccor.-c way— 

The present 's still a cloudy day." 

Is not this the original of the far-famed 

'"Tis distance lendi enchantment to the view, 
And robes the mountain in its azure hue I" 

To return once more to the sea. Let any one look on 
the long wall of Mclamocco, which curbs the Adriatic, 
and pronounce 1» twecn the sea and its master. Surely 
that Roman work (I mean Roman in conception and 

lerformance), which says to the ocean, " thus far shah 



r>ares the nose of his beloved to a "tower," which to us ,i . i, ,-,,.' ., ., 

' i thou come, and no further, and is obeyed, is nol less 



an eastern > xaggcration. If he had said, thai 
her statue was like that of "a tower," it would have 
cen as poetical as if he had compared her to a tree. 
"The virtuous Mania lowers above her sex," 
is an instance of an artificial image to express a moral 
superiority. But Solomon, it is probable, did not com- 
pare his beloved's nose to a " tower" on account of its 



sublime and | oetical than the angry waves which vainly 
break beneath it. 

Mr. Bowles makes the chief part of a«hip's poesv do- 
pend on the " wind:" then why is a ship mmer sail moru 
poetical than a hog in a high wind? The hog is all 
nature, the ship is all art, " coarse canvas," " blue 
bunting," and " tall poles ;" both are violently aci^d 



upon by the win 1, tossed here and there, to and fro ; 
uii'l yet nothing but excess of hunger could make me 
look upon the pig as the more poetical of the two, and 
in the Bhape of a griskin. 
Wili Mr. Bowles tell us thai the poetry of an aqueduct 
consists in the ir.i/ir which it conveys? Let him look 
on thai of Justinian, on those of Rome, Constantinople, 
Lisbon, and Elvas, or even at the remains of that in 

Attica. 

We arc asked " what makes the venerable towers of 
Westminster Abbey more poetical, as objects, than the 
tower for the manufactory of patent shot, surrounded 
Lv the same scenery '" 1 will answer — the urrhileeiure. 
Turn Westminster Abbey, or Saint Paul's, into a powder 
magazine, their poetry, as objects, remains the same; 
'.he Parthenon was actually converted into one by the 
Turks, during Morosini's Venetian siege, and part of it 
destroyed in consequence. Cromwell's dragoons stalled 
their steeds in Worcester cathedral; was it less poeti- 
cal, as an object, than before ! Ask a foreigner on his ap- 
proach to London, what strikes him as the most poetical 
of the towers before him ; he will point out St. Paul's and 
Westminster Vbbey, without, perhaps, knowing the 
or associations of either, and pass over the "tower 
for patent shot," not that, for any thing he knows to 
the contrary, it might not be the mausoleum of a mon- 
arch, or a Waterloo column, or a Trafalgar monument, 
but because its architecture is obviously inferior. 

To the question, " whether the description of a game 
of cards be as poetical, supposing the execution of the 
artists equal, as a description of a walk in a forest?" 
it may be answered, that the materials are certainly 
not equal; but that "the artist" who has rendered 
the " game of cards poetical," is by far the greater of 
the two. But all this "ordering" of poets is purely ar- 
bitrary on the part of Mr. Bowles. There may or may 
not be, in fact, different "orders" of poetry, but the 
poet is always ranked according to his execution, and 
not according to his branch of the art. 

Tragedy is one of the highest presumed orders. 
has writ tm a tragedy, and a very successful one; 
Fenton another ; and Pope none. Did any man, how- 
ever, — will even Mr. Bowles himself rank Hughes and 
Fenton as poets above Pope ? Was even Addison (th 
author of Cato), or Rowe (one of the higher order of 
dramatists, as far as success goes), or Young, or even 
Otway and Southerne, ever raised fir a moment to the 
same rank with Pope in the estimation of the reader 
or the critic, before his death or since? If Mr. Bowles 
will contend for classifications of this kind, let him re- 
collect that descriptive poetry has been ranked as among 
the lowest branches of the art, and description as a mere 
ornament, but which should never form "the i 
of a poem. The Italians, with the most poetical lan- 
guage, and the most fastidious taste in Europe, 
now live great poets, they sny, Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, 
Fasso, and lastly Alfieri ; anil whom do they esteem one 
jf the highest of these, and some of them the very 
higl t? Petrarcn, the sonnetteer ; it is true that some of 
his Canzoni are not less esteemed, but not more ; who 
ever dreams of his Latin Africa? 

Were Petrarch to be ranked according to the "order" 
of his compositions, where would the best, of sonnets 
place him? with Dante and the others? No: but, as I 
lave before said, the poet who executes best is the high- 



est, whatever his department, and will ever be so rated 
in the' world's esti em. 

Had Gray written nothing but his Elegy, high as he 
stands, I am not sure that he won! i 
it is the corner-stone of his glory; without it, ! i 
would be insufficient for bis fame. The depreciation 
of Pope is partly founded upon a false ilea of the 
dignity of his order of poetry, to which he has partly 
contributed by the ingenuous boast, 

"That not in fancy's maze he wander'd I 
Hut stoop' d to truth, and moralized bia so 

He should have written "rose to truth." In my mind, 
the highest of all poetry is ethical poetry, as th 
est of all earthly objects must be moral truth. 1 
does not make a part of my subject ; it is something 
beyond human powers, and has failed in all human 
hands except Milton's and Dante's, and even Dante's 
powers are involved in the delineation of human pas- 
sions, though in supernatural circum tarn - . \\ hat 
made Socrates the greatest of men ? His moral truth — 
his ethics. What proved Jesus Christ the Son of God 
hardly less than his miracles ? His moral precepts. 
And if ethics have made a philosopher the first of men, 
and have not been disdained as an adjunct to hi 
by the Deity himself, are we to be told that ethical 

I try, or didactic poetry, or by whatever name you 

term it, whose object is to make men better and wiser, 
is not the very Jirst order of poetry? and are we to be 
told this loo by one of the priesthood? It r 
more mind, more wisdom, more power, than all the 
" forests" that ever were " walked" for their " descrip- 
tion," and all the epics that ever were (bunded upon 
fields of battle. The Georgics arc indisputabl 
I believe, undispuledly, even a finer poem than the 
JEneid. Virgil knew this ; he did not order them to be 
burnt. 

"The proper study of mankind is man." 

It is the fashion of the day to lay great stress upon 
what they call " imagination" and "invention," the two 
commonest of qualities: an Irish peasant, with a little 
whiskey in his head, will imagine and invent more 
than would furnish forth a modern poem. If Lucretius 
had not been spoiled by the Epicurean system, we 
should have had a far superior poem to any now in 
existence. As mere poetry, it is the first of Latin 
poems. What then has ruined it? His ethics. Pope 
has not this defect; his moral is as pure as his poetry 
is glorious. In speaking of artificial objects, I have 
omitted to touch upon one which I will now mention. 
Cannon may be presumed to be as highly poetical as 
art can make her objects. Mr. Bowles will, perhaps, 
tell me that this is because they resemble that grand 
natural article of sound in heaven, and simile upon 
earth — thunder. I shall be told triumphantly, that 
Milton made sad work with his artillery, when he armed 
his devils therewithal. He did so; and this artificial 
object must have had much of the sublime to attract 
his attention for such a conflict. He has made an 
absurd use of it ; but the absurdity consists net in 
using cannon against the angels of God, but any 
material weapon. The thunder of the clouds would 
have been as ridiculous and vain in the hands of the 
devils, as the " villanous saltpetre :" the angels 
impervious to the one as to the other. The thunder- 
bolts became sublime in the hands of the Almighty, not 



LETTER OX BOWLES'S STRICTURES ON POPE. 



540 



as such, bul ' i use them as a means 

of repelling the n bel spirits : I ut no one can attribute 
r this grand piece of natural electricity: 
the Almighty w tile I, an 1 th y Fell ; bis word would have 
been enough ; and Milton is as absurd (and in fact, 
in putting material lightnings into (he 
hands >f the Godhead as in giving him hands at all. 

The artillery of the demons « is bul the firs) stepof 
his mistake, the thunder the nr\t, and it is a step lower. 
! ! have been fit for Jove, but not for Jel 

The subject altogether was essentially unpoetical ; he 
has made more of it than another could, but it is be- 
yond him and all men. 

In a portion of his reply, Mr. Bowles asserts that 
Pope " envied Phillips" because he quizzi d his pastorals 
in the Guardian in that most admirable model of 
irony, his paper on the subject. If there was any 
thing enviable about Phillips, it could hardly be his 
pastorals. Th ' pressed 

his contempt. If Mr. Fitzgerald published a volume of 
s,ora " Spirit of Discovery," or a " Missionary," 
and Mr. Bowles wrote in any periodical journal an 
ironical paper upon them, would this be "envy?" The 
of the "Reje ,; " haveridiculed the 

sixl ten "i- twenty "first living pots" of the day; but 

"envy" them? "Envy" writhes, it don' 
The authors of the " Rejecte 1 Addresses " may despise 
some, but they can hardly " envy" any of the persons 
whom they have parodied : and Pope could ha\« no 
more envied Phillips than he did Welsted, or Theobalds, 
or Smcdlev, or any other given hero of the Dunciad. 
He could not have envied him, even had he himself not 
been the greatest poet of his age. Did Mr. higs"enoy" 
Mr. Phillips, when he asked him, "how came your 
Pyrrhus to drive oxen, and say, I am goaded on by 
love?" This question silenced poor Phillips; but it no 
more procee led from " envy" than did Pope's ridicule. 
Did he envy Swift ? Did he envy Bolingbroke ? Did he 
envy Gay the unparalleled success of his "Beggar's 
Opera?" We may be answered that these wire his 
friends — true; but does friendship pri 
Study the first woman you meet with, or the first scrib- 
bler, ht Mr. Howies himself (whom I acquit fully of 
such an odious quality) study some of his own poetical 
intimates: the most envious man I ever heard of is a 
poet, and a high one ; besides it is an universal passion. 
01 only the puppets for their danc- 
ing, and broke his shins in the attempt at rivalry, but 
was seriously angry because two pretty women re- 
ceived more attention than he did. This is envy; but 
whi re docs P sign of the passion? In that 

case,Dryden envied the hero of his MacFlecknoe. Mr. 
hen and where he can, Pope with 
Cowper (the same Cow per whom, in his edition of Pope, 
i:i' laughs a' for his attachment to an old woman, Mrs. 
Un win: search and you will find it; I remember the 
ugh not the page); in particular he rc- 
r's Dutch delineation of a wood, drawn 
up like a seedsman's catalogue, 1 with an affected imi- 



1 I will submit io Mr. Bowles's own judi 
from another poem of Cowpi I with the 

same wnt( r's Sylvan Sampler. In the Joes to Mary, 

" Thy hi I!' s, once ; 

For m ' ■ I ■-tiire, 

Now rust disused, and shine no more, 

My .Mary," 
2Z 



tr:tion of Mi'ton's style, as burlesque as the "Splendid 
I > writers (for Cowper is no poet) 

come into comparison in one great work — the trans- 
lation of Homef. Now, with all the great, and mani- 
fest, and manifold, and reprove I, and acknowl 
ami uncontrovcrtcd faults of Pope's translation, and 
nil the scholarship, and pains, and lime, and trouble, and 
blank \ i rse of tin- othi r, w ho can ever ■ 
and who v. id ever lav down Pope, unless for the 
original .' Pope's was " not Homer, it was Spondaues ;" 

ButCowpcr's is not Homer, either, il is no; even Cow- 
per. As a child 1 first read Pope's Homer with a rap- 
ture which no subsequent work could ever affoi 
children arc not the wore! judges of their own lan- 
guage. As a boy I read Hon. or m the original, as we 
have all done, some of us by force, and a lew by 
favour; under which description I come is nothing to 
the purpose, it is enough that I read. him. As a man 

' read Cowpor's version, and I 
impossible. Has any human reader ever succeed .1 1 

And now that we have heard the Catholic reproached 
wit!, envy, duplicity, licentiousness, avarice — what was 
the Calvinist .' He attempted the most atrocious of 
crimes in the Christian code, viz. suicide — and why? 
Hi cause he was to be examined whether he was fit for 
an office which he seems to wish to have made a sine- 
cure. His connexion with Mrs. Unwin was pure enough, 
for the old lady was devout, and he was deranged ; but 
why then is the infirm and then elderly Pope to be re- 
proved for his connexion with Martha Blount ? Cow- 
per was the almoner of 'Mrs. Throgmorton ; but Pope's 
charities were his own', and they were noble and ex- 
tensive, far beyond his fortune's warrant. Pope was 



contain a simple, household, "indoor," artificial, and ordi 
wiry image. 1 refer Mr. Bowles to the stanza, and ask iftheso 
three lines about "necdlea" are not worth all the boasted 
twaddling about trees, so triu and yet 

in fiirt what do 'bey convey ? A homely collection of images 
ami ideas associated with the darning Of stockings, ami the 
hemming ni' shins, and the mending of breeches; hut will any 
ont; deny that tin y are eminently poetical anil pathetic as ad- 
uy Cowper to his nurse'! The trash of trees reminds 
me of a saying of Sheridan's. Soon after the " Rejected Ad- 
i ae. in i^l'J. I met Sheridan. In the course of din- 
i.ir. be sum!, " Lord Byroo, did you know that amongst tho 
writers of addresses was Wbjtbread himself?" 1 answered 
by an inquiry of what sort of an address lie had made. " Of 
that," replied Sheridan, "1 remember little, except that there 
was a phoenix in it." " A phoenix! ! Well, how ciij he de- 
scribe it !" " Like a poulterer,'" answered Sheridan • "it was 
d yellow, and red. and blue: he did not let us oh" 
for a single leather." And just such as this poulterer's ac- 
count of a phoenix, is Cowper's stick-picker's detail of a wood, 
with all its petty minutiae of this that, an.! the other. 

Ooe more l tica] instance of the power of art, and even 

iver nature, in poetry, and I ha\ e 'one : — the 
bust of Jlnthunul Is there any thing in nature like this 
marble, excepting tho VenUB 1 Can there be more iiiiitrii 

lathered iuto existence than in that wonderful creation of par- 
ity ? But the poetry of this bust is in no ret 

rived from nature, nor from any association ol 

■ what is there in common wi'.h moral niturc and Iho 

:1. or rather supir-artijuiul, for nature lias 

inch. 

Away, Ihi n, with 'his emit about nature nnd "invariable 

principles of poetry!" A great artist will make a block of 

n, and a i ood poel nan imbuo 

i ith more poetry than i orests of 

America, It is the business and the proof of a poel to giva 

the iroverb, and sometimes to "matt 
ml of a sou? t r.ir;" and to concludo with another homely 
pruverb, "a good workman will do) find fault with his toolj 



550 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



will not. You, fir, know how fur I am sincere, r:nH 
whether my opinion, not only in the short work in- 
tended for publication, and in private letters which 
can never be published, has or has not been the same. 
I look upon tins as tin- declining age of Engli h poel rj ; 
do regard for others, no selfish feeling! can prevent me 
from seeing this, ami expressing the truth. There can 
be no worse sign for the taste of the times than the 
tion of Pope. It would he better to receive for 
proof Mr. Cobbet's rough but strong attack upon 
Shakspeare and Milton, than to allow this smooth and 
"candid" undermining of the reputation of thi 
perfect of our poets and the purest of our moralists. 
Of his power in the passions, in description, in the 
mock-heroic, I leave others to descant. I take him on 
his strong ground, as an ethical poet: in the former 
none excel, in the mock-heroic and the ethical none 
equal him; and, in my mind, the latter is the I 
of all poetry, because it docs that in verse, which the 
greatest of men have wished to accomplish in prose. 
If the essence of poetry must be a lie, throw it to the 
dogs, or banish it from your republic, as Plato would 
te. He who can reconcile poetry with truth 
and wisdom, is the only true "poet" in its real sense; 
"the maker" "the creator" — why must this mean the 
" liar," the " feigner," " the tale-teller?" A man may 
make and create better things than these. 

I shall not presume to say that Pope is as high a 
poet as Shakspeare and Milton, though his enemy, 
Warton, places him immediately under them. I would 
no more say this than I would assert in the mos<)ue 
(once St. Sophia's), that Socrates was a greater man 
than Mahomet. But if I say that he is very near them, 
it is no more than has been asserted of Burns, who is 
supposed 

"To rival all but Shakspeare's name below." 
I say nothing against this opinion. But of what " order" 
according to the poetical aristocracy, are Bums's poems? 
These are his opus m ignwn, " Tarn O'Shanter," 
the " Cotter's Saturday Night," a descriptive sketch ; 
some others in the same style ; the rest are songs. So 
much for the rank of his productions ; the rank of 
Burns is the very first of his art. Of Pope I have ex- 
pressed my opinion elsewhere, as also of the effect 
which the present attempts at poetry have had upon 
our literature. If any great national or natural con- 
vulsion could or should overwhelm your country, in 
such sort as to sweep Great Britain from the kingdoms 
of the earth, and leave only that, after all the most 
living of human things, a dead language, to be studied 
and read, and imitated, by the wise of future and far 
generations upon foreign shores; if your literature 
should become the learning of mankind, divested of 
party cabals, temporary fashions, and national pride 
and prejudice ; an Englishman, anxious that the pos- 
terity of strangers should know that there had been 
such a thing as a British Epic and Tragedy, might wish 
for the preservation of Shakspeare and Milton ; but 
the surviving world would snatch Pope from the wreck, 
and let the rest sink with the people. He is the moral 
poet of all civilization, and, as such, let us Hop 
he will cue day be the national poet of mankind. He 
is the only poet that never shocks ; the only pot I 
favltlessness has been made his reproach. (' 
lucre are those who will believe this, and those who I eye over his productions ; consider their extent, and 



the tolerant yet stcadv adherent of the most bigoted of 

scits; and Cowper the most bigoted and despondent 

sectary that ever anticipated damnation to hr 

Others. Is tins harsh? I know it is, and I do not assert 

rt as my opinion of Cowper personally, but to show 

hi l»- said, with just as great an appearance of 

truth and candour, as all the odium which has been 

dated upon Pope in similar speculations. Cow- 

a good man, and lived at a fortunate time for 

his works. 

Mr. Bowles, apparently not relying entirely upon his 
own arguments, has, in person or by proxy, brought 
forward the names of Soulhey and Moore. Mr. Southey 
"agrees entirely with Mr. Bowles in his i/. t 
principles of poetry." The least that Mr. Bowles can 
do in return is to approve the "invariable principles of 
Mr. Southey." I should have thought that the word 
" invariable" might have stuck in Southey's throat, like 
Macbeth's "Amen!" I am sure it did in mine, and I 
am not the least consistent of the two, at least as a 
Moore (it tu Brute !) also approves, and a Mr. 
J. Scott. There is a letter also of two lines from a 
gentleman in asterisks, who, it seems, is a poet of "the 
highest rank" — who can this be? not my friend, Sir 
Walter, surely. Campbell it can't be ; Rogers it won't 
be. 

"You have hit the vnil in the head, and**** [Pope, I 
presume] on the head also." 

1 remain, your9, afFectionatcdy, 

(Four Asterisks.) 

And in asterisks let him remain. Whoever this person 
may be, he deserves, for such a judgment of Midas, 
that "the nail" which Mr. Bowles has hit in the 
I : i should be driven through his own ears; I am 
sure that they are long enough. 

The attention of the poetical populace of the present 
day to obtain an ostracism against Pope is as easily ac- 
eounted fir as the Athenian's shell against Aristides; 
they are tired of hearing him always called " the Just." 
Thev are also fighting for life; for if he maintains his 
Station, they will reach I heir own falling. They have 
raised a mosque by the side of a Grecian temple of the 
purest architecture ; and, more barbarous than the 
barbarians from whose practice I have borrowed the 
figure, they are not contented with their own grotesque 

, unless they destroy the prior and purely beauti- 
ful fabric which preceded, and which shames them and 
theirs f. >r ever and ever. I shall be told that amongst 
lli I have been (or it maybe still am) conspicuous — 
(rue, and I am ashamed of it. I have been amongst. 
the builders of this Babel, attended by a confusion of 

ss, but never amongst the envious destroyers of 
the classic temple of our predecessor. I have loved 
and honoured the fame and name of that illustrious 
and unrivalled man, far more than my own paltry 
renown, and the trashy jingle of the crowd of 
" schools" and upstarts, who pretend to rival, or even 
surpass him. Sooner than a single leaf should be 
torn'from his laurel, it were better that all which these 
men, and that I, as one of their set, have ever written, 
bhuuld 

" Lirtu trunks, clothe apice, or, fluttering in a row, 
BulHnpo the rails of liedlam or Sotio I" 



LETTER ON BOWLES»S STRICTURES ON POPE. 



651 



contemplate their variety .'—pastoral, passion, mock- 
hcroic, translation, satire, ethics,— all excellent, and 
often perfect; If his great charm be his melody, how 
comes it that foreigners adore him even in their diluted 
translation? But I have made this letter loo long. 
Give my compliments to Mr. Bowles. 

Yours ever, very trulv, 

BYRON. 
To J. Murray, Esq. 

Post taiptum. — Long as this letter has grown, I 
find it necessary to append a postscript, — if possible, a 
short one. Mr. Bowles denies that he lias accused Pope 
of "a sordid money-getting passion ;" but he adds "if 
I had ever done so, I should be glad to find any testi- 
mony thai might show me he was not so." Thi 
mony he may find to his heart's content in Spence 
and elsewhere. First, there is Martha Blount, who, 
Mr. Bowles charitably says, "probably thought he did 
not save enough for her as legatee." Whatever she 
thought upon this point, her words are in Pope's favour. 
Then there is Alderman Barber — see Spence's Anec- 
dotes. There is Pope's cold answer to Halifax, when he 
proposed a pension ; his behaviour to CraggS and to 
Addison upon like occasions ; and his own two lines — 

" And, thanks to Homer, since I live and thrive. 

Indebted to no prince or peer alive — " 
written when princes would have been proud to pen- 
sion, and peers to promote him, and when tin; whole 
army of dunces were in array against him, and would 
have been but too happy to deprive him of this boast 
of independence. But there is something a little more 
serious in Mr. Bowles's declaration, that he "would have 
spoken" of his "noble generosity to the outcast, Richard 
Savage," and other instances of a compassionate and 
generous heart, "had they occurred to his recollection when 
he wrote." What ! is it come to this ? Does Mr. Bowles 
sit down to write a minute and laboured life and edition 
of a great poet ? Does he anatomize his character, 
moral and poetical ? Does he present us with his faults 
an I with his foibles? Does he sneer at his feelings, and 
doubt of his sincerity? Does he unfold his vanity and 
duplicity? and then omit the gi 3 which 

might, in part, have "covered this multitude of sins?" 
and then plead that "they did not ocour to his recolL 
Is this the frame of mind and of memory with which the 
illustrious dead are to be approached? If Mr. Bowles, 
who must have had access to all the means of re 
his memory, did not recollect these facts, he is unfit for 
his task ; but if he did recollect, and omit them, I know 
not what he is fit for, but I know what would be fit 
for him. Is the plea of "not recollecting" such promi- 
nent facts to be admitted 1 l-h\ Bowles has been at o 
public school, and, as I have been publicly educated 
also, I can sympathize with ins predilection. When we 
were in the third form even, had we pleaded on the 
Monday morning, that we had not brought up the Satur- 
day's . wise " wc had forgotten it," what 
would have been the reply? And is an I KCUSe, whii i, 
would not be pardoned to a school-boy, to pass current 
in a matter which SO nearly concerns the fame of the 
first poet of his age, if not of Ins country.' If Mr. Bowles 
the virtues of Others, why complain 
, iii-iv that others have a better m< morj for Ins 
own faults/ Thev are but the faults of an author; 



while the virtues he omitted from his catalogue are 
tial to the justice due to a man. 
Mr. Bow les appears, indeed, to be susceptible bej'ond 
the privilege of authorship; There is a plaintive dedica- 
tion totMr. Gilford, in which he is made responsible for 
all the articles of the Quarterly. Mr. Southey, il seems, 
"the most able and eloquent writer in that Review," 
approves of Mr. Bowles's publication. Now, il seems 
to me the more impartial, that, notwithstanding that the 
great writer of the Quarterly entertains opinions op- 
posite to the able article on Spence, nevertheless lhal 
as permitted to appear. Is a review to be de- 
voted to the opinions of any one man? Must it not 
vary according to circumstances, and according to the 
subjects to be criticised? I fear that writers must take 
the sweets and hitters of the public journals as they 
occur, and an author of so long a standing as .Mr. Bowles 
might have become accustomed to such incidents; he 
might be angry, but not astonished. I have been re- 
viewed in the Quarterly almost as often as Mr. Bowles, 
and have had as pleasant things said, and some as wre- 
pleasanlf as could well be pronounced. In the review 
of " The Fall of Jerusalem," it is stated that I have de- 
voted "mv powers, etc. to the worst parts of mani- 
cheism," which, being interp-etcd, means that 1 wor- 
ship the devil. Now, I have neither written a reply, nor 
complained to GifTord. I believe that I observed in a 
letter to you, that 1 thought "that the critic might have 
praised Milman without finding it necessary to abuse 
me ;" but did I not add at the same time, or soon after 
(apropos, of the note in the book of travels), that I 
would not, if it were even in my power, have a single 
line cancelled on my account in that nor in any other 
publication? — Of course, I reserve to myself the privi- 
lege of n spouse when necessary. Mr. Bowles seems in 
a whimsical state about the article on Spruce. Von 
know very well that I am not in your confidence, nor 
tor of the journal. The moment 
I saw that article, I was morally certain that I knew the 
author " by his style." You will tell me that I do not 
know him : that is all as il should be ; keep the secret, 
so shall I, though no one has ever entrusted it tome. 
He is not ti ivhom Mr. Bowles denounces. Mr. 

■me sensibility reminds me of a circum- 
stance which occurred on board of a frigate, in which 
I whs g passenger and guest of the captain's for a con- 
siderable time. The surgeon on board, a very gentle 
manly young man, and r< markably able in his profes 
sion,woreat«g'. Upon this ornament he was extremely 
tenacious. As naval jests are s nuctimes a little rough, 
his brother-officera made occasional allusions to this 
; . the doctor's person. ():ie day a 
iitenanl, in the course of a facetious < 
sion, said, " Suppose, now, doctor, I should take otT 
.'' " Sir,'' replied the doctor, " I shall itdk no 
ith vou ; you grow uld not 

even admit so near an approach as to the hat which 
protected it. In like manner, if any bod; 
Mr. Bowles's laurels, even in his outside capacity of an 
editor, " they grow scurrilous." You say that you are 
about to prepare an edition of P nnot do 

better for your own credit as a publisher, nor for the re- 
demption of Pope from -Mr. Bowles, and of the public 
taste from rapid degeneracy. 



( 5b2 ) 

& iFrtigmrut. 



JimeM, 1S1G. 
In the year 17 — . having for some time determined 
on a journey through countries not hitherto much fre- 
quented b) travellei ,1 et out, accompanied by a friend 
whom ! : ite by the name of Augustus Dar- 
vell. !' years my elder, and a man of con- 
nt family — advantages which 
■ i nled him alike fr under- 
valuing or overrating. Some peculiar circumstances in 
hts [in. ndered him to me an object 
of attention, ofinl i t, and even of regard, which 
neither the reserve ofhis manners, nor occasional indi- 
cations of an inquietu le at times nearly approaching lo 

!' mind, could extinguish. 

I was yet young in life, which Iliad begun early; 
hut in v intimacy with him was of a recent date: we hail 
been e lucate i at the same schools and university ; but' 
his pro i these had preceded mine, and he 

had been deeply initiated into what is called the world, 
while I was yet in my noviciate. While thus engaged, I 
had heard much both of his past and present life ; and, 
in ccounts there were many and irre- 

concilahle contradictions, I could still gather from the 
whole thai hewasabcing of no common order, and 
one who, [hi take to avoid re- 

mark, would still be remarkable. I had cultivated his 
;uently, and endeavoured to obtain 
his friendship, but this last appeared to be unattainable; 
he might have possessed seemed 
languished, and others to be 
concentred: that Ins feelings were acute, I had suffi- 
cient opportunities of observing; for, although he could 
lie could not dtogtther disguise them: still he 
had a power of giving lo one passion the appearance of 
anothi r in such a manner that it was difficult to define 
the nature of what was working within him; and the 
expre -ions ofhis features would vary so rapidly, though 
slightly, that it was useless to trace them to their sources. 
It was evidenl thai he was a prey to some cureless dis- 
quiet; biri whether it arose from ambition, love, re- 
. from one or all of these, or merely from 
a morbi I temperament akin to disease, I could not dis- 
ircumstances alleged which mi ;hl 
have justified the application to each of these causes; 
but, as I have before said, these were so contradii tor 
and cohtradicte I, that none could be fixed upon with 
accuracy. Whi re there is mystery, it is generally sup- 
be evil : I know not how tins 
may be, but in him there certainly was the one, though 
ertain the extent of the other — and felt 
loth, a far as regarded himself, to believe in its exist- 
ence, wi re received with sufficient cold- 

bul I was y g, and not easily discouraged, and 

i in obtaining, to a certain degree, 
thatcoi, and moderate confidence 

of common and every-day concerns, created and ce- 
mented by similarity of pursuit and frequency of meet- 
icy, or friendship, according to 
the ideas of him who uses those words to express them. 
Darvi ll ha I already travelled extensively, and to him 
I limi applied lor information with regard to the con- 



duct of my intended journey. It was my secret wisn 
that ho might be prevailed on to accompany hie : it was 
also a probable hope, Founded upon the shadowy rest- 
lessness "Inch 1 had observed in him, an 1 to which the 
animation which he appeared to feel on such su 
and bis apparent indifference to all by which he was 
more immediately surrounded, cave fresh strength. 
This wish I first hinted, and then expressed : his answ er, 
though I had partly expected it, gave me all the pleasure 
of surprise — he consented ; and, after the requisite ar- 
tents, we commenced our voyages. After journey- 
ing through various countries of the scuth of Europe, 
our attention was turned towards the cast, according 
to our original destination; and it was in my progress 
ihose regions thai the incident occurred upon 
which will turn what I may have to relate. 

The constitution of Darvell, which must, from his 
appearance, have been in early life more than usually 
robust, had been for some time gradually giving way, 
without the intervention of any apparent disease: he 
bad neither cough nor hectic, yet he became daily 
more enfeebled : his habits were temperate, and be 
neither declined nor complained of fatigue, yet he was 
evidently wasting away: he became more and more 
silent and sleepless, and at length so seriously altered, 
that my alarm grew proportionate to what I conceived 
lo be his danger. 

We bad determined, on our arrival at Smyrna, on 
■i- ion to the ruins of Ephesus and Sardis, from 
which I endeavoured to dissuade him, in his present 
state of indisposition — hut in vain : then' appeared to be 
an oppression on his mind, and a solemnity in his man- 
ner, which ill corresponded with his eagerness to proceed 
on what I regarded as a mere party of pleasure, htlls 
suited to a valetudinarian ; but 1 op] o longer 

— and bl a few days we set off together, accompanied 
only by a serrugee and a single janizary. 

We had passed half-way towards the remains of 
Ephesus, leaving lo him! us the more fertile environs ol 
Smyrna, and were entering upon that wild and ten- 
antless track through the marshes and defiles which 
lead to the few huts yet lingering over the broken col- 
umns of Diana — the rootless walls of expelled Christi- 
anity, and the still more recent but complete desolation 
of abandoned mosques — when the su. '.den and rapid ill- 
ness of my companion obliged us to hall at a Tu kish 
cemetery, the lurbaned tombstones of which were the 
sole indication that human life had ever b* en a sojourner 
in this wilderness. The only caravanscra we had seen 
was left some hours behind us; not a vestige of a town 
or even cottage, was within sight or hope, and tins " city 
of the dead" appeared to be the sole refuge for my un- 
fortunate friend, who seemed on the verge of becoming 
the last of its inhabitants. 

In this situation, I looked round for a place where ho 
might mosl conveniently repose : — contrary to the usual 
of Mahometan burial-grounds, the cypresses 
were in this few in number, and these thinly - 

Over its extent : the tombstones were mostly fallen, ar.J 

worn with age: upon one of the most considet 

these, and beneath one of the fit g tr»cs 



PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES. 



553 



Darvell supported himself, in a half-reclining posture, 
with great difficulty. He asked for water. I had some 
doubts of our being able to find any, and prepare.! to go 
in search of it with hesitating despondency — but he 
desired me to remain; and, turning to Suleiman, our 
janizary, who stood by us smoking with great tranquil- 
lity, he said, " Suleiman, verbana su," (i. e. bring some 
water), and went on describing the spot where it was to 
be found with great minuteness, at a small well for 
camels, a few hundred yards to the right : the janizary 
obeyed. I said to Darvell, " How did you know this 7" 
■—He replied, " From our situation ; you must perceive 
thai this place was once inhabited, and could not have 
been so without springs : I have also been here before." 

" You have been here before ! — How came you never 
to mention this to me ? and what could you be doing in 
n place where no one would remain a moment longer 
than they could help it?" 

To this question I received no answer. In the mean- 
time, Suleiman returned with the water, leaving the sor- 
rugce and the horses at the fountain. The quenching of| 
his i hit I pearance of reviving him for a mo- 

ment; and I conceived hopes of his being able to pro- 
ceed, or at Least to return, and I urged the attempt, lie 
was silent — and appeared to be collecting his spirits for 
an effort to spi ak< He began. 

" This is the end of my journey, and of my life — I 
came here to die : but I have a request to make, a 
command — for such my last words must be. — You will 
observe it ?" 

" Most certainly ; but have better hopes." 

" I have no hopes, nor wishes, but this — concpal my 
death from every human being." 

"I hope there will be no occasion ; that you will re- 
cover, and " 

" Peace ! it must be so : promise this." 

"Ido." 

" Swear it by all ihst" He here dictated an oath 

of great solemnity. 

" There is no occasion for this — 1 will observe your 
request ; and to doubt me is " 

" It cannot be helped, you must swear." 

I took the oath : it appeared to relieve him. Here- 
moved a seal-ring from his linger, on which were some 
Arabic characters, and presented it to me. He pro- 
ceeded* — 

"On the ninth day of the month, at noon precisely 
(what month you please, but this must be the day), you 
must fling this ring into the salt springs which run into 
the Hay of Kleusis : the day after, at the same hour, 
vol must repair to the ruins of the temple of Ceres, 
and wait one hour." 



it Why?" 

" You will see." 

" Tie f the month, you say ?" 

"The i 

As I observed that the present was the ninth day of 

the month, hisc itenance changed, and he paused. A3 

. 1 . idently becoming more feeble, a stork, with a 
snake in Imt beak, perchi d upon a tombstone near us; 
and, without devouring her prey, appeared to | 
lastly regarding us. I know not what impelled me to 
dnve it away, but the attempt was useless ; she made a 

t'ew circles in (he air, and returned exactly to the same 
spot. Darvi 11 poin ed to it, and smiled : he spoke — I 
knovt not whether to himself or to me — but the words 
wer ily, "''I' is well !'' 

" What is w c II 7 what no you mean ? " 

"No matter: sou must bury me hero this evening, 
and exactly when- that bird is now perched. You know 
the rest of my injunctions." 

He then proceeded to give me several directions as 
to the manner in which his death might be best eon 
cealed. After these were finished, he exclaimed, " You 
pei 1 ■' ■!-. e thai bird?" 

"Certainly." 

"Aui the serpen! writhing in her beak?" 

" Doubtless: there is nothing uncommon in it; it is 
her natural prey. But il is odd that she dues not de- 
vour it." 

1 le smiled in a ghastly manner, and said, faintly, " It 
is not yet time!" As he spoke, the stork flew away. 
My eyes followed it for a moment ; it could hardly be 
longer than ten might be counted. I felt Darvell's 
weight, as it were, increase upon my shoulder, and, 
turning 4o look upon his face, perceived that he was 
dead ! 

I was shocked with the sudden certainty which tDuld 
not be mistaken — his countenance in a few minutes 
became nearly black. I should have attributed so rapid 
a change to poison, had I not been aware that he had 
no opportunity of receiving it unperceived. The day 
was declining, the body was rapidly altering, and 
nothing n mained but to fulfil his request. With the aid 
of Suleiman's ataghan and my own sabre, we scooped 
a shallow grave upon the spot which Darvell had indi 
cated: the earth easilj gave way, having already reci ived 
some Mahometan tenant We dug as deeply as the 
time permitted us, and throwing the dry earth upon all 
that remained of the singular being so lately departed, 
we cul a « turf from the less withered 

soil around us, and laid them upon his sepulchre. 

Between aslonishmi nt and grief, I was tearless. 



3tar!famrutors S^irecfire. 



DEBATE ON THE FRAME-WORK BILL, IN THE 
HOUSE OP LORDS, FEBRUARY 87, 1813. 

Tiif. order of the day for the second reading of this 
bill being read, 

LOUD BYRON rose, and (for the first time) ad- 
dressed theii lord, hips, as follows: 

2z2 75 



My Lords — the subject now submitted to your loro- 
ships for the firsl time, though new .,, t!.-- House, is by 
no m ins new to the country. I believe it had occu- 
pied the serious thoughts of all d< scrtptions of persona, 
long before its introduction to the notice of that legis- 
lature, whose interference alone could be of p 
vice. As a person in some degree connected with tho 



55 I 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



. i county, though a stranger not only to this 
House in general, but to almost every individual whose 
attention I presume to solicit, I must claim some por- 
tion of your lordships' indulgence whilst I offer a few 
itions on a question in which I confess myself 
. interested. 

To enter into any detail of the riots would be 
fluous : the House is already aware that every outrage 
short of actual bloodshed lias been perpetrated, and 
that the proprietors of the frames obnoxious to the 
rioters, and all persons supposed to he connected 
with them, have heen liable to insult and violence. 
During the short time I recently passed in Nottingham- 
shire, not twelve hours elapsed without some fresh act 
of violence ; and on the day I left the county, I v. as in- 
formed that forty frames had been broken the pn mi- 
ning, as usual, without resistance and without 
detection. 

Such was then the state of that county, and such I 
have reason to believe it to be at this moment. But 
whilst these outrages must be admitted to exist to an 
alarming extent, it cannot be denied that they have 
arisen from circumstances of the most unparalleled 
distress. The perseverance of these miserable men in 
their proceedings, tends to prove that nothing but abso- 
lute want could have driven a large, and once honest 
ami industrious, body of the people, into the commission 
of excesses so hazardous to themselves, their familii s, 
and the community. At the time to which I allude, 
the town and county were burthened with large detach- 
ments of the military; the police was in motion, the 
magistrates assembled; yet all the movements, civil and 
military, had led to — nothing. No' a single instance 
had occurred of the apprehension of any real delinquent 
actually taken in the fact, against whom there existed 
legal evidence sufficient for conviction. But the police, 
however useless, were by no means idle : several noto- I 
rious delinquents had been detected ; men, liable to 
conviction, on the clearest evidence, of the capital crime 
of poverty; men who had been nefariously guilty of 
lawfully begetting several children, whom, thanks to ! 
the times] the)' were unable to maintain. Considerable 
injury has been done to the proprietors of the improved 
frames. These machines were to them an advantage, 
inasmuch as they superseded the necessity of employing 
a number of workmen, who were left in consequence 
to starve. By the adoption of one species of frame in 
particular, one man performed the work of many, and 
the superfluous labourers were thrown out of employ- 
ment. Yet it is to be observed, that the work thus 
executed was inferior in quality ; not marketable at 
home, and merely hurried over with a view to exporta- 
tion. It was called, in the cant of the trade, by the 
name of " Spider work." The rejected workmen, in 
the blindness of their ignorance, instead of rejoicing at 
these improvements in arts so beneficial to mankind, 
conceived themselves to be sacrificed to improvements 
in mechanism. In the foolishness of their hearts they 
imagined, that the maintenance and well-doing of the 
industrious poor were objects of greater consequence 
than the enrichment of a few individuals by any im- 
provement, in the implements of trade, which threw 
the' workmen out of employment, and rendered the 
labourer unworthy of his hire. And it must be con- 
fessed tha although the adoption of the enlarged ma- 



chinery, in that state of our commerce which the coun- 
try once bo it I, might have been beneficial to the 
master without being detrimental to the servant ; yet, 
situation of our manufactures, rotting in 
warehouses, without a prospect of exportation, with 
r!;e deman I for work and workmen equally dimiri 
frames of this description tend materially to aggravate 
the distress and discontent of the disappointed 
lint the real cause of these distresses and con 
disturbances lies deeper. When we are told that these 
men are leagued togi ther not only for the destruction 
of their own comfort, but of their very means of sub- 

i can "e fbrgi t that it. is the bitter policy, the 

tive warfare of the last eighteen year 1 -, which 

has destroyed their comfort, your comfort, a',! men's 

1011 1 :ri 1 that policy which, cn h ,inaiir with " great 

an now n i mori ," has survived the dead to bo- 
come a curse on the living, unto the third ami fourth 
generation! These men never destroyed their looms 
til! they W( re become useless, worse than useless ; till 
they were I iceoi lie actual impediments to their exertions 
in obtaining their daily bread. Can you, then, wonder 
that in times like these, when bankruptcy, convicted 
fraud, and imputed felony are found in a station not 
fur beneath that of your lordships, the lowest, 
once most useful portion of the people, should forget 

y in their distresses, and become only less 
guilty than one of their representatives / But while the 
exalted offender can find means to baffle the law, new 
capital punishments must be devised, new snares of 
death must he spread lor the wretched mechanic, wdio 
is famished into guilt. These men were willing to dig, 
but the spade was in other hands : they were not 

I io h ig, let tier,: was none to relieve them: 
their own means of subsistence were cut off, all oilier 
employments prc-occupicd, and their excesses, hi 
io be deplored and condemned, can hardly be subject 
of surprise. 

It has been stated that the persons in the temporary 
possession of frames connive at their destruction ; if 
this be proved upon inquiry, it were necessary that such 
material accessaries to the crime should be principals 
in the punishment. But I did hope, that any measure 
proposed by his majesty's government, for your lord- 
ship's decision, would have had conciliation for its basis; 
or, if that were hopeless, that some previous inquiry, 
some deliberation would have been deemed requisite; 
not that we should have been called at once with- 
out examination, and without cause, to pass sentenct s 
by wholesale, and si";n death-warrants blindfold. But 
admitting that these men had no cause of complaint ; 
that the grievances of them and their employers were 
alike groundless; that they deserved the worst; what 
inefficiency, what imbecility has been evinced in the 
method chosen to reduce them ! Why were the military 
called out to be made a mockery of, if they were to he 
called out at all? As far as the difference of seasons 
would permit, they have merely parodied the summer 
campaign of Major Sturgeon; and, indei 

Igs, civil and military, seemed on the m< 
those of the Mayor and Corporation of Garratt. — Such 
marchings and counter-marchings! from Not tin 
to Bullwell, from BullweU to Banford, from Banfbrd to 
Mansfield! and when at length the d i arrived 

at their destinations, in all M the pride, pomp,' and cir- 



PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES. 



555 



rumstance of glorious war," they came just in time lo 
witness the mischief which had been done, and ascertain 
the escape of the perpetrators, to collect the " spolin 
opima" in the fragments of broken frames, and return 
to their quarters amidst the derision of old women, and 
the hootings of children. Now, though in a free country, 
it were to be wished that our military should never be too 
formidable, at least to ourselves, I cannot see the policy of 
placing them in situations where they can only be made 
ridiculous. As the sword is the worst argument that can 
be used, so should it be the last. In this instance it has 
been the first ; but providentially as yet only in the 
scabbard. The present measure will, indeed, pluck it 
from the sheath ; vet had proper meetings been held in 
the earlier stages of these riots, — had the grievances of 
these men and their masters (for they also had their 
grievances) been fairly weighed and justly examined, I 
do think that means might have been devised to restore 
these workmen to their avocations, and tranquillity to 
the county. At present the county suffers from the 
double infliction of an idle military, and a starving 
population. In what state of apathy have we been 
plunged so long, that now for the first time the House 
has been officially apprized of these disturbances! All 
this has been transacting within ISO miles of London, 
and vet we, "good easy men, have deemed full sure 
our greatness was a-ripening," and have sat down to 
enjoy our foreign triumphs in the midst of domestic 
calamity. But all the cities you have taken, all the 
armies which have retreated before your leaders, are 
but paltry subjects of self-congratulation, if your land 
divides against itself, and your dragoons and your exe- 
cutioners must be let loose against your fellow-citizens. 
— You call these men a mob, desperate, dangerous, 
and ignorant ; and seem to think that the only way to 
quiet the " Bellua multorum capilum" is to lop off a 
few of its superfluous heads. But even a mob may 
be better reduced to reason by a mixture of concilia- 
tion and firmness, than by additional irritation and re- 
doubled penalties. Arc we aware of our obligations 
to a mob ? It is the mob that labour in your fields, and 
serve in your houses, — that man your navy, and recruit 
your army, — that have enabled you to defy all the 
world, and can also defy you when neglect and ca- 
lamity have driven them to despair. You may call the 
people a mob ; but do not forget, that a mob too often 
speaks the sentiments of the people. And here I 
must remark, with what alacrity you are accustomed 
to fly to the succour of your distressed allies, leaving 
the distressed of your own country to the care of Provi- 
dence, or — the parish. When the Portuguese suffered 
under the retreat of the French, every arm was stretch- 
ed out, every hand was opened, from the rich man's 
largess to the widow's mite, all was bestowed to enable 
them to rebuild their villages and replenish their gran- 
aries. And at this moment, when thousands of misguided 
but most unfortunate fellow-countrymen are strug- 
gling with the extremes of hardships and hunger, as 
your charity began abroad, it should end at home. A 
much less sum, a tithe of the bounty bestowed on Por- 
tugal, even if those men (which I cannot admit with- 
out inquiry) could not have been restored to their em- 
ployments, would have rendered unnecessary the ten- 
der mercies of the bayonet and the gibbet. But 
doubtless our friends have too many foreign claims to 
tdmit a orosucct of domestic relief; though never did 



such objects demand it. I have traversed the seat of 
war in the Peninsula, I have been in some of the most 
oppressed provinces of Turkey, but never under the 
most despotic of infidel governments did I behold such 
squalid wretchedness as I have seen since my return 
in the very heart of a Christian country. And what 
are your remedies ? After months of inaction, and 
months of action worse than inactivity, at length comes 
forth the grand specific, the never-failing nostrum of 
all state physicians, from the days of Draco to the 
present time. After feeling the pulse and shaking the 
head over the patient, prescribing the usual course of 
warm water and bleeding, the warm water of your 
maukish police, and the lancets of your military, these 
convulsions must terminate in death, the sure consum- 
mation of the prescriptions of all political Sangrados. 
Setting aside the palpable injustice, and the certain 
inefficiency of the bill, are there not capital punish- 
ments sufficient in your statutes ? Is there not blood 
enough upon your penal code, that more must be poured 
forth to ascend to Heaven and testify against you ? 
How will you carry the bill into effect ? Can you com- 
mit a whole county to their own prison? Will you 
erect a gibbet in every field, and hang up men like 
scarecrows? or will you proceed (as you must, to 
bring this measure into effect) by decimation? place 
the country under martial law ? depopulate and lay 
waste all around you ? and restore Sherwood Forest 
as an acceptable gift to the crown, in its former condi- 
tion of a royal chase and an asylum for outlaws ? Are 
these the remedies for a starving and desperate popu- 
lace ? Will the famished wretch who has braved your 
bayonets, be appalled by your gibbets ? When death 
is a relief, and the only relief it appears that you will 
afford him, will he be dragooned into tranquillity > 
Will that which could not be effected by your grena- 
diers be accomplished by your executioners? If you 
proceed by the forms of law, where is your evidence 1 
Those who have refused to impeach their accomplices, 
when transportation only was the punishment, will 
hardly be tempted to witness against them when death 
is the penalty. With all due deference to the noble 
lords opposite, I think a little investigation, some pre- 
vious inquiry, would induce even them to change their 
purpose. That most favourite state measure, so mar- 
vellously efficacious in many and recent instances, 
temporizing, would not be without its advantages in 
this. When a proposal is made to emancipate or re- 
lieve, you hesitate, you deliberate for years, you tem- 
porize and tamper with the minds of men ; but a death- 
bill must be passed off" hand, without a thought of the 
consequences. Sure I am, from what I have heard, 
and from what I have seen, that to pass the Bill under 
all the existing circumstances, without inquiry, without 
deliberation, would only be to add injustice to irritation 
and barbarity to neglect. The framers of such a Bin 
must be content to inherit the honours of that .Athe- 
nian lawgiver whose edicts were said to be written not 
in ink, but in blood. But suppose it past; suppose. 
one of these men, as I have seen them, — meagre with 
famine, sullen with despair, careless of a life which 
your lordships are perhaps about to value at some- 
thing less than the prico of a stocking-frame — sup- 
pose this man surrounded by the children for whom 
he is unable to procure bread at the hazard of his ex- 
istence, about to be torn for c\ er from a fami'y which 



5.36 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



he lately supported in peaceful industry, and which ii 
is not his fault that he can no longer so support — sup- 
lis man, and there are ten thousand such from 
whom yon may select your victims, dragged into 
court, to be tried for this new offence, by this new 
law ; still, there are two things wanting to convict 
and condemn him ; and these arc, in my opinion, — 
twelve Butchers for a Jury, and a Jetferies for a 
Judge ! 



DEBATE ON THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE'S 
M< i'I'ION FOB A COMMITTEE O.N THE ROMAN 
CATHOLIC CLAIMS, APRIL. SI, 1812. 

My Lords — the question before the House has been 
so frequently, fully, and ably discussed, and never 
perhaps more ably than on this night, that it .would 
lie difficult to adduce new arguments for or against it. 
But with each discussion difficulties have been removed, 
objections have been canvassed and refuted, and some 
of the former opponents of Catholic Emancipation 
have at length conceded to the expediency of relieving 
the petitioners. In conceding thus much, however, a 
new objection is started ; it is not the time, say they, 
or it is an improper time, or there is time enough yet. 
In some degree I concur with those who say it is not the 
time exactly ; that time is passed ; better had it been 
for the country, that the Catholics possessed at this 
moment their proportion of our privileges, that their 
nobles held their due weight in our councils, than that 
we should be assembled to discuss their claims. It had 
indeed been better 

"Non tempore tali 
Cogere concilium cum muroa obsidet hostis." 

The enemy is without, and distress within. It is too late 
to cavil on doctrinal points, when wc must unite in de- 
fence of things more important than the mere ceremo- 
nies of religion. It is indeed singular, that we are called 
together to deliberate, not on the God we adore, for in 
that we are agreed ; not about the king we obey, for to 
him we are loyal ; but how far a difference in the 
ceremonials of worship, how far believing not too little, 
but too much (the worst that can be imputed to the 
Catholics), how far too much devotion to their God, 
niav incapacitate our fellow-subjects from effectually 
serving their king. 

Much has been said, within and without doors, of 
Church and State, and although those venerable words 
have been too often prostituted to the most 'despica- 
ble of party purposes, we cannot hear them too often ; 
all, I presume, are the advocates of Church and State, 
the Church of Christ, and the State of Great Britain ; 
but not a state of exclusion and despotism ; not an in- 
tolerant church ; not a church militant, which renders 
liable to the very objection urged against the 
Romish communion, and in a greater degree, fir the 
Catholic merely withholds its spiritual benediction 
(and even that is doubtful), but our church, or rather 
our churchmen, not only refuse to the Catholic their 
Spiritual grace, but all temporal blessings whatsoever. 
|> was an observation of the great Lord Peterborough, 
iiiade within these walls, or wi'hin the walls where the 
Lords then assembled, that he was for a " parliamen- 
tary king and a parliamentary constitution, but not a 
iinrliamenlary God and a parliamentary religion." 



The interval of a century has not weakened the for< » 
of the remark. It is indeed time that we should leave 
off these petty cavils on frivolous points, these Lilli- 
putian sophistries, whether our " eggs are best broken 
at the broad or narrow end." 

The opponents of the Catholics may be divided into 
two classes ; those who assert that the Catholics have 
too much already, and those who allege that the lower 
Orders, at least, have nothing more to require. We ire 
told by the former, that the Catholics never will be con- 
tented: by the latter, that they arc already too nappy. 
The last paradox is sufficiently refuted by the present, 
as by all past petitions: it might as well be said., that 
the negroes did not desire to be emancipated — but this 
is an unfortunate comparison, for you have already de- 
livered them out of the house of bondage without any 
petition on their part, but many from their task-masters 
to a contrary effect ; and for myself, when I consider 
this, I pity the Catholic peasantry for not having the 
good fortune to be born black. But the Catholics are 
contented, or at least ought to be, as we are told : I shall 
therefore proceed to touch on a few of those circum- 
stances which so marvellously contribute to their ex- 
ceeding contentment. They are not allowed the free 
exercise of their religion in the regular army ; the 
Catholic soldier cannot absent himself from the service 
of the Protestant clergyman, and, unless he is quartered 
in Ireland, or in Spain, where can he find eligible op- 
portunities of attending his own? The permission of 
Catholic chaplains to the Irish militia regiments was 
conceded as a special favour, and not till after years of 
remonstrance, although an act, passed in 1793, estab- 
lished it as a right. But are the Catholics properly 
protected in Ireland? Can the church purchase a rood 
of land whereon to erect a chapel ? No ; all the places 
of worship arc built on leases of trust or sufferance from 
the laity, easily broken and often betrayed. The moment 
any irregular wish, any casual caprice of the benevolent 
landlord meets with opposition, the doors are barred 
against the congregation. This has happened continual- 
ly, but in no instance more glaringly, than at the town 
of Newtown Barry, in the county ot Wexford. The 
Catholics, enjoying no regular chapel, as a temporary ex- 
pedient, hired two barns, which, being thrown into one, 
served for public worship. At this time, there was quar- 
tered opposite to the spot an officer, whose mind appears 
to have been deeply imbued with those, prejudices which 
the Protestant petitions, now on the table, prove to 
have been fortunately eradicated from the more rational 
portion of the people; and when the Catholics wero 
assembled on the Sabbath as usual, in peace and good- 
will towards men, for the worship of their God and 
yours, they found the chapel door closed, and were 
told that if they did not immediately retire (and they 
were told this by a yeoman officer and a magistrate), 
the riot act should be read, and the assembly dispersed 
at the point of the bayonet ! This was complained of to 
the middle-man of government, the secretary at the 
Castle in 1806, and the answer was (in lieu of redress), 
that he woidd cause a letter to be written to the colonel, 
to prevent, if possible, the recurrence of similar dis- 
turbances. Upon this fact, no very great stress need be 
laid ; but it tends to prove that while the Catholic church 
has not power to purchase land for its chapels I 
upon, the laws for its protection are of no avail. !n the 
mean time, the Catholics arc at the mercy of every 



PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES. 



557 



"pelting petty officer," who may choose to play his 
" fantastic tricks before high heaven," to insult his God, 
and injure his fellow-creatures. 

Every school-boy, any foot-boy (such have held com- 
missions in our service), any foot -boy who can exchange 
his shoulder-knot for an epaulet, may perform all this 
and mure against the Catholic, by virtue of that very 
authority delegated to him by his sovereign, for the 
express purpose of defending his fellow-subjects to the 
last drop of his blood, without discrimination or dis- 
tinction between Catholic and Protestant. 

Have the Irish Catholics the full benefit of trial by 
jury? They have not ; they never can have until they 
are permitted to share the privilege of serving as 
sheriffs and under-sheriffs. Of this a striking example 
occurred at the last Eimiskillen assizes. A yeoman was 
arraigned for the murder of a Catholic named Mac- 
vournagh : three respectable uncontradicted witnesses 
I that they saw the prisoner load, take aim, fire 
at, ami kill the said Macvournagh. This was properly 
commented on by the judge ; but, to the astonishment 
of the bar, and indignation of the court, the Protestant 
jury acquitted the accused. So glaring was the par- 
tialis, that Mr. Justice Osborne felt it his duty to bind 
over the acquitted, but not absolved assassin, in large 
recognizances, thus for a time taking away his license 
to kill Catholics. 

Are the very laws passed in their favour observed ? 
They are rendered nugatory in trivial as in serious cases. 
By a late act, Catholic chaplains are permitted in jails, 
but in Fermanagh county the grand jury lately persisted 
in presenting a suspended clergyman for the office, 
(hereby evading the statute, notwithstanding the most 
pressing remonstrances of a most respectable magistrate, 
named Fletcher, to the contrary. Such is law, such is 
justice, for the happy, free, contented Catholic ! 

It has been asked in another place, why do not the 
rich Catholics endow foundations for the education of 
the priesthood ? Why do you not permit them to do so ? 
Why are all such bequests subject to the interference, 
the vexatious, arbitrary, peculating interference of the 
Orange commissioners for charitable donations? 

As to Maynooth college, in no instance, except at the 
time of its foundation, when a noble Lord (Camden), at 
the head of the Irish administration, did appear to in- 
terest himself in its advancement ; and during the gov- 
ernment of a noble Duke (Bedford), who, like his 
ancestors, has ever been the friend of freedom and 
mankind, and who has not so far adopted the selfish 
policy of the day as to exclude the Catholics from the 
number of his fellow-creatures ; with these exceptions, 
in no instance has that institution been properly en- 
couraged. There was indeed a time when the Catholic 
clergy were conciliated, while the Union was pending, 
that Union which could not be carried without them, 
while their assistance was requisite in procuring ad- 
dresses from the Catholic counties ; then they were 
Cajoled and caressed, feared and Haltered, and given to 
Understand that "the Union would do everything;" 
but, the moment it was passed, they were driven back 
with contempt into their former obscurity. 

In the contempt pursued towards Mavnooth college, 
everything is done to irritate and perplex — every thing 
is done to efface the slightest impression of gratitude 
from tho Catholic mind; the very hay made upon the 



lawn, the fat and tallow of the beef and mutton allowed, 
must be paid for and accounted upon oath. It is true, 
this economy in miniature cannot be sufficiently com- 
mended, particularly at a time when only the insect 
defaulters of the Treasury, your Hunts and your 
Chinnerys, when only these " gilded bugs" can escape 
the microscopic eye of ministers. But when you come 
forward session after session, as your paltry pittance is 
wrung from you with wrangling and reluctance, to 
boast of your liberality, well might the Catholi": ex- 
claim, in the words of Prior, — 

"To John I owe seme obligation, 

But John unluckily thinks fit 
To publish it to all the nation. 

So John and I are more than quit." 

Some persons have compared the C acholics to the 
beggar in Gil Bias. Who made them beggars? Whoare 
enriched with the spoils of their ancestors > And cannot 
you relieve the beggar when your fathers have made 
him such ? If you are disposed to relieve him at all, 
cannot you do it without Hinging your farthings in his 
face ? As a contrast, however, to this beggarly benev- 
olence, let us look at the Protestant Charter Schools ; 
to them you have lately granted 41,000/. : thus are they 
supported, and how arc they recruited? Montesquieu 
observes, on the English constitution, that the model 
may be found in Tacitus, where the historian describes 
the policy of the Germans, and adds, " this beautiful 
system was taken from the woods ;" so in speaking of 
the charter schools, it may be observed, that this beau 
tiful system was taken from the gypsies. These schools 
are recruited in the same manner as the Janizaries at 
the time of their enrolment under Amurath, and the 
gypsies of the present day with stolen children, with 
children decoyed and kidnapped from their Catholic 
connexions by their rich and powerful Protestant neigh- 
bours : this is notorious, and one instance may suffice 
to show in what manner. The sister of a Mr. Carthy (a 
Catholic gentleman of very considerable property) died, 
leaving two girls, who were immediately marked out as 
proselytes, and conveyed to the charter school of Cool- 
greny. Their uncle, on being apprized of the fact, which 
took place during his absence, applied for the restitution 
of his nieces, offering to settle an independence on 
these relations; his request was refused, and not till 
after five years' struggle, and the interference of very 
high authority, could this Catholic gentleman obtain 
back his nearest of kindred from a charity chaitcr 
school. In this manner are proselytes obtained, and 
mingled with the offspring of such Protestants as mav 
avail themselves of the institution. And how are they 
taught > A catechism is put into their hands consisting 
of, I believe, forty-five pages, in which are three ques- 
tions relative to the Protestant religion ; one of these 
qui ries is, "Where was the Protestant religion before 
Luther?" Answer, " In the Gospel." The remaining 
forty-four pages and a half regard the damnable idola 
try of Papists ! 

Ml ■ me to ask our spiritual pastors and masters, is 
this training up a child in the way which he should go? 
Is this the religion of the gospel before the' time of 
Luther .' that religion which preaches " Peace on earth, 
ami glory to God >" Is it bringing up infants to be men 
or devils ! Heller would it be to send them anv where 
than teach them such doctrines ; better send them to 



558 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



those islands in the South Seas, where they might more 
Humanely learn to become cannibals ; it would be less 
disgnstiiii; that they were brought up to devour the 
dead, than persecute the living. Schools do you call 
them .' call them rather dunghills, where the viper of 
intolerance deposits her young, that, when their teeth 
are cut and their poison is mature, they may issue forth, 
filthy and venomous, to sting the Catholic. But are 
these the doctrines of the Church of England, or of 
churchmen ? No ; the most enlightened churchmen are 
of a ditferent opinion. What says Paley ? " I perceive 
no reason why men of different religious persuasions, 
should not sit upon the same bench, deliberate in the 
same council, or fight in the same ranks, as well as men 
of various religious opinions, upon any controverted 
topic of natural history, philosophy, or ethics." It may 
be answered that Paley was not strictly orthodox ; 1 
know nothing of his orthodoxy, but who will deny that 
he was an ornament to the church, to human nature, 
to Christianity'.' 

1 shall not dwell upon the grievance of tithes, so 
severely felt by the peasantry, but it may be proper to 
ooserve that there is an addition to the burthen, a per- 
centage to the gatherer, whose interest it thus becomes 
to rale them as highly as possible, and we know that in 
many large livings in Ireland, the only resident Prot- 
estants are the tithe proctor and his family. 

Among many causes of irritation, too numerous for 
recapitulation, there is one in the militia not to be 
passed over, I mean the existence of Orange lodges 
amongst the privates ; can the officers deny this ? And 
if such lodges do exist, do they, can they tend to pro- 
mote harmony amongst the men, who are thus indi- 
vidually separated in society, although mingled in the 
ranks ? And is this general system of persecution to be 
permitted, or is it to be believed that with such a system 
the Catholics can or ought to be contented ? If they are, 
they belie human nature ; they are then, indeed, un- 
worthy to be any thing but the slaves you have made 
them. The facts stated are from most respectable au- 
thority, or I should not have dared in this place, or any 
place, to hazard this avowal. If exaggerated, there are 
plenty, as willing as I believe them to be unable, to 
disurove them. Should it be objected that I never was in 
Ireland, I beg leave to observe, that it is as easy to know 
something of Ireland without having been there, as it ap- 
pears with some to have been born, bred, and cherished 
there, and yet remain ignorant of its best interests. 

But there are, who assert that the Catholics have 
already been too much indulged: see (cry they) what 
lias been done : we have given them one entire college. 
we allow them food and raiment, the full enjoyment of 
the elements, and leave to fight for us as long as they 
have limns and lives to offer ; and yet they are never to 
be satisfied ! Generous and just declaimers ! To this, 
and to this only, amount the whole of your arguments, 
when stript of their sophistry. These personages re- 
mind me of the story of a certain drummer, who being 
called upon in the course of duly to administer punish- 
ment to a friend tied to the halberts, was requested to 
Hog high ; he did — to flog low, he did — to flog in the 
middle, he did — high, low, down the middle, and up 
again, but all in vain, the patient continued his com- 
plaints with the most provoking pertinacity, until the 
drummer, exhausted and angry, Hung down his scourge, 



exclaiming, " the devil burn you, there 's no pleasing 
you, flog where one will!" Thus it is, you have H 
the Catholic, high, low, here, there, and every where, 
and then you wonder he is not pleased. It is true, th it 
time, experience, and that weariness which attends 
even the exercise of barbarity, have taught you 
a little more gently, but still you continue to lay on the 
lash, and will so continue, till perhaps the rod may he 
wrested from your hands, and applied to the backs ol 
yourselves and your posterity. 

It was said by somebody in a former debate (I forget 
by whom, and am not very anxious to remember), if the 
Catholics are emancipated, why not the Jews? If this 
sentiment was dictated by compassion for the Jews, it 
might deserve attention, but as a sneer against theCath- 
o!ir, what is it but the language of Shylock transferred 
from his daughter's marriage to Catholic emancipation— 

" Would any of the tribe of Barrabbas 
Should have it lather than a Christian." 

I presume a Catholic is a Christian, even in the 
opinion of him whose taste only can be called in ques- 
tion for his preference of the Jews. 

It is a remark often quoted of Dr. Johnson (whom I 
take to be almost as good authority as the gentle apostle 
of intolerance, Dr. Duigenan), that he who could 
tain serious apprehensions of danger to the Church in 
these times, would have "cried fire in the deluged' 
This is more than a metaphor, for a remnant of these 
antediluvians appear actually to have comedown to us, 
with fire in their mouths and water in their brains, to 
disturb and perplex mankind with their whimsical out- 
cries. And as it is an infallible symptom of that dis- 
tressing malady with which I conceive them to be 
afflicted (so any doctor will inform your Lordships) for 
the unhappy invalids to perceive a flame perpetually 
flashing before their eyes, particularly when their eyes 
are shut (as those of the persons to whom I allude have 
long been), it is impossible to convince these poor crea- 
tures, that the fire against which they arc perpetually 
warning us and themselves, is nothing but an ignit 
fatuus of their own drivelling imaginations. What 
rhubarb, senna, or " what purgative drug can scour 
that fancy thence ?" — It is impossible, they are given 
over, theirs is the true 

" Caput insanabile Iribus Anticyris." 
These are your true Protestants. Like Bayle, who pro- 
tested against all sects whatsoever, so do they protest 
against Catholic petitions, Protestant petitions, all re- 
dress, all that reason, humanity, policy, justice, and 
common sense, can urge against the delusions of their 
absurd delirium. These are the persons who reverse 
the fable of the mountain that brought forth a mouse ; 
they are the mice who conceive themselves in labour 
with mountains. 

To return to the Catholics, suppose the Irish were 
actually contented under their disabilities, suppose them 
capable of such a bull as not to desire deliverance, ought 
we not to wish it for ourselves? Have we nothing to 
gain by their emancipation ? What resources have been 
wasted ! What talents have been lost by the selfish 
system of exclusion! You already know the value 1 id' 
Irish aid ; at this moment the defence of England is 
entrusted to the Irish militia; at this moment, while 
the starving people are rising in the fierceness of de- 



PARLIAMENTARY SPEECHES. 



559 



■fwir, the Irish are faithful to their trust. But till equal 
energy is imparted throughout by the extension of free- 
dom, you cannot enjoy the full benefit of the strength 
which you are glad to interpose between you and de- 
struction. Ireland has done much, but will do more. 
At tins moment the only triumph obtained through 
long years of continental disaster has been achieved 
by an Irish general ; it is true he is not a Catholic ; had 
D so, we should have been deprived of his exer- 
tions ; but I presume no one will assert that his religion 
would have impaired his talents or diminished his pa- 
triotism, though in that case he must have conquered 
in tlie ranks, for he never could have commanded an 
army. 

Hut while he is fighting the battles of the Catholics 
abroad, his noble brother has this night advocated 
their cause, with an eloquence which I shall not depre- 
ciate by the humble tribute of my panegyric, whilst a 
third of his kindred, as unlike as unequal, has been 
combating against his Catholic brethren in Dublin, with 
circular letters, edicts, proclamations, arrests, and dis- 
persions — all the vexatious implements of petty war- 
fare that could be wielded by the mercenary guerillas 
of government, clad in the rusty armour of their obso- 
lete statutes. Your lordships will, doubtless^di vide new 
honours between the saviour of Portugal, and the dis- 
penser of delegates. It is singular, indeed, to observe 
the difference between our foreign and domestic poli- 
cy ; if Catholic Spain, faithful Portugal, or the no less 
Catholic and faithful king of the one Sicily (of which, 
by the by, you have lately deprived him), stand in 
need of succour, away goes a fleet and an army, an 
ambassador and a subsidy, sometimes to light pretty 
hardly, generally to negotiate very badly, and always 
to pay very dearly for our Popish allies. But let four 
millions of fellow-subjects pray for relief, who fight 
and pay and labour in your behalf, they must be treated 
as aliens, and although their li father's house has many 
mansions," there is no resting-place for them. Allow 
me to ask, are you not fighting for the emancipation 
of Ferdinand the Seventh, who certainly is a fool, and 
consequently, in all probability, a bi^ot ; and have you 
more regard for a foreign sovereign than your own 
-subjects, who are not fools, for they know your 
interest better than von know your own; who are not 
bigots, for they return you good for evil; but who are 
in uorse durance than the prison of an usurper, inas- 
much as the fetters of the mind are more galling than 
those of the body. 

Upon the consequences of your not accedin<_' to the 
claims, of the petitioners, I shall not expatiate; you 
'fr.ow them, you will feel them, and your children's 
children when you are passed away. Adieu to that 
Union so called, as u JLujus a non tucendo," a Union 
from never uniting, which, in its first operation, gave 
a death-blow to the independence of Ireland, and in 
its last may be the cause of her eternal separation from 
this country. If it must be called a Union, it is the 
union of the shark with his prey ; the spoiler swallows 
up his victim, and thus they become one and indivis- 
ible. Thus has Great Briiain swallowed up the par- 
liament, the constitution, the independence of Ireland, 
and refuses to disgorge oven a ningle privilege, although 
fcr the relief of her swollen and distempered body 
politic. 

And now, my lords, before I sit down, will his maj- 



esty's ministers permit me to say a few words, not on 
their merits, for that would be superfluous, but on the 
degree of estimation in which they are held by the 
people of these realms. The esteem in which they are 
held has been boasted of in a triumphant tone on a 
late occasion within these walls, and a comparison in- 
stituted between their conduct, and that of noble lords 
on this side of the house. 

What portion of popularity may have fallen to the 
share of my noble friends (if such I may presume to 
call them), I shall not pretend to ascertain; but that 
of his majesty's ministers it were vain to deny. It is, 
to be sure, a little like the wind, " no one knows whence 
it cometh or whither it goeth," but they feel it, they 
enjoy it, they boast of it. Indeed, modest and unos- 
tentatious as they are, to what part of the kingdom, 
even the most remote, can they flee to avoid the tri- 
umph which pursues them ? If they plunge into the 
midland counties, there they will be greeted by the 
manufacturers, with spurned petitions in their hands, 
and those halters round their necks recently voted in 
their behalf, imploring blessings on the heads of those 
who so simply, yet ingeniously contrived to remove 
them from their miseries in this to a better world. If 
they journey on to Scotland, from Glasgow to Johnny 
Groat's, every where will they receive similar marks of 
approbation, if they take a trip from Tortpatrick to 
Donaghadee, there will they rush at. once into the em- 
braces of four Catholic millions, to whom their vote 
of this night is about to endear them for ever. When 
they return to the metropolis, if they can pass undei 
Temple Uar without unpleasant sensations at the sighi 
of the greedy niches over that ominous gateway, the} 
cannot escape the acclamations of the livery, and th< 
more tremulous, but not less sincere, applause, th« 
9 " not loud but deep" of bankrupt merchants 
and doubting stockholders. If they look to the army, 
what wreaths, not of laurel, but of nightshade, are 
preparing for the heroes of Walcheren ! Il is true there 
are few living deponents left to testify to their merits 
on that occasion ; but a "cloud of witnesses" are gone 
above from that gallant army which they so generously 
and piously despatched, to recruit the "noble army of 
martyrs." 

What if, in the course of this triumphal career (in 
which they will gather as many pebbles as Caligula's 
army diil on a similar triumph, the prototype of their own), 
they do not perceive any of those memorials which a 
grateful people erect in honour of their benefactors ; what 
although not even a sign-post will condescend to depose 
the Saracen's head in favour of the likeness of the con- 
querors of Walcheren, they will not want a picture 
who can always have a caricature ; or regret the omis- 
sion of a statue who will so often see themselves exalted 
in effigy. Hut their popularity is not limited to the 
narrow bounds of an island ; there are other countries 
where their measures, and, above all, their conduct to 
the Catholics, must render them pre-eminently popular. 
If they are beloved here, in France they must be adored 
There is no measure more repugnant to the designs and 
of Buonaparte than Catholic emancipation ; no 
line of conduct more propitious to his projects, than 
that which has been pursued, is pursuing, and, I feai, 
will be pursued, towards Ireland. What is England 
without Ireland, and what is Ireland without the ('a- 
thohes? Il is on the basis of your tyranny Napoleon 



560 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



hopes to build his own. So grateful must oppression 
of the Catholics 1"' to his mind, that doubtless (us he 
tins lately permitted some renewal of intercourse) the 
next cartel will convey to this country cargoes of Sevres 
china and blue ribands (tilings in gnat request, and of 
equal value at this moment), blue ribands of th< 
lur for Dr. Duigenan and his ministerial di 
Such is thai well-earned popularity , the result of those 
extraordinary expeditions, so expensive to OUI 
and so useless to our allies ; of those singular inquiries, 
60 exculpatory to the accused, and so dissatisfactory to 
e paradoxical victories, so honour- 
we arc told, to the British name, and so de- 
Btructive to the best interests of the British nation: 
above all, such is the reward of a conduct pursued by 
ministers towards the Catholics. 

1 have to apologize to the House, who will, I trust, 
pardon one, not often in the habit of intruding upon 
their indulgence, for so long attempting to engage their 
attention. My most decided opinion is, as my vote will 
be, in favour of the motion. 



DEBATE ON MAJOR CAETWRIGHT'S PETITION, 
JUNE 1, 18J3. 

LORD BYRON rose and said : 

Mv Lords, the Petition which I now hold for the 
purpose of presenting to the House, is one which I 
humbly conceive requires the particular attention of 
your lordships, inasmuch as, though signed but by n 
single individual, it contains statements which (if not 
disproved) demand most serious investigation. The 
grievance of which the petitioner complains is neither 
selfish nor imaginary. It is not his own only, for it 
has been, and is still felt by numbers. No one with- 
out these walls, nor indeed within, but may to-morrow 
be made liable to the same insult and obstruction, in the 
discharge of an imperious duty for the restoration of the 
true constitution of these realms by petitioning for reform 
in parliament. The petitioner, my Lords, is a man whose 
long life lias been spent in one unceasing struggle for 
the liberty of the subject, against that undue influence 
which has increased, is increasing, and ought to be 
diminished ; and, whatever difference of opinion may 
exist as to his political tenets, few will be found to 
question the integrity of his intentions. Even now, 
oppressed with years, and not exempt from the infirm- 
ities attendant on his age, but still unimpaired in tal- 
ent, and unshaken in spirit — '■'■frangax non J/irits" — 
he has received many a wound in the combat against 
corruption ; and the new grievance, the fresh insult of 
winch he complains, may inflict another scar, but no 
dishonour. The petition is signed by John Cartwright, 
and it was in behalf of the people and parliament, in 
the lawful pursuit of that reform in the representation 
which is the best, service to be rendered both to parlia- 
ment and people, that he encountered the wanton out- 
rage which forms Ike subject matter of his petition to 
your lordships. It is couched in firm, yet respectful 
<inguagc — in the language of a man, not regardless 
of what is uue to himself, but at the same time, I trust, 



equally mindful of the deference to be paid to tnis 
inei slates, amongst other matter 
ter importance, to all who are 
in their feelings, as well as blood and birth, 
ili .it on the 21st January, 1813, at Huddersfield, him- 
. .us, who, on hearing of his ar- 
rival, had waited on him merely as a testimony of re- 
spect, we r e seized by a military and civil force, and 
kept in close custody for several hours, subjected to gross 
ami abusive insinuations from the commanding officer 
relative to the character of the petitioner; that he (the 
petitioner) was finally carried before a magistrate ; and 
iii' released till an examination of his papers proved 
that there was not only no just, but not even statuta- 
ble charge against him ; and that, notwithstanding the 
and order from the presiding magistrates of a 
copy of the w arrant against your petitioner, it was after- 
wards withheld on divers pretexts, and has never 
until this hour been granted. The names and condi- 
tion of the parties will be found in the petition. To 
the other topics touched upon in the petition, I shall 
not now advert, from a wish not to encroach upon the 
time of the House ; but I do most sincerely call the at- 
tention of your lordships to its general contents — it is 
in the caufc of the parliament and people that the 
rights of this venerable freeman have been violated, 
and it is, in my opinion, the highest niark of respect 
that could be paid to the House, that to your justice, 
rather than by appeal to any inferior court, he now 
commits himself. Whatever may be the fate of his re- 
monstrance, it is some satisfaction to me, though mix- 
ed with regret fur the occasion, that I have this oppor- 
tunity of publicly stating the obstruction to which the 
i liable, in the prosecution of the most lawful 
and imperious of his duties, the obtaining by petition 
reform in parliament. I have shortly stated his com- 
plain! ; the petitioner has more fully expressed it. 
Your lordships will, I hope, adopt some measure fully 
to protect and redress him, and not him alone, but the 
whole body of the people insulted anil aggrieved in his 
person by the interposition of an abused civil, and un- 
lawful military force between them and their right of 
petition to their own representatives. 

His lordship then presented the petition from Major 
Cartwright, which was read, complaining of the circum- 
stances at Huddersfield, and of interruptions given to the 
right of petitioning, in several places in the northern 
parts of the kingdom, and which his lordship moved 
should he laid on the table. 

Several Lords having spoken on the question, 
LORD BYRON replied, that he had, from motives 
of duty, presented this petition to their lordships' con- 
ion. The noble Earl had contended that it was 
not a petition but a speech ; and that, as it contained 
no prayer, it should not be received. What was the 
necessity of a prayer? If that word were to be used in 
its proper sense, their lordships could not expect that 
any man should pray to others. He had only to say 
that the petition, though in some parts expressed strongly 
perhaps, did not contain any improper mode of address, 
hut was couched in respectful language towards their 
lordships ; he should therefore trust their lordships 
would alli?w the petition to be received. 



( 561 ) 



33<m %\xan. 



Difficile est pronrio communia dicere. 

UOK.'Epist. ad Pison. 
Oo«t limn think, because thou nrt virtuous, there shall be no mora 

Cakes anil Ale ?— Yea, by St. A and Ringi r shall be hot i' ilio 

muuth, too.— Twelfth Wight; or What yoa—WUL— 

SHAKSPEARE. 



CANTO I. 



i. 

1 want a hero: — an uncommon want, 

When every year and month sends forth a new one, 
Tii!, after cloying the gazettes with cant, 

The age discovers he is not the true one ; 
Of such as these I should no) care to vaunt, 

I '11 therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan ; 
We all have seen him in the pantomime 
Sent to the devil somewhat ere his lime. 

II. 
Vernon, the hutcher, Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke, 

Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Fteppel, Howe, 
Evil and good, have had their tithe of talk, 

An 1 fill'd their sign-posts then, like Wellesley now ; 
Each in their turn like Banqun's monarchs stalk, 

Followers of fame, "nine farrow" of that sow: 
Fram e, too, had Buonaparte - and Dumourier, 
Recorded in the Moniteur and Courier. 

III. 
Barnave, Hrissot, Condorcet, Mirabeau, 

Petion, Clootz, Danton, Marat, La Fayette, 
Were French, and famous people, as we know; 

And there were others, scarce forgotten yet, 
Joubert, Hoche, Morceaii, Lanncs, Dessaix, Moreau, 

With many of the military set, 
Exceedingly remarkable at times, 
But not at all adapted to my rhymes. 

IV. 

Nelson was once Britannia's nod of war, 

And still should be so, but the tide is turn'd; 
There 's no more to be said of Trafalgar, 

'Tis with our hero quietly inuru'd ; 
Because the army 's grown more popular, 

At which the naval people are concern'd : 
I' us, the prince is all for the land-service, 
Forgetting Duncan, Nelson, Howe, and Jervis. 

V. 
Brave men were living before Agamemnon, 1 

And since, cveeediiig valorous anil sage, 
A good deal like him too, though quite the same none, 

But then they shone not on the poet's pago, 
And so have been forgotten: — I condemn none, 

liut can't find any in the present age 
Fit foi my poem (that is, for my new one); 
So, as I laid, I'll take my friend Don Juan. 

3 A 76 



VI. 
Most epic poets plunge in "medias res" 

(Horace makes tins the hence turnpike road) 
And then your hero tells, whene'er you please, 

Whal w m bi fore — by way of epi , 
While scaled after dinner al hi< 

Beside hi: mistress in some soft abode, 
Palace or garden, paradise or cav< rn, 
Which serves the ha] for a tavern. 

VII. 
rhal is the usual method, but not mine — 

My way is to begin with the beginning; 
The regularity of my design 

Forbids all wandering as the worst of sinning, 
And therefore I shall open with a line 

(Although it cost me half an hour in spinning) 
Narrating somewhat of Don Juan's father, 
And also of his mother, if you 'd rather. 

VIII. 
In Seville was he born, a pleasant city, 

Famous for oranges and women — he 
Who has not seen it will he much to pity, 

So says the proverb — and I quite agree; 
Of all the Spanish towns is none more pretty, 

Cadiz perhaps, but that you soon may see : — 
Don Juan's parents live 1 besi le the nver, 
A noble stream, and call'd the Guadalquivir. 

IX. 
His father's name was Jose — Dm, of course, 

A true Hidalgo, free from every stain 
Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source 

Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain. 
A better cavalier ne'er mounted horse, 

Or, being mounted, e'er g >t down again, 
Than Jose, who begot our hero, who 
Begot — but that's to come — Well, to renew: 

X. - 
His mother was a learned lady, famed 

For every branch of every science known — ■ 
In every Christian language ever named, 

Willi virtues equalled by her wit alo 
She made the cleverest people quite ashamed, 

And even the good with inward em v 
Finding themselves so vi ry mui 
In their own way by all the things that she did. 

XI. 
Her memory was a mine: she knew bv heart 

All Caideron and greater part of I. 
So that if any aelor mjss'd his part, 

She could have perved him tor ihe prompter's conn 
For her Feinagle a w i 

And he himself obliged to shut up shop — ),o 
Could never make a memory bo fine as 
That which adorn'd the brain of Dynna Ine*. 



562 



BYRON'S YVORhS. 



CVLVVO 1 



XII. 

Her favourite science was llie mathematical, 
Her noblest virtue was her magnanimity, 

Her \\ it (she sometimes tried at wit) was Attic all, 
Her serious sayings darken' d to sublimity: 

In short, in all tilings she was fairly what I call 
A prodigy — her morning dress was dimity, 

Her evening silk, or, in the summer, muslin, 

And other stuffs, with which I won't stay puzzling. 

XIII. 

She knew the Latin — that is, " the Lord's prayer," 
And Greek, the alphabet, I 'm nearly sure; 

She read some French romances here and there, 
Although her mode of speaking was not pure : 

F<>r native Spanish she had no great care, 
At least her conversation was obscure ; 

Her thoughts were theorems, her words a problem, 

As if she decni'd that mystery would ennoble 'em. 

XIV. 
She Bked the English and the Hebrew tongue, 

And said there was analogy between 'cm ; 
She proved it somehow out of sacred song, 

But I must leave the proofs to those who 've seen 'em; 
But this I 've heard her say, and can't be wrong, 

And all may think which way their judgments lean 'cm, 
*'Tis strange — the Hebrew noun which means 'Iain,' 
t'he English always use to govern d — n." 

XV. 



XVT. 

In short, she was a walking calculation, 

Miss Edgeworth's novels stepping from their covers, 
Or Mrs. Trimmer's books on education, 

Or "C celebs' Wife" set out in quest of lovers, 
Morality's prim personification, 

In which not Envy's self a flaw discovers ; 
To others' share let " female errors fall," 
For she had not even one — the worst of all. 

XVII. 
Oh ! she was perfect past all parallel — 

Of any modern female saint's comparison ; 
So far above the cunning powers of hell. 

Her guardian angel had given up his garrison ; 
Even her minutest motions went as well 

As those of the best time-piece made by Harrison : 
In virtues nothing earthly could surpass her, 
Save thine "incomparable oil," Macassar ! 2 

XVIII. 
Perfect she was, but as perfection is 

Insipid in this naughty world of ours, 
Where our first parents never learn'd to kiss 

Till they were exiled from their earlier bowers, 
Where all was peace, and innocence, and bliss 

(I wonder how they got through the twelve hours), 
Don Jose, like a lineal son of Eve, 
Went plucking various fruit without her leave. 



XIX. 

He was a mortal of the careless kind, 

With no great love for learning, or the learn'd, 
Who chose to go where'er he had a mind, 

And lever dream'd his lady was eonccin'd ; 
The world, as usual, wickedly inclined 

To see a kingdom or a house o'erturn'd, 
Whisper'd he had a mistress, some said two, 
But for domestic quarrels one will do. 

XX. 

Now Donna Inez had, with all her merit, 
A great opinion of her own good qualities ; 

ct, indeed, requires a saint to bear it, 
And such indeed she was in her moralities; 

But then she had a devil of a spirit, 
And sometimes mix'd up fancies with realities, 

And let few opportunities escape 

Of getting her liege lord into a scrape. 

XXI. 

This was an easy matter with a man 

Oft in the wrong, and never on bis guard; 

And even the wisest, do tiie best they can, 
Have moments, hours, and days, so unprepared, 

That you might "brain them with their lady's fan j" 
And sometimes ladies hit exceeding hard, 

And fans turn into falchions in fair It 

And why and wherefore no one understands. 

XXII. 

'Tis pity learned virgins ever wed 

With persons of no sort of education, 
Or gentlemen who, though well-born and bred, 

Grow tired of scientific conversation: 
I don't choose to say much upon this head, 

I 'm a plain man, and in a single station, 
But — oh! ye lords of ladies intellectual, 
Inform us truly, have they not heu-peek'd you all? 

XXIII. 
Don Jose and his lady quarrell'd — why 

Not any of the many could divine, 
Though several thousand people chose to trj - , 

'T was surely no concern of theirs nor mine: 
I loathe that low vice curiosity ; 

But if there's any thing in which I shine, 
'T is in arranging all my friends' affairs, 
Not having, of my own, domestic cares. 

XXIV. 
And so I interfered, anil with the best 

Intentions, but their treatment was not kind; 
I think the foolish people were possess'd, 

For neither of them could I ever lind, 
Although their porter afterwards confessed — > 

But that 's no matter, and the worst 's behind. 
For little Juan o'er me threw, down stairs, 
A pail of housemaid's water unawares. 

XXV. 
A little curly-headed, good-for-nothing, 

And mischief-making monkey from his birth ; 
His parents ne'er agreed except in doting 

Upon the most unquiet imp on earth; 
Instead of quarrelling, had they been but b«th in 

Their senses, they 'd have sent young master forth 
To school, or had him whipp'd at home, 
To teach him manners for the time to come. 



CANTO I. 



DON JUAN. 



5G.3 



XXVI. 

Don Jose and !ho Donna Inez led 
For some time an unhappy sort of lif,-, 

Wishing each other, not. divorced, but dead ; 
They live;! respectably as man and wife, 

Their conduct was exceedingly well-bred, 
And gave no outward signs of inward strife, 

Unli! at length the smother' d fire broke on!, 

And put the business past all kind of doubt. 

XXVII. 
For Inez call'd some druggists anil physicians, 

And tried to prove her loving lord was mad, 
But as he had some lurid intermissions, 

She next decided he was only bad} i 
Yet when they ask'd her for her depositions, 

No sort of explanation could be bad, 
Save that her duty both to man and God 
Required this conduct — which scem'd very odd. 

XXVIII. 
She kept a journal, where bis faults Wire noted, 

And open'd certain trunks of books and letters, 
Alt which might, if occasion served, be quoted; 

And then she had all Seville for abettors, 
Besides her good old grandmother (who doted) ; 

The hearers of her case became repeaters, 
Then advocates, inquisitors, and judges, 
Some for amusement, others for old grudges. 

XXIX. 

And then this best and meekest woman bore 
With such serenity her husband's woes, 

Just as the Spartan ladies did of yore, 

Who saw their spouses kill'd, and nobly chose 

Never to say a word about them more — 
Calmly she heard each calumny that rose, 

And saw his agonies with such sublimity, 

That all the world exclaim'd, " What magnanimity !" 

XXX. 

No doubt, this patience, when the world is damning us, 

Is philosophic in our former friends ; 
'T is also pleasant to be deemed magnanimous, 

The more so in obtaining our own ends ; 
And what the lawyers call a "matus animus," 

Conduct like this by no means comprehends ; 
Revenge in person 's certainly no virtue, 
But then 't is not my fault if others hurt you. 

XXXI. 

And if our quarrels should rip up old stories, 
And help them with a lie or two additional, 

I'm not to blame, as you well know, no *nore is 
Any one else — they were become traditional ; 

Besides, their resurrection aids our glories 

By contrast, which is what we just were wishing all ; 

And science profits by this resurrection — 

Dead scandals form good subjects for dissection. 

XXXII. 

Their' friends had tried at reconciliation, 
Then their relations, who made matters worse 

('T were hard to tell upon a like occasion 
To whom it may be best to have recourse — 
can't say much for friend or yet relation) : 
The lawyers did their utmost for divorce, 

But scarce a fee wan paid on either side 

Before, unluckily, Don Jose died. 



XXXIII. 
He died : and most unluckily, because, 

According to all hints 1 could i 
From counsel learned in those kinds of laws 

(Although their talk's obscure and 
ili- death contrived to spoil a charming ca 

A thousand pities also with r. ■ 
To public reeling, which on this occasion 
Was manifested in a great sensation. 

XXXIV. 

But ah! he died; and buried with him lav 

The public feeling and the lawyi rs' 
His lion-,' wis sold, his servants sent away, 

A Jew took one of his two n 
A priest the other — at le 

I ask'd the doctors after his diseae — 
He died of Ihe slow fever called the tertian, 
And left his widow to her own aversion. 

XXXV. 

Yet Jose was an honourable man, 

That I must say, who knew him very well ; 
; i ore Ins frailties I'll no further 
Indeed there were not many more to tell; 

And if lus passions now and then outran 
Discretion, and were not so peaceable 

As Numa's (who was also named Pompilius), 

He had been ill brought up, and was born bilious. 

XXXVI. 
Whate'er might be his wordlessness or worth, 

Poor fellow ! he had many things to wound him, 
Let's own, since it can do no good on earth; 

It was a trying moment that which fund him, 
Standing alone beside his desolate hearth, 

Where all his household gods layshiver'd round him. 
No choice was left his feelings or his pride 
Save death or Doctors' Commons — so he died. 

XXXVII. 

Dying intestate, Juan was sole heir 

To a chancery-suit, and messuages, and lands, 
Which, with a long minority and care, 

Promised to turn out Well in proper hands: 
Inez became sole guardian, which was fair, 

And answor'd but to nature's just demands; 
An only son left with an only mother 
Is brought up much more wisely than another. 

XXXVIII. 

Safest of women, even of widows, she 

Resolved that Juan should be quite a paraxon. 

And worthy of the noblest pedigree 

(His sire was of Castile, his dam from Arraooni 

Then for accomplishments of chivalry, 

In case our lord the king should go to war aguu 

He learn'd the arts of riding, fencing, gunnery, 

And how to scale a fortress— or a nunnery. 

XXXIX. 

But that which Donna Inez most desired, 
And SEW into herself each day bof, >re aC 

The learned tutors whom for him she hired, 
Was that his breeding should be strictly mor.b 

Much into ail Ins studies she inquired, 

And so they were submitted first to her, all, 

Arts, sciences, no branch was made a mvsterv 

To Juan's eyes, excepting natural histoi v. 



564 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CJ.XIO I. 



XL. 

The languages, especially the dead, 

The sciences, and irost of all the abstruse, 

The arts, at least all such as could be said 
To be the most remote from common use, 

In all these he was much and deeply read ; 
But not a page of any thing "that's loose, 

Or hints continuation of the species, 

Was ever suffcr'd, lest he should grow vicious. 

XLI. 

His classic studies made a little puzzle, 

Because of filthy loves of gods and goddesses, 

Who in the earlier ages raised a bustle, 
But never put on pantaloons or boddiees ; 

His reverend tutors had at times a tussle, 
And for their ..'Eneids, Iliads, and Odysscys, 

Were forced to make an odd sort of apology, 

For Donna Inez dreaded the mythology. 

XLII. 
Ovid 's a rake, as half his verses show him ; 

Anacreon's morals are a still worse sample ; 
Catullus scarcely has a decent poem; 

1 don't think Sappho's Ode a good example, 
Although 3 Longinus tells us there is no hvmn 

Where the sublime soars forth on wings more ample ; 
But Virgil's songs are pure, except that horrid one 
Beginning with " Formosum pastur Curt/don." 

XLIII. 

Lucretius' irreligion is too strong 

For early stomachs, to prove wholesome food, 
I can't help thinking Juvenal was wrong, 

Although no doubt his real intent was good, 
Fcv speaking out so plainly in his song, 

So much indeed as to be downright rude ; 
And then what proper person can be partial 
To all those nauseous epigrams of Martial ? 

XLIV. 

Juan was taught from out the best edition, 
Expurgated by learned men, who place, 

Judiciously, from out the school-boy's vision, 
The grosser parts ; but, fearful to deface 

Too much their modest bard by this omission, 
And pitying sore his mutilated case, 

They only add them all in an appendix, 4 

Which saves, in fact, the trouble of an index ; 

XLV. 
For there we have them all " at one fell swoop," 

Instead of being scatter'd through the pages ; 
They stand firth marshall'd in a handsome troop, 

To meet the ingenuous youth of future ages, 
Till some less rigid editor shall stoop 

To call them back into their separate cages, 
Ins'ead of standing staring altogether, 
Like garden gods — and not so decent, cither. 

XLVI. 

1 he Mi.isal too (it was the family Missal) 

Was ornamented in a sort of way 
Which ancient mass-books often are, and this all 

Kinds of grotesques illumined ; and how they 
Who saw those figuics on the margin kiss all, 

Could turn their optics to the text and pray 
Is more than I know — but Don Juan's mother 
Kent '.his herself, ami gave her son another. 



XLVI I. 

Sermons ho read, and lectures he endured, 
And homilies, and lives of all the saints ; 

To Jerome and to Chrysostom inured, 

lie did not take such studies for restraints : 

But how faith is acquired, and then insured, 
So well not one of the aforesaid paints 

As Saint Augustine, in his fine Confessions, 

Which make the reader envy his transgrcs. i 

XLVIII. 

This, too, was a seal'd book to little Juan — 
I can't but say that his mamma was right, 

If such an education was the true one. 

She scarcely trusted him from out her sight ; 

Her maids were old, and if she took a new one 
You might be sure she was a perfect fright; 

She did this during even her husband's hie — 

I recommend as much to every wife. 

XLIX. 

Young Juan wax'd in goodliness and grace : 
At six a charming child, and at eleven 

With all the promise of as fine a face 

As e'er to man's maturcr growth was given : 

He studied steadily and grew apace, 
And seem'd, at least, in the right road to heaven 

For half his days were pass'd at church, the other 

Between his tutors, confessor, and mother. 

L. 

At six, I said he was a charming child, 
At twelve, he was a fine, but quiet boy ; 

Although in infancy a little wild, 

They tamed him down amongst them: to destroy 

His natural spirit not in vain they toil'd, 

At least at seem'd so ; and his mother's joy 

Was to declare how sage, and still, and steady, 

Her young philosopher was grown already. 

LI. 

I had my doubts, perhaps I have them still, 
But what I say is neither here nor there ; 

I knew his father well, and have some skill 
In character — but it would not be fair 

From sire to son to augur good or ill : 
He and his wife were an ill-sorted pair — 

But scandal 's my aversion — I protest 

Against all evil speaking, even in jest. 

LII. 
For my part I say nothing — nothing — but 

This I will say — my reasons are my own — 
That if I had an only son to put 

To school (as God be praised that I have none} 
'T is not with Donna Inez I would shut 

Him up to learn his catechism alone ; 
No — no — I 'd send him out betimes to co!le<rp, 
For there it was I piek'd up my own knowledge. 

Lin. 

For there one learns — 'tis not for me to boast, 
Though I acquired — but I pass over (/•<//, 

As well as all the Greek I since have lost: 
I say that there 's the place — but " Vcrbum sat 

I think I piek'd up, too, as weD as most, 

Knowledge of matters — but, no malter what — 

I never married — but I think, I know, 

That sons should not be educated so. 



xlANTO I. 



DON JUAN. 



565 



LIV. 

Foung Juan now was sixteen years of age, 
Tall, handsome, slender, but well knit; ho seem'd 

Active, though not so sprightly, as a pi 
And every hody but his mother deem'd 

Him almost man ; hut she flew in a rage, 
And hit her lips (for else she might have scream'd) 

If any .said so, for to he precocious 

Was in her eyes a thing the most atrocious. 

LV. 
Amongst her numetous acquaintance, all 

Selected for discretion and devotion, 
There was the Donna Julia, whom to call 

Pretty were but to give a feeble notion 
Of many charms, in her as natural 

As sweetness to the flower, or salt to ocean, 
Her zone to Venus, or his bow to Cupid 
(But this last simile is trite and stupid). 

LVI. 

The darkness of her oriental eye 

Accorded with her Moorish origin : 
(Her blood was not all Spanish, by the by; 

In Spain, you know, this is a sort of sin). 
When proud Grenada fell, and, forced to fly, 

Boabdil wept, of Donna Julia's km 
Some went to Africa, some stay'd in Spain, 
Her greal-great-grandmamma chose to remain. 

LVII. 

She married (I forget the pedigree) 

With an Hidalgo, who transmitted down 
His blood less noble than such blood should be : 

At such alliances his sires would frown, 
In that point so precise in each degree 

That they bred in and t;i, as might be shown, 
Marrying their cousins — nay, their aunts and nieces, 
Which always spoils the breed, if it increases. 

LVIII. 
This heathenish cross restored the breed again, 

Ruin'd its blood, but much improved its flesh ; 
For, from a root, the ugliest in Old Spain, 

Sprung up a branch as beautiful as fresh; 
The sons no more were short, the daughters plain: 

But there's a rumour which I fain would hush — 
'T is said that Donna Julia's grandmamma 
Produced her Don more heirs at love than law. 

LIX. 
However this might be, the race went on 

Improving still through every generation, 
Until it ceuter'd in an only son, 

Wiio left an only daughter; my narration 
May have suggested that this single one 

Could be hut Julia (whom on this occasion 
I shall have much to speak about), and she 
Was married, charming, chaste, and twenty-three. 

LX. 
Her eye (I 'in very fond of handsome eyes) 

Was large and dark, suppressing half its fire 
Until she spoke, then through its soft di 

Flash'd an expression more of pride than ire, 
And love than either; and there would arise 

A something in them which v,us no) ■ 
But would have been, perhaps, but for the soul 
Which struggled through andchasteu'd down the 
3a 2 



LXI. 

Her glossy hair was cluster'd o'er a brow 
Bnght with intelligence, and fair and smooth; 

Her eyebrow's shape was like the aerial bow. 
Her cheek all purple with the bi am i f youth, 

Mounting at times to a transparent giow, 

As if her veins ran lightning; she, in sooth, 

Possess'd an air ami grace by no means common : 

Her stature tall — I hale a dumpy woman. 

LXII. 

Wedded she was some years, run! to a man 
Of fifty, and such husbands are in plenty; 
And yet, I think, instead of such a ore, 

'T were better to have two of !i\ e-and-tw enty, 
Especially in countries near the sun: 

And now I think on 't, "mi vicn in mente," 
Ladies, even of the most uneasy virtue, 
Prefer a spouse whose age is short of thirty. 

lxiii. 

'T is a sad thing, I cannot choose but say, 
And all the fault of that indecent sun 

Who cannot Leave alone our helpless clay, 
But will keep baking, broiling, burning on, 

That, howsoever people fast and pray, 
The flesh is frail, and so the soul undone : 

What men call gallantry, and gods adultery, 

Is much more common where the climate 's sultry. 

LXIV. 

Happy the nations of the moral north ! 

Where all is virtue, and the winter season 
Sends sin without a rag on, shivering forth 

('T was snow that brought Saint Anthony to reason); 
Where juries cast up what a wife is worth, 

By laying whate'er sum, in mulct, they please on 
The lover, who must pay a handsome price, 
Because it is a marketable vice. 

LXV. 
Alfonso was the name of Julia's lord, 

A man well looking for his years, and who 
Was neither much beloved nor yet abhorr'd: 

They lived together as most people do, 
Suffering each others' foibles by accord, 

And not exactly either one or two ; 
Yet he was jealous, though he did not show it, 
For jealousy dislikes the world to know it. 

LXVI. 
Julia was — yet I never could see why — 

With Donna Inez quite a favourite friend : 
Between their tastes there was small sympathy, 

For not a line had Julia ever penn'd : 
Some people whisper (but no doubt they lie, 

For malice still imputes some private end) 
That Inez had, ere Don Alfonso's man 
Forgot with him her very prudent carriage; 

LXVII. 
And that, still keeping up the old connexion, 

Which time hail lately render'd much more chaste 
She took his lady also in affection, 

And certainly this course was much the best. 
She flatler'd Julia with In i tion, 

And complimented Don Alfonso's taste; 
And it' she could not (who can !) silence scandai, 
A', least she left it a more slender ban 



566 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO l. 



LXVIII. 
1 can'l tell whether Julia saw the affair 

With other | pie's eyes, or if her own 

Discoveries made, but none could be aware 

Of this, at least no symptom e'er was shown; 
Perhaps she did not know, or did not care, 

Indifferent from the first or callous grown : 
1 'm really puzzled what to think or say, 
She kept her counsel in so close a way* 

LXIX. 

Juan she saw, and, as a pretty child, 

Caress'd him often, such a thing might be 

Quite innocently done, and harmless styled 
When she had twenty years, and thirteen he; 

But I am not so sure I should have smiled 
When he was sixteen," Julia twenty-three : 
• These few short years make wondrous alterations, 

Particularly amongst sun-burnt nations. 

LXX. 

Whate'er the cause might be, they had become 
Changed ; for the dame grew distant, the youth shy, 

Their looks cast down, their greetings almost dumb, 
And much embarrassment in cither eye ; 

Them surely will be little doubt with some 
That Donna Julia knew the reason why, 

But as for Juan, he had no more notion 

Then he who never saw the sea of ocean. 

LXXI. 

Yet Julia's very coldness still was kind, 
And tremulously gentle her small hand 

Withdrew itself from his, but left behind 
A little pressure, thrilling, and so bland 

And slight, so very slight, that to the mind 

'T was but a doubt ; bat ne'er magician's wand 

Wrought change with all Armida's fiery art 

Like what this light touch left on Juan's heart. 

LXXII. 

And if she met him, though she smiled no more, 

She look'd a sadness sweeter than her smile, 
As if her heart had deeper thoughts in store 

She must not own, but cherish d more the while, 
For that compression in its burning core ; 

Even innocence itself has many a wile, 
And will not dare to trust itself with truth, 
And love is taught hypocrisy from youth. 

LXXI1I. 
But passion most dissembles, yet betrays 

Even by its darkness ; as the blackest sky 
Foretells the heaviest tempest, it displays 

Its workings through the vainly-guarded eye, 
And in whatever aspect it arrays 

Itself, 't is still the same hypocrisy ; 
Coldness or anger, even disdain or hate, 
Are masks it often wears, and still too late. 

LXXIV. 
.Then, there were sighs, the deeper for suppression, 

And stolen .glance!, sweeter for the theft, 
And burning blushes, though for no transgression, 

Tremblings when met, and restlessness when left: 
Al! these ore little preludes to possession, 

Of which young passion cannot be bereft, 
And tnorciy end to show how greatly love is 
Emoai r;vs\l pt first starting with a novice. 



LXXV. 

Poor Julia's heart was in an awkward 
She felt it going, and resolved to ma 

The noblest efforts for herself and mate, 
For honour's, pride's, religion's, virtue's sake: 

Her resolutions were most truly great, 

And almost might have made a Tarquin quake 

She pray'd the Virgin Mary for her grace, 

As being the best judge of a lady's case. 

LXX VI. 

She vow'd she never would see Juan more, 
And next day paid a visit to his mother, 

Ami look'd extremely at the opening door, 
Which, by the Virgin's grace, let in another; 

Grateful she was, and yet a little sore — 
Again it opens, it can be no other, 

'T is surely Juan now — No! I'm afraid 

That night the Virgin was no further pray'd. 

LXXVII. 

She now determined that a virtuous woman 
Should rather face and overcome temptation ; 

That flight was base and dastardly, and no man 
Should ever give her heart the least sensation ; 

That is to say a thought, beyond the common 
Preference that we must feel upon occasion 

For people who are pleasanter than others, 

But then they only seem so many brothers. 

LXXVIII. 
And even if by chance — and who can tell ? 

The devil 's so very sly — she should discover 
That all within was not so very well, 

And if, still free, that such or such a lover 
Might please perhaps, a virtuous wife can quell 

Such thoughts, and be the better when they 're over 
And, if the man should ask, 't is but denial : 
I recommend young ladies to make trial. 

LXXIX. 
And then there are such things as love divine, 

Bright and immaculate, unmix'd and pure, 
Such as the angels think so very fine, 

And matrons, who would be no less secure, 
Platonic, perfect, "just such love as mine;" 

Thus Julia said — and thought so, to be sure, 
And so I'd have her think, were I the man 
On whom her reveries celestial ran. 

LXXX. 
Such love is innocent, and may exist 

l'et.Mvn young persons without any danger; 
A hand may first, and then a lip he kiss'd ; 

For my part, to such doings I'm a stranger, 
But hear these freedoms for the utmost list 

Of all o'er which such love may be a ranger : 
If people go bevond, 't is quite a crime, 
But not my fault — I tell them all in time. 

LXXXI. 
Love, then, but love within its proper limits, 

Was Julia's innocent determination 
In young Don Juan's favour, and to him its 

Exertion might be useful on occasion ; 
And, lighted at too pure a shrine to dim its 

Etherial lustre, with what sweet persuasion 
He might be taught, by love and her together— 
1 really don't know what, nor Julia p'ther. 




I 



CANTO J. 



DON JUAN. 



5G7 



LXXXII. 
i ! if with this fine intention, and well fenced 

In mail of proof — her purity of soul, 
She, for the future, of her strength convinced, 

And that her honour was a rock, or mole, 
Excee ling sagely from that hour dispensed 

With any k i 1 1 < 1 of troublesome control. 
But whether Julia to the task was equal 
Is that which must be mention'd in the sequel. 

LXXXIII. 

Her plan she deem'd both innocent and feasible, 
And, surely, with a stripling of sixteen 

Not scandal's fangs could fix on much that's seizable ; 
Or, if they did so, satisfied to mean 

Nothing but what was good, her breast was peaceable — 
A quiet conscience makes one so serene! 

Christians have burned each other, quite persuaded 

That all the apostles would have done as they did. 

LXXXIV. 

And if, in the mean time, her husband died, 

But Heaven forbid that such a thought should cross 

Her brain, though in a dream, (and then she sigh'd !) 
Never could she survive that common loss; 

But just suppose that moment should betide, 
I only say suppose it — inter ros 

(This should be entre nous, for Julia thought 

In French, but then the rhyme would go for nought). 

LXXXV. 

I only say suppose this supposition : 

Juan, being then grown up to man's estate, 
Would fully suit a widow of condition ; 

Even seven years hence it would not be too late ; 
And in the interim (to pursue this vision) 

The mischief, after all, could not bo great, 
For he would learn the rudiments of love, 
I mean the seraph way of those above. 

LXXXVI. 
So much for Julia. Now we '11 turn to Juan. 

Poor little fellow ! he had no idea 
Of his own case, and never hit the true one ; 

In feelings quiek as Ovid's Miss Medea, 
He puzzled over what he found a new oik;, 

But not as yet imagined it could be a 
Thinfi quite in course, and not at all alarming, 
Which, with a little patience, might grow charming. 

LXXXVII. 
Silent and pensive, idle, restless, slow, 

His home deserted for the lonely wood, 
Tormented with a wound ho could not know, 

His, like all deep grief, plunged in solitude. 
I'm fond myself of solitude or so, 

But then I beg it may be understood 
By soiitudc I mean a sultan's, not 
A hermit's, with a haram for a grot. 

LXXXVIII. 
K Oh love ! in such a wilderness as this, 

Where transport and security entwine, 
Here is the empire of thy perfect bliss, 

And here thou art a god indeed divine." 
The bard I quote from does not sing amiss, 5 

With the exception ol the second line, 
For that same twining "transport and security" 
Are twisted to a nhrasc of some obscurity. 



LXXXIX. 

The poet mean', no doubt, and thus appeals 
To the good sense and senses of mankind, 

The very thing which every body fei Is, 
As all have found on trial, or may find, 

Thai ii" one likes to be di&turb'd at m 

Or love: — I won't say more about "entwined" 

Or "transport," as wc know all that before, 

But beg "security" will bolt the door. 

XC. 

Young Juan wander'd by the glassy brooks, 
Thinking unutterable things: he threw 

Himself at length within the leafy nooks 

V\ here the wild branch of the cork forest grrw 

There poets find materials for their books, 

And every now and then we read them through, 

So that their plan and prosody are eligible, 

Unless, like Wordsworth, they prove unintelligible. 

XCI. 

lie, Juan, (and not Wordsworth), so pursued 
His self-communion with his own high soul, 

Until his mighty heart, in its great mood, 
Had mitigated part, though not the whole 

Of its disease ; he did the best he could 
With things not very subject to control, 

And tum'd, without perceiving his condition, 

Like Coleridge, into a metaphysician. 

XCII. 

lie thought about himself, and the whole earth, 

Of man the wonderful, and of the stars, 
And how the deuce they ever could have birth ; 

And then he thought of earthqu I warv 

How many miles the moon might have in girth, 

Of air-balloons, and of the many bars 
To perfect knowledge of the boundless skies; 
And then he thought of Donna Julia's eyes. 

XC1II. 
In thoughts like these true wisdom may discern 

Longings sublime, and aspirations high, 
WhichVsome are born with, but the most part iearr 

To plague themselves withal, they know not why: 
'T was strange' that one so young should thus concern 

His brain about the action of the sky ; 
U you think 'twas philosophy that this did, 
i can't help thinking puberty assisted. 

XCIV. 
He pored upon the leaves, and on the flowers, 

And heard a voice in all the winds ; and then 
He thought of wood-nymphs and immortal bowers, 

And how the goddesses came down to men: 
He miss'd the pathway, ho forgot the hours, 

And, when he look'd upon his watch again, 
He found how much old Time had been a winner — 
He also found that he had lost his dinner. 

xcv. 

Sometimes he turn'd to gaze upon his book, 

Boscan, or Garcilasso; — by the wind 
Even as the page is rustled while we look. 

So by the poesy of h:s own mind 
Over the mystic leaf his soul was shook. 

As if 'twere one who eon magicians bind 
Their spells, and give them to the passing gale. 
According to some good old woman's : 



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BYRON'S WORKS. 



C.1.XTO , 



xcvi. 

Tims woul 1 he while his lorn ly hours away 

Dissatisfied, nor knowing what hewantecfj 
Nor glowing reverie, nor poet's lay, 

Could yield his spiril thai for which it panted, — 
A bosom whereon he his head might lay, 

And hear the heart beat with the love it granted, 
Willi — several other things, which I forget, 
Or which, at least, I need not mention yet. 

XCVII. 
Those lonely walks and lengthening reveries 

Could ii"l escape the gentle Julia's eyes; 
She saw that Juan was not at his ease; 

But that whirl, chiefly may and must surprise, 
Is, that the Donna Inez did nut tease 

Her only son with question or surmise; 
Whether it was she did not see, or would not, 
Or, like all very clever people, could not. 

XCVIII. 
This mav seem strange, but yet 't is very common ; 

For instance — gentlemen, whose ladies taUe 
Leave to o'erstep the written rights of woman, 

And break the — Which commandment is 't they break? 
(I have forgot the number, and think no man 

Should rashly quote, for fear of a mistake), 
I sav, when these same gentlemen are jealous, 
They make some blunder, which their ladies tell us. 

XCIX. 
A real husband always is suspicious, 

But still no less suspects in the wrong place, 
Jealous of some one. who had no such wishes, 

Or pandering blindly to his own disgrace, 
By harbouring some dear friend extremely vicious ; 

The last indeed \s infallibly the case : 
And when the spouse and friend are gone off wholly, 
He wonders at their vice, and not his folly. 

C. 

Thus parents also are at times short-sighted; 

Though watchful as the lynx, they ne'er discover, 
The while the wicked world beholds, di lighted. 

Young Hopeful's mistress, or Miss Fanny's lover, 
Till some co 1 ; pade has blighted 

The plan of twenty years, and all is over ; 
And then the mother cries, the father swears, 
And wonders why the devil he got heirs. 

CI. 
But Inez was so anxious, and so clear 

Of sijzht, that I must think on this occasion, 
She had some other motive much more near 

For leaving Juan to this new temptation; 
But what that motive was, I shan't say here; 

Perhaps to finish Juan's education, 
Perhaps to open Don Alfonso's eyes, 
In case he thought his wife too great a prize. 

CII. 
It was upon a day, a summer's day ; 

Summer 's indeed a very dangerous season, 
And so is spring about the end of May ; 

The sun, no doubt, is the prevailing reason; 
But whatsoe'er the cause is, one may say, 

And stand convicted of more truth than treason, 
Th.a there are months which nature grows more 

merry in — 
Mar.-h nn„s ,ts hares, and May must have its heroine. ! Quite by mistake— she thought it was her own ; 



cm. 

'T was on a summer's day — the sixth of June: 

I like to be particular in dates, 
Not oidy of the age, and year, but moon ; 

They are a sort of post-house, where the Fates 
Change horses, making history change its tune, 

Then spur away o'er empires and o'er states, 
Leaving at last not much besides chronology, 
Excepting the post-obits of theology. 

CIV. 

'Twas on the sixth of June, about the hour 
Of half-past six — perhaps still nearer seven, 

When Julia, sate within as pretty a bower 

As ere held houri in that heathenish heaven 

Described by Mahomet, and Anacreon Moore, 
To whom the lyre and laurels have been given, 

With all the trophies of triumphant song — 

He won then well, and may he wear them long. 

cv. 

She sate, but not alone ; I know not well 
How this same interview had taken place, 

And even if I knew, I should not tell — 

People should hold their tongues in any case ; 

No matter how or why the thing befell, 

But there were she and Juan face to face — 

When two such faces are so, 'twould be wise, 

But very difficult, to shut their eyes. 

CVI. 
How beautiful she look'd! her conscious heart 

Glow'd in her cheek, and yet she felt no wrong : 
Oh love ! how perfect is thy mystic art, 

Strengthening the weak and trampling on the strong, 
How self-deceitful is the sagest part 

Of mortals whom thy lure hath led along: 
The precipice she stood on was immense — 
So was her creed in her own innocence. 

cm 

She thought of her own strength, and Juan's youth. 

And of the folly of all prudish fears, 
Victorious virtue, and domestic truth, 

And then of Don Alfonso's fifty years: 
I wish these last had not occurr'd, in sooth, 

Because that number rarely much endears, 
And through all climes, the snowy and the sunny, 
Sounds ill in love, whate'er it may in money. 

CVIII. 
When people say, "I've told you fifty times," 

They mean to scold, and very often do ; 
When poets say "I've written fifty rhymes," 

They make you dread that they'll recite them too; 
In gangs of fifty, thieves commit their crimes ; 

At fifty, love for love is rare, 't is true ; 
But then, no doubt, it equally as true is, 
A good deal may be bought for fifty Jjouis. 

CIX. 
Julia had honour, virtue, truth, and love 

For Don Alfonso; and she inly s wore, 
By all the vows below to powers above, 

She never would disgrace the ring she wore, 
Nor leave a wish which wisdom might reprove: 

And while she ponder'd this, besides much more, 
One hand on Juan's carelessly was thrown, 



CANTO l. 



DON JUAN. 



5C9 



ex. 

[Unconsciously she loan'd upon the other, 
Which play'd within (he tangles of her hair; 

Anil to contend with thoughts she could not smother, 
She seem'd, hy the distraction of her air. 

'T was surely very wrong in Juan's mother 
To leave, together tills imprudent pair, 

She who lor many years had watch'd her son so — 

I'm ve.j certain mine would not have done so. 

CXF. 

The hand which still held Juan's, by degrees 
Gently, bat palpably, confirm'd its grasp, 

As if it said " detain me, if you please j" 
Yet there 's no doubt she only meant to clasp 

His fingers with a pure Platonic squeeze : 

She would have shrunk as from a toad or asp, 

Had she imagined such a thing could rouse 

A feeling dangerous to a prudent spouse. 

CXII. 
I cannot know what Juan thought of this, 

But what he did is much what you would do ; 
His young lip thank'd it with a grateful kiss, 

And then, abash'd at his own joy, withdrew 
In deep despair, lest he had done amiss, 

Love is so very timid when 'tis new: 
She blush'd and frown'd not, but she strove to speak, 
And held her tongue, her voice was grown so weak. 

cxni. 

The sun set, and up rose the yellow moon : 
The devil 's in the moon for mischief; they 

Who call'd her chaste, methinks, began loo soon 
Their nomenclature: there is not a day, 

The longest, not the twenty-first of June, 
Sees half the business in a wicked way 

On which three single hours of moonshine smile — 

And then she looks so modest all the while. 

CXIV. 
There is a dangerous silence in that hour, 

A stillness which leaves room for the full soul 
To open all itself, without the power 

Of calling wholly back its self-control; 
The silver light which, hallowing tree and tower, 

Sheds beauty and deep soilness o'er the whole, 
Breathes also to the heart, and o'er it throws 
A loving languor, which is not repose. 

cxv. 

And Julia sate with Juan, half embraced, 

And half retiring from the glowing arm, 
Which trembled like the bosom where 'twas placed: 

Yet still she must have thought there was no harm, 
Or else 'I were easy to withdraw her waist ; 

But then the situation had its charm, 

And then God knows what next — I can't go on ; 

I 'm almost sorry that I e'er begun. 

CXVl". 
Oh, Plato! Plato! you have paved the way, 

With your confounded fantasies, to more 
Immoral conduct by the fancied sway 

Your system feigns o'er the controlless core 
Of human hearts, than all the long array 

Of poets and romancers: — You're a bore, 
A charlatan, a coxcomb— and have been, 
At best, no belter than a go-between. 
77 



CXVII. 

And Julia's voice was lost, except in sighs, 
Until too late for useful conversation; 

The tears were gushing from her gentle eyes, 
1 wish, indeed, they had not had occasion ; 

But who, alas! can love, and then be wise? 
Not that remorse did not oppose temptation, 

A little still she strove, and much repented, 

And whispering "I will ne'er consent" — consented. 

CXVIII. 

'T is said that Xerxes otTer'd a reward 

To those who could invent him a new pleasure, 

.Methinks the requisition's rather hard, 

And must have cost his majesty a treasure: 

For my part, I 'm a moderate-minded bard, 
Fond of a little love (which I call leisure) ; 

I care not for new pleasures, as the old 

Are quite enough for me, so they but hold. 

CXIX. 

Oh Pleasure! you 're. indeed a pleasant thing, 

Although one must be damn'd for you, no doubt ; 

I make a resolution every spring 
Of reformation ere the year run out, 

But, somehow, this my vestal vow takes wing, 
Yet still, I trust, it may be kept throughout: 

I'm very sorry, very much ashamed, 

And mean, next winter, to be quite reclaim'd. 

cxx. 

Here my chaste muse a liberty must take — 

Start not! still chaster reader, — she'll be nice hence- 
Forward, and there is no great cause to quake : 

This liberty is a poetic license 
Which some irregularity may make 

In the design, and as I have a high sense 
Of Aristotle and the Rules, 'l is fit 
To beg his pardon when I err a bit. 

CXXI. 

This license is to hope the reader will 

Suppose from June the sixth (the fatal day, 

Without whose epoch my poetic skill, 

For want of facts, would all be thrown away). 

But keeping Julia and Don Juan still 

In sight, that several months have pass'd ; we'll sat 

'T was in November, but I 'm not so sure 

About the day — the era's more obscure. 

CXXII. 

We'll talk of that anon. — 'Tis sweet to hear. 

At midnight on the blue and moonlit deep, 
The song and oar of Adria's goni 

By distance mello.vM, o'er the waters sweep, 
'Tis sweet to see the evening star appear; 

'T is sweet to listen as the night-winds creep 
From leaf to leaf; 'tis sweet to view on high 
The rainbow, based en ocean, span the sky ; 

CXXUI. 
'Tis sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark 

Hay deep-mouth'd welcome as we draw near hem* 
'T is sweet to know there is an eye will mark 

Our coming, and look brighter whin we come, 
'Tis sweet 10 be awaken'd by the lark, 

Or lull'd by falling waters ; sweet the hum 
Of bees, the voice of girls, the song of birds, 
The lisp of children, and their earliest wordb 



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BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO 



CXXIV. 

Sweet is the vintage, when the showering grapes 

In Bacchanal profusion reel to earth 
Purple and gushing ; sweet are our escapes 

From civic revelry to rural mirth ; 
Sweet to the miser are his glittering heaps ; 

Sweet to the father is his first-born's birth ; 
Sweet is revenge — especially to women, 
Pillage to soldiers, prize-money to seamen. 

exxv. 

Sweet is a legacy ; and passing sweet 
The unexpected death of some old lady 

Or gentleman of seventy years complete, 
W lio ' ve made " us youth" wait too — too long already 

For an estate, or cash or country-seat, 
Still breaking, hut with stamina so steady, 

That all the Israelites are fit to mob its 

Next owner, for their double-damn'd post-obits. 

CXXVI. 

'T is sweet to win, no matter 'how, one's laurels 
By blood or ink; 'tis sweet to put an end 

To strife; 'ti3 sometimes sweet to have our quarrels, 
Particularly with a tiresome friend ; 

Sweet is old wine in bottles ale in barrels ; 
Dear is the helpless crea/ure we defend 

Against the world ; and dear the school-boy spot 

We ne'er forget, though there we are forgot. 

CXXVII. 

But sweeter still than this, than these, than all, 
Is first and passionate love — it stands alone, 

Like Adam's recollection of his fall ; 
The tree of knowledge has been pluck'd-all's known- 

And life yields nothing further to recall 
Worthy of this an.brosial sin so shown, 

No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven 

Fire which Prometheus filch'd for us from heaven. 

C XXVIII. 

Man's a strange animal, and makes strange use 
Of his own nature and the various arts, 

And likes particularly to produce 

Some new experiment to show his parts: 

This is the age of oddities let loose, 

Wnere different talents find their different marts; 

You 'd best begin with truth, and when you 've lost your 

I abour, there 's a sure market for imposture. 

CXXIX. 

What opposite discoveries we have seen ! 

(Signs of true genius, and of empty pockets:) 
One makes new noses, one a guillotine, 

One breaks your bones, one sets them in their sockets ; 
But vaccination certainly has been 
A kind antithesis to Congrcvc's rockets, 



exxx. 

Bread has been made (indifferent) from potatoes, 
^nd galvanism has set some corpses grinning, 

But has not answer'd like the apparatus 
Of the Humane Society's beginning, 

By winch men are unsuffocated gratis ; — 

VV hat wondrous new machines have late been spinning 



CXXXI. 



CXXXII. 

This is the patent age of new inventions 
For killing bodies and for saving souls, 

All propagated with the best intentions: 

Sir Humphry Davy's lantern, by which coals 

Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions; 
Timbuctoo travels, voyages to the Pules 

Are ways to benefit mankind, as true, 

Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo. 

CXXXIII. 

Mali's a phenomenon, one knows not what, 
And wonderful beyond all wondrous measuie, 

'Tis pity though, m this sublime world, that 

Pleasure's a sin, and sometimes sin's a pleasure, 

Few mortals know what end they would be at, 
But whether glory, power, or love, or treasure, 

The path is through perplexing ways, and when 

The goal is gain'd, we die, you know— and then • 

CXXXIV. 

What then? — I do not know, no more do you— 
And so good night. — Return we to our story : 

'T was in November, when fine days are few, 
And the far mountains wax a little b^ary, 

And clap a white cape on their mantles blue ; 
And the sea dashes round the promontory, 

And the loud breaker boils against the rock, 

And sober suns must set at live o'clock. 

exxxv. 

'Twas, as the watchmen say, a cloudy night; 

No moon, no stars, the wind was low or loud 
By gusts, and many a sparkling hearth was bright 

With the piled wood, round which the funily crowd 
There's something cheerful in that sort of light, 

Even as a summer sky 's without a cloud : 
I 'm fond of fire, and crickets, and all that, 
A lobster salad, and champagne, and chat 

C XXXVI. 

'Twas midnight — Donna Julia was in bed, 

Sleeping, most probably, — when at her door 
Arose a clatter might awake the dead, 

If they had never been awoke before — 
And that they have been so we all have read, 

And are to be so, at the least, once more — 
The door was fasten'd, but, with voice and fist, 
First knocks were heard, then "Madam — Madam — hist! 

C XXXVII. 
"For God's sake, Madam — Madam — here's my mastei 

With more than half the city at his back — 
Was ever heard of such a cursed disaster? 

'Tis not my fault — I kept good watch — Alack' 
Do, pray, undo the bolt a little faster — 

They're on the stair just now, and in n crach 
Will all be here ; perhaps he yet ma) fly- 
Surely the window 's not so very high '" 



CANTO I. 



DON JUAN. 



571 



CXXXVIII. 

By this time Don Alfonso was arrived, 

With torches, friends, and servants in great number; 
The major part of them had long been wived, 

And therefore paused not to disturb the slumber 
Of any wicked woman, who contrived 

By stealth her husband's temples to encumber : 
Examples of this kind are so contagious, 
Were one not punish'd, all would be outrageous. 

CXXXIX. 

I can't tell how, or why, or what suspicion 
Could enter into Don Alfonso's head, 

But for a cavalier of his condition 
It surely was exceedingly ill-bred, 

Y\ ithout a word of previous admonition, 
To hold a levee round his lady's bed, 

And summon lackeys, arm'd with tire and sword, 

To prove himself the thing he most abhorr'd. 

CXL. 

Poor Donna Julia ! starting as from sleep 

(Mind — that I do not say — she had not slept), 

Began at once to scream, and yawn, and weep; 
Her maid Antonia, who was an adept, 

Contrived to fling the bed-clothes in a heap, 
As if she had just now from out them crept: 

I can't tell why she should take all this trouble 

Ta prove her mistress had been sleeping double. 

CXLI. 

But Julia mistress, and Antonia maid, 

Appear'd like two poor harmless women, who 
Of goblins, but still more of men, afraid, 

Had thought one man might be deterr'd by two, 
And therefore side by side were gently laid, 

Until the hours of absence should run through, 
And truant husband should return, and say, 
" My dear, I was the first who came away." 

CXLII. 
Now Julia found at length a voice, and cried, 

"In Heaven's name, Don Alfonso, what d' ye mean? 
Has madness seized you? would that I had died 

Ere such a monster's victim I had been ! 
What may this midnight violence betide, 

A sudden fit of drunkenness or spleen? 
Dare you suspect me, whom the thought would kill ? 
Search, then, the room!" — Alfonso said, "I will." 

CXLIII. 
He search'd,<ftfi/ search'd, and rummaged every where, 

Closet and clothes'-press, chest and window-seat, 
And found much linen, lace, and several pair 

Of stockings, slippers, brushes, combs, complete, 
With other articles of ladies fair, 

To keep them beautiful, or leave them neat : 
Arras they prick'd and curtains with their swords, 
And wounded several shutters, and some boards. 

CXLIV. 
Under the bed they search'd, and there they found — 

No matter what — it was not that they sought, 
They open'd windows, gazing if the ground 

Had signs or foot-marks, but the earth said nought : 
And then they stared each other's faces round: 

'T is odd, not one of all these seekers thought, 
And seems to me almost a sort of blunder, 
Of looking in the bed as well as under. 



CXLV. 

During this inquisition Julia's tongue 

Was not asleep — " Ycs,search and search," she cried, 
"Insult on insult heap, and wrong on wrong! 

It was for this that I became a bride ! 
For this in silence I have sulfer'd long 

A husband like Alfonso at my side ; 
But now I '11 bear no more, nor here remain, 
If there be law, or lawyers, in all Spain. 

CXLVI. 
" Yes, Don Alfonso, husband now no more, 

If ever you indeed deserved the name, 
Is 't worthy of your years ? — you have threescore, 

Fifty, or sixty — it is all the same — 
Is 't wise or fitting causeless to explore 

For facts against a virtuous woman's fame ? 
Ungrateful, perjured, barbarous Don Alfonso ! 
How dare you tliink your lady would go on so ? 

CXLVII. 

"Is it for this I have disdain'd to hold 

The common privileges of my sex? 
That I have chosen a confessor so old 

And deaf, that any other it would vex, 
And never once he has had cause to scold, 

But found my very innocence perplex 
So much, he always doubted I was married- 
How sorry you will be when I 've miscarried ! 

CXLVIII. 

" Was it for this that no Cortejo ere 

I yet have chosen from out the youth of Seville f 
Is it for this I scarce went any where, 

Except to bull-fights, mass, play, rout, and revel ? 
Is it for this, whate'er my suitors wore, 

I favour'd none — nay, was almost uncivil ? 
Is it for this that General Count O'Reilly, 
Who took Algiers, declares I used him vilely?* 

CXLIX. 
"Did not the Italian Musico Cazzani 

Sing at my heart six months at least in vain ? 
Did not his countryman, Count Corniani, 

Call me the only virtuous wife in Spain? 
Were there not also Russians, English, many? 

The Count StrongstroganofT I put in pain, 
And Lord Mount Coffeehouse, the Irish peer, 
Who kill'd himself for love (with wine) last year. 

CL. 
" Have I not had two bishops at my feet, 

The Duke of Ichar, and Don Fernan Nunez ? 
And is it thus a faithful wife you treat? 

I wonder in what quarter now the moon is . 
I praise your vast forbearance not to beat 

Me also, since the time so opportune is — 
Oh, valiant man ! with sword drawn and cock'd triggej 
Now, tell me, don't you cut a pretty figure ? 

CLI. 
"Was it for this you took your sudden jouinct. 

Under pretence of business indispensable, 
With that sublime of rascals your attorney, 

Whom I sec standing there, and looking sensible 
Of having play'd the* fool ? though both I spurn, he 

Deserves the worst, his conduct 's less defensible. 
Because, no doubt, 't was for his dirty fee t 
And not for any love to you or me. 



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BYRONS WORKS. 



CANTO I 



CLII. 
to If he conies here to lake a deposition, 

]{y all means let the gentleman proceed ; 
i'ou 've made the apartment in a fit condition : 

There 's pen and ink for you, sir, when you need — 
Let every thing be noted with precision, 

1 would not you for nothing should be fee'd — 
But, us my maid 's undress'd, pray turn your spies out." 
" Oh!" sobb'd Antonia, "1 could tear their eyes out." 

CLIII. 

"There is the closet, there the toilet, there 
The ante-chamber — search them under, over: 

There is the sofa, there the great arm-chair, 
The chimney — which would really hold a lover. 

I wish to sleep, and beg you will take care 
And make no further noise till you discover 

The secret cavern of this lurking treasure — 

And, when't is found, let me, too, have that pleasure. 

CL1V. 

" And now, Hidalgo ! now that you have thrown 

Doubt upon me, confusion over all, 
Pray have the courtesy to make it known 

J Vho is the man you search for ? how d' ye call 
Him? what's his lineage? let him but be shown — 

I hope he 's young and handsome — is he tall ? 
Tell me — and be assured, that since you stain 
My honour thus, it shall not be in vain. 

CLV. 

" At least, perhaps, he has not sixty years — 

At that age he would be too old for slaughter, 
Or for so young a husband's jealous fears-r 

(Antonia! let me have a glass of water). 
I am ashamed of having shed these tears, 

They are unworthy of my father's daughter ; 
My mother dream'd not in my natal hour 
That I should fall into a monster's power. 

CLVI. 
•* Perhaps 't is of Antonia you are jealous, 

You saw that she was sleeping by my side 
When you broke in upon us with your fellows : 

Look where you please — we ' ve nothing, sir, to hide; 
Only another time, I trust, you '11 tell us, 

Or for the sake of decency abide 
A moment at the door, that we may be 
Dress'd to receive so much good company. 

CLVII. 
" And now, sir, I have done, and say no more ; 

The little I have said may serve to show 
The guileless heart in silence may grieve o'er 

The wrongs to whose exposure it is slow: — 
I leave you to your conscience as before, 

'T will one day ask you why you used me so ? 
God grant you feel not then the bitterest grief! — 
Afl'onia! where 's my pocket-handkerchief?" 

CLVHI. 
She ceased, and turn'd upon her pillow ; pale 

She lav, her dark eyes flashing through their tears, 
Like skies that rain and lighten ; as a veil 

Waved and o'ershading her wan cheek, appears 
VI 'T streaming hair; the black curls strive, but fail, 

To hide the glossy shoulder which uprears 
lis snow through all; — her soft lips lie apart, 
And leader than her breathing beats her heart. 



CLIX. 
The Senhor Don Alfonso stood confused ; 

Antonia bustled round the ransack'd room, 
And, turning up her nose, with looks a ! 

Her master, and his myrmidons, of whom 
Not one, except the attorney, was amused ; 

He, like Achates, faithful to the tomb, 
So there were quarrels, cared not foi the cause, 
Knowing they, must be settled by the laws. 

CLX. 

With prying snub-nose, and small eyes, he stood 
Following Antonia's motions here and there, 

With much suspicion in his attitude ; 
For reputation he had little car« : 

So that a suit or action were made good, 
Small pity had he for the young and fair. 

And ne'er believed in negatives, till these 

Were proved by competent false witnesses. 

CLXI. 

But Don Alfonso stood with downcast looks, 
And, truth to say, he made a foolish figure ; 

When, after searching in five hundred nooks, 
And treating a young wife with so much rigour, 

He gain'd no point, except some self rebukes, 
Added to those his lady with such vigour 

Had pour'd upon him for the last half hour, 

Quick, thick, and heavy — as a thunder-shower. 

CLXII. 

At first he tried to hammer an excuse, 

To which the sole reply were tears and sobs, 
And indications of hysterics, whose 

Prologue is always certain throes and throbs, 
Gasps, and whatever else the owners choose: — 

Alfonso saw his wife, and thought of Job's ; 
He saw, too, in perspective, her relations, 
And then he tried to muster all his patience. 

CLXIII. 
He stood in act to speak, or rather stammer, 

But sane Antonia cut .him short before 
The anvil of his speech received the hammer, 

With " Pray, sir, leave the room, and say no more, 
Or madam dies." — Alfonso mutter'd " D n her." 

But nothing else, the time of words was o'er ; 
He cast a rueful look or two, and did, 
He knew not wherefore, that which he was bid. 

CLXIV. 
With him retired his "jmsse comitatu*" 

The attorney last, who iinger'd near the door, 
Reluctantly, still tarrying there as late as 

Antonia let him — not a little sore 
At this most strange and unexplain'd "hiatus'" 

In Don Alfonso's facts, which just now wore 
An awkward look ; as he revolved the case, 
The door was fasten'd in his legal face. 

CLXV. 
No sooner was it bolted, than — Oh shame ! 

Oh sin ! oh sorrow ! and oh womankind ! 
How can you do such things and keep your fame, 

Unless this world, and t' other too, be blind ? 
Nothing so dear as an unfilch'd good name! 

But to proceed — for there is more behind : 
With much heart-felt reluctance be it said, 
Young Juan slipp'd, half-sniother'd, from the bed 



CANTO I. 



DON JUAN. 



573 



CLXVI. 
He had been hid — I don't pretend to say 

How, nor can I indeed describe the where — 
Young, slender, and pack'd easily, he lay, 

No doubt, in little compass, round or square ; 
But pity him I neither must nor may 

His suffocation by that pretty pair ; 
'T were better, sure, to die so, than be shut, 
With maudlin Clarence, in his Malmsev butt. 

CLXVII. 
And, secondly, I pity not, because 

He had no business to commit a sin, 
Forbid by heavenly, fined by human laws,— 

At least 't was rather early to begin ; 
Hut at sixteen the conscience rarely gnaws 

So much as when we call our old debts in 
At sixty years, and draw the accounts of evil, 
And find a deuced balance with the devil. 

CLXVIII. 

Of his position I can give no notion : 
'T is written in the Hebrew Chronicle, 

How the physicians, leaving pill and potion, 
Prescribed, by way of blister, a young belle, 

When old King David's blood grew dull in motion, 
And that the medicine answer'd very well ; 

Perhaps 't was in a different way applied, 

For David lived, but Juan nearly died. 

CLXIX. 

What 's to be done ? Alfonso will be back 

The moment he has sent his fools away. 
Antonia's skill was put upon the rack, 

But no device could be brought into play — 
And how to parry the renew'd attack ? 

Besides, it wanted but few hours of day : 
Antonia puzzled ; Julia did not speak, 
But press'd her bloodless lip to Juan's cheek. 

CLXX. 
He turn'd his lip to hers, and with his hand 

Call'd back the tangles of her wandering hair; 
Even then their love they could not all command, 

And half forgot their danger and despair : 
Antonia's patience now was at a stand — 

" Come, come, 't is no time now for fooling there," 
She whisper'd in great wrath — " I must deposit 
This pretty gentleman within the closet : 

CLXXI. 
" Pray keep your nonsense for some luckier night — 

Who can have put my master in this mood ? 
What will become on't? — I'm in such 8 fright! 

The devil 's in the urchin, and no good — 
Is this a time for giggling ? this a plight ? 

Why, don't you know that it may end in blood ? 
You '11 lose your life, and I shall lose my place, 
My mistress all, for that half-girlish face. 

CLXXII. 
" Had it but been for a stout cavalier 

Of twenty-five or thirty — (come, make haste) 
But for a child, what piece of work is here ! 

I really, madam, wonder at your taste — 
(Come, sir, get in) — my master must be near. 

There, fcr the present at the least he 's fast, 
And, if we can but till the morning keep 
Oiir counsel — (Juan, mind you must not sleep)." 
3B 



CLXXIII. 

Now, Don Alfonso entering, but alone, 
Closed the oration of the trusty maid : 

She loiter'd, and he told her to be gone, 
An order somewhat sullenly obey'd ; 

However, present remedy was none, 
And no great good seem'd answer'd if she stay' J ' 

Regarding both with slow and sidelong view, 

She snuff 'd the candle, curtsied, and withdrew. 

CLXXI V. 

Alfonso paused a minute — then begun 

Some strange excuses for his late proceeding ; 

He would not justify what he had done, 
To say the best, it was extreme ill-breeding : 

But there were ample reasons for it, none 
Of which he specified in this his pleading : 

His speech was a fine sample, on the whole, 

Of rhetoric, which the learn'd call " rigviaiole." 

CLXXV. 

Julia said nought ; though all the while there rose 
A ready answer, which at once enables 

A matron, who her husband's foible knows, 
By a few timely words to turn the tables, 

Which, if it does not silence, still must pose, 
Even if it should comprise a pack of fables ; 

'T is to retort with firmness, and when he 

Suspects with one, do you reproach with three. 

CLXX VI. 

Julia, in fact, had tolerable grounds, 

Alfonso's loves with Inez were well known ; 
But whether 'twas that one's own guilt confounds— 

But that can't be, as has been often shown ; 
A lady with apologies abounds : 

It might be that her silence sprang alone 
From delicacy to Don Juan's ear, 
To whom she knew his mother's fame was dear. 

CLXXVII. 
There might be one more motive, which makes two: 

Alfonso ne'er to Juan had alluded, 
Mcntion'd his jealousy, but never who 

Had been the happy lover, he concluded, 
Conceal'd amongst his premises; 'tis true, 

His mind the more o'er this its mystery brooJea , 
To speak of Inez now were, one may sav, 
Like throwing Juan in Alfonso's way. 

CLXX VIII. 
A hint, in tender cases, is enough ; 

Silence is best, besides there is a tact 
(That modern phrase appears to me sad stuff, 

But it will serve to keep my verse compact) 
Which i<eeps, whin puah'd by questions rather rou^n 

A lady always distant from the fact — 
The charming creatures lie with such a gracrf, 
There's nothing so becoming to the face. 

CLXXIX. 
They blush, and we believe them ; at least I 

Have always done so; 'tu of no great use, 
In any case, attempting a reply, 

For then their eloquence grows quite profuse, 
And when at length tiny 're out of breath, they sigh. 

And cast theii languid eyes down, and let loose 
A tear or two, and then wc make it up ; 
And then — and then — and then — sit down and sun 



574 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO I. 



CLXXX. 

Alfonso closed his speech, and begg'd her pardon, 
Which Julia half withheld, and then half granted, 

And laid conditions, he thought, very hard on, 
Denying several little things he wanted : 

lie stood, like Adam, lingering near his garden, 
Willi useless penitence perplex' d and haunted, 

Beseeching she no further would refuse, 

When lo ! he stumbled o'er a pair of shoes. 

CLXXXI. 

A pair of shoes! — what then? not much, if they 
Are such as fit with lady's feet, but these 

(No one can tell how much I grieve to say) 
Were masculine : to see them and to seize 

Was but a moment's act. — Ah ! well-a-day ! 
My teeth begin to chatter, my veins freeze — 

Alfonso first examined well their fashion, 

And then flew out into another passion. 

CLXXXII. 

He left the room for his relinquish'd sword, 

And Julia instant to the closet flew ; 
41 Fly, Juan, fly ! for Heaven's sake — not a word — 

The door is open — you may yet slip through 
The passage you so often have explored — 

Here is the garden-key — fly — fly — adieu ! 
Hasxe — haste ! — I hear Alfonso's hurrying feet — 
Day has not broke — there 's no one in the street." 

CLXXXIII. 
Nov.e can say that this was not good advice, 

The only mischief was, it came too late ; 
Of all experience 't is the usual price, 

A sort of income-tax laid on by fate : 
Juan had reach'd the room-door in a trice, 

And might have done so by the garden-gate, 
But met Alfonso in his dressing-gown, 
Who threaten'd death — so Juan knock'd him down. 

CLXXXI V. 
Dire was the scuffle, and out went the light, 

Antonia cried out "Rape!" and Julia "Fire!" 
But not a servant stirr'd to aid the fight. 

Alfonso, pommell'd to his heart's desire, 
Swore lustily he 'd be revenged this night ; 

And Juan, too, blasphemed an octave higher ; 
His blood was up ; though young, he was a Tartar, 
And not at all disposed to prove a martyr. 

CLXXXV. 
Alfonso's sword had dropp'd ere he could draw it, 

And they continued battling hand to hand, 
For Juan very luckily ne'er saw it ; 

His temper not being under great command, 
If at that moment he had chanced to claw it, 

Alfonso's days had not been in the land 
Much longer. — Think of husbands', lovers' lives 
And how you may be doubly widows — wives! 

CLXXX VI. 
Alfonso grappled to detain the foe, 

And Juari throttled him to get away, 
And blood ('twas from the nose) began to flow ; 

At last, as they more faintly wrestling lay, 
Juan contrived to give an awkward blow, 

And then his only garment quite gave way ; 
Ho fled, like Joseph, leaving it — but there, 
I doubt, all likeness ends between the pair. 



CLXXXVII. 

Lights came at length, and men and maids, who found 
An awkward spectacle their eyes before ; 

Antonia in hysterics, Julia swoon'd, 
Alfonso leaning, breathless, by the door ; 

Some half-torn drapery scatter'd on the ground, 
Some blood, and seveial footsteps, but no more: 

Juan the gate gain'd, turn'd the key about, 

And, hking not the inside, lock'd the out. 

CLXXXvm. 

Here ends this Canto. — Need I sing or say, 
How Juan, naked, favour'd by the night 

(Who favours what she should not), found his way 
And reach'd his home in an unseemly plight .' 

The pleasant scandal which arose next day, 

The nine days' wonder which was brought lo light, 

And how Alfonso sued for a divorce, 

Were in the English newspapers, of course. 

CLXXXIX. 

If you would like to see the whole proceedings, 
The depositions, and the cause at full, 

The names of all the witnesses, the pleadings 
Of counsel to nonsuit or to annul, 

There 's more than one edition, and the readings 
Are various, but they none of them are dull, 

The best is that in short-hand, ta'en by Gurney, 

Who to Madrid on purpose made a journey. 

CXC. 

But Donna Inez, to divert the train 

Of one of the most circulating scandals 
That had for centuries been known in Spain, 

At least since the retirement of the Vandals, 
First vow'd (and never had she vow'd in vain) 

To Virgin Mary several pounds of dandles ; 
And then, by the advice of some old ladies, 
She sent her son to be shipp'd off from Cadiz. 

CXCI. 
She had resolved that he should travel through 

All European climes by land or sea, 
To mend his former morals, and get new, 

Especially in France and Italy, 
(At least this is the thing most people do v y . 

Julia was sent into a convent ; she 
Grieved, but perhaps, her feelings may be bettci 
Shown in the following copy of her letter: 

CXCII. 
" They tell me 't is decided, you depart : 

'T is wise — 't is well, but not the less a pain 
I have no further claim on your young heart, 

Mine is the victim, and would be again : 
To love too much has been the only art 

I used ; — I write in haste, and if a stain 
Be on this sheet, 't is not what it appears — 
My eyeballs burn and throb, but have no tears 

CXCIH. 
" I loved, I love you ; for this love have lost 

State, station, heaven, mankind's, mv own esiv- n 
And yet cannot regret what it hath cost, 

So dear is still the memory of that dream ; 
Yet, if I name my guilt, 'tis not to boast, — 

None can deem harshlier of me than I deem . 
I trace this scrawl because I cannot rest — 
I've nothing to reproach or to request. 



CANTO I. 



DON JUAN. 



Mb 



CXCIV. 
"Man's love is of man's life a thing apart, 

'T is woman's whole existence; man may range 
The court, camp, church, the vessel, and the mart ; 

Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange 
Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart, 

And few there are whom these cannot estrange: 
Men have all these resources, we but one — 
To love again, and be again undone. 

exev. 

" You will proceed in pleasure and in pride, 
Beloved and loving many ; all is o'er 

For me on earth, except some years to hide 
My shame and sorrow deep in my heart's core: 

These I could bear, but cannot cast aside 
The passion, which still rages as before, 

And so farewell — forgive me, love mc — No, 

That word is idle now — but let it go. 

CXCVI. 

"Mv breast has been all weakness, is so yet; 

Hut still, I think, I can collect my mind ; 
My blood still rushes where my spirit 's set, 

As roll the waves bofore the settled wind ; 
RIy heart is feminine, nor can forget — 

To all, except one image, madly blind : 
So shakes trie needle, and so stands the pole, 
As vibrates my fond heart to my fix'd soul. 

CXCVII. 
" I have no more to say, but linger still, 

And dare not set my seal upon this sheet, 
And yet I may as well the task fulfil, 

My misery can scarce be more complete : 
I had not lived till now, could sorrow kill ; 

Death shuns the wretch who fain the blow would meet. 
And I must even survive this last adieu, 
And bear with life, to love and pray for you!" 

exevm. 

This note was written upon gilt-edged paper, 

With a neat little crow-quill, slight and new: 
Her small white hand could hardly reach the taper, 

It trembled as magnetic needles do, 
And yet she did not let one tear escape her ; 

The seal a sun-flower ; " Kite vuus suit yartout" 
The motto cut upon a white cornelian, 
The wax was superfine, its hue vermilion. 

CXCIX. 
This was Don Juan's earliest scrape ; but whether 

1 shall proceed with his adventure is 
Dependent on the public altogether: 

We '11 see, however, what they say to this 
(Their favour in an author's cap 's a feather, 

And no great mischief 's done by their caprice); 
And, if their approbation we experience, 
Perhaps they '11 have some more about a year hence. 

CC. 
My poem 's epic, and is meant to be 

Divided in twelve books; each book containing, 
Wi'h love, and war, a heavy gale at sea, 

A list of ships, and captains, anil kings reigning, 
New characters ; the episodes are three : 

A panorama view of hell's in training, 
After the style of Virgil and of Homer, 
So ihat my name of Epic 's no misnomer. 



CCI. 

All these things will be specified in time, 
With strict regard to Aristotle's Rules, 

The vade mecum of the true sublime, 

Which makes so many poets and some fools; 

Prose poets like blank-verse — I 'm fond of rhyme- 
Good workmen never quarrel with their tools ; 

I 've got new mythological machinery, 

And very handsome supernatural scenery. 

ecu. 

There 's only one slight difference between 
Me and my epic brethren gone before, 

And here the advantage is my own, I ween, 
(Not that I have not several merits more); 

But this will more peculiarly be seen ; 
They so embellish, that 'tis quite a bore 

Their labyrinth of fables to thread through, 

Whereas this story 's actually true. 

CCIII. 
If any person doubt it, I appeal 

To history, tradition, and to facts, 
To newspapers, whose truth all know and feel, 

To plays in five, and operas in three acts ; 
All these confirm my statement a good deal, 

But that which more completely faith exacts 
Is, that myself, and several now in Seville, 
Saw Juan's last elopement with the devil. 

CCIV. 
If evor I should condescend to prose, 

I '11 write poetical commandments, which 
Shall supersede beyond all doubt all those 

That went before ; in these I shall enrich 
My text with many things that no one knows, 

And carry precept to the highest pitch: 
I '11 call the work " Longinus o'er a Bottle, 
Or, Every Poet his own Aristotle." 

ccv. 

Thou shalt believe in Milton, Dryden, Pope : 

Thou shalt not set up Words worth, Coleridge, Southey, 
Because the first is crazed beyond all hope, 

The second drunk, the third so quaint and mouthey 
With Crabbe it may be difficult to cope, 

And Campbell's Hippocrene is somewhat drouthy : 
Thou shalt not steal from Samuel Rogers, nor 
Commit — flirtation with the muse of Moore: 

CCVI. 
Thou shalt not covet Mr. Sotheby's Muse, 

His Pegasus, nor anything that's his: 
Thou shalt not hear false witness, like "the Blues," 

(There's one, at least, is very fond of this): 
Thou shalt not write, in short, but what I choose : 

This is true criticism, and you may kiss — 
Exactly as you please, or not — the rod, 
But if you don't, I'll lay it on, by G — d! 

CCVII. 
If any person should presume to assert 

The story is not moral, first, I pray 
That they will not cry out beforo they 're hurt , 

Then that they '11 read it o'er again, and say 
(But, doubtless, nobody will be so pert) 

That this is not a moral tale, though gay ; 
Besides, in canto twelfth, I mean to show 
The very place where wkked people go. 



57G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO 1. 



CCVIII. 

If, after all, there should be some so blind 
To their own go >< 1 this warning to despise, 

Led by some tortuosity of mind, 

Not to believe my verse and their own eyes, 

Ami cry that they "the moral cannot find," 
I tell him, if a clergyman, he lies — 

Should captains the remark, or critics, make, 

They also lie too — under a mistake. 

CCIX. 
The public approbation I expect, 

And be« * e y '" t:lke rn y "' or '' auoul tMe moral, 
Which I with their amusement will connect 

(So children cutting teeth receive a coral) J 
Meantime, they '11 doubtless please to recollect 

My epical pretensions t<> the laurel: 
For fear some prudish reader should grow skittish, 
I've bribed my grandmother's review — the British. 

ccx. 

I sent it in a letter to the editor, 

Who thank'd me duly by return of post— 

1 'm for a handsome article his creditor ; 
Yet, if my gentle Muse he please to roast, 

And break a promise after having made it her, 
Denying the receipt of what it cost, 

And smear his page with gall instead of honey, 

All I can say is — that he had the money. 

CCXI. 

I think that with this holy new alliance 

I may insure the public, and defy 
AH other magazines of art or science, 

Daily, or monthly, or three-monthly ; I 
Have not essay'd to multiply their clients, 

Because they tell me 't were in vain to try, 
And that the Edinburgh Review' and Quarterly 
Treat a dissenting author very martyrly. 

CCXII. 

" Non ego hoe ferrem cnlida juventa 

Cunsulc Planeo," Horace said, and so 
Say I, by which q_.otation there is meant a 

Hint that some six or seven good years ago 
'Long ere I dreamt of dating from the Brenta), 

I was most ready to return a blow, 
And would not brook at all this sort of thing 
In my hot youth — when George the Third was King. 

CCXIII. 
But now, at thirty years, my hair is gray — 

(I wonder what it will be like at forty ? 

I ■ i.'M of a peruke the other day,) 

■ iieart is not much greener ; and, in short, I 
Have squander'd my whole summer while 'twas May, 

And feel no more the spirit to retort ; I 
Have spent my life, both interest and principal, 
And deem not, what I deem'd, my soul invincible. 

CCXIV. 
No more — no more — Oh ! never more on me 

The freshness of the heart can fall like dew, 
Which out of all the lovely things we see 

Extracts emotions beautiful and new, 
Hived in our bosoms like the bag o' the bee : 

Think's" thou the honey with those objects grew ? 
Alas ! 't was not in them, but in thy power, 
'f 3 double even the sweetness of a flower. 



CCXV. 

No more — no more — Oh! never more, my heart, 
Canst thou be my sole world, my universe ! 

Once all in all, but now a thing apart, 

Thou canst not be my blessing or my curse* 

The illusion 's gone f >r ever, and thou art 
lii cneible, I trust, hut none the worse ; 

And in thy stead I 've got a deal of judgment, 

Though Heaven knows how it ever found a lodgment. 

CCXVT. 

My days of love are over — me no more' 

The charms of maid, wife, and still less of widow, 

Can make the fool of which they made hi: lore — 
In short, I must not lead the life I did do: 

The credulous hope of mutual minds is o'er ; 
The copious use of claret is forbid, too ; 

So, for a good old gentlemanly vice, 

I think I must take up with avarice. 

CCXVII. 

Ambition was my idol, which was broken 

Before the shrines of Sorrow and of Pleasure ; 

And the two last have left me many a tok< n 
O'er which reflection may be made at leisure : 

Now, like Friar Bacon's brazen head, I 've spoken, 
"Time is, time was, time's past," a chymic treasure 

Is glittering youth, which I have spent netimes — 

My heart in passion, and my head on rhymes. 

CCXV1II. 

What is the end of fame? 'tis but to fill 
A certain portion of uncertain paper; 

Some liken it to climbing up a hill, 

Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in vapour; 

For this men write, speak, preach, and heroes kill ; 
And bards burn what they call their "midnight taper," 

To have, when the original is .dust, 

A name, a wretched picture, and worse bust. 

CCXIX. 

What are the hopes ol man? old Egypt's king, 

Cheops, erected the first pyramid 
And largest, thinking it was just the thing 

To keep his memory whole, and mummy hid ; 
But somebody or other, rummaging, 

Burglariously broke his coffin's lid ; 
Let not a monument give you or me hopes, 
Since not a pinch of dust remains of Cheops. 

cexx. 

But I, being fond of true philosophy, 

Say very often to myself, " Alas ! 
All things that have been born were born to die, 

And fiesh (which death mows down to hay) is grass; 
You've pass'd your youth not so unpleasantly, 

And if you had it o'er again — 't would pass — 
So thank your stars that matters are no wors«>, 
And read your Bible, sir, and mind your purse." 

CCXXI. 
But f>r the present, gentle reader! and 

Still gentler purchaser! the bard — that's 1^ 
Must, with permission, shake you by the hand, 

And so your humble servant, and good bye ! 
We meet again, if we should understand 

Each other; and if not, I shall not try 
Your patience further than by this short sample- 
|T were well if others follow'd my example. 



CANTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



57 



CCXXII 

•'Go, tittle book, from this my solitude ! 

I cast thee on the waters, go thy ways ! 
And if, as I believe, thy vein be good, 

The world will find ihee after many days." 
When Southey 's read, and Wordswoith understood, 

I can't help putting in my claim to praise — 
The four first rhymes are Southey's, everv line : 
For God's sake, reader ! take them not for mine. 



CANTO II. 



i. 

Oh ye! who teach the ingenuous youth of nations 
Holland, France, England, Germany, or Spain, 

I pray ye tlog them upon all occasions, 

It mends their morals ; never mind the pain : 

The best of mothers and of educations. 
In Juan's case, were but employ'd in vain, 

Since in a way, that 's rather of the oddest, he 

Became divested of his native modesty. 

II. 

Had he but been placed at a public school, 

In the third form, or even in the fourth, 
His daily task had kept his fancy cool, 

At least had he been nurtured in the north; 
Spain may prove an exception to the rule, 

But then exceptions always prove its worth — 
A lad of sixteen causing a divorce 
Puzzled his tutors very much, of course. 

III. 
I can't say that it puzzles me at all, 

If all tilings be consider'd : first, there was 
His lady mother, mathematical, 

A , never mind ; his tutor, an old ass ; 

A pretty woman — (that's quite natural, 

Or else the thing had hardly come to pass); 
A husband rather old, not much in unity 
Willi his young wife — a lime, and opportunity. 

IV. 
Well — well, the world must turn upon its axis, 

And all mankind turn with it, heads or tails, 
And live and die, make love, and pay our taxes, 

And as the veering wind shifts, shift our sails ; 
The king commands us, and the doctor quacks us, 

The priest instructs, and so our life exhales. 
A little breath, love, wine, ambition, fame, 
Fighting, devotion, dust — perhaps a name. 

V. 
I said, that Juan had been sent to Cadiz— 

A pretty town, I recollect it well — 
'Tis there the mart of the colonial trade is 

(Or was, before Peru lcarn'd to rebel); 
And such sweet girls — I mean such graceful ladies, 

Their very walk would make your bosom swell ; 
I can't describe it, though so much it strike, 
Nor liken it — I never saw the like : 
3 b2 73 



VI. 
An Arab horse, a stately Stag, a barb 
New broke, a cami leopard, a gazelle, 

No — none of these mil do; — and then their garb! 

Thru- veil end petticoat — Al is ! to dwell 
Upon such things would very near absorb 

A canto — then their feet an I ;:><!. s ! — well, 
Thank Heaven I've gol no metaphor quite ready, 
(And so, my sober Musi — come let's be steady — 

VII. 

Chaste Muse! — well, if. you must, vou mus*) — the veil 
Thrown back a moment with the glancing hand, 

While Llie o'erpowering eye, that turns you pale, 
Flashes into the heart: — all sunny laud 

Of love! when 1 forget you, may I fail 

To say me prayers — but never was th re plannM 

A dress through which the eyes give such a volley, 
Excepting the Venetian FazziOli. 

VIII. 
But to our tale : the Donna Inez sent 

Her son to Cadiz only to embark; 
To stay there had not answer'd her intent, 

But why 1 — we leave the reader in the dark — 
'T was for a voyage that the young man was meant, 

As if a Spanish ship were Noah's ark, 
To wean him from the wickedness of earth, 
And send him like a dove of promise forth. 

IX. 

Don Juan bade his valet pack his tilings 

According to direction, then received 
A lecture and some money: for four springs 

He was to travel ; and, though Inez grieved 
(As every kind of parting has its stings), 

She hoped he would improve — perhaps believed: 
A letter, 100, she gave (he never read it) 
Of good advice — and two or three of credit. 

X. 

In the mean time, to pass her hours away, 

Brave Inez now set up a Sunday-school 
For naughty children, who would rather play 

(Like truant rogues) the devil or tie' fool ; 
Infants of three years old were taught that day, 

Dunces were whipp'd or set upon a stool: 
The great success of Juan's education 
Spurr'd her to teach another generation. 

XI. 
Juan embark'd — the ship got under weigh, 

The wind was fair, the water passing rough ; 
A devil of a sea rolls in that bay, 

As I, who've cross'd it oft, know well enough" 
And, standing upon deck, the dashing spray 

Flies in one's face, and makes it weather-tough 
And there to stood to take, and take again, 

His first — perhaps his last — farewell of Spain. 

XII. 

I can't but say it is an awkward sight 

To see one's nat'n ding through 

The growing waters — it unmans one quite; 
Especially when life is rather now : 

I recollect Great Britain's ooast looks white 
But almost every other country's blue, 

When, gazing i'ii them, mystified hv distance, 

We enter on our nautical existence 



573 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CA.XTO 11 



XIII. 

So Juan stood bewilder'd on the deck: 

The wind sung, cordage strain'd, and sailors swore, 

And the ship crcak'd, the town became a specie, 
From which away so fair and fast they bore. 

The best oi' remedies is a beef-steak 
Against sea-sickness ; try it, sir, before 

Von sneer, and I assure you this is true, 

For 1 have found it answer — so may you. 

XIV. 

Don Juan stood, and, gazing from the stern, 
Beheld his native Spain receding far : 

First partings form a lesson hard to learn, 
Even nations feel this when they go to war ; 

There is a sort of une.xpress'd concern, 

A kind of shoek that sets one's heart ajar : 

At leaving even the most unpleasant people 

And places, one keeps looking at the steeple. 

XV. 

But Juan had got many things to leave — 
His mother, and a mistress, and no wife, 

So that he bad much better cause to grieve 
Than many persons more advanced in life; 

And, if we now and then a sigh must heave 
At quitting even those we quit in strife, 

No doubt wo weep for those the heart endears — 

That ts, till deeper grids congeal our tears. 

XVI. 

So Juan wept, as wept the captive Jews 
By Babel's water, still remembering Sion : 

I 'd weep, but mine is not a weeping muse, 

And such light griefs are not a thing to die on ; 

Young men should travel, if but to amuse 

Themselves ; and the next time their servants tic on 

Behind their carriages their new portmanteau, 

Perhaps it may be lined with this my canto. 

XVII. 

And Juan wept, and much he sigh'd, and thought, 

While his salt tears dropt into the salt sea, 
" Sweets to the sweet ;" (I like so much to quote: 

You must excuse this extract, 't is where she, 
The Queen of Denmark, for Ophelia brought 

Flowers to the grave,) and sobbing often, he 
Reflected on his present situation, 
And seriously resolved on reformation. 

XVIII. 
" Farewell, my Spain ! a long farewell !" he cried, 

»' Perhaps I may revisit thee no more, 
B.it die, as many an exiled heart hath died, 

Of its own thirst to see again thy shore: 
Farewell, where Guadalquivir's waters glide! 

Farewell, my mother ! and, since all is o'er, 
Farewell, too, dearest Julia!" — (here he drew 
Her letter out again, and read it through.) 

XIX. 
"And oh! if e'er I should forget, I swear- 
But that 's impossible, and cannot be — 
Sooner shall this blue ocean melt to air, 
Sooner shall earth resolve itself to sea, 
Thin I resign thine image, oh! my fair I 
Or think of any thing, excepting thee ; 
A mind diseased no remedy can physic" — 
Here Jie ship gave a lurch, and he grew sea-sick). 



XX. 

" Sooner shall heaven kiss earth — (here he fell sicker^ 
Oh, Julia! what is every other woe! — 

(For Cod's sake, let me have a glass of liquor — 
Pedro! Battista! help me down below), 

Julia, mv love! — (you rascal, Pedro, quicker) 

Oh, Julia! — (this cursed vessel pitches so) — 
Beloved Julia! hear me still beseeching— 

(Hen; he grew inarticulate with retching). 

XXI. 

He felt that chilling heaviness of heart, 

Or rather Btomach, which, alas ! attends, 
Beyond the best apothecary's art, 

The loss of love, the treachery of frien Is, 
Or death of those we doat on, when a part 

Of us dies with them, as each (bnd hope ends : 
No doubt he would have been much more pathetic, 

But the sea acted as a strong emetic. 

XXII. 
Love 's a capricious power ; I 've known it hold 

Out through a fever caused by its own heat, 
But be much puzzled by a cough anil cold, 
And find a quinsy very hard to treat ; 

i all noble maladies he's bold, 
But vulgar illnesses don't like to meet, 
Nor that a sneeze should interrupt his sigh; 
Nor inflammations redden his blind eye. 

XXIII. 

But worst of all is nausea, or a pain 

About the lower region of the bowels ; 
Love, who heroically breathes a vein, 

Shrinks from the application of hot towels, 
And purgatives are dangerous to his reign, 

Sea-sickness death: his love was perfect, how e.si 
Could Juan's passion, while the billows roar, 
Resist his stomach, ne'er at sea before? 

XXIV. 
The ship, called the most holy "Trinidada," 

Was steering duly for the port Leghorn ; 
For there the Spanish family Moncada 

Were settled long ere Juan's sire was born: 
They were relations, and for them he had a 

Letter of introduction, which the morn 
Of bis departure had been sent him by 
His Spanish friends for those in Italy. 

XXV. 
His suite consisted of three servants and 

A tutor, the licentiate Pedrillo, 
Who several languages did understand, 

But now lay sick and speechless on his pillow, 
And, rocking in his hammock, longM tor land, 

His head-ache being increased by every billow; 
And the waves oozing through the port-hole made 
His birth a little damp, and him afraid. 

XXVI. 
'T was not without some reason, for the wind 

Increased at night, until it blew a gale ; 
And though 't was nol much to a naval mind, 

Some landsmen would have look'd a little pale, 
For sailors arc, in fact, a different kind: 
At sunset they began to take, in sail, 
For the sky show'd it would come on to blow, 
And carry away, perhaps, a mesi or so. 



CANTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



579 



XXVII. 

At one o'clock, the wind with sudden shift 

Threw the ship right into the trough of the sen, 
Which struck her aft, and made an awkward rift, 

Started the stern-post, also shatter'd tiic 
Whole of her stem-frame, and, ere she could lift 

Herself from out her present jeopardy, 
The rudder tore away: 'twas time to sound 
The pumps, ana there were four feet water found. 

XXVIII. 
One gang of peopie insiantlv was put 

Upon the pumps, and the remainder set 
To get up part of the cargo, and wh.it not, 

Rut they could not come at the leak as yet; 
At last they did get at it really, hut 

Still their salvation was an even bet: 
The water rush'd through in a way quite puzzling, 
While they thrust sheets, shirts, jackets, bales of muslin, 

XXIX. 

•Into the opening; but all such ingredients 

Would have been vain, and they must have gone down 

Despite of all their efforts and expedients, 

But for the pumps: I 'm glad to make them known 

To all the brother-tars who may have need hence, 
For fifty tons of water were upthrown 

By them per hour, and they had all been undone 

But for the maker, 3Ir. Man, of London. 

XXX. 

As day advanced, the weather seem'd to abate, 
And then the leak they reckon'd to reduce, 

And keep the ship ailoat, though three feet yet 
Kept two hand and one chain pump still in use. 

The wind blew fresh asain : as it grew late 

A squall came on, and, while some guns broke lnnse, 

A gust — which all descriptive power transcends — 

Laid with one blast the ship on her beam-ends. 

XXXI. 

There she lay motionless, and seem'd upset : 
The water left the hold, and wash'd the decks, 

And made a scene men do not soon forget; 
For they remember battles, fires, and wrecks, 

Or any other thing that brings regret, 

Or breaks their hopes, or hearts, or heads, or necks 

Thus drownings are much talk'd of by the divers 

And swimmers who may chance to be survivors. 

XXXII. 

Immediately the masts were cut away, 

Both main and mizen ; first the mizen went, 

The main-mast foilow'd : but the ship still lay 
Like a mere log, and baffled our intent 

Foremast and bowsprit were cut down, and they 
Eased her at last (although we never meant 

To part with all till every hope was blighted), 

And then with violence the old ship righted. 

XXXIII. 

It may be easily supposed, while this 

Was going on >ome people were unquiet ; 

That passengers would find it much amiss 

To lose their lives, as well as spoil their diet ; 

That even the able seamen, deeming his 
Days nearly o'er, might be disposed to riot, 

As upon such occasions tars will ask 

For grog, and sometimes drink rum from the cask. 



XXXIV. 

There's nought, no doubt, so much the spirit calms 

As rum and true religion; thus it was, 
Some plunder'd, some drank spirits, some suns psalms, 

The high wind made the treble, and as Ii.l-s 
The hoarse harsh waves kept time; fright cured the 
qualms 

Of all tin; luckless landsmen's sea-sick maws: 
Strange s tun Is of wailing, blasphemy, devotion, 
Clamour'd in chorus to the roaring ocean. 

XXXV. 
Perhaps more mischief had been done, but for 

Our Juan, who, with sense beyond his years, 
Got to the fore 

It with a pair of pisiols ; and their fears, 
As if Death were more dreadful by his door 

Of fire than water, spile of i>;.'!;s an , 

Kept still aloof the crew, who, ere they sunk, 
Thought it would be becoming to die drunk. 

XXXVI. 
"Give us more grog," they cried, " for it will be 

All one an hour hence." Juan answer'd, " No ' 
'T is true that death awaits both you anil mo, 

But let us die like men, not sink below 
Like brutes:" — and thus his dangerous post kept he, 

An 1 none liked to anticipate the blow ; 
And even Pedrillo, his most reverend tutor, 
Was for some rum a disappointed suitor. 

XXXVII. 
The good old gentleman was quite a. r 

And made a loud and pious lamentation; 
I all his sins, and made a last 

Irrevocable vow of reformation ; 
Nothing should tempt him more (this peril past) 

To quit his academic occupation, 
In cloislei-s of the classic Salamanca, 
To follow Juan's wake like Sancho Panca. 

XXXVIII. 
But now there came a flash of hope once more ; 

Day broke, and the wind lull'd : the masts were gone. 
The leak increased ; shoals round her, but no shore, 

The vessel swam, yet still she held her own. 
They tried the pumps again, and though before 

Their desperate etforts seem'd all useless grown, 
A glimpse of sunshine set some hands to bale— 
The stronger pump'd, the weaker thrumm'd a sail. 

XXXIX. 
Under the vessel's keel the sail was pass'd, 

And for the moment it had some effect ; 
But with a leak, and not a stick of mast 

Nor rag of canvas, what could they expect ? 
But still 't is best to struggle to the last, 

'T is never too late to be wholly wreck'd: 
And though 'tis true that man can only die once, 
'T is not so pleasant in the Gulf of Lyons. 

XL. 
There winds and waves had hurl'd them, and from thenr.% 

Without their will, they carried them away: 
Fur they were forced with steering to dispense, 

And never had as yet a quiet day 
On which they might repose, or even commenor 

A jury-mast or rudder, or could say 
The ship would swim an hour, which, by good uck. 
Still swam — though not exactly UVo a duck. 



A80 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO I) 



XLI. 
The wind, in (act, perhaps was rather less, 

But the ship labour'd so, they scarce could hope 
To weather out much longer ; the distress 

Was also great with which they had to cope, 
For waul uf water, and their solid mess 

Was scant enough ; in vain the telescope 
Was used — nor sail nor shore appear'd in sight, 
Nought but the heavy sea, and coming night. 

XLII. 

Again the weather threaten'd, — again blew 
A gale, and in the fere and after hold 

Water appear'd ; yet, though the people knew 
All this, the most were patient, and some bold, 

Until the chains and leathers were worn through 
Of all our pumps: — a wreck complete she roll'd, 

At mercy of the waves, whose mercies are 

Like human beings during civil war. 

XLIII. 
Then came the carpenter, at last, with tears 

In his rough eyes, and told the captain he 
Could do no more ; he was a man in years, 

And long had voyaged through many a stormy sea, 
And if he wept at length, they were not fears 

That made his eyelids as a woman's be, 
But he, poor fellow, had a wife and children, 
Two things for dying people cmite bewildering. 

XLIV. 

The ship was evidently settling now 

Fast by the head ; and, all distinction gone, 

Some went to prayers again, and made a vow 
Of candles to their saints — but there were none 

To pay them with ; and some look'd o'er the bow ; 
Some hoisted out the boats : and there was one 

That begg'd Pedrillo for an absolution, 

Who told him to be damn'd — in his confusion. 

XLV. 

Some lash'd them in their hammocks, some put on 

Their best clothes as if going to a fair ; 
Some cursed the day on which they saw the sun, 

And gnash'd their teeth, and, howling, tore their hair ; 
And others went on, as they had begun, 

Getting the boats out, being well aware 
That a tight boat will live in a rough sea, 
Unless with breakers close beneath her lee. 

XLVI. 
The worst of all was, that in their condition, 

Having been several days in great distress, 
'T was difficult to get out such provision 

As now might render their long suffering less : 
Men, even when dying, dislike inanition ; 

Their stock was damaged by the weather's stress: 
Two casks of biscuit and a keg of butter 
Were all that could be thrown into the cutter. 

XLVII. 
But in the long-boat they contrived to stow 

Some pounds of bread, though injured by the wet ; 
Water, a twenty-gallon cask or so; 

Six Casks of wine ; and they contrived to get 
r\ portion of their beef up from below, 

And with a piece of pork, moreover, met, 
But -scarce enough to serve them for a luncheon ; 
Thbli ihcre was rum, eight gallons in a puncheon. 



XLVIII. 

The other boats, the yawl and pinnace, had 
Been stove in the beginning of the gale ; 

And the long-boat's condition was but bad, 
As there were but two blankets f >r a sail, 

And one oar for a mast, which a young lurd 
Threw m by good luck over the ship's rail ; 

And two boats could not hold, far less be stored, 

To save one half the people then on board. 

XLIX. 

'T was twilight, for the sunless day went down 
Over the waste of waters; like a veil, 

Which, if withdrawn, would but disclose the frown 
Of one whose hate is mask'd but to ;i 

Thus to their hop< less eyes the night was shown, 
And grimly darkled o'er their faces pale 

And the dun desolate deep; twelve days had Fear 

Been their familiar, and now Death was here. 

L. 

Some trial had been making at a raft, 
With little hope in such a rolling sea< 

A sort of thing at which one would have laugh'd, 
If any laughter at such times could be', 

Unless with people who too much have quaff'd, 
And have a kind of wild and horrid glee, 

Half epilcptical, and half hysterical : 

Their preservation would have been a miracle. 

LI. 

At half-past eight o'clock, booms, hen-coops, spars, 
And all things, for a chance, had been Cast loose, 

That still could keep afloat the struggling tarS, 
For yet they strove, although of no great use: 

There was no light in heaven but a few stars ; 
The boats put off o'ercrowded with their crews ; 

She gave a heel, and then a lurch to port, 

And, going down head-foremost — sunk, in short. 

LII. 

Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell ! 

Then shrick'd the timid, and stood still the brave; 
Then some leap'd overboard with dreadful yell, 

As eager to anticipate their grave ; 
And the sea yawn'd around her like a hell, 

And down she suck'd with her the whirling wave. 
Like one who grapples with his enemy, 
And strives to strangle him before he die. 

tin. 

And first one universal shriek there rush'd, 

Louder than the loud ocean, like a crash 
Of echoing thunder ; and then all was hush'd, 

Save the wild wind and the remorseless dash 
Of billows ; but at intervals there gush'd, 

Accompanied with a convulsive splash, 
A solitary shriek — the bubbling cry 
Of some strong swimmer in his agony. 

LIV. 
The boats, as stated, had got off before, 

And in them crowded several of the crew; 
And yet their present hope was hardly more 

Than what it had been, for so strong it blew, 
There was slight chance of reaching any shore ; 

And then they wcic too many, though so few- 
Nine in the cutter, thirty in the boat. 
Were counted in them when they got afloat. 



CANTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



581 



LV. 

All the rest perish'd ; near two hundred souls 
Had left their hodies ; and, what 's worse, alas ! 

When over Catholics the ocean rolls, 

They must wait several weeks, before a mass 

Takes otT one peck of purgatorial coals, 

Because, till people know what 's come to pass, 

They won't lay out their money on the dead — 

It costs three francs for every mass that 's said. 

LVI. 

Juan got into the long-boat, and there 
Contrived to hell) PedriUo to a place ; 

It seem'd as if they had exchanged their care, 
For Juan wore the magisterial face 

Which courage gives, while poor Pedrillo's pair 
Of eyes were crying for their owner's case ; 

Battista (though a name call'd shortly Tita) 

Was lost by getting at some aqua-vita. 

LVII. 

Pedro, his valet, too, he tried to save ; 

But the same cause, conducive to his loss, 
Left him so drunk, he jump'd into the wave, 

As o'er the cutter's edge he tried to cross, 
And so he found a wine-and-watery grave : 

They could not rescue him, although so close, 
Because the sea ran higher every minute, 
And for the boat — the crew kept crowding in it. 

LVI1I. 

A small old spaniel, — which had been Don Jose's, 

His father's, whom he loved, as ye may think, 
For on such things the memory reposes 

With tenderness, — stood howling on the brink, 
Knowing, (dogs have such intellectual Doses!) 

No doubt, the vessel was about to sink ; 
And Juan caught him up, and, ere he stepp'd 
OtT, threw him in, then after him he leap'd. 

LIX. 
He also stuff'd his money where he could 

About his person, and Pedrillo's too, 
Who let him do, in fact, whate'er he would, 

Not knowing what himself to say or do, 
As every rising wave his dread renew 'd ; 

But Juan, trusting they might still get thro"gh, 
And deeming there were remedies for any ill, 
Thus rc-cmbark'd his tutor and his spaniel. 

LX. 
'Twas a rough night, and blew so stiffly yet, 

That the sail was becahn'd between the seas, 
Though on the wave's high top too much to set, 

They dared not take it in for all the breeze ; 
Each sea curl'd o'er the stern, and kept them wet, 

And made them bale without a moment's i^ c, 
So that themselves as well as hopes were damp'd, 
And the pour little cutter quickly swamp'd. 

LXI. 

Nine souls more went in her: the long-boat still 

Kept above water, with an oar for i 
Two blankets stitch'd together, answering ill 

Instead of sail, were to the oar made fast ; 
Though every wave roll'd men icing to fill, 

And present peril all before surpassed, 
They grieved for those who perish'd with the culler, 
And also for the biscuit-casks and butter. 



LXII. 
The sun rose red and fiery, a sure sign 

Of the continuance of the gale : to run 
Before the sea, until it should grow line, 

Was all that fir the present could be done: 
A few tea-spoonfuls of their rum and wine 

Was served out to the people, who begun 
To (hint, and damaged bread wet through the bags, 
And most of them had little eloth.es but rags. 

LXIII. 

They counted thirty, crowded in a spare 
Which left scarce room for motion or exertion: 

their best to modi 
One half sate up, though nurnb'd with ibe immersion. 

While t'other bait' were laid down in their place, 
At watch ami watch j thus, shivering like the tertian 

Ague in its cold fit, they fill'd their boat, 

With nothing but the sky for a great-coat. 

LXIV. 

'T is very certain the desirfe of life 

Prolongs it ; this is obvious to physicians, 

When patients, neither plagued with friends nor wife, 
Survive through very desperate conditions, 

Because they still can hope, nor shines the knife 
Nor shears of Atropos before their visions : 

Despair of all recovery spoils longevity, 

And makes men's miseries of alarming brevity. 

LXV. 

'T is said that persons living on annuities 

Are longer lived than others, — God knows why, 
Unless to plague the grantors, — yet so true it is, 

That some, I really think, do never die ; 
Of any creditors the worst a Jew it is, 

And that's their mode of furnishing supply: 
In my young days they lent me cash that way, 
Which I found very troublesome to pay. 

LXVI. 
'Tis thus with people in an open boat, 

They live upon the love of life, and bear 
More than can be believed, or even thought, 

And stand, like rocks, the tempest's wear and tear; 
And hardship still has been the sailor's lot, 

Since Noah's ark went cruising here and there — 
She had a curious crew as well as cargo, 
Like the first old Greek privateer, the Argo. 

LXVII. 
But man is a carnivorous production, 

And must have meals, at least one meal a day • 
He cannot live, like woodcocks, upon suction, 

But, like the shark and tiger, must have prey: 
Although his anatomical construction 

Bears vegi tables in a grumbling way, 
Your labouring people think, beyond all question. 
Beef, veal, and mutt tion. 

LXYIII. 
it was with this our h 

For on tlio third day there came on a calm, 
And though at first their strength it might renew 

And, King on their weariness like balm, 

Lull'd them like turtles sleeping on the bW 
Of ocean, when they woke they fell a qualm. 

And fell all ravenouslyon their provision, 

I Instead of hoarding it with due precnkui 



>82 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO II. 



LXIX. 

The consequence was easily foreseen — 
They ate up all they had, a/id drank their wine, 

In spite of all remonstrances, and then 

On what, in fact, next day were they to dine? 

Th°y hoped the wind would rise, these foolish men ! 
And carry them to shore ; these hopes were fine, 

But, as they had but one oar, and that brittle, 

It would have been more wise to save their victual. 

LXX. 

The fourth day came, but not a breath of air, 
And ocean slumber' d like- an unwean'd child: 

The fifth day, and their boat lay floating there, 

The sea and sky were blue, ami clear, and mild — 

With their one oar (I wish they had had a pair) 
What could they do ? and hunger's rage grew wild : 

80 Juan's spaniel, spite of his entreating, 

Was kill'd, and portion'd out for present eating. 

LXX I. 

On the sixth day they fed upon his hide, 
And Juan, who had still refused, because 

The creature was his father's dog that died, 
Now feeling all the vulture in his jaws, 

With some remorse received (though first denied), 
As a great favour, one of the fore-paws, 

Which he divided with Pedrillo, who 

Devour'd it, longing for the other too. 

LXXII. 

The seventh day, and no wind — the burning sun 

Blister'd and scorch'd ; and, stagnant on the sea, 
They lay like carcasses ; and hope was none, 

Save in the breeze that came not ; savagely 
They glared upon each other — all was done, 

Water, and wine, and food, — and you might see 
The longings of the cannibal arise 
(Although they spoke not) in their wolfish eyes. 

LXXIII. 
At length one whisper'd his companion, who 

Whisper'd another, and thus it went round, 
And then into a hoarser murmur grew, 

An ominous, and wild, and desperate sound ; 
And when his comrade's thought each sufferer knew, 

'T «as but his own, suppress'd till now, he found : 
And out they spoke of lots for flesh and blood, 
And who should die to be his fellows' food. 

LXXIV. 
But ere they came to this, they that day shared 

Some leathern caps, and what remain'd of shoes ; 
And then they look'd around them, and despair'd, 

And none to be the sacrifice would choose ; 
At length the lots were torn up and prepare!, 

But of materials that must shock the muse — 
Having no paper, for the want of better, 
They took by force from Juan Julia's letter. 

LXXV. 
The lots were made, and mark'd, and mix'd, and handed 

In silent horror, and their distribution 
Lull'd even the savage hunger which demanded, 

J. ike the Promethean vulture, this pollution ; 
Nor.c in particular had sought or plann'd it, 

'T was nature gnaw'd them to this resolution, 
By which none were permitted to be neuter — 
And the lot fell on Juan's luckless tutor. 



LXXVI. 

He but requested to be bled to death : 

The surgeon had his instruments and bled 

Pedrillo, and so gently ebb'd his breath, 

You hardly could perceive when he was dead. 

as horn, a Catholic in faith, 
Like most in the belief in which they 're bred, 

And first a little crucifix he kiss'd, 

And then held out his jugular and wrist. 

LXXVII. 

The surgeon, as there was no other fee, 

Had his first choice of morsels for his pains; 

But being thirstiest at the moment, he 
Preferr'd a draught from the fast-flowing veins : 

Part was divided, part thrown in the sea, 
And such things as the entrails and the brains 

Regaled two sharks, who follow'd o'er the billow — 

The sailors ate the rest of poor Pedrillo. 

LXXVIII. 

The sailors ate him, all save three or four, 

Who were not quile so fond of animal food; 
To these was added Juan, who, before 

Refusing his own spaniel, hardly could 
Pee! now his appetite increased much more; 

'T was not to be expected that he should, 
Even in extremity of their disaster, 
Dine with them on his pastor and his master. 

LXXIX. 
'T was better that he did not ; for, in fact, 

The consequence was awful in the extreme: 
For they, who were most ravenous in the art, 

Went rasing mad — Lord ! how they did blaspheme ! 
And foam and roll, with strange convulsions rack'd, 

Drinking salt water like a mountain-stream, 
Tearing, and grinning, howling, screeching, swearing. 
And, with hyaena laughter, died despairing. 

LXXX. 

Their numbers were much thinn'd by this infliction, 

And all the rest were thin enough, Heaven knows ; 
And some of them had lost their recollection, 

Happier than they who still perceived their woes ; 
But others ponder'd on a new dissection, 

As if not warn'd sufficiently by those 
Who had already perish'd, suffering madly, 
For having used their appetites so sadly. 

LXXXI. 
And next they thought upon the master's mate, 

As fattest ; but he saved himself, because, 
Besides being much averse from such a fate, 

There were some other reasons : the first was, 
He had been rather indisposed of late, 

And that which chiefly proved his saving clause, 
Was a small present made to him at Cadiz, 
By general subscription of the ladies. 

LXXXII. 

Of poor Pedrillo something still remain'd, 

But it was used sparingly, — some were afraid, 

An. I others still their appetites constraint, 
Or but at times a little supper made; 

All except Juan, who throughout ahstain'd, 
Chewing a piece of bamboo, and some leao . 

At length they caught two boobies and a noddy 

And then they left off eating the dead body. 



CAXTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



585 



LXXXIII. 

And if Pcdrillo's fate should shocking be, 

Remember Ugolino condescends 
To ea. tr.e head of his arch-enemy 

The moment after he politely ends 
His tale ; if foes be food in hell, at sea 

'T is surely fair to dine upon our friends, 
When shipwreck's short allowance grows too scant)', 
Without being much more horrible than Dante. 

LXXXIV. 

And the same night there fell a shower of rain, 
For which their mouths gaped, like the cracks of earth 

When dried to summer dust ; till taught by pain, 
Men really know not what good water 's worth : 

If you had been in Turkey or in Spain, 

Or with a fumish'd boat's-crew had your birth, 

Or in the desert heard the camel's bell, 

You 'd wish yourself where Truth is — in a well. 

LXXXV. 

It pour'd down torrents, but they were no richer, 
Until they found a ragged piece of sheet, 

Which served them as a sort of spongy pitcher, 
And when they deem'd its moisture was complete, 

They wrung it out, and, though a thirsty ditcher 

Might not have thought the scanty draught so sweet 

As a full pot of porter, to tneir thinking 

They ne'er till now had known the joys of drinking. 

LXXXVI. 

And their baked lips, with many a bloody crack, 
Suck'd in the moisture, which like nectar stream'd ; 

Their throats were ovens, their swoln tongues were black, 
As the rich man's in hell, who vainly scrcam'd 

To beg the beggar, who could not rain back 
A drop of dew, when every drop had seetn'd 

To taste of heaven — if this be true, indeed, 

Some Christians have a comfortable creed. 

LXXXVII. 
There were two fathers in this ghastly crew, 

And with them their two sons, of whom the one 
Was more robust and hardy to the view, 

But he died early ; and when he was gone, 
His nearest messmate told his sire, who threw 

One glance on him, and said, " Heaven's will be done! 
I can do nothing!" and ho saw him thrown 
Into the deep, without a tear or groan. 

LXXXVI1I. 
The other father had a weaklier child, 

Of a soft cheek, and aspect delicate ; 
But the boy bore up long, and with a mild 

And jiatient spirit, held aloof his fate; 
Little he said, and now and then he smiled, 

As if to win a part from off the weight 
He saw increasing on his father's heart, 
With the deep deadly thought, that they must part. 

LXXXIX. 
And o'er him bent his sire, and never raised 

His eyes from off" his face, but wiped the foam 
From his pale lips, and ever on him gazed ; 

And when tiic wish'd-for shower at length was come, 
And the boy's eyes, which the dull film half glazed, 

Brighten'd, and for a moment seem'd to roam, 
He squeezed from out a rag some drops of rain 
Into his dving child's mouth — but in vain. 



XC. 

The boy expired — the father held the clay, 
And look'd upon it long, and when at last 

Death left no doubt, and the dead burthen lay 
Stiff on his heart, and pulse and hope were past 

He watched it wistfully, until away 

'Twas borne by the rude wave wherein 't wa* cast 

Then he himself sunk down, all dumb and shivering 

And gave no signs of life, save his limbs quivering. 

XCI. 

Now over-head a rainbow, bursting through 

The scattering clouds, shone, spanning the dark sea, 

Resting its bright base on the quivering blue: 
And all within its arch appear'd to be 

Clearer than that without, and its wide hue 
Wax'd broad and waving like a banner ii 

Then changed like to a bow that's bent, and then 

Forsook the dim eyes of these shipwreck'd men. 

XCII. 
It changed, of course ; a heavenly chameleon, 

The airy child of vapour and the sun, 
Brought forth in purple, cradled in vermilion, 

Baptized in molten gold, and swathed in dun, 
Glittering like crescents o'er a Turk's pavilion, 

And blending every colour into one, 
Just like a black eye in a recent scuffle 
(For sometimes we must box without the muffle). 

XCIII. 

Our shipwreck'd seamen thought it a good omen- 
It is as well to think so, now and then ; 
'T was an old custom of the Greek and Roman, 

And may become of great advantage when 
Folks are discouraged; and most surely no men 

Had greater need to nerve themselves again 
Than these, and so this rainbow look'd like hope- 
Quite a celestial kaleidoscope. 

XCIV. 

About this time, a beautiful white bird, 
Web-footed, not unlike a dove in size 

And plumage (probably it might have err'd 
Upon its course), pass'd oft before their eyes, 

And tried to perch, although it saw and heard 
The men within the boat, and in this guise 

It came and went, and flutter'd round them till 

Night fell : — this seem'd a better omen still. 

xcv. 

But in this :ase I also must remark, 

'Twas well this bird of promise did not perch, 
Because the tackle of our shatter'd bark 

Was not so safe for roosting as a church ; 
And had it been the dove from Noah's ark, 

Returning there from her successful search, 
Which in their way that moment chanced to fall, 
They would have eat her, olive-branch and all. 

XCVI. 
With twilight it again came on to blow, 

But not with violence ; the stars shone out, 
The boat made way; yet now they were so low, 

They knew not where nor what they were about, 
Some fancied they saw land, and some said "No 1 " 

The frequent fog-banks gave them cause to douU- 
Some swore that they heard breakers, others gutw 
And all mistook about the latter once. 



584 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO II 



XCVII. 

As morning broke, the light wind died away, 
When be who bad the watch sung out, and swore 

If 'twas not land that rose with the sun's ray 
lie wish'd thai land lie never might see more: 

And the rest rubb'd their eyes, and saw a 

Or thought they saw, and shaped their course for 
shore ; 

For shore it was, and gradually grew 

Distinct and high, and palpable lo view. 

XCVIII. 
And then of these some part burst into tears, 

And others, looking with a stupid stare, 
Could not yel separate their hopes from fears, 

And seem'd as if they had no further care; 
While a few prp.y'd — (the first time for some years) — 

And at the bottom of the boat three were 
Asleep ; they shook them by the hand and head, 
And tried to awaken them, but found them dead. 

XC1X. 
The da'v before, fast sleeping on the water, 

They found a turtle of the hawk's-bill kind, 
And by good fortune, gli hug softly, caught her, 

Which yielded a day's life, and to their mind 
Proved even still e. more nutritious matter, 

Because it left encouragement behind : 
They thought that in such perils, more than chance 
Had sent them this for their deliverance. 

C. 
The land af pcar'd, a high and rocky coast, 

And higher grew the mountains as they drew, 
Set by a current, toward it : they were lost 

In various conjectures, for none knew 
To what part of the earth they had been toss'd, 

So changeable had been the winds that blew; 
Some thought it was Mount /Etna, some the highlands 
Of Candia, Cyprus, Rhodes, or other islands. 

CI. 
Meantime tke current, with a rising gale, 

Still set them onwards to the welcome shore, 
Like Charon's bark of spectres, dull and pale: 

Their living freight was now reduced to four; 
And three dead, whom their strength could not avail 

To heave into the deep with those before, 
Though the two sharks still follow'd them, and dash'd 
The spray inlo their faces as they splash'd. 

CI I. 
Famine, despair, col 1, thirst, and heat had done 

Their work on them by turns, and thinn'd them to 
Such things, a mother had not known her son 

Amidst the skeletons of that gaunt crew ; 
By night chill'd, by day scorch'd, thus one by one 

They pcrish'd, until withered to these few, 
But chiefly by a species of self-slaughter, 
In washing down Pednllo with salt water. 

cm. 

As they drew nigh the land, which now was seen, 
Unequal in its aspect here and there, 

They felt the freshness of its growing green, 
That waved in forest tops, and smooth'd the air, 

And fell upon their glaz id eyes as a screen 

From glistening waves, and skies so hot and bare — 

I ijvely seem'd any object that should sweep 

^ uray ;he vast, salt, dread, eternal deep. 



CIV. 

The shore look'd wild, without the trace of man, 
And girt by formidable waves ; but they 

Were mad for land, and thus their course they ran. 
Though right ahead the roaring breakers lay • 

A reef between them also novi I 

To show its boiling surf and bounding spray, 

But, finding no place for their landing better, 

They ran the boat for shore, and overset her. 

cv. 

But in his native stream, the Guadalquivir, 
Juan to lave his youthful limbs was wont ; 

And, having learn'd to swim in that sweet river, 
Had often turn'd the art to some account. 

A better swimmer you could scarce see ever, 
He could, perhaps, have pass'd the Hellespont, 

As once (a feat on which ourselves we prided) 

Leander, Mr. Ekenhcad, and I did. 

CVI 

So, here, though faint, emaciated, and stark, 
He huov'd his boyish limbs, and strove to ply 

With the quick wave, and gain, ere it was dark, 
The beach which lay before him, high and dry: 

The greatest danger here was from a shark, 
That carried off his neighbour by the thigh ; 

As for the other two, they could not swim, 

So nobody arrived on shore but him. 

cvn. 

Nor yet had he arrived but for the o.-:r, 
Which, providentially for him, was wash'd 

Just as his feeble arms could strike no more, 

And the hard wave o'erwln .-lin'd him as 't was dajh'd 

Within his grasp; he clung to it, and sore 
The waters beat while he thereto was lash'd ; 

At last, with swimming, wading, scrambling, he 

Roll'd on the beach, half senseless, from the sea: 

CVIII. 

There, breathless, with his digging nails he clung 

Fast to the sand, lest the returning wave, 
From whose reluctant roar his life he wrung, 

Should suck him hack to her insatiate grave : 
And there he lay, full-length, where he was (lung, 

Before the entrance of a cliff-worn cave, 
With just enough of life to feel its pain, 
And deem that it was saved, perhaps in vain. 

CIX. 
With slow and staggering effort he arose, 

But sunk again upon his bleeding knee . 
And quivering hand ; and then he look'd for thoso 

Who long had been his mates upon the sea, 
But iii me of them appear'd to share his woes, 

Save one, a corpse from out the famish'd three. 
Who died two days before, and now had found 
An unknown barren beach for burial ground. 

CX. 
And, as he gazed, his dizzy brain spun fast, 

And down he sunk, and, as he sunk, the sand 
Swam round and round, and all his senses ] 

lie fell upon his side, and his stretoh'd hand 
Droop'd dripping on the oar (their jury-mast), 

And, like a wither'd lily, on the land 
His slender frame and pallid aspect lay, 
As fair a tiring as e'er was form'd of clay. 



CANTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



535 



CXI. 
How long in liis damp trance young Juan lay 

He knew not, for the earth was gone for him, 
And time had nothing more of night nor day 

For his congealing blood, and senses dim: 
And how this heavy fainlness pass'd away 

He knew not, till each painful pulse and limb, 
And tingling vein, seem'd throbbing back to life, 
For Death, though vanquish'd, still retired with strife. 

CXII. 
His eyes he open'd, shut, again unclosed, 

For all was doubt and dizziness : he thought 
He still was in the boat, and had but dozed, 

And felt again with his despair o'erwrought, 
And wish'd it death in which he had reposed ; 

And then once more his feelings back were brought, 
And slowly by his swimming eyes was seen 
A lovely female face of seventeen. 

CXIII. 

'T was bending close o'er his, and the small mouth 
Seem'd almost prying into his for breath; 

And chafing him, the soft warm hand of youth 
Recall his answering spirits back from death : 

And, bathing his chill temples, tried to soothe 
Each pulse to animation, till beneath 

Us gentle touch and trembling care, a sigh 
to these kind efforts made a low reply. 

CX1V. 
Jhen was *hs cordial pour'd, and mantle flung 

Around his scarce-clad limbs ; and the fair arm 
Raised higher the faint head which o'er it hung ; 

And lici transparent cheek, all pure and warm, 
Pillow'd hi.? death-like forehead ; then she wrung 

His dewy curls, long drench'd by every storm ; 
And watch'd with eagerness each throb that drew 
A sigh from his heaved bosom — and hers too. 

CXV. 

And lifting him with care into the cave, 
The gentle girl, and her attendant, — one 

Young yet her elder, and of brow less grave, 
And more robust of fig'ire, — then begun 

To kindle fire, and as the new flames gave 

Light to the rocks which roof'd them, which the sun 

Had never seen, the moid, or whatsoe'er 

She was, appear'd distinct, and tall, and fair. 

CXVI. 

Her brow was overhung with coins of gold, 

That sparkled o'er the auburn of her hair, 
Her clustering hair, whose longer locks were roll'd 

In braids behind, and, though her stature were 
E>"en ol the highest for a female mould, 

They nearly reach'd her heel ; and in her air 
There was a something which bespoke command, 
As one who was a lady in the land. 

CXV1I. 
Her hair, I said, was auburn ; but her eyes 

Were black as death, their lashes the same hue, 
Of downcast length, in whose silk Bhadow Ins 

Deepest attraction, for when to the view 
Forth from its raven fringe liie full glance flies, 

Ne'er with such force tin' swiftest arrow flew; 
'Tis as the snake, late coil'd, who pours !us length, 
And hurls at once his venom and his strength. 
3 C 79 



CXVIII. 
Her brow was white and low, her cheeks' pure nyo 

Like i . .-till with the set sun ; 

Short upper lip — sweet lips! that make us sigh 

Ever to have seen such; for she vas one 
Fit for the model ol' a statuary 

(At race of mere impostors, when all's done — 
I \e seen much liner women, ripe and real, 
Than all the nonsense of their stone ideal). 

CX1X. 

I'll tell you why I say so, fir 'lis just 

One should not rail without a decent cause: 

There was an Irish lady, to whose bust 
I ne'er saw justice done, and vet she was 

A frequent model ; and if e'er she must 

Yield to stern Time anil Nature's wrinkling laws, 

They will destroy a ii.ee which mortal thought 

Ne'er coropass'd, nor less mortal chisel wrought. 

CXX. 
And such was she, the lady of the cave: 
Her dress was very different from the Spanish, 

Simpler, and vet of colours not "so grave; 

For, as vou know, the Spanish women banish 
Bright hues when out of doors, and yet, while wave 

Around them (what I hope will never vanish) 
The basquina and the mantilla, they 
Seem at the same time mystical and gay. 

CXXI. 

But with our damsel this was not the case : 
Her dress was many-coleur'd, finely spun ; 

Her locks curl'd negligently round her face, 

But through them gold and gems pro;'',-!;,- shone, 

Her girdle sparkled, and the richest lace 
Flow'd in her veil, and many a precious stone 

Flash'd on her little hand ; but, what was shocking, 

Her small snow feet had slippers, but no stocking. 

CXXII. 

The other female's dress was not unlike, 

But of inferior materials : she 
Had not so many ornaments to strike : 

Her hair had silver only, bound to be 
Her dowry ; and her veil, in form alike, 

Was coarser ; and her air, though firm, less free ; 
Her hair was thicker, hut less long; her eyes 
As black, but quicker, and of smaller size. 

CXXI II. 
And these two tended him, and chcer'd him both 

Wiili food and raiment, an 1 those soft attentions. 
Which are (as 1 must own) of female growth, 
An I have ten thou ilions , 

ior ii. ess of broth, 
A thing which poesy but seldom mentions, 
But the lest dish that e'er was cook'd since Homer '* 
Order'd dinner fir 111 W CO 

CXXIV. 

1 "]! led vou wl female pail. 

Lest they should use , 

Besides I hate all mystery, and that air 

Of clap-trap, which your recent poets prize-, 
\n' so, in short, the gnls they really were 

hall appear 1" lore youi curious 
Mistress and maid; the first was only daughta 
Of mi old man who lived upon the water 



50G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTU II 



cxxv. 

A fisherman he had been in his youth, 
And still a sort of fisherman was he ; 

But other speculations were, in sooth, 
Added to his connexion with the sea, 

Perhaps, not so respectable, in truth: 
A little smuggling, and some piracy, 

Lift hiin, at last, the sole of many masters 

Of an ill-gotten million of piastres. 

CXXVI. 
A fisher, therefore, was he — though of men, 

Like Peter the Apostle, — and be fish'd 
For wandering merchant-vessels, now and then, 

And sometimes caught as many as he wish'd ; 
The cargoes he confiscated, and tram 

He sought in the slave-market too, and dish'd 
Full many a morsel for that Turkish trade, 
By which, no doubt, a good deal may be made. 

C XXVII. 

He was a Greek, and on his isle had built 
(One of the wild and smaller Cyclades) 

A very handsome house from out his g'ii!t, 
And there he lived exceedingly at ease ; 

Heaven knows what cash he got, or blood he spilt, 
A sad old fellow was he, if you please, 

But this I know, it was a spacious building, 

Full of barbaric carving, paint, and gilding. 

CXXVIII. 

He had an only daughter call'd Haidee, 
The greatest heiress of the Eastern isles ; 

Besides so very beautiful was she, 

Her dowry was as nothing to her smiles: 

Still in her teens, and like a lovely tree 
So grew to womanhood, and between whiles 

Rejected several suitors, just to learn 

How to accept a better in his turn. 

CXXIX. 

And walking out upon the beach below 

The cliff, towards sunset, on that day she found, 

Insensible, — not dead, but nearly so, — 

Don Juan, almost famish'd, and half drown'd ; 

But, being naked, she was shock'd, you know, 
Yet deem'd herself in common pity bound, 

As far as in her lay, " to take him in, 

A stranger," dying, with so white a skin. 

exxx. 

But taking him into her father's house 

Was not exactly the best way to save, 
But like conveying to the cat the mouse, 

Or people in a irance into their grave ; 
Because the good old man had so much " vouj," 

Unlike the honest Arab thieves so brave, 
lie would have hospitably cured the stranger, 
And sold him instantly when out of danger. 

CXXXI. 
And therefore, with hei maid, she thought it best 

(A virgin always on her maid relies.} 
I'o p'aee him in the cave for present rest : 

And when, at last, he open'd his black eyesj 
Their charily increased about their guest: 

And thi ir compassion grew to such a size, 
[t open'd half the turnpike gates to heaven — 
<Saiii' Piu' says 'us the toll which must be given) 



CXXXII. 

They made a fire, but such a fire as they 
Upon the moment could contrive with such 

Materials as were cast up round the bay, 

Some broken planks and oars, that to the touch 

Were m ailv tinder, since so long they lay, 
A mast was almost crumbled to a crutch ; 

But, by God's grace, here wrecks were in such plenty 

That there was fuel to have furnish'd twenty. 

CXXXIII. 

He had a bed of furs and a pelisse, 

For Hai lee stripp'd her sables otf to make 

His couch; and that he might be more at ease, 
And warm, in case by chance he should awake, 

They also gave a petticoat apiece, 

She atid her maid, and promised by day-break 

To pay him a fresh visit, with a dish, 

For breakfast, of eggs, coffee, bread, and fish. 

CXXXIV. 

And thus they left him to his lone repose: 
Juan slept like a top, or like the dead, 

Who sleep at last, perhaps (God onlv know?), 
Just lor the present, and in his lull'd head 

Not even a vision of his former woes 
Throbb'd in accursed dreams, which sometimes spread 

L nwelcome visions of our former years, 

Till the eye, cheated, opens thick with tears. 

exxxv. 

, poling Juan slept all dreamless: — but the maid 
Who smooth'd his pillow, as she left the den, 

Look'd back upon him, and a moment stav'd, 
And lurn'd, believing that he call'd again. 

He slumber'd ; yet she thought, at least she said 
(The heart will slip even as the tongue and pen), 

He had pronounced her name — but she forgot 

That at this moment Juan knew it not. 

C XXXVI. 

And pensive to her father's house she went, 

Enjoining silence strict to Zoe, who 
Better than her knew what, in fact, she meant, 

She being wiser by a year or two: 
A year or two's an age when rightly spent, 

And Zoe spent hers as most women do, 
In gaining all that useful sort of knowledge 
Which is acquired in nature's good old college. 

cxxxvn. 

The morn broke, and found Juan slumbering still 
Fast in his cave, and nothing clash'd upon 

His rest; the rushing of the neigbouring rill, 
And the voting beams of the excluded sun, 

Troubled him not, and he might sleep his till; 
And need he had of .slumber yet, for none 

Had suffer'd more — his hardships were comparative 

To those related in my grand-dad's narrative. 

CXXXVIII. 

Not so Haidee ; she sadly toss'd and tumbled, 
And started from her sleep, and, turning 0*1 r, 

Dream' 1 1 of a thousand wrecks, o'er which she sto 
And handsome corpses strew'd upon the shore; 

Ami v.oke her maid so early that she j 

And call'd her father's old slaves up, won swore 
In several oaths — Armenian, Turk, and Greek, — 
They knew not what to think of such a freak. 



CAXTO IT. 



DON JUAN. 



587 



CXXXIX. 

But up she got, and up she made them get, 
With some pretence about the sun, that makes 

Sweet skies just when he rises, or is set ; 
And 't is, no doubt, a sight to see when breaks 

Bright Phoebus, while the mountains still are wet 
With mist, and every bird with him awakes, 

And night is Hung off like a mourning suit 

Worn for a husband, or some other brute. 

CXL. 

I say, the sun is a most glorious sight, 
I 've seen him rise full oft, indeed of late 

I have sat up on purpose all the night, 

Which hastens, as physicians say, one's fate ; 

And so all ye, who would be in the right 
It health and purse, begin your day to date 

From day-break, and when coffm'd at fourscore, 

Engrave upon the plate, you rose at four. 

CXLI. 

And Haidce met the morning face to face ; 

Her own was freshest, though a feverish flush 
Had dyed it with the headlong blood, whose race 

From heart to cheek is curb'd into a blush. 
Like to a torrent which a mountain's base, 

That overpowers some Alpine river's rush, 
Checks to a lake, whose waves in circles spread, 
Or the Red Sea — but the sea is not red., 

CXLII. 

And down the cliff the island virgin came, 

And near the cave her quick light footsteps drew, 

While the sun smiled on her with his first flame, 
And young Aurora kiss'd her lips with dew, 

Taking her for a sister ; just the same 

Mistake you would have made on seeing the two, 

Although the mortal, quite as fresh and fair, 

Had all the advantage too of not being air. 

CXLIII. 

And when into the cavern Haidee stepp'd, 

All timidly, yet rapidly, she saw 
That like an infant Juan sweetly slept : 

And then she stopp'd, and stood as if in awe 
(For sleep is awful), and on tiptoe crept 

And wrapp'd him closer, lest the air, too raw, 
Should reach his blood ; then o'er him, still as death, 
Bent with hush'd lips that drank his scarce-drawn breath. 

CXLIV. 
And thus, like to an angel o'er the dying 

Who die in righteousness, she lean'd ; and there 
All tranquilly the shipwreck'd boy was lying, 

As o'er him lay the calm and stirlcss air : 
But Zoe the meantime some eggs was frying, 

Since, after all, no doubt the youthful pair 
Must breakfast, and betimes — lest they should ask it, 
She drew out her provision from the basket. 

CXLV. 
She knew that the best feelings must have victual, 

And that a shipwreck'd youth would hungry be ; 
Besides, being less in love, she yawn'd a little, 

And felt her veins chill'd by the neighbouring sea ; 
And so, she cook'd their breakfast to a tittle ; 

I can't say that she gave them any tea, 
But there were eggs, fruit, coffee, bread, fish, honey, 
With Scio wine, — and all for love, not money. 



CXLVI. 

And Zoe, when the eggs were ready, and 

The coffee made, would fain have waken'd Juan ; 

But Haidee stopp'd her with her quick small nand, 
And without word, a sign her finger drew on 

Her lip, which Zoe needs must understand ; 

And, the first breakfast spoil'd, prepared a new one, 

Because her mistress would not let her break 

That sleep which scem'd as it would ne'er awake. 

CXLVII. 

For still he lay, and on his thin worn cheek, 
A purple hectic play'd, like dying day 

On the snow tops of distant hills ; the streak 
Of sufferance yet upon his forehead lay, 

Where the blue veins look'd shadowy, shrunk, and weak ; 
And his black curls were dewy with the spray, 

Which weigh'd upon them yet, all damp and salt, 

Mix'd with the stony vapours of the vault. 

CXLVIII. 

And she bent o'er him, and he lay beneath, 
Hush'd as the babe upon its mother's breast, 

Droop'd as the willow when no winds can breathe, 
Lull'd like the depth of ocean when at rest, 

Fair as the crowning rose of the whole wreath, 
Soft as the callow cygnet in its nest ; 

In short, he was a very pretty fellow, 

Although his woes had turn'd him rather yellow. 

CXLIX. 

He woke and gazed, and would have slept again, 
But the fair face which met his eyes, forbade 

Those eyes to close, though weariness and pain 
Had further sleep a further pleasure made ; 

For woman's face was never form'd in vain 
For Juan, so that even when he pray'd, 

He turn'd from grisly saints, and martyrs hairy, 

To the sweet portraits of the Virgin Mary. 

CL. 

And thus upon his elbow he arose, 

And look'd upon the lady in whose check 
The pale contended with the purple rose, 

As with an effort she began to speak ; 
Her eyes were eloquent, her words would pose, 

Although she told him in good modern Greek 
With an Ionian accent, low and sweet, 
That he was faint, and must not talk, but eat. 

CLI. 
Now Juan could not understand a word, 

Being no Grecian ; but he had an ear, 
And her voice was the warble of a bird, 

So soft, so sweet, so delicately clear, 
That finer, simpler music ne'er was heard ; 

The sort of sound we echo with a tear, 
Without knowing why — an overpowering tone. 
Whence melody descends, as from a throne. 

CLII. 
And Juan gazed, as one who is awoks 

By a distant organ, doubting if he be 
Not yet a dreamer, till the speii is broko 

By the watchman, or some such reality. 
Or by one's early valet's cursed knock , 

At least it is a heavy sound to me, 
Who like a morning slumber — for the nighi 
Shows stars and women in a better light. 



538 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



caf;to 



CLIII. 

And Juan, too, was help'd out from his dream, 
Or sleep, or whatsoe'er it was, by feeling 

A most prodigious appetite : the steam 
Of Zoe's cookery no doubt was stealing 

Upon his senses, and the kindling beam 
Of the new fire which Zoe kept up, kneeling 

To stir lior viands, made him quite awake 

And long for food, but chiefly a beef-steak. 

CLIV. 
But beef is rare within these oxless isles ; 

Goats' flesh there is, no doubt, ami kid, and mutton, 
And when a holiday upon them smiles, 

A joint upon their barbarous spits they put on : 
But this occurs but seldom, between whill s, 

For some of these are rocks with scarce a hut on, 
Others are fair and fertile, among which, 
This, though not large, was one of the most rich. 

CLV. 

I say that beef is rare, and can't help thinking 
That the old fable of the Minotaur — 

From which our modern morals, rightly shrinking, 
Condemn the royal lady's taste who wore 

A cow's shape for a mask — was only (sinking 
The allegory) a mere type, no more, 

That PasiphaS promoted breeding cattle, 

To make the Cretans bloodier in battle. 

CLVI. 

For we all know that English people are 
Fed upon beef — I won't say much of beer, 

Because 'tis liquor only, and being far 

From this my subject, has no business here : — 

We know, too, they are very fond of war, 
A pleasure — like all pleasures — rather dear ; 

So were the Cretans — from which I infer 

That beef and battles bolh were owing to her. 

CLVII. 

But to resume. The languid Juan raised 

His head upon his elhow, and he saw 
A sight on which he had not lately gazed, 

As all his latter meals had been quite raw, 
Three or four things for which the Lord he praised, 

And, feeling still the famishM vulture gr.pw, 
He fell upon whate'er was offer'd, like 
A priest, a shark, an alderman, or pike. 

CLVIII. 
He ate, and lie was well supplied ; and she, 

Who watch'd him like a mother, would have fed 
Him past all bounds, because she smiled to see 

Such appetite in one she had deem'd dead : 
But Zoe, being older than Haidec, 

Knew (by tradition, for she ne'er had read) 
That famish'd people must be slowly nursed, 
And fed by spoonfuls, else they always burst. 

CLIX. 

And so she took the liberty to state, 

Rather by deeds than words, because the case 

Was urgent, that the gentleman, whose fate 
Had made her mistress quit her bed to trace 

The sea-shore at this hour, must leave his plate, 
Unless he wish'd to die upon the |>lace — 

She snalch'd it, and refused another morsel, 

Saying, he had gorged enough to make a horse ill. 



CLX. 
Next tliev — he being naked, Fa •< •« 'a'.er'J 

Pair of scarce decent trowae / - .v-.n< to wo:k_ 
And in the lire his recent ra;_s 'br.y eeUter'd, 

And dress'd him, for the present, like a Turk, 
Or Greek — that is, although it not much malter'd, 

OmittinL' turban, slippers, pistols, dirk,— 
They furnish'd him, entire except some stitches, 
V\ ith a clean shirt, and very spacious breeches. 

CLXI. 

And then fair Haidec tried her tongue at spcakinj, 
But not a word could Juan comprehend, 

Although he listen'd so that the young Greek in 
Her earnestness would ne'er have made an end* 

And, as he interrupted not, went eking 

Her speech out to her protege and friend, • 

Till, pausing at the last her Breath to take, 

She saw he did not understand Romaic. 

CLXII. 

And then she had recourse to nods, and signs, 
And smiles, and sparkles of the speaking eye, 

And read (the only book she could) the lines 
Of his fair face, and bund, by sympathy, 

The answer eloquent, where the soul shines 
And darts in one quick glance a long reply ; 

And thus in every look she saw express'd 

A world of words, and things at which she guess'd. 

CLXIII. 

And now, by dint of fingers and of eyes, 
And words repeated after her, he took 

A lesson in her tongue ; but by surmise, 
No doubt, less of her language than her look: 

As he who studies fervently the skies 

Turns oflener to the stars than to his book, 

Thus Juan learn'd his alpha beta better 

From Haidee's glance than any graven letter. 

CLXIV. 

'T is pleasing to be school'd in a strange tongue 

By female lips and eyes — that is, I m»jan, 
When both the teacher and the taught are young, 

As was the case, at least, where I have been; 
They smile so when one 's right, and when one 's wrong 

They smile still more, and then there intervene 
Pressure of hands, perhaps even a chaste kiss ; — 
I learn'd the little that I know by this : 

CLXV. 
That is, some words of Spanish, Turk, or G reek, 

Italian not at all, having no teachers, 
Much English I cannot pretend to speak, 

Learning that language chiefly from its preachers, 
Barrow, South, Tillotson, wh im every week 

I study, also Blair, the highest reachers 
Of eloquence in piety anil prose — 
I hate your poets, so read none of those. 

CLXVI. 
As for the ladies, I have nought to say, 

A wanderer from the British world of fashion, 
Where I, like other "dogs, have had my day," 

Like other men, too, may have had my passion— 
But that, like other things, has pass'd ;■. 

And all her fools whom I could lay the lash on, 
Foes, friends, men, women, now are nought to me 
But dreams of what has been, no more to be. 



canto n. 



DON JUAN. 



53'J 



CLXVII. 

Return we to Don Juan. He begun 

To hear new words, and to repeat them ; but 

Some feelings, universal as the sun, 

Were such as could not in his breast be shut 

More than within the bosom of a nun : 

He was in love — as you would be, no doubt, 

With a young benefactress, — so was she 

Just in the way we very often see. 

CLXVIII. 

And every day by day-break — rather early 
For Juan, who was somewhat fond of rest — 

She came into the cave, but it was merely 
To see her bird reposing in his nest ; 

And she would softly stir his locks so curly, 
Without disturbing her yet slumbering guest, 

Breathing all gently o'er his cheek and mouth, 

As o'er a bed of roses the sweet south. 

CLXIX. 

And every morn Ids colour froshlier came, 
And every day help'd on his convalescence, 

'T was well, because health in the human frame 
Is pleasant, besides being true love's essence, 

For health and idleness to passion's flame 
Are oil and gunpowder ; and some good lessons 

Are also learnt from Ceres and from Bacchus, 

Without whom Venus will not long attack us. 

CLXX 

*Vhile Venus fills the heart (without heart really 
Love, though good always, is not quite so good), 

Ceres presents a plate of vermicelli, 

For love must be sustain'd like flesh and blood. — 

While Bacchus pours out wine, or hands a jeliy : 
Eggs, oysters too, are amatory food ; 

But who is their purveyor from above 

Heaven knows, — it may be Neptune, Pan, or Jove. 

CLXXI. 

When Juan woke, be found some good things ready, 

A bath, a breakfast, and the finest eyes 
That ever made a youthful heart less steady, 

Besides her maid's, as pretty for their size ; 
But I have spoken of all this already — 

And repetition's tiresome and unwise,— 
Well — Juan, after bathing in the sea, 
Came always back to coffee and Haidee. 

CLXXII. 
Both were so young, and one so innocent, 

That bathing pass'd for nothing; Juan seem'd 
To her, as 't were the kind of being sent. 

Of whom these two years she had nightly dream'd, 
A something to be loved, a creature meant 

To be her happiness, and whom she deem'd 
To render happy ; all who joy would win 
Must share it, — happiness was born a twin. 

CLXXIII. 
It was such p!easure to behold him, such 

Enlargement of existence to partake 
Nature with him, to thrill beneath his touch, 

To watch him slumbering, and to see him wake. 
To live with him for ever were too much ; 

But then the thought of parting made her quake : 
He was her own, her ocean treasure, cast 
Like a rich wreck — her first love and her last. 
3c2 g 



CLXXIV. 

And thus a moon roll'd on, and fair Haidee 
Paid daily visits to her boy, and took 

Such plentiful precautions, that still he 

Remain'd unknown within his craggy nook: 

At last her father's prows put out to sea, 
For certain merchantmen upon the look, 

Not as of yore to carry off an Io, 

But three Ragusan vessels, bound for Scio. 

CLXXV. 

Then came her freedom, for she had no mother, 
So that, her father being at sea, she was 

Free as a married woman, or such other 
Female, as where she likes may freely pass, 

Without even the encumbrance of a brother, 
The freest she that ever gazed on glass : 

I speak of Christian lands in this comparison, 

Where wives, at least, are seldom kept in garrison. 

CLXXVI. 

Now she prolong'd her visits and her talk 

(For they must talk), and he had learnt to say 

So much as to propose to take a walk, — 
For little had he wander'd since the clay 

On which, like a young flower snapp'd from the stall 
Drooping and dewy on the beach he lay, — 

And thus they walk'd out in the afternoon, 

And saw the sun set opposite the moon. 

CLXX VII. 

It was a wild and breaker-beaten coast, 

With cliffs above, and a broad sandy shore, 

Guarded by shoals and rocks as by a host, 

With here and there a creek, whose aspect wore 

A better welcome to the tempest-toss'd ; 

And rarely ceased the haughty billows' roar, 

Save on the dead long summer days, which make 

The outstretch'd ocean glitter like a la*e. 

CLXXVIII. 

And the small ripple spilt upon the beach 

Scarcely o'erpass'd the cream of your champagne. 
When o'er the brim the sparkling bumpers reach, 

That spring-dew of the spirit ! the heart's rain ! 
Few things surpass old wine: and they may preach 

Who please, — the more because they preach in vain,— 
Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter, 
Sermons and soda-water the day ai'u r. 

CLXXIX. 
Man, beinjr reasonable, must get drunk ; 

The best of life is but intoxication: 
Glory, the grope, !<>ve, gold, in these are sunk 

The hopes of all men, and of every nation ; 
Without their sap, how branchless were the trunk, 

0? life's strange tree, so fruitful on occasion : 
But M return, — get very drunk ; and when 
You wake with head-ache, you shall see what then. 

CLXXX. 
Ring for your valet — hid him quickly bring 

Some hock and soda-water, thon you'll know 
A pleasure worthy Xerxes the great ling; 

For not the blest sherbet, sublimed with snow. 
Nor the first sparkle of the desert-spring. 

Nor Burgundy in all its sunset glow, 
After long travel, ennui, love, or slaughter, 
Vic with that draught of hock and soda-wafei. 



wo 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO n 



CLXXXI. 
1 he coast — I think it was the coast that 1 

Was just describing — Yes, it was the coast — 
Lay at this period quiet as the sky, 

The sands untumbled, the blue waves untoss'd, 
And all was stillness, save the sea-bird's cry, 

And dolphin's leap, and little billow cross'd 
By some low rock or shelve that made it fret 
Against the boundary it scarcely wet. 

CLXXXII. 

And forth they wander'd, her sire being gone, 

As I have said, upon an expedition ; 
And mother, brother, guardian, she had none, 

Save Zoe, who, although with due precision 
She waited on her lady with the sun, 

Though daily service was her only mission, 
Bringing warm water, wreathing her long tresses, 
And asking now and then for cast-off dresses. 

CLXXXIII. 

It was the cooling hour, just when the rounded 

Red sun sinks down behind the azure hill, 
Which then seems as if the whole earth it bounded, 

Circling all nature, hush'd, and dim, and still, 
With the far mountain-crescent half surrounded 

On one side, and the deep sea calm and chill 
Upon the other, and the rosy sky, 
With one star sparkling through it like an eye. 

CLXXXIV. 
And thus they wander'd fi>rth, and hand in hand, 

Over the shining pebbles and the shells, 
Glided along the smooth and harden'd sand, 

And in the worn and wild receptacles 
Work'd by the storms, yet work'd as it were plann'd, 

In hollow halls, with sparry roofs and cells, 
They turn'd to rest ; and, each clasped by an arm, 
Yielded to ^he deep twilight's purple charm. 

CLXXXV. 
They look'd up to the sky, whose floating glow 

Spread like a rosy ocean, vast and bright ; 
They gazed upon the glittering sea below, 

Whence the broad moon rose circling into sight ; 
1'hey heard the waves splash, and the wind so low, 

And saw each other's dark eyes darting light 
Into each other — and, beholding this, 
Their lips drew near, and clung into a kiss ; 

CLXXXVI. 
A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth, and love, 

And beauty, all concentrating, like rays 
Into one fo%us kindled from above ; 

Such kisses as belong to early days, 
Where heart, and soul, and sense, in concert move, 

And the blood 's lava, and the pulse a blaze, 
Each kiss a heart-quake, — far a kiss's strength, 
I think it must be reckon'd by its length. 

CLXXXVII. 
By length I mean duration ; theirs endured 

Heaven knows how long — no doubt they never 
reckon'd ; 
And if they had, they could not have secured 

The bum of their sensations to a second: 
They had not spoken ; but they felt aliurcd, 

As if their souls and lips each other beckon'd, 
Which, being join'd, like swarming bees they clung — 
Their hearts tne flowers from whence the honey sprung. 



CLXXXVI1I. 

They were alone, vet not alum; as they 
Who, shut in chambers, think il loneliness; 

The silent ocean, and the star-light b 
The twilight glow, which momently grew less, 

The voiceless sands, and dropping caves, that lay 
Around them, made them to each other press, 

As if there were no life beneath the 

Save theirs, and that their life could never die. 

CLXXXIX. 

They fear'd no eyes nor ears on that lone beach, 
They felt no terrors from the night, they were 

All in all to each other : though their speech 

Was broken words, they thougld a language there, — 

And all the burning tongues the passions teach 
Found in one sigh the best interpreter 

Of nature's oracle — first love, — that all 

Which Eve has left her daughters since her fall. 

cxc. 

Haidee spoke not of scruples, ask'd no vows, 
Nor offcr'd any; she had never heard 

Of plight and promises to be a spouse, 
Or perils by a loving maid incurr'd ; 

She was all which pure ignorance allows, 
And flew to her young mate like a young bird ; 

And, never having dreamt of falsehood, she 

Had not one word to say of constancy. 

CXCI. 

She loved, and was beloved — she adored, 

And she was worshipp'd ; after nature's fashion, 

Their intense souls, into each other pour'd, 

If souls could die, had perish'd in that passion,- - 

But bv degrees their senses were restored, 
Again to be o'ercome, again to dash on ; 

And, beating 'gainst ki.i bosom, Haidee's heart 

Felt as if never more to beat apart. 

CXCII. 

Alas ! they were so young, so beautiful, 

So lonely, loving, helpless, and the hour 
Was that in which the hear* is always full, 

And, having o'er itself no further power, 
Prompts deeds eternity cannot annul, 

But pays off moments in an endless shower 
Of hell-fire — all prepared for people giving 
Pleasure or pain to one another living. 

CXCIII. 
Alas! for Juan and Haidee ! they were 

So loving and so lovely — till then never, 
Excepting our first parents, such a pair 

Had run the risk of being damn'd for ever; 
And Haidee, being devout as well as fair, 

Had, doubtless, heard about the Stygian river, 
And hell and purgatory — but forgot 
Just in the very crisis she should not. 

CXCIV. 
They look upon each other, and their exes 

Gleam in the moon-light; and her white arm cLsps- 
Round Juan's head, and his around hers lies 

Half buried in the tresses which it grasps; 
She sits upon his knee, and drinks his 

He hers until they end in broken g 
And thus they form a group that's <]iiite antique, 
Half naked, loving, natural, and Greek. 



CANTO II. 



DON JUAN. 



591 



cxcv. 

And when those deep and burning moments pass'd, 
And Juan sunk to sleep within her arms, 

She slept not, but all tenderly, though fast, 
Sustain'd his head upon her bosom's charms, 

And now and then her eye to neaven is cast, 

And then on the pale cheek her breast now warms, 

Pillow'd on her o'crflowing neart, which pants 

With all it granted, and with all it grants. 

CXCVI. 

An infant when it gazes on a light, 

A child the moment when it drains the breast, 
A devotee when soars the host in sight, 

An Arab with a stranger for a guest, 
A sailor, when the prize has struck in fight, 

A miser filling his most hoarded chest, 
Feel rapture ; but not such true joy arc reaping 
As they who watch o'er what they love while sleeping. 

exevn. 

For there it lies so tranquil, so beloved, 
All that it hath of life with us is living; 

So gentle, stirless, helpless, and unmoved, 
And all unconscious of the joy 'tis giving, 

AH it hath fell, inflicted, pass'd, and proved, 

Hush'd into depths beyond the watcher's diving ; 

There lies the thing we love with all its errors, 

And all its charms, like death without its terrors. 

CXCVIII. 

The lady watch'd her lover — and that hour 
Of Love's, and Night's, and Ocean's solitude, 

O'erflow'd her soul with their united power ; 
Amidst the barren sand and rocks so rude 

She and her wave-worn love had made their bower, 
Where nought upon their passion could intrude, 

And all the stars that crowded the blue space 

Saw nothing happier than her glowing face. 

CXCIX. 

Alas ! the love of women ! it is known 

To be a lovely and a fearful thing ; 
For all of theirs upon that die is thrown, 

And if 't is lost, life hath no more to bring 
To them but mockeries of the past alone, 

And their revenge is as the tiger's spring, 
Deadly, and quick, and crushing ; yet as real 
Torture is theirs — what they inflict they feci. 

CC. 
They 're right ; for man, to man so oft unjust, 

Is always so to women ; one sole bond 
Awaits them, treachery is all their trust ; 

Taught to conceal, their bursting hearts despond 
Over their idol, till some wealthier lust 

Buys them in marriage — and what rests beyond? 
A thankless husband, next a faithless lover, 
Then dressing, nursing, praying, and all 's over. 

CCI. 

Some take a lover, some take drams or prayers, 
Some mind their household, others dissipation, 

Some run away, and but exchange their cares, 
Losing the advantage of a virtuous station ; 

Few changes e'er can belter their affairs, 
Theirs being an unnatural situation, 

From the dull palace to the dirty hovel : 

Some play the devil, and then write a novel. 



ecu. 

Haidee was nature's bride, and knew not this ; 

Ilaidee was passion's child, born where the sun 
Showers triple light, and scorches even the kiss 

Of his gazelli -ryv<\ daughters ; she was one 
Made but to love, to fuel that she was his 

Who was her chosen : what was said or done 
Elsewhere was nothing — She had nought to fear, 
Hope, care, nor love beyond, her heart beat here. 

coin. 

And oh! that quickening of the heart, that beat! 

How much it costs us! yet each rising throb 
Is in its cause as its effect so sweet, 

That wisdom, ever on the watch to rob 
Joy of its alchymy, and to repeat 

Fine truths ; even conscience, too, has a tough job 
To make us understand each good old maxim, 
So good — I wonder Castlereagh don't lax 'cm. 

CCIV. 

And now 'twas done — on the lone shore were plighted 
Their hearts; the stars, their nuptial torches, shed 

Beauty upon the beautiful they lighte 1 ! 
Ocean their witness, and the cave their bed, 

By their own fei lings hallow'd and united, 
Their priest was solitude, and they were wed : 

And they were happy, for to their young qvus 

Each was an angel, and earth paradise. 

ccv. 

Oh love ! of whom great Coesar was the suitor, 

Titus the master, Antony the slave, 
Horace, Catullus, scholars, Ovid tutor, 

Sappho fhe sage blue-stocking, in whose grave 
All those may leap who rather would he neuter— 

(Lcucadia's rock still overlooks the wave) — 
Oh Love ! thou art the very god of evil, 
For, after all, we cannot call thee devil. 

CCVI. 
Thou makest the chaste connubial state precarious, 

And jestcst with the brows of mightiest men : 
Cresar and Pompey, Mahomet, Belisarius, 

Have much employ'd the muse of history's pen ; 
Their lives and fortunes were extremely various, — 

Such worthies time will never see again : — 
Yet to these four in three things the same luck holds, 
They all were heroes, conquerors, and cuckolds. 

CCVII. 
Thou makest philosophers : there 's Epicurus 

And Aristippus, a material crew ! 
Who to immoral courses would allure us 

By theories, quite practicable too ; 
If only from the devil they would in: ure us 

How pleasant were the maxim (not quite new), 
" Eat, drink, and love, what can the rest avail us J" 
So said the royal sage, Sardanapalus. 

CCVIII. 

But Juan! had lie quite forgotten Julia? 

And should he have forgotten her so soon? 
I can't hut say it seems to me most truly a 

Perplexing question ; but, no doubt, the moon 
Does these thmgs for us, and whenever newly a 

Palpitation rises, 't is her boon, 
Else how the devil is it that fresh features 
Have such a charm for as ooor human crealuros 7 



5i)2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO 11. 



CCIX. 
I hate inconstancy — I loathe, detest, 

Abhor, condemn, abjure tbe morial mu.de 
Of such quicksilver clay thai in his breast 

No permanent foundation can be laid ; 
Love, constant love, has been my constant guest, 

Anil yet last night, being at a masquerade, 
I saw the prettiest creature, fresh from Milan, 
Which gave me some sensations like a villain. 

ccx. 

But soon philosophy came to my aid, 

And whisper'd, "think of every sacred tie!" 

" I will, my dear philosophy !" I said, 

" Hut then her teeth, and then, oh heaven ! her eye ! 

I '11 just inquire if she be wife or maid, 
Or neither — out of curiosity*" 

"Slop!" cried philosophy, with air so Grecian 

(Though she was mask'd then as a fair Venetian) — 

CCXI. 
"Stop!" so I stopp'd. — But to return: that which 

Men call inconstancy is nothing more 
Than admiration due where nature's rich 

Profusion with young beauty covers o'er 
Some favour'd object ; and as in the niche 

A lovely Statue we almost at ore, 
This sort of adoration of the rt al 
Is but a heightening of the " beau ideal." 

CCXII. 

'T is the perception of the beautiful, 

A fine extension of the faculties, 
Platonic, universal, wonderful, 

Drawn from the stars, and filter'd through the skies, 
Without which life would be extremely dull ; 

In short, it is the use of our own eyes, 
With one or two small senses added, just 
To hint that Iksh is form'd of fiery dust. 

CCXIII. 

Yet 'tis a painful feeling, and unwilling, 
For surely if we always could perceive 

In (he same object graces quite as lulling 
As when she rose upon us like an Eve, 

'T would save us many a heart-ache, many a shilling 
(For we must get them any how, or grieve), 

Whereas, if one sole lady pleased for ever, 

How pleasant for the heart, as well as liver! 

CCXIV. 

The heart is like the sky, a part of heaven, 
But changes night and day too, like the sky ; 

Now o'er it clouds and thunder must, be driven, 
And darkness and destruction as on high ; 

■Rut when it hath been scorch'd, and pierced, and riven, 
Its storms expire in water-drops ; the eye 

Pours forth at last tne heart's blood turn'd to tears, 

Which make the English climate of our years. 

cexv. 

The liver is the lazaret of bile, 

But very rarely executes its function, 
For ihe first passion stays there such a while 

That all the rest creep in and form a junction, 
Like kii'.t -: of vipers on a dunghill's soil, 

Kagc, fear, hale, jealousy, revenge, compunction, 
Ko that all mischiefs spring up from this entrail, 
Lit*, earthquakes from the hidden firecall'd "central." 



CCXVI. 

In the mean time, without proceeding more 
In this anatomy, I 've finish'd now 

Two hundred and odd Btanzas as before, 
That being about the number I'll allow 

Each canto of the twelve, or twenty-four; 
And, laying down my pen, I make my bow, 

Leaving Don .Juan ami Haidee, to plead 

For them and theirs with all who deign to read. 



CANTO III. 



i. 

Hah., Muse! et cat era. — We left Juan sleeping, 
Pillow'd upon a fair and happy breast, 

And watch'd by eyes that never yet knew weeping, 
And loved by a young heart too deeply bless'd 

To feel the poison through her spirit creeping, 
Or knew who rested there ; a foe to rest 

Had soil'd the current of her sinless years, 

And turn'd her pure heart's purest blood to tears. 

II. 

Oh, love ! what is it in this world of ours 

Which makes it 'fatal to be loved? Ah, why 
Willi cypress branches hast ihou wreathed thy bo.vcrs, 

And made thy best interpreter a si<di ? 
As those who doat on odours pluck the dowers, 

And place them on their breast — but place to die — 
Thus the frail beings we would fondly cherish 
Are laid within our bosoms but to perish. 

III. 
In her first passion woman loves her lover, 

In all the others all she loves is love, 
Which grows a habit she can ne'er gel over, 

And liis her loosely — like an easy glove, 
As you may find, whene'er you like to prove her: 

One man alone at first her heart can move ; 
She then prefers him in the plural number, 
Not finding that the additions much encumber. 

IV. 
I know not if the fault be men's or theirs ; 

But one thing's pretty sure ; a woman planted 
(Unless at once she plunge for life in prayers), 

After a decent time must be gallanted ; 
Although, no doubt, her first of love affairs 

Is that to which her heart is wholly granted ; 
Yet there are some, they say, who have had nune t 
But those who have ne'er end with only one. 

V. 
'Tis melancholy, and a fearful sign 

Of human frailty, folly, also crime, 
That love and marriage rarely can combine, 

Although they both are born in the same clime, 
Marriage from love, like vinegar from wine — 

A sad, sour, sober beverage — by time 
Is sharpen'd from its high celestial flavour 
Down to a very homely household savour. 



CANTO III. 



DON JUAN. 



5'J< 



VI. 
There's something of antipathy, as 't were, 

Between their present and their Future state; 
A kind of flattery that's hardly fair 

Is used, until the truth arrives too late — 
Yet what can people do, except despair? 

The same things change their names at such a rate ; 
For instance — passion in a lover's glorious, 
But in a hushand is pronounced uxorious. 

VII. 
Men grow ashamed of being so very fond; 

They sometimes also get a little tired 
(But that, of course, is rare), and then despond: 

The same tilings cann »t always he admired, 
Yet 1 t is " so nominated in the bond," 

That both are tied till one shall have expired. 
Sad thought ! to lose the spouse that was adorning 
Our days, and put one's servants into mourning. 

VIII. 
There's doubtless something in domestic doings 

Which forms, in fact, true love's antithesis; 
Romances paint at full length people's wooings, 

But only give a bust of marriages ; 
For no one cares for matrimonial Cooings, 

There's nothing wrong in a connubial kiss: 
Think vou, if Laura had been Petrarch's wife, 
He would have written sonnets all his life? 

IX. 
All tragedies are finish'd by a death, 

All comedies are ended by a marriage; 
The future states of both arc left to faith, 

For authors fear description might disparage 
The worlds to come of both, or fall beneath, 

And then both worlds would punish their miscarriage, 
So leaving each their priest and prayer-book ready, 
They say no more of Death or of the Lady. 

X. 

The only two that in ray recollection 

Have sung of heaven and hell, or marriage, are 
Dante and Milton, and of both the affection 

Was hapless in their nuptials, for some bar 
Of fault or ten: i.i- rmuM the connexion — 

v Sn, h things, in fact, it don't ask much to mar) ; 
But Dante's Beatrice and Milton's Eve 
Were not drawn from their spouses, you conceive, 

XI. 

Some persons say that Dante meant theology 

By Beatrice, and not a mistress — I, 
Although my opinion may require apology, 

Deem this a commentator's phantasy, 
Unless indeed it was from his own knowledge he 

Decided thus, and show'd uood reason why; 
I think that Dante's more abstruse ccstatics 
Meant to personify the mathematics. 

XII. 
Haidee and Juan were not married, but 

The fault was theirs, not mine: i*. is not fair, 
Chaste reaiier, then, in any way to put 

Tii- blame on me, unless vou wish they were ; 
Then, if you'd have them wedded, please to shut 

The book which treats of this erroneous pair, 
Before the consequences grow too awful — 
To dangerous to read of loves unlawful. 



XIII. 
Vet they were happy, — happy in the illicit 

Indulgence of their innocent desires; 
But, more imprudent grown with every visit, 

forgot the island was her sire's ; 
When we have what we like, 'tis hard to miss it. 

At least in the beginning, ere one tires; 
Thus she caine often, not a moment losing, 
Whilst her piratical papa was cruising. 

XIV. 
Let not his mode of raising cash scetn strange, 

Although he fleeced the Bags of every nation, 
For into a prime minister but change 

His title, and 't is nothing hut taxation ; 
But he, more modest, took an humbler range 

Of life, and in an hone ter vocation 
Pursued o'er the high seas his watery journey, 
And merely practised as a sea-at!ori.ey. 

XV. 
The good old gentleman hail hern detain'd 

By winds and waves, an I some important capture*, 
And, in the hope of more, at sea remain'd, 

Although a squall or two had damped his raptures 
By swamping one of the prizes ; he had ehain'd 

His prisoners, dividing them like chapters, 
In number'd lots ; they all had cuffs and collars, 
And averaged each from ten to a hundred dollars 

XVI. 
Some he disposed of off Cape Matapan, 

Among his friends the Mainots ; some he sold 
To his Tunis correspondents, save one man 

Toss'd overboard unsaleable (being old) ; 
The rest — save here and tier.; some' richer one, 

Reserved for future ransom in the hold, — 
Were link'd alike; as for the common people, he 
Had a large order from the Dcy of Tripoli. 

XVII. 
The merchandise was served in the same way, 
Pieced out for different marts in the Levant, 
Except some certain portions of the prey, 

Light classic articles of female want, 
French stuffs, lace, tweezers, toothpicks, teapot tray, 

Guitars and castanets from Alicant, 
All which selected from the spoil he gathers, 
Kobh'd for his daughter by the best of fathers. 

XVIII. 
A monkey, a Dutch mastiff', a raackaw, 

Two parrots, with a Persian cat and killc.-j} 
He chose from several animals he saw — 

A terrier too, which once had been a Briton's, 
Who dying on the coast of Ithaca, 

The peasants gave the poor dumb thing a pittance; 
These to secure in this strong blowing weather, 
He caged in one huge hamper altogether. 

XIX. 
Then having settled his marine affairs, 

Despatching single cruisers here alio diere. 

His vessel ha' ing need ol tire, 

lie shaped his course to where his daughter tair 
Continued still her h ires ; 

But that part of the coast being shoal ,v,hl hare. 
And rough with reefs which ran out many a mile. 
Ills port lay on the other side o' the isi« 



bO\ 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C\l.XTO III 



XX. 

\nd there he went ashore without delay, 
Having no custom-house or quarantine 
To ask him awkward questions on the way 

About the time ami place where he had been: 
He left his shi|) to he hove down next day, 

With orders to the people to caieen; 
So that all hands were busy beyond mea 
In getting out goods, ballast, guns, and treasure. 

XXI. 

Arriving at the summit of a hill 

Winch overlook'd the white walls of his home, 
He stopp'd. — What singular emotions fill 

Their bosoms who have been induced to roam! 
With Buttering doubts if all be well or ill— 

With love for many, and with fears for some; 
All feelings which o'crleap the years long lost, 
And bring our hearts back to their starting-post. 

XXII. 
The approach of home to husbands and to sires, 

After long travelling by laiul or water, 
Most naturally some small doubt inspires — 

A female family's a serious mailer; 
(None trusts the sex more, or so much admires — 

But they hate flattery, SO I never Hatter) : 
Wives in their husbands 1 absences grow .subtler. 
And daughters sometimes run otr with the butler. 

XXIII. 

Aii honest gentleman at his return 

May not have the good fortune of Ulysses : 

Not all lone matrons for their husbands mourn, 
Or show the same dislike to suitors' kisses; 

The odds are that lie finds a handsome urn 

To his memory, and two or three young misses 

Born to some friend, who holds his wife and riches, 

And that his Argus bites him by — the breeches. 

XXIV. 
If single, probably his plighted fair 

Has in his absence wedded some rich miser ; 
But all the better, lor the happy pair 

May quarrel, and the lady growmg wiser, 
He may resume his amatory care 

As cavalier servente, or despise her; 
And, that his sorrow may not be a dumb one, 
Write odes on the inconstancy of woman. 

XXV. 

And oh! ye gentlemen who have already 

Some chaste li<iist/n of the kind — I mean 
An honest friendship with a married lady — 

The only tlnng of this sort ever seen 
To last — of all connexions the most steady, 

And the true Hymen (the first 's but a screen) — 
Yet for all that keep not too long away ; 
I 've known the absent wrong'd four times a-Jay 

XXVI. 
Lambro,, our sca-solicilur, who had 

Much less experience of dry land than ocean, 
tin seeing his own chimney smoke, felt glad; 

But r.ot knowing metaphysics, had no notion 
().' ine true reason of his not being sad, 

Or that of any other strong emotion ; 
II-. Wed Ins child, and would have wept the loss of her, 
But knew the cause no more than a philosopher, 



XXVII. 

He saw his white walls shining in the sun, 
His garden trees all shadowy and green; 

lie heard his rivulet's light bubbling run, 
The distant dog-bark; ami perceived between 

The umbrage of the wood, so cool and dun, 

The moving figures and the sparkling sheen 
Of arms (in the East all arm), and various dyes 
Of colour'd garbs, as bright as butterflies. 

XXVIII. 

And as the spot where they appear he ncars, 

Surprised at these unwonted si^lis ol 
lie hears — alas! no music of the spheres, 

But an unhallow'd, earthly sound of fiddling! 
A melody which made him doubt his cars, 

The cause being past his guessing or unriddling; 
A pipe too and a drum, and, shortly after, 
A most unoriental roar of laughter. 

XXIX. 

And still more nearly to the place advancing, 

Descending rather quickly the declivity, 
Through the waved branches, o'er the greensward 
glancing, 

'Midst other indications of festivity, 
Si i ing a troop of his domestics dancing 

Like dervises, who turn as on a pivot, he 
Perceived it was the Pyrrhic dance so martial, 
To which the Levantines are very partial. 

XXX. 
And further on a group of Grecian girls, 

The first and tallest her white kerchief waving, 
Were strung together like a row of pearls ; 

Link'd hand in hand, ami dancing; each too having 
Down her white neck long floating auburn curls — 

(The least of which would set ten poets raving) , 
TheL leader sang — and bounded to her song, 
With coral step and voice, the virgin throng. 

XXXI. 
And here, assembled cross-le<:g'd round their trays, 

Small social parties just begun to dine ; 
Pilaus and meats of all sorts met the gaze, 

And flasks of Simian and of Chian wine, 
And sherbet cooling in the porous vase ; 

Above them their desert grew on its vine, 
The orange and pomegranate, nodding o'er, 
Dropp'd in their laps, scarce pluck'd, their mellow store. 

XXXII. 
A band of children, round a snow-white ram, 

There wreathe his venerable horns with Bowers j 
While peaceful as if still an unwean'd lamb, 

The patriarch of the llock all gently cowers 
His sober head majestically tame, 

Or eats from out the palm, or playful lowers 
His brow as if in act to butt, and then, 
Yielding to their small hands, draws back again. 

XXXIII 
Their classical profiles, ane glittering dresses, 

Their large black eyes, and soft si raphic clu . ks, 
Crimson as cleft pomegranates, their long ties.-, s, 

The gesture winch enchants, the eye that speaks, 
The innocence which happy childhood blesses, 

Made quite a picture of these little Greeks; 
So that the philosophical beholder 
Sigh'd for their sakes— that they should e'er grow older. 



CANTO III. 



DON JUAN 



595 



XXXIV. 

Afar, a dwarf buffoon stood telling talcs 
To a sedate "ray circle of old smokers, 

Of secret treasures found in hidden vules, 
Of wonderful replies from Arab jokers, 

Of charms to make good gold anil cure bad ails, 
Of rocks bewitched that open to the knockers, 

Of magic ladies, who, by one soli: act, 

Transform'd their lords to hearts (but that's a fact) 

XXXV. 

Here was no lack of innocent diversion 

For the imagination or the senses, 
Song, dance, wine, music, stories from the Persian, 

All pretty pastime in which no offence is; 
But Lambro saw all these things with aversion, 

Perceiving in his absence such expenses, 
Dreading that climax of all hinni.ii ills, 
The inflammation of his weekly bills. 

XXXVI. 

Ah! what is man? what perils still environ 
The happiest mortals even after dinner — 

A day of n (l l,| from out an age of iron 
Is all that life allows the luckiest sinner ; 

Pleasure (whene'er she sings, at least) 's a siren, 
That lures to Hay alive the young beginner; 

Lambro's reception at his people's banquet 

Was such as tire accords to a wet blanket. 

XXXVII. 

He — being a man who seldom used a word 
Too much, and wishing gladly to surprise 

(In general he surprised men with the sword) 
His daughter — had not sent before to advise 

Of his arrival, so that no one stirr'd ; 

And long he paused to reassure his eyes, 

In fact much more astonish'd than delighted 

To find so much good company invited. 

XXXV11I. 
He did not know — (alas ! how men will lie) — 

That a report — (especially the Greeks) — 
Avouch'd his death (such people never die), 

And put his house in mourning several weeks. 
But now their eyes and also lips were dry ; 

The bloom too had return'd to llaidee's checks; 
Her tears too being return'd into their fount, 
She now kept house upon her own account. 

XXXIX. 
Hence all this rice, meat, dancing, wine, and fiddling, 

Which tum'd the isle into a place of pleasure ; 
The servants all were getting drunk or idling, 

A life which made them happy bevond measure. 
Her father's hospitality seem'd middling, 

Compared with what Haidce did with his treasure ; 
'T w as w r onderful how things went on improving, 
While she had not one hour to spare from loving. 

XL. 
Perhaps you think, in stumbling on this feast 

He flew into a passion, and in fact 
There was no mighty reason to be pleased ; 

Perhaps you prophesy some sudden act, 
The whip, the rack, or dungeon at the least, 

To teach his people to be more exact, 
And that, proceeding at a very high rate, 
rie show'd the royal pcnc/ianls of a pirate. 



XLI. 

You're wrong. — He was the niildest-manner'd man 
That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat; 

With such true breeding of a gentleman, 
Von never could divine his real thought j 

No co nlier could, and scarcely woman can 
Gird more. deceit within a petticoat; 

Pity he loved adventurous life's variety, 

He was so great a loss to good society. 

XLII. 
Advancing to the nearest dinner-tray, 

Tapping the shoulder of the nigheal guest, 
With a peculiar smile, which, by the way, 

Boded no good, whatev< r it ex| 
He ask'd the meaning of tins holiday? 

The vinous Greek to whom hi; had aJ.Jress'd 
His question, much too merry to divir.e 
The questioner, lill'd up a glass of wine, 

XLI1I. 
And, without turning his facetious head, 
Over his shoulder, with a Bacchant air, 

d the o'erflowing cup, and said, 
" Talking 's dry work, I have no time to spare." 
A second hiccup'd, " Our old master 's dead, 

You'd belter ask our mistress, who 's Ins heir." 
" Our mist; ess!" quoth a third: " Our mistress! — pooh' 
Vou mean our master — not the old, but new." 

XLIV. 
These rascals, being new comers, knew noc ivhom 

They thus address'd — and Lambro's visage fell — 
And o'er his eye a momentary gloom 

Pass'd, but he strove quite courteously to quell 
The expression, and, endeavouring to resume 

His smile, requested one of them to tell 
The name and quality of his new patron, 
Who seem'd to have turn'd Haidee into a matron. 

XLV. 

" I know not," quoth the fellow, "who or what 

He is, nor whence he came — and little ca>-e ; 
But this I know, that this roast capon 's fat, 

And that good wine ne'er wash'd down belter fare ; 
And if you are not satisfied with that, 

Direct your questions to my neighbour there ; 
He 'II answer all for better or for worse, 
For none likes more to hear himself converse." ' 

XLVI. 
I said that Lambro was a man of patience, 

And certainly he show'd the best of breeding, 
Which scarce even France, the paragon of nations, 

E'er saw her most polite of sons exceeding; 
He bore these sneers against his near relations, 

His own anxiety, his heart tun bleeding, 
The insults too of every servile glutton, 
Who all the time were eating up his mutton. 

XLYII. 
Now in a person used to much command — 

To bid men come, and g.>, and come again — 
To sec his ordi rs done too out of hand — 

Whether the word wu death, or but the cham- 
It may seem strange to find his manners bland, 

Yet such things ore, which I cannot explain, 
Though doubtless he who can command himself 
Is good to govern — almost as a G'lelf. 



596 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CA.XTO III 



XLVIII. 
Not that he was not sometimes rash or so, 

But never in his real and serious mood ; 
Then calm, concentrated, and still, and slow, 

He lay coil'd like the boa in the wood ; 
With him it never was a word and blow. 

His angry word once o'er, he shed no blood, 
But in his silence there was much to rue, 
And his one blow left little work for two. 

XLIX. 

He ask'd no further questions, and proceeded 
On to the house, but by a private way, 

So that the few who met him hardly heeded, 
So little they expected him that day ; 

If love paternal in his bosom pleaded 

For Haidee's sake, is more than I can say, 
But certainly to one, deem'd dead, returning, 
This revel seem'd a curious mode of mourning. 

L. 

If all the dead could now return to life, 

(Which God forbid!) or some, or a great many; 

For instance, if a husband or his wife 
(Nuptial examples are as good as any), 

No doubt whate'er might be their former strife, 
The present weather would be much more rainy — 

Tears shed into the grave of the connexion 

Would share most probably its resurrection. 

LI. 

He enter'd in the house no more his home, 
A thing to human feeiings the most trying, 

And harder for the heart to overcome 

Perhaps, than even the mental pangs of dying ; 

To find our hearthstone turn'd into a tomb, 
And round its once warm precincts palely lying 

The ashes of our hopes, is a deep grief, 

Beyond a single gentleman's belief. 

LII. 

He enter'd in the house — his home no more, 

For without hearts there is no home — and felt 
The solitude of passing his own door 

Without a welcome ; there he long had dwelt, 
There his few peaceful days Time had swept o'er, 

There his worn bosom and keen eye would melt 
Over the innocence of that sweet child, 
His only shrine of feelings undefiled. 

LIII. 
He was a man of a strange temperament, 

Of mild demeanour though of savage mood, 
Moderate in all his habits, and content 

With temperance in pleasure as in food, 
Quick to perceive, and strong to bear, and meant 

For something better, if not wholly good ; 
His country's wrongs and his despair to save her 
Had stung him from a slave to an enslaver. 

LIV. 
The love of power, and rapid gain of gold, 

The hardness by long habitude produced, 
The dangerous life in which he had grown old, 

The mercy he had granted oft abused, 
The sights he was accustom'd to behold, 

The wild seas and wild men with whom he cruised, 
Had cost his enemies a long repentance, 
And made him a pood friend, but bad acquaintance. 



LV. 
But something of the spirit of old Greece 
Flash'd o'er his soul a few heroic rays, 

Such as lit onward to the golden fleece 
His predecessors in the Colchian days: 

'T is true he had no ardent love for pi 

Alas! his country show'd no path to praise: 

Hate to the world and war with every nation 

He waged, in vengeance of her degradation. 

LVT. 

Still o'er his mind the influence of the clinic 
Shed its Ionian elegance, which show'd 

Its power unconsciously fUU many a time,— 
A taste seen in the choice of his abode, 

A love of music and of scenes sublime, 

A pleasure in the gentle stream that flow'd 

Past him in crystals, and a joy in flowers, 

Bedew'd his spirit in his calmer hours. 

LVII. 

But whatsoe'er he had of love, reposed 
On that beloved daughter; she had been 

The only thing which kept his heart unclosed 
Amidst the savage deeds he had done and seen, 

A lonely pure affection unopposed : 

There wanted but the loss of this to wean 

His feelings from all milk of human kindness, 

And turn him, like the Cyclops, mad with blindness. 

LVIII. 

The cubless tigress in her jungle raging 
Is dreadful to the shepherd and the flock ; 

The ocean when its yeasty war is waging 
Is awful to the vessel near the rock : 

But violent tiling's will sooner bear assuaging — 
Their fury being si>»" 'jy its own shock, — 

Than the stern, single, cteep, and wordless ire. 

Of a strong human heart, and in a sire. 

LIX. 

It is a hard, although a common case, 

To find our children running restive — they 
In whom our brightest days we would retrace, 

Our little selves reform'd in finer clay ; 
Just as old age is creeping on apace, 

And clouds come o'er the sunset of our day, 
They kindly leave us, though not quite alone, 
But in good company — the gout and stone. 

LX. 
Yet a fine family is a fine thing, 

(Provided they don't come in after dinner); 
'T is beautiful to see a matron bring 

Her children up (if nursing them don't thin uu*\i 
Like cherubs round an altar-piece they cling 

To the fireside (a sight to touch a sinner). 
A lady with her daughter or her nieces 
Shine like a guinea and seven-shilling pieces. 

LXI. 
Old Lambro pass'd unseen a private gate, 

And stood within his hall at eventide; 
Meantime the lady and her lover sale 

At wassail in their beauty and their pride: 
An ivory inlaid table spread with state 

Before them, and fair slaves on every side ; 
Grems, gold, and silver, form'd the service mostly 
Mother-of-pearl and coral the less costly. 



VANTO 111. 



DON JbAN. 



597 



LXII. 

Ttie dinner made about a hundred dishes ; 

Lamb am. pistachio-nuts — in short, all meats, 
And saffron soups, and sweetbreads ; and the fishes 

Were of the finest that e'er flounced in nets, 
Dress'd to a Sybarite's most pampcr'd wishes ; 

The beverage was various sherbets 
Of raisin, orange, and pomegranate juice, 
Squeezed through the rind, which makes it best for use. 

LXIII. 

These were ranged round, each in its crystal ewer, 
And fruits and date-bread loaves closed the repast, 

And Mocha's berry, from Arabia pure, 

In small fine China cups came in at last — 

Gold cups of filigree, made to secure 

The hand from burning, underneath them placed; 

Cloves, cinnamon, and saffron to'), were boil'd 

Up with the coffee, which (I think) they spoil'd. 

LXIV. 

The hangings of the room were tapestry, made 
Of velvet panels, each of different hue, 

And thick with damask flowers of silk inlaid: 
And round them ran a yellow border too ; 

The upper border, richly wrought, display'd, 
Embroider'd delicately o'er with blur, 

Soft Persian sentences, in lilac letters, 

From poets, or the moralists their betters. 

LXV. 

These oriental writings on the wall, 

Quite common in those countries, are a kind 

Of monitors, adapted to recall, 

Like skulls at Memphian banquets, to the mind 

The words which shook Belshazzar in his hall, 
And took his kingdom from him. — You will find, 

Though sages may pour out their wisdom's treasure, 

There is no sterner moralist than pleasure. 

LXVl. 

A beauty at the season's close grown hectic, 

A genius who has drunk himself to death, 
A rake turn'd methodistic or eclectic — 

(For that's the name they like to pray beneath) — 
But most, an alderman struck apoplectic, 

Are things that really take away the breath, 
And show that late hours, wine, and love, are able 
To do not much less damage than the table. 

LXVII. 
Haidee and Juan carpeted their feel 

On crimson satin, border'd with pale blue ; 
Their sofa occupied three parts complete 

Of the apartment — and appealed quite new; 
The velvet cushions — (for a throne more meet) — 

Were scarlet, from whose glowing centre crew 
A sun emboss'd in gold, whose rays of tissue, 
Meridian-like, were seen all light to issue. 

LXVIII. 
Crystal and marble, plate and porcelain, 

Had done their work of splendour, Indian mats 
And Persian carpels, which the heart bled to slain, 

Over the floors were spread ; gazelles and cats, 
And dwarfs and blacks, and such like things, that gain 

Their bread as ministers and favourites— (that 'a 
To sav, by degradation) — mingled there 
As plentiful as in a court or fair. 
3D 



LXIX. 

There was no want of lofty mirrors, and 

The tables, most of ebony inlaid 
With mother-of-pearl or ivory, stood at hand, 

Or were of tortoise-shell or rare woods made, 
Fretted with gold or silver : by command, 

The greater part of these were ready spread 
With viands, and sherbets in ice, and wine — 
Kept for all comers, at all hours to dine. 

LXX. 

Of all the dresses I select Haidce's: 

She wore two jelicks — one was of pale yellow; 

Of azure, pink, and white, was her chemise — 

'Neath which her breast heaved like a little billow , 

With buttons form'd of pearls as large as peas, 
All gold and crimson shone her jelick's fellow, 

And the striped white gauze baracau that bound her, 

Like lleecy clouds about the moon, fiow'd round her. 

LXXI. 

One large gold bracelet clasp'd each lovely arm, 
Lockless — so pliable from the pure gold 

That the hand stretch'd and shut it without harm, 
The limb which it adorn'd its only mould ; 

So beautiful — ils very shape would charm, 
And clinging as if loth to lose its hold, 

The purest ore inclosed the whitest skin 

That e'er by precious metal was held in. 2 

LXXII. 

Around, as princess of her father's land, 
A like gold bar, above her instep roll'd, 3 

Announced her rank ; twelve rings were on her hand ; 
Her hair was starr'd with gems ; hor veil's fine fold 

Below her breast was fasten'd with a band 

Of lavish pearls, whose worth could scarce be told; 

Her orange silk full Turkish trowsers furl'd 

About the prettiest ankle in the world. 

LXXIII. 

Her hair's long auburn waves down to her heel 
Fiow'd like an Alpine torrent which the sun 

Dyes with his morning Light, — and would concoai 
Her person 4 if allow'd at large to run ; 

And still they seem resentfully to feel 

The silken fillet's curb, and sought to shun 

Their bonds whene'er some zephyr caught began 

To offer his young pinion as her fan. 

LXXIV. 

Round her she made an atmosphere of hie, 

The very air seem'd lighter from her eyes, 
Thev were so soft and beautiful, and rife 

With all we can imagine of the skies, 
And pure as Psyche ere she grew a wife — 

Too pure even for the purest human ties ; 
Her overpowering presence made you feel 
It would not be idolatry to kneel. 

LXXV. 
Her eyelashes, though dark as night, were tingvd 

(It is the country's custom), but in vain; 
For those large black eyes were so blackly frillg*», 

The glossy rebels mock'd the jetty stain, 
And in their native beaul aged: 

Her nails were toueh'd with henna ; but again 
The power of art was tnni'd t<> nothing, for 
They could not look more rosy tb-ju before 



598 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LAXTO 111 



LXXVI. 

The henna should bo deep!/ dyed to make 

Tin- skill relieved appear more fairly fair : 
She had no need of this — day ne'er will break 

On mountain tops more heavenly white than her: 
The eve might doubt if it were well awake, 

She was so like a vision ; I might err, 
But Shakspcare also says 'tis very silly 
" To gild refined gold, or paint the lily." 

LXXVII. 
Juan had on a shawl of black and gold, 

But a while baracan, and so transparent, 
The sparkling gems beneath you might behold, 

Like small stars through the milky way appare-.t ; 
His turban, furl'd in many a graceful fold, 

An emerald aigrette with Haidee's hair in 't 
Surmounted as its clasp — a glowing crescent, 
Whose rays shone ever trembling, but incessant. 

LXXVI II. 

And now they were diverted by their suite, 

Dwarfs, dancing girls, black eunuchs, and a poet, 

Which made their new establishment complete ; 
The last was of great fame, and liked to show it : 

His verses rarely wanted their due feet — 

And for his theme — ho seldom sung below it, 

He being paid to satirize or flatter, 

As the psalm says, " inditing a good matter." 

LXXIX. 

He praised the present and abused the past, 
Reversing the good custom of old days, 

An eastern anti-jacobin at last 
He turn'd, preferring pudding to r.n praise — 

For some few years his lot had been o'ercast 
By his seeming independent in his lays, 

But now he sung the Sultan and the Pacha, 

Wiih truth like Southey, and with verse like Crashaw, 

LXXX. 

He was a man who had seen many changes, 

And always changed as true as any needle, 
His polar star being one which rather ranges, 

And not the fix'd — lie knew the way to wheedle : 
So vile he 'scaped the doom which oft aver pes ; 

And being fluent (save indeed when fee'd ill), 
He lied with such a fervour of intention — 
There was no doubt he earn'd his laureate pension 

LXXXI. 
But he had genius — when a turncoat has it 

The "vates irritabilis" takes care 
That without notice few full moons shall pass it ; 

Even good men like to make the public stare :- 
But to- my subject — let me see — what was it ? 

(>h ! — the third canto — and the pretty pair — 
Their loves, and feasts, and house, and dress, and mode 
Of living in their insular abode. 

LXXXII. 
Their poet, a sad trimmer, but no less 

[n company a very pleasant fellow, 
ilad been the favourite of full many a mess 

Of men, and made them speeches when half mellow; 
And though his meaning they could rarely guess, 

Yet bIhI ihey deign'd to hiccup or to bellow 
The glorious meed of popular applause, 
•*f which the first ne'er knows the second cause. 



LXXXIil. 
But now being lifted into high su? sty, 

And having pick'd up sct'crd _<dds and ends 
Of free thoughts in his travels, for variety, 

He deeni'd, being in a lone isle among friends. 
That without any danger of a riot, h.3 

Might for long lying make himself amends; 
An I, singing as he sung in his warm youth, 
Agree to a short armistice with truth. 

LXXXIV. 
He had travell'd 'mongsl the Arabs, Turks, and Frawks, 

And knew the self-loves of the different nations t 
And, having lived with people of all rankc, 

Had something ready upon most occasions- - 
Which got him a few presents and some thanks. 

He varied with some skill his adulations ; 
To "do at Rome as Romans do," a pii 
Of conduct was which he observed in Greece. 



LXXXV. 

Thus, usually, when he was ask'd to sing, 

He gave the different nations something national: 

'T was all the same to him — " God save the King," 
Or " Ca ira," according to the fashion all ; 

His muse made increment of any thing, 
From the high lyrical to the low rational : 

If Pindar sang horse-races, what should hinder 

Himself from being as pliable as Pindar ? 

LXXXVI. 

In France, fir instance, he would write a chanson; 

In England, a six-canto quarto tale ; 
In Spain, he \l make a ballad or romance on 

The last war — much the same in Portugal ; 
In Germany, the Pegasus he 'd prance on 

Would he old Goethe's — (sec what says dc Stael) 
In Italy, he'd ape the " Trecentisti ;" 
In Greece, he 'd sing some sort of hymn like this t' yo 

The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece! 

Where burning Sappho loved and sung, — ■ 
Where grew the arts of war and peace, — 

Where Delos rose and Piicebus sprung! 
Eternal summer gilds them yet, 
But all, except their sun, is set. 

The Scian and the Teian muse, 
The hero's harp, the lover's lute, 

Have found the fame your shores refuse; 
Their place of birth alone is mute 

To sounds which echo further west 

Than your sires' " Islands of the Bless'd." 

The mountains look on Marathon — 
And Marathon looks on the sea; 

And musing there an hour alone, 

I dreani'd that Greece might still be free ; 

For, standing on the Persians' grave, 

I could not deem myself a slave. 

A king sate on the rocky brow 

\\ huh looks o'er sea-born Salamis; 

And ships, by thousands, lay below, 
And men in nations; — all were his! 

He counted tnem at break of day — 

And when the sun set, where were thev? 



CANTO III. 



DON JUAN. 



e .9?> 



And where are they ? and where art thou, 
My country ? On thy voiceless shore 

The heroic lay is tuneless now — 
The heroic bosom beats no more ! 

And must thy lyre, so long divine, 

Degenerate into hands like mine? 

Tis something, in the dearth of fame, 
Though link'd among a fetter'd race, 

To feel at least a patriot's shame, 
Even as I sing, suffuse my face j 

For what is left the poet here ? 

For Greeks a blush — for Greece a tear. 

Must ice but weep o'er days more bless'd ? 

Must we but blush? — Our fathers bled. 
Earth! render back from out thy breast 

A remnant of our Spartan dead ! 
Of the three hundred grant but three, 
To make a new Thermopylae. 

What, silent still? and silent all? 

Ah ! no ; — the voices of the dead 
Sound like a distant torrent's fall, 

And answer, " Let one living head, 
But one arise, — we come, we come!" 
'Tis but the living who are dumb. 

In vain — in vain : strike other chords ; 

Fill high the cup with Samian wine ! 
Leave battles to the Turkish hordes, 

And shed the blood of Scio's vine ! 
Hark ! rising to the ignoble call — 
How answers each bold bacchanal ! 

You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet, 
Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone ? 

Of two such lessons, why forget 
The nobler and the manlier one? 

You have the letters Cadmus gave — 

Think ye he meant them for a slave? 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 

We will not think of themes like these ! 
It made Anacreon's song divine : 

He served — but served Polycrates — 
A tyrant ; but our masters then 
Were still, at least, our countrymen. 

The tyrant of the Chersonese 

Was freedom's best and bravest friend ; 
That tyrant was Miltiades ! 

Oh ! that the present hour would lend 
Another despot of the kind! 
Such chains as his were sure to bind. 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! 

On Suli's rock, and Parga's shore, 
Exists the remnant of a line 

Such as the Doric mothers bore ; 
And there, perhaps, some seed is sown, 
The Heracleidan blood might own. 

Trust not for freedom to the Franks — 
They have a king who buys and sells. 

In native swords, and native ranks, 
The only hope of courage dwells ; 



But Turkish force, and Latin fraud, 
Would break your shield, however broad. 

Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 

Our virgins dance beneath the shade 
I see their glorious black eyes shine ; 

Du!, gazing on each glowing maid, 
My own the burning tear-drop laves, 
To think such breasts must suckle slaves. 

Place me on Sunium's marbled steep — 
Where nothing, save the waves and I, 

May hear our mutual murmurs sweep ; 
Tin re, swan-like, let me sing and die : 

A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine — 

Dash down yon cup of Samian wine! 



LXXXVII. 

Thus sung, or would, or could, or should have sung, 
The modern Greek, in tolerable verse ; 

If not like Orpheus quite, when Greece was young, 
Yet in these times he might have done much worse : 

His strain display'd some fueling — right or wrong ; 
And feeling, in a poet, is the source 

Of others' feeling ; but they are such liars, 

And take all colours — like the hands of dyers. 

LXXXVIII. 

But words are things, and a small drop of ink 

Falling like dew upon a thought, produces 
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think , 

'T is strange, the shortest letter which man uses, 
Insteud of speech, may form a lasting link 

Of ages ; to what straits old Time reduces 
Frail man, when paper — even a rag like this, 
Survives himself, his tomb, and all that 's his. 

LXXXIX. 
And wh.cn his bones are dust, his grave a blank, 

His station, generation, even his nation, 
Become a thing, or nothing, save to rank 

In chronological commemoration, 
Some dull MS. oblivion long has sank, 

Or graven stone found in a barrack's station, 
In digging the foundation of a closet, 
May turn his name up as a rare deposit. 

XC. 
And glory long has made the sages smile ; 

'Tis something, nothing, words, illusion, wind — 
Depending more upon the historian's style 

Than on the name a person leaves behind : 
Troy owes to Homer what whist owes to Iioyie; 

The present century was growing bUnd 
To the great Marlborough's skill in giving kiwcto, 
Until his late Life by Archdeacon Coxe. 

XCI. 

Milton's the prince of poets — so we say; 

A little heavy, but no less divine ; 
An independent being in nis day — 

Learn'd, pious, temperate in love and wine , 
But his life falling into Johnson's way, 

We're told this great high priest of ail the Nil* 
Was whip! at college — a harsh sire — odd spouse. 
For the first Mrs. Milton left Ids house. 



600 



BYRON'S WORK'S. 



CAXTO Jh 



XC1I. 
A!l th3se are, certes, entertaining Facts, 

I stealing deer, Lord L5acon's bribes; 

I >"tli, and Caesar's earliest acte ; 

Like Burns (whom Doctor Currie well describes) ; 
Like Cromwell's pranks; — but although truth exacts 
These amiable descriptions from the scribes, 
i essentia] to tlcir hero's Btory, 
They do not much contribute to his glory. 

XOIII. 
All are not moralists like Southey, when 

He prated to the world of "Pantisocracy;" 
Or Wordsworth unexcised, in. hired, who then 

Season'd his pedlar po°.ms with democracy; 
Or Coloridgej long before his flighty pen 

Let to the Morning Posl its aristocracy; 
When he and Southey, following the same path, 
Espoused two partners (milliners of Bath). 

XC1V. 

Such naines at present cut a convict figure, 
Tne very Botany Bay in moral geography; 

Their loyal treason, renegado vigour, 

Are good manure fur their more bare biography. 

Wordsworth's last quarto, by the way, is bister 
Than any since the birth-day of typography: 

A clumsy 1'rowzy poem, call'd the " Excursion," 

Writ in a manner which is my aversion. 

xcv. 

lie there builds up a formidable dyke 

Between his own and others' intellect; 
But Wordsworth's poem, and his followers, like 

Joanna Southcole's Shiloh and her sect, 
Are things which in this century don't strike 

The public mind, so few arc the elect; 
And the new births of both their stale virginities 
Have proved but dropsies taken for divinities. 

XCVI. 
But let me to my story : I must own, 

If I have any fault, it is digression ; 
Leaving my people to proceed alone, 

While I soliloquize beyond expression; 
Rut these arc my addresses from the throne, 

Which put off business to the ensuing session: 
1 ting each omission is a loss to 

The world, not quite so great as Ariosto. 

XCV1I. 
I know that what our neighbours call "longueurs" 

(We 've not so good a word, but have the thing 
In that complete perfection which insures 

An epic from. Bob Southey every spring) — 
Form not the tnib temptation which allures 

The reader; but 'twould not be hard to bring 
Some line examples of the dpopie, 
To piovc its grand ingredient is ennui. 

XCVIII. 
We leacn from Horace, Homer sometimes sleeps; 

Wo feel without him, Wordsworth sometimes wakes 
To show with what complacency he creeps, 

With his dear " Waggoners," around his lakes; 
He wishes fir "a boat" to sail the deeps — 

Of ocean? — no, of air; and then he makes 
Another outcry for "a little boat," 
And drive's seas to set it well afloat. 



XC1X. 

If he must fain sweep o'er the ethereal plain, 

And Pegasus runs restive in his "waggon,'' 

Could he not beg the loan of Charles's wain 1 

Or pray Medea for a single dragon? 
Or if, too classic for his vulgar brain, 

He fear'd his neck to venture such a nag on, 
An I he must needs mount nearer to the moon, 
Could not the blockhead ask fur a balloon? 

C. 

"Pedlars," and "boats," and "waggons !" Oh ! yc shades 
Of Pope and Dryi'en, are we come to this? 

That trash of such sort not alone evades 
Contempt, but from the bathos' vast abyss 

Floats scum-like uppermost, and these Jack Cades 
Of sense and song above your graves may hiss— 

The " little boatman " and his " Peter Bell " 

Can sneer at him who drew " Achitophel !" 

CI. 

T' our tale. — The feast was over, the slaves gone, 
The dwarfs and dancing girls had all retired ; 

The Arab lore and poet's song were done, 
And every sound of revelry expired ; 

The lady and her lover, left alone, 

The rosy flood of twilight sky admired ; — 

Ave Maria! o'er the earth and sea, 

That heavenliest hour of Heaven is worthiest thee! 

CII. 

Ave Maria! blessed be the hour! 

The time, the clinic, the spot, where I so oft 
Have felt that moment in its fullest power 

Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft, 
While swung the deep bell in the distant tower, 

Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft, 
And not a breath crept thtough the rosy air, 
And yet the forest leaves seem stirr'd with prayer 

cm. 

Ave Maria! 'tis th*: hour of prayer! 

Ave Maria! 'tis the hour of love! 
Ave Maria ! may our spirits dare 

Look up to thine and to thy Soil's above ! 
Ave Maria! oh that face so fair! 

Those downcast eyes beneath the almighty dove— 
What though 't is but a pictured image strike — 
That painting is no idol, 't is too like. 

CIV. 
Some kinder casuists are pleased to say, 

In nameless print — that I have no devotion ; 
But set those persons down with me to pray, 

And you shall see who has the properest notion 
Of getting into heaven the shortest way; 

My altars are the mountains and the ocean, 
Earth, air, stars, — all that springs from the great whole, 
Who hath produced, and will receive the soul. 
CV. 
; hour of twilight! — in the solitude 

Of the pine forest, and the silent shore 
Which bounds Ravenna's immemorial wood, 

Rooted where once the Adrian wave flow'd o'er, 
To where the last Caesarean fortress stood, 

Ever-green forest! which Boccaccio's lore 
And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me, 
How have I loved the twilight hour and thee! 



.yt.Xl O III. 



DON JUAN. 



GUI 



CVI. 

The shrill cicalas, people of the pine, 

Making their summer lives one ceaseless son<r, 

Were the sole echoes, save my steed's ami mine, 
And vesper-bell's that rose the boughs along ; 

The spectre huntsman of Onesu's line, 

His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair throng, 

Which learn'd from this example not to fly 

From a true lover, shadow'd my mind's eye. 

CVII. 

Oh Hesperus! 5 thou bringest all good things- 
Home to the weary, to the hu/igry cheer, 

To the young bird the parent's brooding wings, 
The welcome stall to the oV: labour'd steer; 

Whate'cr of peace about our hearthstone clings, 
Whate'er our household go** protect of dear, 

Are gather'd round us by thy look of rest ; 

Thou bring'st the child, too, to the mother's breast. 

CVIII. 

Soft hour ! 5 which wakes the wish and melts the heart 
Of those who sail the seas, on the first day 

When they from their sweet friends are torn apart ; 
Or fitls with love the pilgrim on his wav, 

As the far bell of vesper makes him start, 
Seeming to weep the dying day's decay ; 

Is this a fancy which our reason scorns / 

Ah ! surely nothing dies but something mourns ! 

CIX. 

When Nero perish'd by the justest doom 
Which ever the destroyer yet destroy'd, 

Amidst the roar of liberated Rome, 

Of nations freed, and the world overjov'd, 

Some hands unseen strew'd flowers upon his tomb :' 
Perhaps the weakness of a heart not void 

Of feeling for some kindness done, when power 

Had left the wretch an uncorrupted hour. 

CX. 

But I 'm digressing: what on earth has Nero, 

Or any such like sovereign buffoons, 
To do with the transactions of my hero, 

More than such madmen's fellow-man — the moon's? 
Sure my invention must be down at zero, 

And I grown one of many " wooden spoons " 
Of verse (the name with which we Cantabs please 
To dub the last of honours in degrees). 

CXI. 
I feel this tediousness will never do — 

'T is being too epic, and I must cut down 
(In copying) this long canto into two : 

They '11 never find it out, unless I own 
The fact, excepting some experienced few ; 

And then as an improvement 'twill be shown: 
I'll prove that such the opinion of the critic is, 
From Aristotle passim. — See rioujriKijj. 



****** 



3d2 



Bl 



CANTO IV. 



i. 

NoTiiiN-f! so difficult as a beginning 

In poesy, unless perhaps the end : 
For oftentimes when Pegasus seems winning 

The race, he sprains a wing, and down we tend, 
Like Lucifer when hurl'd from heaven for sinning; 

Our sin the same, and hard as his to mend, 
Being pride, which leads the mind to soar too far, 
Till our own weakness shows us v. hat we are. 

II. 

But time, which brings all beings to their level, 
And sharp adversity, will teach at last 

Man, — and, as we would hope, — perhaps the devil, 
That neither of their intellects are vast : 

While youth's hot wishes in our red veins revel, 
We know not this — the blood flows on too fast , 

But as the torrent widens towards the ocean, 

We ponder deeply on each past emotion. 

III. 

As boy, I thought myself a clever fellow, 

And wish'd that others held the same opinion • 
They took it up when my days grew more mellow. 

And other minds acknowledged my dominion : 
Now my sere fancy " falls into the yellow 

Leaf," and imagination droops her pinion, 
And the sad truth which hovers o'er my desk 
Turns what was once romantic to burlesque. 

IV. 
And if I laugh at any mortal thing, 

'T is that I may not weep ; and if I weep, 
'T is that our nature cannot always bring 

Itself to apatny, which we must steep 
First in the icy depths of Lethe's spring, 

Ere what we least wish to behold will sleep , 
Thetis baptized her mortal son in Styx ; 
A mortal mother would on Lethe fix. 

V. 
Some have accused me of a stransc design 

Against the creed and morals of the land, 
And trace it in this poem every line : 

I don't pretend that I quite understand 
My own meaning when I would be very fine ; 

But the fact is that 1 have nothing plann'd, 
Unless it was to be a moment meirv, 
A novel word in my vocabulary. 

VI. 
To the kind reader of our sober clime 

This way of writing will appear exotic; 
Pulci was sire of the hnl&serious rhyme, 

Who sung when chivalry was more Quixotii, 
And reveil'd in the fancies of the time, 

True knights, chaste dames, huge giants, kings d»» 
potic ; 
But all these, save the last, being obsolete, 
1 chose a modem subject as more meet. 



ro2 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAN! Q IV. 



VII. 
How I have treated it, I do not know — 

Perhaps no better than they have treated me 
Who have imputed such designs as show, 

Not what they saw, but what they wish'd to see ; 
But if it gives them pleasure, be it so, — 

This is a liberal age, and thoughts are free : 
Meantime Apollo plucks me by the ear, 
And tells me to resume my story here. 

VIII. 
Young Juan and his lady-love were left 

To their own hearts' most sweet society; 
Even Time the pitiless in sorrow cleft 

Willi his rule scythe such gentle bosoms ; he 
Sijrh'd to behold them of their hours bereft, 

Though foe to love ; and yet they could not be 
Meant to grow old, but die in happy spring, 
Befure one charm or hope had taken wing. 

IX. 
Their faces were nof made for wrinkles, their 

Pure blood to stagnate, their great hearts to fail ; 
The blank gray was not made to blast their hair, 

But, like the climes tiiat know nor snow nor hail, 
They were all summer : lightning might assail 

And shiver them to ashes, but to trail 
A long and snake-like life of dull decay 
Was not for them — they had too little clay. 

X. 

Thev were alone once more ; for them to be 
Thus was another Eden ; they were never 

Weary, unless when separate : the tree 
Cut from its forest root of years — the river 

Damm'd from its fountain — the child from the knee 
And breast maternal wean'd at once for ever, 

Would wither less than these two torn apart ; 

Alas ! there is no instinct like the heart — 

XI. 

The heart — which may be broken : happy they ! 

Thrice fortunate ! who, of that fragile mould, 
The precious porcelain of human clay, 

Break with the first fall : they can ne'er behold 
The long year hnk'd with heavy day on day, 

And all which must be borne, and never told ; 
While life's strange principle will often lie 
Deepest in those who long the most to die. 

XII. 

*' Whom the gods love die young," was said of yore,' 

And many deaths do they escape by this : 
The death of friends, and, that which slays even more — 

The death of friendship, love, youth, all that is, 
Except mere breath ; and since the silent shore 

Awaits at last even those whom longest miss 
The old archer's shafts, perhaps the early grave 
Which men weep over may be meant to save. 

XIII. 
Haidee and Juar thought not of the dead ; 

The heavens, und earth, and air, seem'd made for them: 
They found no fault, with time, save that he fled ; 

They s?.w not in themselves aught to condemn : 
f.ach was the other's mirror, and but read 

Joy sparkling in their dark eyes like a gem, 
And knew such brightness was but the reflection 
Of tl.cir exchanging glances of affection. 



XIV. 

The gentle pressure, and the thrilling touch, 
The least glance better understood than worns, 

Which still said all, and ne'er could say too much; 
A language, too, but like to that of birds, 

Known but to them, at least appearing such 
As but to lovers a true sense affords ; 

Sweet playful phrases, which would stem absurd 

To ihosu who have ceased to hear such, or ne'er heard 

XV. 

All these were theirs, fir they were children still, 
And children still they should have ever been ; 

They were not made in the real world to fill 
A busy character in the dull scene ; 

But like two beings born from out a rill, 
A nymph and her beloved, all unseen 

To pass their lives in fountains and on flow rs, 

And never know the weight of human hours. 

XVI. 
Moons changing had roll'd on, and changeless found 
Those their bright rise had lighted to such joys 

As rarely they beheld throughout tin ir round: 
And these were not of the vain kind which cloys ; 

For theirs were buoyant spirits, never bound 
By the mere senses ; and that which destroys 

Most love, possession, unto them appeard 

A thing which each endearment mure endear'd. 

XVII. 
Oh beautiful! and rare as beautiful! 

But theirs was love in which the mind delights 
To lose itself, when the whole world grows dull, 

And we are sick of its hack sounds and sights, 
Intrigues, adventures of the common school, 

Its petty passions, marriages, and Bights, 
Where Hymen's torch but brands one strumpet more. 
Whose husband only knows her not a wh — re. 

XVIII. 

Hard words ; harsh truth ; a truth which many know. 

Enough. — The faithful and the fairy pair, 
Who never found a single hour too slow, 

What was it made them thus exempt from care 7 
Young innate feelings all have felt below, 

Which perish in the rest, but in them were 
Inherent ; what we mortals call romantic, 
And always envy, though we deem it frantic. 

XIX. 
This is in others a factitious state, 

An opium dream of too much youth and reading, 
But was in them their nature or their fate ; 

No novels e'er had set their young hearts bleeding, 
For Hai lee's knowledge was by no means groa;, 

And Juan was a boy of saintly bree ling, 
So that there was no reason fur their |i 
More than for those of nightingales or doves. 

XX. 
They gazed upon the sunset ; 't is an hour 

Dear tmto all, but dearest to their eyes, 
For it had made them what they were : the powei 

Of love had first o'erwhelm'd them from Stfch 
When happiness had been their only di 

And twilight saw them Hnk'd in passion's ties ; 
Charm'd with each other, all things charm'd that brought 
The past still welcome as the present thought. 



CANTO IV. 



DON JUAN. 



603 



XXI. 

I know not why, but in that hour to-night, 
Even as they gazed, a sudden tremor came, 

A.nd swept, as 't were, across their hearts' delight, 
Like the wind o'er a harp- string, or a riame, 

When one is shook in sound, and one in sight ; 
And thus some boding flash'd through either frame, 

And call'd from Juan's breast a faint low sigh, 

While one new tear arose in Haidce's eye. 

XXII. 

That large black prophet eye seem'd to dilate 

And follow far the disappearing sun, 
As if their last day of a happy date 

With his broad, bright, and dropping orb were gone ; 
Juan gazed on her as to ask his fate — 

He felt a grief, but knowing cause for none, 
His glance inquired of hers for some excuse 
For feelings causeless, or at least abstruse. 

XXIII. 

She turn'd to him, and smiled, but in that sort 
Which makes not others smile ; then turn'd aside : 

Whatever feeling shook her, it seem'd short, 
And master'd by her wisdom or her pride ; 

When Juan spoke, too — it might be in sport— 
Of this their mutual feeling, she replied— 

" If it should be so, — but — it cannot be — 

Or I at least shall not survive to see." 

XXIV. 

Juan would question further, but she press'd 
His lips to hers, and silenced him with this, 

And then dismiss'd the omen from her breast, 
Defying augury w^th that fond kiss ; 

And no doubt of all methods 't is the best : 
Some people prefer wine — 't is not amiss : 

I have tried both ; so those who would a part take 

May choose between the head-ache and the heart-ache. 

XXV. 

One of the two, according to your choice, 

Women or wine, you 'II have to undergo ; 
Both maladies are taxes on our joys : 

But which to choose I really hardly know ; 
And if I had to give a casting voice, 

For both sides I could many reasons show, 
And then decide, without great wrong to either, 
It were much better to have both than neither. 

XXVI. 
Juan and Haidee gazed upon each other, 

With swimming looks of speechless tenderness, 
Which mix'd all feelings, friend, child, lover, brother, 

All that the best can mingle and express, 
When two pure hearts are pour'd in one another, 

And love too much, and yet can not love less ; 
But almost sanctify the sweet excess 
By the immoital wish and power to bless. 

XXVII. 
Mix'd in each other's arms, and heart in heart, 

Why did they not then die? — they had lived too long, 
Should an hour come to bid thein breathe apart ; 

Years could but bring them cruel things or wrong, 
The world was not for them, nor the world's art 

For beings passionate as Sappho's song ; 
Love was born with them, in them, so intense, 
It was their very spirit — not a sense. 



XXVIII. 

They should have lived together deep in woods, 

Unseen as sings the nightingale ; they were 
Unfit to mix in these thick solitudes 

Call'd social, where all vice and hatred are: 
How lonely every freeborn creature broods ! 

The sweetest song-birds nestle in a pair; 
The eag'.e soars alone ; the gull and crow 
Flock o'er their carrion, just as mortals do. 

XXIX. 
Now pillow'd, cheek to cheek, in loving sleep, 

Haidee and Juan their s»csta took, 
A gentlo slumber, but it was not deep, 

For ever and anon a something shook 
Juan, and shuddering o'er his frame would creep ; 

And Haidee's sweet lips murmur'd like a brook 
A wordless music, and her face so fair 
Stirr'd with her dream as rose-leaves with the air : 

XXX. 

Or as the stirring of a deep clear stream 

Within an Alpine hollow, when the wind 
Walks over it, was she shaken by the dream, 

The mystical usurper of the mind — 
O'erpowering us to be whate'er may seem 

Good to the soul which we no more can bind j 
Strange state of being! (for 'tis still to be) 
Senseless to feel, and with seal'd eyes to see. 

XXXI. 
She dream'd of being alone on the sea-shore, 

Chain'd to a rock ; she knew not how, but sti» 
She could not from the spot, and the loud roar 

Grew, and each wave rose roughly, threatening her; 
And o'er her upper lip they seem'd to pour, 

Until she sobb'd for breath, and soon they were 
Foaming o'er her lone head, so fierce and high 
Each broke to drown her, yet she could not die. 

XXXII. 

Anon — she was released, and then she stray'd 

O'er the sharp shingles with her bleeding feet, 
And stumbled almost every step she made ; 

And something roll'd before her in a sheet, 
Which she must still pursue howe'er afraid ; 

'T was white and indistinct, nor stopp'd to met 
Her glance nor grasp, for still she gazed and grasp'd, 
And ran, but it escaped her as she clasp'd. 

XXXIII. 
The dream changed : in a cave she stood, its walls 

Were hung with marble icicles ; the work 
Of ases on its water-fretted halls, 

Where waves might wash, and seals might bretd and 
lurk ; 
Her hair was dripping, and the very balls 

Of her black eyes seem'd turn'd to tears, and mut« 
The sharp rocks look'd below each drop they caught, 
Which froze to marble as it feli, she thought. 

XXXIV. 
And wet, and cold, and lifeless at her feet, 

Pale as the foam that froth'd on his dead brow, 
Which she essay'd in vain to clear, (how sweet 

Were once her cares, how idle seem'd they now ' \ 
Lay Juan, nor could aught renew the beat 

Of his quench'd heart ; and the sea-dirges low 
Rang in her sad ears like a mermaid's song, 
And (hat brief dream appcar'd a life too long. 



604 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO IV. 



XXXV. 

And gazing on the dead, she thought his face 
Faded, or alter'd into something new — 

Like to her father's features, till each trace 
More like and like to Lambro's aspect grew — 

With all his keen worn look and Grecian grace ; 
And starting, she awoke, and what to view ! 

Oh! Powers ofHeaven I whal dark eye meets she there? 

>T is — 't is her father's — Ax'd upon the pair ! 

XXXVI. 

Then shrieking, she arose, and shrieking fell, 
With joy and sorrow, hope and fear, to see 

Him whom she dcem'd a habitant where dwell 
The ocean-buried, risen from death, to be 

Perchance the death of one she loved too well ; 
Dear as her father had been to Ilaidee, 

It was a moment of that awful kind 

I have seen such — but must not call to mind. 

XXXVII. 
Up Juan sprung to Haidee's bitter shriek, 

And caught her falling, and from off the wall 
Snatch'd down his sabre, in hot haste to wreak 

Vengeance on him who was the cause of all : 
Then Lambro, who till now forbore to speak, 

Smiled scornfully, and said, " Within my call 
A thousand scimitars await the word ; 
Put up, young man, put up your silly sword." 

XXXVIII. 

And Haidee clung around him; "Juan, 'tis— 
'T is Lambro — 'tis my father! Kneel with me — 

He will forgive us — yes — it must be — yes. 
Oh ! dearest father, in this agony 

Of pleasure and of pain — even while I kiss 
Thy garment's hem with transport, can it he 

That doubt should mingle with my filial joy? 

Deal with me as thou wilt, but spare this boy." 

XXXIX. 

High and inscrutable the old man stood, 

Calm in his voice, and calm within his eye — 

Not always signs with him of calmest mood : 
He look'd upon her, hut gave no reply ; 

Then turn'd to Juan, in whoso cheek the blood 
Oft came and went, as there resolved to die ; 

In arms, at least, he stood, in act to spring 

On the first foe whom Lambro's call mig'.it bring. 

XL. 
"Young man, your sword ;" so Lambro once more said: 

Juan replied, " Not while this arm is free." 
The old man's cheek grew pale, but not with dread, 

And drawing from his belt a pistol, he 
Replied, "Your blood be then on your own head." 

Then look'd close at the Hint, as if to see 
'Twas fresh — for he had lately used the lock — 
And next proceeded quietly to cock. 

XLI. 
it has a strange quick jar upon the ear, 

Thai cocking of a pistol, when you know 
A moment more will biing the sight to bear 

Upon vour person, twelve yards ofT, or so ; 
A g< nllemanly distance, not too near, 

If you have got a former friend for foe ; 
Hut after being fired at once or twice, 
The ear becomes more Irish, and less nice. 



XLII. 

Lambro presented, and one instant more 

Had BtOpp'd this canto, and Don Juan's breath, 

When Haidee threw herself her boy before, 

Stern as her sire: "On me," she cried, "let death 

Descend — the fault is mine ; this fatal shore 

He found— but sought not. I have pledged my faith; 

I love him — I will die with him : I knew 

Your nature's firmness — know your daughter's too." 

XLIII. 

A minute past, and she had been all tears, 
Anl tenderness, and infancy: but now 

She stood as one who champion'd human fears — 
Pale, statue-like, and stern, she woo'd the blow ; 

And tall beyond her sex and their compeers, 
She drew up to her height, as if to show 

A fairer mark ; and with a lix'd eye scann'd 

Her father's face — but never stopp'd his hand. 

XLIV. 

He gazed on her, and she on him ; 't was strange 
How like tiiey look'd ! the expression was the same; 

Serenely savage, with a little change 

In the large dark eye's mutual-darted flame ; 

For she too was as one who could avenge, 
If cause should be — a lioness, though lame : 

Her 'father's blood before her father's face 

Boil'd up, and proved her truly of his race. 

XLV. 

I said they were alike, their features and 
Their stature differing but in sex and years; 

Even to the delicacy of their hands 

There was resemblance, such as true blood wears; 

And now to see them, thus divided, stand 
In fix'd ferocity, when joyous tears, 

And sweet sensations, should have welcomed both, 

Siiow what the passions are in their full growth. 

XLVI. 

The father paused a moment, then withdrew 

His weapon, and replaced it; but stood still, 
And looking on her, as to look her through, 

"Not /," he said, "have sought this stranger's ill; 
Not 1 have made this desolation : few 

Would bear such outrage, and forbear to kill ; 
But I must do my duly — how thou hast 
Done thine, the present vouches for the past. 

XLVII. 
" Let him disarm ; or, by my father's head, 

His own shall roll before you like a ball !" 
He raised his whistle, as the word he said, 

And blew ; another answer'd to the call, 
And rushing in disorderly, though led, 

And arm'd from boot to turban, one and all, 
Some twenty of his train came, rank on rank ; 
He gave the word, "Arrest or slay the Frank." 

XLVI1I. 
Then, with a sudden movement, he withdrew 

His daughter ; while compress'd within his grasp, 
'Twbtt her and Juan interposed the crew; 

In vain she struggled in her father's L'rasp, — 
His arms were like a jserpent's coil : then flew 

Upon their prey, as darts an angry asp, 
The file of pirates ; save the foremost, who 
Had fallen, with his right shoulder half cut through. 



CANTO IV. 



DON JUAN. 



60i 



XLIX. 

The second had his cheek laid open ; but 
The third, a wary, cool old sworder, took 

The blows upon his cutlass, and then put 
His own well in : so well, ere you could look, 

His man was Hoor'd, and helpless at his foot, 
With the blood running like a little brook 

From two smart sabre gashes, deep and red — 

One on the arm, the other on the head. 

L. 

And then they bound him where he fell, and bore 
Juan from the apartment: with a sign 

Old Lambro bade them take him to the shore, 
Where lay some ships which were to sail at nine. 

They laid him in a boat, and plied the oar 

Until they reach'd some galliots, placed in line ; 

On board of one of these, and under hatches, 

They stow'd him, with strict orders to the watches. 

LI. 

The world is full of strange vicissitudes, 
And here was one exceedingly unpleasant : 

A gentleman so rich in the world's goods, 

Handsome and young, enjoying all the present, 

Just at the very time when he least broods 
On such a thing, is suddenly to sea sent, 

Wounded and chain'd, so that he cannot move, 

And all because a lady fell in love. 

LII. 

Here I must leave him, for I grow pathetic, 

Moved by the Chinese nymph of tears, green tea! 

Than whom Cassandra was not more prophetic; 
For if my pure libations exceed three, 

I feel my heart become so sympathetic, 

That I must have recourse to black Bohea: 

'T is pity wine should be so deleterious, 

For tea and coffee leave us much more serious. 

LIII. 

Unless when qualified with thee, Cognac! 

Sweet Naiad of the Phlegethontic rill ! 
Ah! why the liver wilt thou thus attack, 

And make, like other nymphs, thy lovers ill ? 
I would take refuge in weak punch, but rack 

(In each sense of the word), whene'er I fill 
My mild and midnight beakers to the brim, 
Wakes me next morning with its synonym. 

LIV. 
I leave Don Juan for the present safe — 

Not sound, poor fellow, but severely wounded ; 
Yet could his corporal pangs amount to half 

Of those with which his Haidce's bosom bounded? 
She was not one to weep, and rave, and chafe, 

And then give way, subdued because surrounded ; 
Her mother was a Moorish maid, from Fez, 
Where all is Eden, or a wilderness. 

LV. 
There the large olive rains its amber store 

In marble fonts ; there grain, and flower, and fruit, 
Gush from the earth until the land runs o'er ; 

But there too many a poison-tree has root, 
And midnight listens to the lion's roar, 

And long, leng deserts scorch the camel's foot, 
Or heaving whelm the helpless caravan, 
And as the soil is, so the heart of man. 



LVI. 

Afric is all the sun's, and as her earth 
Her human clay is kindled : full of power 

For good or evil, burning from its birth, 

The Moorish blood partakes the planet's hour, 

And like the soil beneath it will bring forth : 
Beauty and love were Haidce's mother's dower : 

But her large dark eye show'd deep passion's forcr, 

Though sleeping like a lion near a source. 

LVH. 

Her daughter, tetnper'd with a milder ray, 

Like summer clouds all silvery, smooth, and fair, 

Till slowly charged with thunder they display 
Terror to earth, and tempest to the air, 

Had held till now her soft and milky way ; 
But, overwrought with passion and despair, 

The fire burst furth from her Numidian veins, 

Even as the simoom sweeps the blasted plains. 

LVIII. 

The last sight which she saw was Juan's gore, 
And he himself o'ermaster'd and cut down ; 

His blood was running a-, the very floor 
Where late he trod, her beautiful, her own : 

Thus much she view'd an instant and no more,— 
Her struggles ceased with one convulsive groan ; 

On her sire's arm, which until now scarce held 

Her writhing, fell she like a cedar fell'd. 

LIX. 

A vein had burst, 2 and her sweet lips' pure dyes 
Were dabbled with the deep blood which ran o'er ; 

And her head droop'd as when the lily lies 

O'ercharged with rain: her summon'd handmaidftbore 

Their lady to her couch with gushing eyes ; 

Of herbs and cordials they produced their store. 

But she defied all means they could employ, 

Like one fife could not hold, nor death destroy. 

LX. 

Days lay she in that state unchanged, though chill, 

With nothing livid, still her lips were red; 
She had no pulse, but death seem'd absent still ; 

No hideous sign proclaim'd her surely dead ; 
Corruption came not in each mind to kill 

All hope ; to look upon her sweet face bred 
New thoughts of life, for it seem'd full of soul, 
She had so much, earth could not claim the whole. 

LXI. 
The ruling passion, such as marble shows 

When exquisitely chisell'd, still lay there, 
But fix'd as marble's unchanged aspect throws 

O'er the fair Venus, but for ever fair ; 
O'er the Laocoon's all eternal throes, 

And ever-dying Gladiator's air, 
Their energy like life forms all their fame. 
Yet looks not life, for they are still the same. 

LXII. 
She woke at length, but not as sleepers wake, 

Rather the dead, for life seem'd something new, 
A strange sensation which she must partake 

Perforce, since whatsoever met her view 
Struck not on memory, though a heavy ache 

Lay at her heart, whose earliest beat still true 
Brought back the sense of pain without the cause. 
For, for a wliile, the furies made a pause. 



006 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO IV. 



LXIII. 

She look'd on many a face with vacant eye, 
On many a token without knowing what ; 

She saw them watch her without asking why, 
And reck'd not who around her pillow sat ; 

Not speechless, though she spoke not : not a sigh 
Reveal'd her thoughts; dull silence and quick chat 

Were tried in vain by those who served ; she gave 

No sign, save breath, of having left the grave. 

LXIV. 

Iier handmaids tended, but she heeded not ; 

Her father watch'd, she turn'd her eyes away ; 
She recognised no being, and no spot, 

However dear or chensh'd in their day ; 
They changed from room to room, but all forgot, 

Gentle, but without memory, she lay ; 
And yet those eyes, which they would fain be weaning 
Back to old thoughts, seem'd full of fearful meaning. 

LXV. 

At last a slave bethought her of a harp ; 

The harper came, and tuned his instrument ; 
At the first notes, irregular and sharp, 

On him her flashing eyes a moment bent, 
Then to the wall she turn'd, as if to warp 

Her thoughts from sorrow through her heart re-sent, 
And he began a long low island song 
Of ancient days, ere tyranny grew strong. 

LXVI. 

Anon her thin wan fingers beat the wall 
In time to his old tune ; he changed the theme, 

And sung of love — the fierce name struck through all 
Her recollection ; on her fiash'd the dream 

flf what she was, and is, if ye could call 
To be so being ; in a gushing stream 

The tears rush'd forth from her o'erclouded brain, 

Like mountain mists at length dissolved in rain. 

LXVII. 

Short solace, vain relief! — thought came too quick, 

And whirl'd her brain to madness ; she arose 
As one who ne'er had dwelt among the sick, 

And flew at all she met, as on her foes ; 
But no one ever heard her speak or shriek, 

Although her paroxysm drew towards its close: 
Hers was a frenzy which disdain'd to rave, 
Even when they smote her, in the hope to save. 

LXVIII. 
Yet she betray'd at times a gleam of sense ; 

Nothing could make her meet her father's face, 
Though on all other things with looks intense 

She gazed, but none she ever could retrace ; 
Food she 'refused, and raiment; no pretence 

Avail'd for either ; neither change of place, 
Nor time, nor skill, nor remedy, could give her 
Senses to sleep — the power seem'd gone for ever. 

LXIX. 
Twelve days and nights she wither'd thus ; at last, 

Without a groan, or sigh, or glance, to show 
A parting pang, the spirit from her pass'd : 

And they who watch'd her nearest could not know 
Tfctj very instant, till the change that cast 

H'.-r sweet face into shadow, dull and slow, 
Glj^od o'er her eyes — the beautiful, the black — 
Oh ' to oossess such lustre — and then lack ! 



LXX. 

She died, but not alone ; she held within 
A second principle of life, which might 

Have dawn'd a fair and sinless child of sin : 
But closed its little being without li^ht, 

And went down to the grave unborn, wherein 
Blossom and bough lie wither'd with one blight; 

In vain the dews of heaven descend above 

The bleeding flower and blasted fruit of love. 

LXXI. 

Thus lived — thus died she : never more on her, 
Shall sorrow light or shame. She was not made 

Through years or moons the inner weight to bear, 
Which colder hearts endure till they are laid 

By age in earth ; her days and pleasures w« re 
Brief, but delightful — such as had not stayVJ 

Long with her destiny; but she sleeps will 

By the sea-shore whereon she loved to dwelL 

LXXII. 

That isle is now all desolate and bare, 

Its dwellings down, its tenants pass'd away, 

None but her own and father's grave is there, 
And nothing outward tells of human clay : 

Ye could not know where lies a thing so fair, 
No stone is there to show, no tongue to say 

What was ; no dirge, except the hollow sea's, 

Muurns o'er the beauty of the Cyclades. 

LXXIII. 
But many a Greek maid in a loving song 

Sighs o'er her name, and many an islander 
With her sire's story makes the night less long ; 

Valour was his, and beauty dwelt with her ; 
If she loved rashly, her life paid for wrong — 

A heavy price must all pay who thus err, 
In some shape ; let none think to fly the danger, 
For soon or late Love is his own avenger. 

LXXIV. 

But let me change this theme, which grows too sad, 

And lay this sheet of sorrow on the shelf; 
I don't much like describing people mad, 

For fear of seeming rather touch'd myself— 
Besides, I 've no more on this head to add : 

And as my Muse is a capricious elf, 
We '11 put about and try another tack 
With Juan, left half-kill'd some stanzas back. 

LXXV. 
Wounded and fetter'd, " cabin'd, cribb'd, confined," 

Some days and nights elapsed before that he 
Could altogether call the past to mind ; 

And when he did, he found himself at sea, 
Sailing six knots an hour before the wind ; 

The shores of Ilion lay beneath their lee — 
Another time he might have liked to see 'cm, 
But now was not much pleased with Cape Sigajum. 

LXXVI. 
There, on the green and village-cotted hill, is 

(Flank'd by the Hellespont and by the sea) 
Entomb'd the bravest of the brave, Achilles: 

They say so — (Bryant says the contrary): 
And further downward, tall and towering, still is 

The tumulus — of whom? Heaven knows ; 'l may be 
Patroclus, Ajax, or Protesilaus, — 
All heroes, who if living still would slay us. 



CANTO IV. 



DON JUAN. 



607 



LXXVII. 

High barrows, without marble or a name, 
A vast, tintill'd, and mountain-skirted plain, 

And Ida in the distance, still the same, 
And old Scamander (if 'tis he), remain ; 

The situation seems still form'd for fame — 
A hundred thousand men might fight again 

With case; but where I sought for Ilion's walls. 

The quiet sheep feeds, and the tortoise crawls ; 

LXXVIII. 

Troops of untended horses ; here and there 
Some little hamlets, with new names uncouth; 

Some shepherds (unlike Paris), led to stare 
A moment at the European youth 

Whom to the spot their school-boy feelings bear ; 
A Turk, with beads in hand and pipe in mouth, 

Extremely taken with his own religion, 

Are what I found there — but the devil a Phrygian. 

LXXIX. 

Don Juan, here permitted to emerge 

F'-om his dull cabin, found himself a slave ; 

Forlorn, and gazing on the deep-blue surge, 
O'ershadow'd there by many a hero's grave : 

Weak still with loss of blood, he scarce could urge 
A few brief questions ; and the answers gave 

No very satisfactory information 

About his past or present situation. 

LXXX. 

He saw some fellow-captives, who appear'd 
To be Italians — as they were, in fact ; 

From them, at least, their destiny he heard, 

Which was an odd one ; a troop going to act 

In Sicily — all singers, duly rcar'd 

In their vocation, — had not been attack'd, 

In sailing from Livorno, by the pirate, 

But sold by the impresario at no high rate. 5 

LXXXI. 

By one of these, the bulTo of the party, 

Juan was told about their curious case ; 
For, although destined to the Turkish mart, he 

Still kept his spirits up — at least his face ; 
The little fellow really look'd epiite hearty, 

Ami bore him with some gaiety and grace, 
Showing a much more reconciled demeanour 
Than did the prima donna and the tenor. 

LXXXII. 
In a few words he tola their hapless story, 

Saying, " Our Machiavelian impresario, 
Making a sisnal off some promontory, 

Hail'd a strange brig; Corpo di Caio Mario ! 
We wire transferr'd on board her in a hurry, 

Without a single scudo of salai io ; 
But, if the sultan has a taste for son;:, 
We will revive our fortunes before long. 

LXXXIII. 
" The prima donna, though a little old, 

And haggard with a dissipated life, 
And subject, when the house is thin, to cold, 

Has some good notes; and then the tenor's wife 
With no great voice, is pleasing to behold ; 

Last carnival siie made a deal of strife, 
By carrying off Count Csrsar (.'■ lOfna, 
Frc.-n an o'd Roman princess at Bologna. 



LXXX IV. 

" And then there arc the dancers ; there 's the Nim, 
With more than one profession, gains by all ; 

Then there's that laughing slut, the Pellegrini, 
She too was fortunate last carnival, 

And made at least five hundred good zecchini. 
But spends so fast, she has not now a paid ; 

And then there's the Grotesca — such a dancer! 

Where men have souls or bodies, she must answer. 

LXXXV. 
"As for the figuranti, they are like 

The rest of all that tribe ; with here and there 
A pretty person, which perhaps may strike, 

The rest are hardly fitted for a fair ; 
There's one, though tall, and stirTer than a pike, 

Vet has a sentimental kind of air, 
Which might go far, but she don't dance with vigour , 
The more 's the pity, with her face and figure. 

LXXXVI. 

" As for the men, they are a middling set ; 

The Musico is but a crack'd o,Q basin, 
But, being qualified in one way yet, 

May the seraglio do to set his face in, 
And as a servant some preferment get ; 

His singing I no further trust can place in : 
From ail the pope 4 makes yearly, 't would perplex 
To find three perfect pipes of the third sex. 

•LXXXVII. 

"The tenor's voice is spoilt by affectation, 
And for the bass, the beasl can oidy bellow ; 

In fact, he had no singing education, 

An ignorant, noteless, timeless, tuneless fellow, 

But being the prima donna's near relation, 

Who swore his voice was very rich and mellow, 

Thev hired him, though to hear him you'd believe 

An ass was practising recitative. 

LXXXVIII. 

" 'T would not become myself to dwell upon 

My own merits, and though young — I see, sir — you 
Have got a travdl'd air, which shows you one 

To whom the opera is by no means new : 
You 've heard of Raucocanti ? — I 'm the man ; 

The time may come when you may hear me too 
You was not last year at the fair of Ln^o, 
But next, when I 'm engaged to sing there— do go. 

LXXXIX. 
" Our barytone I almost had forgot, 

A pretty lad, but bursting with conceit; 
With <rraccful action, science not a jot, 

A voice W no great compass, and not sweet, 
He always is complaining of his lot, 

Forsooth, scarce fit for ballads in the street ; 
In lovers' parts, his passion more to breathe. 
Having no heart to show, he shows his teeth." 

XC. 
Here Raucocanti's eloquent recital 

Was interrupted by the pirate crew, 
Who came at stated moments to invite all 

The captives buck to their sad births; each threw 
A rueful glance upon the waves (which bright all. 

From the blue skies derived a double blue, 
Dancing all free and happy in the sun), 
And then went down the hatchway one bv one 



003 



BYRONS WORKS. 



CJXTO 1\ 



XCI. 
They heard, next day, that in the Dardanelles, 

Waiting for his sublimity's firman — 
The most imperative of sovereign spells, 

Which every body does without who can, — 
More to secure them in their naval cells, 

Lady to lailv, well as man to man, 
Were to be chained and lotted out per couple 
For the slave-market of Constantinople. 

XCI1. 
It seems when this allotment was made out, 

There chanced to be an odd male and odd female, 
Who (after some discussion and some doubt 

If the soprano nii»ht be doom'd to be male, 
They placed him o'er the women as a scout) 

Were link'd together, and it happen'd the male 
Was Juan, who — an awkward thing at his age — 
rair'd off with a Bacchante's blooming visage. 

XCIII. 
With Raucocanti lucklessly was chain'd 

The tenor ; these two hated with a hate 
Found only on the sta<;e, and each more pain'd 

With this his tuneful neighbour than his fate ; 
Sad strife arose, for they were so cross-grain'd, 

Instead of bearing up without debate, 
That each pull'd different ways with many an oalh, 
" Arcades ambo," ill est — blackguards both. 

XCIV. * 
Juan's companion was a Romagnolc, 

Rut bred within the March of old Ancona, 
With eyes that look'd into the very soul, 

(And other chief points of a " bella donna"), 
Bright — and as black and burning as a coal ; 

And through her clear brunette complexion shone a 
Great wish to please — a most attractive dower, 
Especially when added to the power. 

XCV. 
But all that power was wasted upon him, 

For sorrow o'er each sense held stem command ; 
Her eye might flash on his, but found it dim ; 

And though thus chain'd, as natural her hand 
TouchM his, nor that — nor any handsome limb 

(And she had some not easy to withstand) 
Could stir his pulse, or make his faith feel brittle ; 
Perhaps his recent wounds might help a little. 

XCVI. 
No matter; we should ne'er too much inquire, 

But facts are facts, — no knight could be more true, 
And firmer faith no ladyc-love desire ; 

We will omit the proofs, save one or™wo. 
T is said no one in hand " can hold a fire 

By thought of frosty Caucasus," hut few 
I really think ; yet Juan's then ordeal 
Was more triumphant, and not much less real. 

XCVII. 
Here 1 might enter on a chaste description, 

Having withstood temptation in my youth, 
But hear that several people take exception 

At the first two nooks having too much truth ; 
Therefore I '" make Don Juan leave the ship soon, 

Because the publisher declares, in sooth, 
Through needles' eyes it easier for the camel is 
To pass, than those two cantos into families. 



XCVIII. 
'T is all the same to me, I 'in fond of yielding, 

And therefore leave them to the purer page 
Of Sruollet, Prior, Ariosto, Fielding, 

Who say strange things for so correct an age; 
I once had great alacrity in wielding 

My pen, and liked poetic war to wage, 
And recollect the time when all this cant 
Would have provoked remarks which now it shan't. 

XCIX. 
As boys love rows, my boyhood liked a squabble ; 

But at this hour I wish to part in peace, 
Leaving such to the literary rabble. 

Whether my verse's fame be doom'd to cease 
While the right hand which wrote it still is able, 

Or of some centuries to take a lease, 
The crass upon my grave will grow as long, 
And sigh to midnight winds, but not to song. 

C. 

Of poets, who come down to us through distance 
Of time and tongues, the foster-babes of fame, 

Life seems the smallest portion of existence ; 
Where twenty ages gather o'er a name, 

'T is as a snowball which derives assistance 
From every flake, and yet rolls on the same, 

Even till an iceberg it may chance to grow, — 

But after all 't is nothing but cold snow. 

CI. 

And so great names are nothing more than nominal, 
And love of glory's but an airy lust, 

Too often in its fury overcoming all 

Who would, as 't were, identify their dust 

From out the wide destruction, which, entombing all 
Leaves nothing till the coming of the just — 

Save change : I've stood upon Achilles' tomb, 

And heard Troy doubted ; time will doubt of Rome. 



en. 

The very generations of the dead 

Are swf t away, and tomb inherits tomb, 

Until the 'mory of an age is fled, 

And, Iv , sinks beneath its offspring's doom ; 

Where he epitaphs our fathers read ? 

Sav< tew glean'd from the sepulchral gloom, 

Which once-named myriads nameless he beneath, 

And lose their own in universal death. 

cm. 

I canter by the spot each afternoon 

Where perish 'd in his fame the hero-boy, 
Who lived too long for men, but died too soon 

For human vanity, the young De Foix ! 
A broken pillar not uncouthly hewn, 

But which neglect is hastening to destroy, 
Records Ravenna's carnage on its face, 
While weeds and ordure rankle round the base. 4 

CIV. 
I pass each day where Dante's bones arc laid ; 

A little cupola, more neat than solemn, 
Protects his dust, but reverence here is paid 

To the bard's tomb, and not the warrior's column. 
The time must come when both, alike decay'd, 

The chieftain's trophy and the poet's volume, 
Will sink where lie the songs and wars of earth, 
Before Pclides' death or Homer's birth. 



CANTO IV. 



DON JUAN. 



009 



cv. 

With liuman blood that column was cemented, 
With human filth that column is defiled, 

As if the peasant's coarse contempt were vented. 
To show his loathing of the spot he spoil'd ; 

Thus is the trophy used, and thus lamented 

Should ever be those blood-hounds, from whose wild 

Instinct of gore and glo/y earth has known 

Those sufferings Dante saw in hell alone. 

CVI. 

Vet there will still be bards ; though fame is smoke, 
Its fumes are frankincense to human thought ; 

And the unquiet feelings, which first woke 

Song in the world, will seek what then they sought; 

As or, the beach the waves at last are broke, 
Thus to their extreme verge the passions brought, 

Dash into poetry, which is but passion, 

Or at least was so ere it grew a fashion. 

CVII. 

If in the course of such a life as was 
At once adventurous and contemplative, 

Men who partake all passions as they pass, 
Acquire the deep and bitter power to give 

Their images again, as in a glass, 
And in such colours that they seem to live ; 

Vou may do right forbidding them to show 'em, 

But spoil (I think) a very pretty poem. 

CVIII. 
Oh ! ye, who make the fortunes of all books ! 

Benign ceruleans of the second sex ! 
Who advertise new poems by your looks, 

Your "imprimatur" will ye not annex? — 
What, must I go to the oblivious cooks, — 

Those Cornish plunderers of Parnassian wrecks? 
Ah ! must I then the onlv minstrel be • 
Proscribed from tasting your Castalian lea? 

C1X. 

What, can I ^>rove "a lion" ihen no more? 

A ball-room bard, a foolscap, hot-press irling, 
To bear the compliments of many a bore 

And sigh "I can't get out," like Yoricl arling. 
Why then I '11 swear, as poet Wordy swoi 

(Because the world won't read him, always * ng), 
That taste is gone, that fame is but a lottery, 
Drawn by the blue-coat misses of a coterie. 

CX. 

Oh! "darkly, deeply, beautifully blue," 

As some one somewhere sings about the sky, 
And I, ye learned 'ladies, say of you ; 

Thev say your stockings are so (Heaven knows why, 
I have examined few pair of that hue) ; 
Blue as the garters which serenely lie 
Round the patrician left-iegs, which adorn 
The festal midnight and the levee morn. 

CXI. 
\'<_ .ume of you are most seraphic creatures— 
But times are alter'd since, a rhyming lover, 
You read mv stanzas, and I read your features: 

And — but no matter, all those things are over ; 
Still I have no dislike to learned natures, 

For sometimes such a world of virtues covor ; 
I know one woman of that purple school, 
The loveliest, chastest, best, but — quite a fool. 
3 E 03 



CXII. 
Humboldt, " the first of travellers," but not 

The last, if late accounts be accurate, 
Invented, by some name I have forgot, 

As will as the sublime discovery's date, 
An airy instrument, with which lie sought 

To ascertain the atmospheric state, 
By measuring "the intensity of blue :" 
Oh, Lady Daphne ! let me measure you! 

CXIII. 

But to the narrative. — The vessel bound 
With slaves to sell oil' in the capital, 

After the usual process, might be found 
At anchor under the seraglio wall; 

Her cargo, from the plague being safe and sound, 
Were landed in the market, one and all, 

And there, with Georgians, Russians, and Circassians, 

Bought up for different purposes and passions. 

CXIV. 

Some went off dearlv : fifteen hundred dollars 
For one Circassian, a sweet girl, were given, 

Warranted virgin; beauty's brightest colours 
Had deck'd her out in all the hues of heaven: 

Her sale sent home some disappointed bawlcrs, 
Who bade on till the hundreds reach'd eleven; 

But when the offer went beyond, they knew 

'T was for the sultan, and at once withdrew. 

CXV. 

Twelve ncgrcsses from Nubia brought a price 

Which the West-Indian market scarce would bring, 

Though Wilberforce, at last, has made it twice 
What 'twas ere abolition; and the thing 

Need not seem very wonderful, for vice 

Is always much more splendid than a king: 

The virtues, even the most exalted, charity, 

Are saving — vice spares nothing for a rarity. 

CXVI. 

But for the destiny of this young trcop, 
How some were bought by pachas, some by Jews, 

How some to burdens were obliged to stoop, 
And others rose to the command of crews 

As renegadocs ; while in hapless group, 
Hoping no very old vizier might choose, 

The females stood, as one by one they pick'd 'em, 

To make a mistress, or fourth wife, or victim. 

CXVII. 

All this must be reserved for further smiL'; 

Also our hero's lot, howe'er unpleasant, 
(Because this canto has become too long), 

Must be postponed discreetly for the present; 
I'm sensible redundancy is wrong, 

But could not for the muse of me put less '.n't 
An I now delay the progress of Don Juan, 
Till what is call'd in Ossian the fifth Duaji. 



****** 



G10 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO V. 



CANTO V. 



When amatory poets sing their loves 

In liquid lines mellilluouslv bland, 
And praise their rhymes as Venus yokes her doves, 

They little think what mischief is in hand ; 
The greater their success the worse it prove-:, 

As Ovid's verse may make you understand ; 
Even Petrarch's self, if judged with due severity, 
Is the Plutonic pimp of all posterity. 

II. 

I therefore do denounce all amorous writing, 
Except in such a way as not to attract ; 

Plain — simple — short, and by no means inviting, 
Bui with a moral to each error tack'd, 

Form'd rather for instructing than delighting, 
And with all passions in their turn attack'dj 

Now, if my PegaSUS should not be shod ill, 

This poem will become a moral model. 

III. 
The European with flie Asian shore 

Sprinkled with palaces ; the ocean stream, 1 
Here and there studded with a seventy-four; 

Sophia's cupola with golden gleam; 
The cypress groves; Olympus high and hoar; 

The twelve isles, and the more than I could dream, 
Far less describe, present the very view 
Which chann'd the charming Mary Montagu. 

IV. 

( have a passion for the name of " Mary," 

For once it was a magic sound to me, 
And still it half calls up the realms of fairy, 

Where I beheld what never was to be ; 
Ail feelings changed, but this was last to vary, 

A spell from which even yet I am not quite free : 
Rut I grow sad — and let a tale grow cold, 
Which must not be pathetically told. 

V. 
The wind swept down the Euxine and the wave 

Broke foaming o'er the blue Symplegades, 
T is a grand sight, from off' " the Giant's Grave," 2 

To watch the progress of those rolling seas 
Between the Bosphorus, as they lash and lave 

Europe and Asia, you being quite at ease ; 
There's not a sea the passenger e'er pukes in 
Turns up more dangerous breakers than the Euxine. 

VI. 
Twu a raw day of Autumn's bleak beginning, 

When nights are equal, but not so the days ; 
The Pares then cut short the further spinning 

Of seamen's fates, and the loud tempests raise 
The waters, and repentance for past sinning 

III all who o'er the great deep take their ways: 
They vow to amend their lives, and yet they don't ; 
Because if drown'd, they can't — if spared, they won't. 



VII. 
A crowd (f shivering slaves of every nation, 

And age, and sex, were in the market ranged; 
Each bevy with the merchant in his station: 

Poor creatures ! their good looks were sadly changed. 
All save the blacks seem'd jaded with vexation, 

From friends, and home, and freedom far estranged, 
The negroes more philosophy displayed, — 
Used to it, no doubt, as eels are to be fiay'd. 

VIII. 

Juan was juvenile, and thus was full, 

As most at his age are, of hope, and hei.'.th ; 

Vet I must own he look'd a little dull, 

And now and then a tear stole down by stealth; 

Perhaps his recent loss of blood might pull 

His spirit down; and then the loss of wealth, 

A mistress, and such comfortable quarters, 

To be put up for auction amongst Tartars, 

IX. 

Were things to shake a stoic; ne'erth 

Upon the whole his carriage was serene: 
His figure, and the splendour of his dress, 

Of which some gilded remnants still were seen, 
Drew all eyes on him, giving them to guess 

lie was above the vulgar by his mien ; 
And then, though pale, he was so very handsome ; 
And then — they calculated on his ransom. 

X. 

Like a backgammon-board the place was dotted 

^ ith whites and blacks, in groups on show for sale. 

Though ntther more irregularly spotted : 

Some bought the jet, while others chose the pale. 

It chanced, amongst the other people lotted, 
A man of thirty, rather stout and hale, 

With resolution in his dark-gray eye, 

Next Juan stood, till some might choose to buy. 

XI. 

He had an English Iook ; that is, was" square 
In make, of a complexion white and ruddy, 

Good teeth, with curling rather dark-brown hair, 
And, it might be from thought, or toil, or study, 

An open brow a little mark'd with care : 
One arm had on a bandage rather bloody; 

And there he stood with such sang-fioirl, that greater 

Could scarce be shown even by a mere spectator. 

XII. 

But seeing at his elbow a mere lad, 

Of a high spirit evidently, though 
At present weigh'd down by a doom which had 

O'crthrown even men, he soon beean to sIvjw 
A kind of bluet compassion for the Sad 

L it of so young a partner in the woe, 
Which for himself he seem'd to deem no worse 
Than any other scrape, a thing of course. 

XIII. 

"My hoy!" — said he, "amidst this motley crew 
Of Georgians, Russians, Nubians, and '-hat not, 

All ragamuffins differing but in hue. 

Willi whom it is our luck to east our lot, 

The only gentlemen seem I and you, 
So let us be acquainted, as we ought: 

If I could yield vou any consolation, 

'T would give me pleasure. — Pray,wbatis your nation?" 



cAJsro v. 



DON JUAN. 



611 



XIV. 
VVhen Juan answer'd " Spanish !" he replied, 

"I thought, in fact, you could not be a Greek ; 
Those servile dogs are not so proudly eyed : 

Fortune has play'd you here a pretty freak, 
But that's her way with all men til! they're tried: 

But never mind, — she '11 turn, perhaps, next week ; 
She has served ma also much the same as you, 
Except that I have found it nothing new." 

XV. 

" Pra}', sir," said Juan, " if I may presume, 

IVhal brought you here?" — "Oh! nolhingvcry rare — 

Six Tartars and a drag-chain " — "To this doom 

By what conducted, if the question's fair, 

Is that which I would learn." — "I served lor some 
Months with the Russian army hen; and there, 

And taking lately, by Suwarrow's bidding, 

A town, was ta'en myself instead of Widin." 

XVI. 

"Have you no friends?" — "I had — but, by God's blessing, 
Have not been troubled with them lately. Now 

I have answer'd all your questions without pressing, 
And you an equal courtesy should show." — 

"Alas!" said Juan, "'t were a tale distressing, 
And long besides." — "Oh! if 't is really so, 

You 're right on both accounts to hold your tongue ; 

A sad tale saddens doubly when 't is long. 

XVII. 

" But droop not : Fortune, at your time of life, 

Although a female moderately fickle, 
Will hardly leave you (as she 's not your wife) 

For any length of days in such a pickle. 
To strive too with our fate were such a strife 

As if the corn-sheaf should oppose the sickle : 
Men are the sport of circumstances, when 
The circumstances seem the sport of men." 

XVIII. 
"'Tis not," said Juan, " for my present doom 

I mourn, but for the past ; — I loved a maid :" 
He paused, and his dark eye grew full of gloom ; 

A single tear upon his eyelash staid 
A moment, and then dropp'd ; " but to resume, 

'T is not my present lot, as I have said, 
Which I deplore so much ; for J have borne 
Hardships which have the hardiest overworn, 

XIX. 
"On the rough deep. But this last blow — " and here 

He stopp'd again, and turn'd away his face. 
"Ay," quoth his friend, " I thought it would appear 

Tbat there had been a lady in the case ; 
And these are things which ask a tender tear, 

Such as I too would shed, if in your place : 
I cried upon my first wife's dying day, 
And also when my second ran away : 

XX. 
" My third" — "Your third !" quoth Juan, turning round ; 

" You scarcely can be thirty: have you three V" 
" No — only two at present above ground : 

Surely 't is nothing wonderful to see 
One person thrice in holy wedlock bound !" 

" Well, then, your third," said Juan ; "what did she? 
She did noi urn away, too, did she, sir?" 
"No, faith." — " What then?" — "I ran away from her." 



XXI. 

" You take things coolly, sir," said Juan. "Why," 

Replied the other, " what can a man do ? 
There Mil! are nianv rainbows in your sky, 

But mine have vanish'd. All, when life is now, 
Commence with feelings warm and prospects high; 

But lime strips our illusions of their hue, 
And one by one in turn, some grand mistake 
Casts otf its bright skin yearly, like the snake. 

XXII. 
" 'T is true, it gets anolhcr bright and fresh, 

Or fresher, brighter ; but, the year gone through, 
This skin must go the way too of all 

Or sometimes only wear a week or two ; — 
Love's the first net which spreads its deadly mesh , 

Ambition, avarice, vengeance, glory, glue 
The glittering lime-twigs of our latter days, 
Where Still «e ilutter on for pence or praise." 

XXIII. 
"All this is very fine, and maybe true," 

Said Juan ; " but I really don't see how 
it belters present times with me or you." 

"No!" quoth the other; "yet you will allow, 
By setting things in their right point of view, 

Knowledge, at least, is gain'd ; for instance, now, 
We know what slavery is, and our disasters 
May teach us better to behave when masters." 

XXIV. 

" Would we were masters now, if but to try 

Their present lessons on our pagan friends here," 
Said Juan — swallowing a heart-burning sigh : 

" Heav'n help the scholar whom his fortune sends 
here I" 
" Perhaps we shall be one day, by and by," 

Rejoin'd the other, " when our bad luck mends here, 
Meantime (yon old black eunuch seems to eye us) 
I wish to G-d that somebody would buy us ! 

XXV. 
"But after all, what is our present state ? 

'T is bad, and maybe better — all men's lot. 
Most men ere slaves, none more so than the great, 

To their own whims and passions, and what not; 
Society itself, which should create 

Kindness, destroys what little we had got: 
To feel for none is the true social art 
Of the world's stoics — men without a heart " 

XXVI. 
Just now a black old neutral personage 

Of thf third sex stepp'd up, and peering over 
The captives, scem'd to mark their looks, and age, 

iVnd capabilities, as to discover 
If they were tilted for the purposed cage : 

No lady e'er is ogled by a lover, 
Horse by a blackleg, broadcloth hv a tailor, 
Fee by a counsel, felon by a jailor, 

XXVII. 
As is a slave by his intended bidder. 

'T is pleasant purchasing our fellow-creatures , 
And ah are to be sold, if you consider 

Their passions, and are dext'rous ; some by feature 
Are bought up, others by a warlike leader, 

Some by a place — as lend their years or natures , 
The most by ready cash — but all have prices, 
From crowns to kicks, according to their vices. 



612 



BYRON'S WO [IKS. 



CAXTO V. 



XXVIII. 

The eunuch having eyod them o'er with care, 
Turn'd to the merchant, and began to bid 

First but for one, and after for the pair ; 

They haggled, wrangled, swore, too — so they did ! 

As though they were in a mere Christian fair, 
Cheapening an ox, an ass, a lamb, or kid ; 

So that their bargain sounded like a battle 

For this superior yoke of human cattle. 

XXIX. 

At last they settled into simple grumbling, 
And pulling out reluctant purses, and 

Turning each piece of silver o'er, and tumbling 
Some down, and weighing others in their hand, 

And by mistake sequins with paras jumbling, 
Until the sum was accurately scann'd, 

And then the merchant, giving change and signing 

Receipts in full, began to think of dining. 

XXX. 

I wonder if his appetite was good ; 

Or, if it were, if also his digestion. 
Methinks at meals some odd thoughts might intrude, 

And conscience ask a curious sort of question, 
About the right divine how far we should 

Sell flesh and blood. When dinner has oppress'd one, 
I think it is perhaps the gloomiest hour 
Which turns up out of the sad twenty-four. 

XXXI. 

Voltaire says "No;" he tells you that Candide 
Found life most tolerable after meals ; 

He 's wrong — unless man was a pig, indeed, 
Repletion rather adds to what he feels ; 

Unless he 's drunk, and then no doubt he 's freed 
From his own brain's oppression while it reels. 

Of food I think with Philip's son, or rather 

Ammon's (ill pleased with one world and one father); 

XXXII. 

I think with Alexander, that the act 

Of eating, with another act or two, 
Makes us feel our mortality in fact 

Redoubled ; when a roast and a ragout, 
And fish and soup, by some side dishes back'd, 

Can give us either pain or pleasure, who 
Would pique himself on intellects, whose use 
Depends so much upon the gastric juice ? 

XXXIII. 

The other evening ('t was on Friday last) — 

This is a fact, and no poetic fable — 
Just as my great coat was about me cast, 

My hat and gloves still lying on the table, 
I heard a shot — 't was eight o'clock scarce past — 

And running out as fast as I was able, 3 
1 found the military commandant 
S'rctch'd in the street, and able scarce to pant. 

XXXIV. 
Poor fellow ! for some reason, surely bad, 

They had slain him with five slugs ; and left him there 
l'o perish on the pavement: so I had 

Him borne into the house and up the stair, 
An.) stripp'd, and look'd to But why should I add 

More circumstances? vain was every care ; 
Ihe man was gone: in some Italian quarrel 
Kill U by five bullets from an old gun-barrel.* 



XXXV. 

I gazed upon him, for I knew him well ; 

Ami, though I have seen many corpses, never 
Saw one, whom such an accident befell, 

So calm; though pierced through stomach, heart, 
and liver, 
He seem'd to sleep, for you could scarcely tell 

(As he bled inwardly, no hideous river 
Of gore divulged the cause) that he was dead: — 
So as I gazed on him, I thought or said — 

XXXVI. 
"Can this be death? then what is life or death? 

Speak!" but he spoke not: "wake!" but still he slept: 
But yesterday, and who had mightier breath ? 
A thousand warriors by his word were kept 
In awe: he said, as the centurion sailh, 

' Go,' and he goeth ; ' come,' and forth he stepp'd. 
The trump and bugle till he spake were dumb — 
And now nought left him but the mufiled drum." 

XXXVII. 
And they who waited once and worshipp'd — they 

With their rough faces throng'd about the bed, 
To gaze once more on the commanding clay 

Which for the last though not the first time bled ; 
And such an end ! that he who many a day 

Had faced Napoleon's foes until they fled, — 
The foremost in the charge or in the sally, 
Should now be butcher'd in a civic alley. 

XXXVIII. 
The scars of his old wounds were near his new, 

Those honourable scars which brought him fame ; 
And horrid was the contrast to the view — 

But let me quit the theme, as such things claim 
Perhaps even more attention than is due 

From me : I gazed (as oft I have gazed the same) 
To try if I could wrench aught out of death, 
Which should confirm, or shake, or make a faith ; 

XXXIX. 
But it was all a mystery. Here we are, 

And there we go : — but where ? five bits of lead, 
Or three, or two, or one, send very far ! 

And is this blood, then, form'd but to be shed ? 
Can every element our elements mar? 

And air — earth — water — fire live — and we dead ? 
We, whose minds comprehend all things ? No more . 
But let us to the story as before. 

XL. 
The purchaser of Juan and acquaintance 
Bore off his bargains to a gilded bout, 
Embark'd himself and them, and off they went thence 

As fast as oars could pull and water float ; 
They look'd like persons being led to sentence, 

Wondering what next, till the caique was brought 
Up in a little creek below a wall 
O'ertopp'd with cypresses dark-green and tall. 

XLI. 
Here their conductor tapping at the wicket 
Of a small iron door, 't was open'd, and 
He led them onward, first through a low thicket 

Flank'd by large groves which tower'd on either hand' 
They almost lost their way, and had to pick it — 

For night was closing ere they came to lanU. 
The eunuch made a sign to those on board. 
Who row'd off, leaving them without a word. 



7ANT0 V. 



DOx\ JUAN. 



613 



XLII. 

As they were plodding on their winding way, 
Through orange bowers, and jasmine, and so forth, 

(Of which I might have a good deal to say, 
There being no such prolusion in the North 

Of oriental plants, " et ca?tera," 

But that of late your scribblers think it worth 

Their while to rear whole hotbeds in Ihdr works, 

Because one poet travcH'd 'mongst the Turks) : 

XLIII. 
As they were threading on their way, there came 

Into Don Juan's head a thought, which he 
Whisper' d to his companion : — 't was the same 

Which might have then occurr'd to you or me. 
' Methinks," — said he — "it would be no great shame 

If we should strike a stroke to set us free ; 
Let 's knock that old black fellow on the head, 
And inarch away — 'twere easier done than said." 

XLIV. 

* Fes," said the other, "and when done, what then ? 

How get out? how the devil got we in ? 
And when we once were fairly out, and when 

From Saint Bartholomew we have saved our skin, 
To-morrow 'd see us in some other den, 

And worse off than we hitherto have been ; 
Besides, I'm hungry, and just now would take, 
Like Esau, for my birthright, a beef-steak. 

XLV. 

" We must be near some place of man's abode : 
For the old negro's confidence in creeping, 

With his two captives, by so queer a road, 

Shows that he thinks his friends have not been sleeping; 

A single cry would bring them all abroad : 
'T is therefore better looking before leaping — 

And there, you see, this turn has brought us through. 

By Jove, a noble palace ! — lighted too." 

XLVI. 

It was indeed a wide extensive building 

Which open'd on their view, and o'er the front 
There seem'd to be besprent a deal of gilding 

And various hues, as is the Turkish wont, — 
A gaudy taste ; for they are little skill'd in 

The arts of which these lands were once the font : 
Each villa on the Bosphorus looks a screen 
New painted, or a pretty opcra-sccne. 

XLVII. 
And nearer as they came, a genial savour 

Of certain stews, and roast-meats, and pilaus, 
Things which in hungry mortals' eyes find favour, 

Made Juan in his harsh intentions pause, 
And put himself upon his good behaviour : 

Bia friend, too, adding a new saving clause, 
Said, " In Heaven's name let's get some supper now, 

And then I 'm with you, if you 're for a row." 
XLVIII. 
Some talk of an appeal unto some passion, 

Some to men's feeling-, others to their reason ; 
The last of these was never much the fashion, 

For reason thinks all reasoning out of season. 
Some speakers whine, and others lay (he lash on, 

But more or less continue still to tease on, 
With arguments according to their "forte;" 
But no one ever dreams of being short. 
3e2 



XLIX. 
Bui I digress: of all appeals,— although 

I grant the power of pathos, and of gold, 
Of beauty, flattery, threats, a shillins, — no 

Method 's more sure at moments to take hold 
Of the best feelings of mankind, which grow 

More tender, as we every day behold, 
Than that all-softenin<r, o'erpnwering knell, 
The tocsin of the soul — the dinner-bell. 

L. 

Turkey contains no bells, and vet men dine: 
And Juan and his friend, albeit they heard 

No Christian knoll to table, saw no line 
Of lacqueys usher to the feast prepared, 

Yet smelt roast-meat, beheld a huge fire shine, 
And cooks in motion with their clean arms bared. 

And gazed around them to the left and right 

With the prophetic eye of appetite. 

LI. 
And giving up all notions of resislanee, 

They follow'd close behind their sabie guide, 
Who little thought that his own cracK'd existence 

Was on the point of being set aside : 
He motion'd them to stop at some small distance, 

And knocking at the gate, 't was open'd w\de, 
And a magnificent large hall display'd 
The Asian pomp of Ottoman parade. 

LII. 

1 won't describe ; description is my forte, 

But every fool describes in these bright days 
His wond'rous journey to some foreign court. 

And spawns his quarto, and demands your praise- 
Death to his publisher, to him 't is sport ; 

While nature, tortured twenty thousand ways, 
Resigns herself with exemplary patience 
To guide-books, rhymes, touts, sketches, illustrations. 

LIII. 

Along this hall, and up and down, some, squatted 

Upon their hams, were occupied at chess ; 
Others in monosyllable talk chatted, 

And some seem'd much in love with their own dress, 
And divers smoked superb pipes decorated 

With amber mouths of greater price or less ; 
And several strutted, others slept, and some 
Prepared for supper with a glass of rum. 5 

LIV. 
As the black eunuch enter'd with his brace 

Of purchased infidels, some raised their eyes 
A moment without slackening from their pace ; 

But those who sate ne'er stirr'd in anywise: 
One or two stared the captives in the face, 

Just as one views a horse to guess his price ; 
Some nodded to the negro from their station, 
But no one troubled him with conversation. 

LV. 
He tr-ads them through the hall, and, without stoppmo 

On through a farther range of goodly rooms, 
Splendid but silent, save in one, where, dropping, 

A marble fountain echoes through the glooms 
Of night, which robe the chamber, or where popping 

Some female head most curiously piesumea 
To tbruM its black eyes through the door or lattice. 
As wondering what the devil noise "hat :s. 



C14 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO V. 



LVI. 

Some faint lamps gleaming from the lofty walls 
Gave light enough to hint their farther way, 

But not enou«b to show the imperial halls 
In all the flashing of their full array ; 

Perhaps there's nothing — I'll not say appals, 
Hut saddens more by night as well as day, 

Thau an enormous room without a soul 

To break the lifeless splendour of the whole. 

LVII. 
Two or three seem so little, one seems nothing: 

In deserts, forests, crowds, or by the shore, 
There solitude, we know, has her full growth in 

The spots which were her realms for evermore : 
But in a mighty hall or gallery, both in 

More modern buildings and those built of yore, 
A kind of death comes o'er us all alone, 
Seeing what's meant for many with but one. 

LVIII. 
A neat, snug study on a winter's night, 

A book, friend, single lady, or a glass 
Of claret, sandwich, and an appetite, 

Are things which make an English evening pass ; 
Though certes by no mean? so grand a sight 

As is a theatre lit up by gas. 
I pass my evenings in long galleries solely, 
And that 's the reason I 'm so melancholy. 

LIX. 

Alas ! man makes that great which makes him little: 
I grant you in a church 't is very well : 

What speaks of Heaven should by no means be brittle, 
But strong and lasting, till no tongue can tell 

Their names who rear'd it ; but huge houses fit ill — 
And huge tombs worse — mankind, since Adam fell : 

Mcthinks the story of the tower of Babel 

Might teach them this much better than I 'm able. 

LX. 
Babel was Nimrod's hunting-seat, and then 

A town of gardens, walls, and wealth amazing, 
Whore Nalmchadonosor, king of men, 

Reign'd, till one summer's Jay he took to grazing, 
And Daniel tamed the lions in their den, 

The people's awe and admiration raising ; 
T was famous, too, for Thisbe and f< jr Pyramus, 
And the calumniated Queen Semiramis. 
LXI. 



LXII. 
But to. resume, — should there be (what may not 

Be in these days?) some infidels, who don't, 
Because they can't find out the very spot 

Of that same Babel, or because they won't 
(Though Claudius Rich, esquir ', some bricks has get. 

And written lately two memoirs upon 't), 
Believe the Jews, those unbelievers, who 
Must bo believed, though they believe not you : — 



LXIII. 

Yet let them think that Horace has exprcss'd 
Shortly and sweetly the masonic folly 

Of those, forgetting the great place of rest, 
Who give themselves to architecture wholly ; 

We know where things and nun must end at last ; 
A moral (like all morals) melancholy, 

And " Et sepulcri Lmmemor struis domos" 

Shows that we build when we should but entomb us. 

LXIV. 

At last they reach'd a quarter most retired, 
Where echo woke as if frorii a long slumber: 

Though full of all things which could be desired, 
One wonder'd what to do with such a number 

Of articles which nobody required ; 

Here wraith had done its utmost to encumber 

With furniture an exquisite apartment, 

Which puzzled nature mueh to knew what art meant. 

LXV. 

It seem'd however, but to open on 

A range or suite of further chambers, which 

Might lead to heaven knows where ; but in this one 
The moveables were prodigally rich ; 

Sofas 't was half a sin to sit upon, 

So costly were they ; carpets every stitch 

Of workmanship so rare, that made you wish 

You could glide o'er them like a golden fish. 

LXVI. 

The black, however, without hardly deigning 

A glance at that which wrapt the slaves in wonaer, 

Trampled what they scarce trod for fear of staining, 
As if the milky way their feet was under 

With all its stars : and with a stretch attaining 
A certain press or cupboard, niched in yonder 

In that remote recess which you may see — 

Or if you don't, the fault is not in me : 

LXVII. 
I wish to be perspicuous : and the black, 

I say, unlocking the recess, pull'd forth 
A quantity of clothes fit for the back 

Of any Mussulman, whate'er his worth ; 
And of variety there was no lack — 

And yet, though I have said there was no dearth 
He chose himself to point out what he thought 
Most proper for the Christians he had bought. 

LXVIII. 
The suit he thought most suitable to each 

Was, for the elder and the stouter, first 
A Candiote cloak, which to the knee might reach, 

And trowsers not so tight that they would burs' 
But such as fit an Asiatic breech ; 

A shawl, whose folds in Cashmire had been nurst 
Slippers of satl'ron, danger rich and handy ; 
In short, all things which form a Turkish dandy. 

LXIX. 
While he was dressing, Baba, their black friend, 

Hinted the vast advantages which they 
Might probably attain both in the end, 

If they would but pursue the proper way 
Which fortune plainly seem'd to recommend ; 

And then he added, that he needs must say, 
"'T would greatly tend to better their condition, 
If they would condescend to circumcision. 



CANTO V. 



DON JUAN. 



Gib 



J.XX. 

" For his own part, he really should rejoice 
To see them true believers, but no less 

Would leave his proposition to their choice." 
The other, thanking him for this excess 

Of goodness in thus leaving them a voice 
In such a tritle, scarcely could express 

" Sufficiently (he said) his approbation 

Of all the customs of this polish'd nation. 

LXXI. 

" For his own share — he saw but small objection 

To so respectable an ancient rite, 
And after swallowing down a slight refection, 

For which he own'd a present appetite, 
He doubted not a few hours of reflection 

Would reconcile him to the business quite." — 
"Will it?" said Juan, sharply ; "Strike me dead, 
But they as soon shall circumcise my head — 

LXXII. 
" Cut off a thousand heads, before " — " Now pray," 

Replied the other, " do not interrupt : 
You put me out in what I had to say. 

Sir ! — as I said, as soon as I have supp'd, 
I shall perpend if your proposals may 

Be such as I can properly accept : 
Provided always your great goodness still 
Remits the matter to our own free-will." 

LXXIII. 

Baba eyed Juan, and said " Be so good 

As dress yourself — " and pointed out a suit 
In which a princess with great pleasure would 

Array her limbs ; but Juan standing mute, 
As not being in a masquerading mood, 

Gave it a slight kick with his Christian foot ; 
And when the old negro told him to "Get ready," 
Replied, " Old gentleman, I 'in not a lady." 

LXXIV. 
"What you maybe, I neither know nor care," 

Said Baba, "but pray do as I desire, 
I have no more time nor many words to spare." 

"At least," said Juan, "sure I may inquire 
The cause of this odd travesty ?" — " Forbear," 

Said Baba, " to be curious : 't will transpire, 
No doubt, in proper place, and time, and season: 
I have no authority to tell the reason." 

LXXV. 
" Then if I do," said Juan, " I'll be " "Hold!" 

Rejoin'd the negro, " pray be not provoking ; 
This spirit's well, but it may wax loo' bold, 

And you will find us not too fond of joking." 
"What, sir," said Juan, "shall it e'er be told 

That I unsex'd my dress ?" But Baba, stroking 
The things down, said — " Incense me, and I call 
Those who will leave you of no sex at. all. 

LXXVI. 
" I offer you a handsome suit of clothes : 

A woman's, true ; hut then there is a cause 
Why you should wear them." — "What, though my 
soul loathes 

The effeminate garb ?" — Thus, after a short pause, 
Sigh'd Juan, muttering also some slight oaths, 

"What the devil shall I do with all this gauze?" 
Thus he profanely term'd the finest lace 
Winch «'er set off a marriage-morning face. , 



LXXVII. 

Ami then he swore ; and, sighing, on he slipp d 

A pair of trowsers of flesh-colour'd silk ; 
Next with a virgin zone he was equipp'd, 

W hiofa girt a slight chemise as white as milk ; 
But, tugging on his petticoat, he tripp'd, 

Which — as we say — or a.s the Scotch say, whilk, 
(The rhyme obliges Die to this: — sometimes 
Kings are not more imperative than rhymes) — 

LXXVIII. 
Whilk, which (or what you please) was owing to 

His garment's novelty, and his being awkward ; 
And yet at last he managed to get through 

His toilet, though no doubt a little backward ; 
The negro Baba help'd a little too, 

When some untoward part of raiment stuck hard ; 
And, wrestling both his arms into a gown, 
He paused and took a survey up and down. 

LXXIX. 

One difficulty still remam'd, — his hair 

Was hardly long enough ; but Baba found 
So many false long tresses all to spare, 

That soon his head was most completely cicarn'dj 
After the manner then in fashion there ; 

And this addition with such gems was bound 
As suited the ensemble of his toilet, 
While Baba made him comb his head and oil it. 

LXXX. 
And now being femininely all array'd, 

With some small aid from scissors, paint, and 
tweezers, 
He look'd in almost all respects a maid, 

And Baba smilingly exclaim'd, '•You see, bus, 
A perfect transformation here display'd ; 

And now, then, you must come along with me, sirs, 
That is — the lady:" — clapping his hands twice, 
Four blacks were at his elbow in a trice. 

LXXXI. 
" You, sir," said Baba, nodding to the one, 

"Will please to accompany those gentlemen 
To sniper; but you, worthy Christian nun, 

Will follow me: no trifling, sir: for when 
I say a thing, it must at once be done. 

What fear you ? think you this a lion's den ? 
Why 'tis a palace, where the truly wise 
Anticipate the Prophet's paradise. 

LXXXII. 
"You fool! I tell you no one means you harm.' 

"So much the better," Juan said, "for them: 
Else they shall feel the weight of this my arm, 

Which is not quite so light as you may derm. 
I yield thin i\.r ; hut soon will break the charm, 

If any take me fir that which I seem; 
So that I trust, for every body's sake, 
That this disguise may lead to no mistake." 
LXXXIII. 

Blockhead! come on, and see," quoth Baba ; whim 

Don Juan, turning to his comrade, who, 

somewhat grieved, could scarce forbear a sitvur 

Upon the metamorphosis in view, 
"Farewell!" they mutually exclaim'd : "this soil 

Seems fertile in adventures strange and new ■ 
One's turn'd half Mussulman, and one a maid, 
By this old black enchanter's unsought aid." 



r,i6 



EYRUjN'S works. 



CAXTO v. 



LXXXIV. 

"Farewell!" said Juan ; "should we meet no more, 
I wish you a good appetite." — "Farewell!" 

Replied the other; "though it grieves me sore; 
When we next meet we '11 have a tale to tell; 

We needs must follow when Fate puts from shore. 
Keep your good name; though Eve herself once fell." 

"Nay," quoth the maid, "the Sultan's self shan't cany me, 

Unless his highness promises to many me." 

LXXXV. 

And thus they parted, each by separate doors ; 

Baba led Juan onward, room by room, 
Through glittering galleries and o'er marble floors, 

Till a gigantic portal through the gloom, 
Haughty an! huge, along the distance towers ; 

And w afted far arose a rich perfume : 
It seem'd as though they came upon a shrine, 
For all was vast, still, fragrant, and divine. 

LXXXVl. 

The giant door was broad, and bright and high, 
Of gilded bronze, and carved in curious guise ; 

Warriors thereon were battling furiously; 

Here stalks the victor, there the vanquish'd lies; 

There captives led in triumph droop the eye, 
And in perspective many a squadron flics: 

It seems the work of times before the line 

Of Rome transplanted fell with Constantino. 

LXXXVU. 

This massy portal stood at the wide close 
Of a huge hall, and on its either side 

Two little dwarfs, the least you could suppose, 
Were sate, like ugly imps, as if allied 

In mockeiy to the enormous gate which rose 
O'er them in almost pyramidic pride: 

The gate so splendid was in all its features, 7 

You never thought about these little creatures, 

LXXXVIII. 

Until you nearly trod on them, and then 

You started back in horror to survey 
The wondrous hideousness of those small men, 

Whose colour was not black, nor white, nor gray, 
But an extraneous mixture, which no pen 

Can trace, although perhaps the pencil may; 
They were misshapen pigmies, deaf and dumb — 
Monsters, who cost a no less monstrous sum. 

LXXXIX. 
Their duty was — for they were strong, and though 

They look'd so little, did strong things at times — 
To ope this door, which they could really do, 

The hinges being as smooth as Rogers' rhymes ; 
And now and then, with tough strings of the bow, 

As is the custom of those eastern climes, 
l'o give some rebel Pacha a cravat ; 
For mutes are generally used for that. 

xc. 

rhey spoke by signs — that is, not spoke at all: 
And. looking like two incubi, they glared 

As Baba with his fingers made them fall 
To heaving back the portal folds : it scared 

Juan a moment, as this pair so small 

With shrinking .serpent optics on him stared; 

!• was as if their little looks could poison 

Dr fascinate whome'er they fix'd their eyes on. 



XCI. 
Before they entcr'd, Baba paused to hint 

To Juan some slight lessons as his guide : 
" If you could just contrive," he said, " to stint 

That somen hat manly majesty of stride, 
'T would be as well, and — (though there 's not much 
in 't)— 
To swing a little less from side to side, 
Which has at times an aspect of the oddest ; 
And also, could you look » little modest, 

XCII. 
'T would be convenient ; for these mutes have eyes 
Like needles, which might pierce those petticoats ; 
And if they should discover your disguise, 

You know how near us the deep Bosphorus floats ; 
And you and I may chance, ere morning rise, 
To find our way to Marmora without boats, 
Stitch'd up in sacks — a mode of navigation 
A good deal practised here upon occasion." 

XCIII. 
Willi this encouragement, he led the way 

Into a room still nobler than the last ; 
A rich confusion form'd a disarray 

In such sort, that the eye along it cast 
Could hardly carry any lliing away, 

Object on object flash'd so bright and fast ; 
A dazzling mass of gems, and gold, and glitter, 
Magnificently mingled in a litter. 

XCIV. 
Wealth had done wonders — taste not mucn ; such things 

Occur in orient palaces, and even 
In the more chasten'd domes of western kings, 

(Of which I 've also seen some six or seven), 
Where I can't say or gold or diamond flings 
Much lustre, there is much to be forgiven ; 
Groups of bad statues, tables, chairs, and pictures, 
On which I cannot pause to make my strictures. 

XCV. 
In this imperial hall, at distance lay 

Under a canopy, and there reclined 
Quite in a confidential queenly way, 

A lady. Baba stopp'd, and kneeling, Blgu'd 
To Juan, who, though not much used to pray, 

Knelt down by instinct, wondering in his mind 
What all this meant : while Baba bow'd and bended 
His head, until the ceremony ended. 

XCYI. 
The lady, rising up with such an air 

As Venus rose with from the wave, on them 
Bent like an antelope a Paphian pair 

Of eyes, which put out each surrounding gem : 
And, raising up an arm as. moonlight fair, 

She sign'd to Baba, who first kiss'd the hem 
Of her deep-purple robe, and, speaking low, 
Pointed to Juan, who remain'd below. 

XCVII. 
Her presence was as lofty as her state ; 
Her beauty of that overpowering kind, 
Whose force description only would abate : 

I 'd rather leave it much to your own mind, 
Than lessen it by what I could relate 

Of forms and features ; it would strike you blind, 
Could I do justice to the full detail ; 
So, luckily for both, my phrases fail. 



CANTO V. 



DON JUAN. 



G17 



XCVIII. 
This much however I may add — her years 

Were ripe, they might make six and twenty springs, 
But there are f< irms which Time to touch forbears, 

And turns aside his scythe to vulgar things, 
Such as was Mary's, Queen of Scots ; true — tears 

And love destroy ; and sapping sorrow wrings 
Charms from the charmer — yet some never grow 
Ugly ; for instance — Xinon de l'Enclos. 

XCIX. 

She spake some words to her attendants, who 
Composed a choir of girls, ten or a dozen, 

And were all clad alike ; like Juan, too, 
Who wore their uniform, by Baba chosen: 

They form'd a very nymph-like looking crew, 

Which might have calPd Diana's chorus " cousin," 

As far as outward show may correspond ; 

I won't be bail for any thing beyond. 

C. 

They bow'd obeisance and withdrew, retiring 

But not by the same door through which came in 

Baba and Juan, which last stood admiring, 
At some small distance, all he saw within 

This strange saloon, much fitted for inspiring 

Marvel and praise: for both or none things win; 

And 1 must say I ne'er could see the very 

Great happiness of the " Nil adinirari." 

CI. 

"Not to admire is all the art I know, 

( Plain truth, dear Murray, needs few flowers of speech) 
To make men happy, or to keep them sc ;" 

(So take it in the very words of Creech.) 
Thus Horaca wrote, we all know, long ago ; 

And thus Pope quotes the precept, to re-teach 
From his translation; but had none <ulr>ir-i!, 
Would Pope have sung, or Horace been inspired ? 

CM. 

Baba, when all the damsels were withdrawn, 
Motion'd to Juan to approach, and then 

A second time desired him to kneel down 
And kiss the lady's foot, which maxim when 

He heard repeated, Juan with a frown 
Drew himself up to his full height again, 

And said "It grieved him, but he could not stoop 

To any shoe, unless it shod the Pope." 

CHI. 

Baba, indignant at this ill^imcd pride, 

Made fierce remonstrances, and then a threat 
He mutter'd (but the last was given nsiile) 

About a bowstring — quite in vain ; not yet 
Would Juan stoop, though 'twere to Mahomi t's bride: 

There 's nothing in the world like etiquette, 
In kingly chambers or imperial halls, 
As also at the race and county balls. 

CIV. 
He stood like Atlas, with a world of words 

About his ears, and nathloss would not bend; 
The bloort of all his line's Castilian lords 

Boil'd in his veins, and rather than descend 
To stain his pedigree, a thousand swi 

A thousand times of him had made an end; 
At length perceiving the u fbot n could not stand, 
Baba proposed that he should kiss the hand. 



cy. 

Here was an honourable compromise, 

A half-way house of diplomatic rest, 
Where they might meet in much more peaceful guise, 

And Juan now his willingness express'd 
To use all lit and proper courtesies, 

Adding, that this was commonest and best, 
For through the South the custom still commands 
The gentleman to kiss the lady's hands. 

CVT. 

And he advanced, though with but a bad grace, 
Though on more thorough-bred 3 or fairer fingers 

No lips ere left their transitory trace : 

On such as these the lip too fondly lingers, 

And for one kiss would fain imprint a brace, 
As you will see, if she you love will bring hers 

In contact; and souk tunes even a fair stranger's 

An almost twelvemonth's constancy endangers. 

cm 

The lady eyed him o'er and o'er, and bade 
Baba retire, which he obcy'd in style, 

As if well used to the retreating trade; 

And taking hints in good part all the while, 

He whisper'd Juan not to be afraid, 

Afid, looking on him with a sort of smile, 

Took leave with such a face of satisfaction, 

As good men wear who have done a virtuous action. 

CVIII. 

When he was gone, there was a sudden change : 
I know not what might be the lady's thought, 

But o'er her bright brow flash'd a tumult strange, 
And into her clear cheek the blood was brought, 

Blood-red as sunset summer clouds which range 
The verge of heaven ; and in her large eves wrought 

A mixture of sensations might be scann'd, 

Of half voluptuousness and half command, 

CIX. 

Her form had all the softness of her sex, 
Her features all the sweetness of the devil, 

When he put on the cherub to perplex 

Eve, and paved (God knows how) the road to evil, 

The sun himself was scarce more free from specks 
Than she from aught at which the eye could cavil; 

Yet somehow there was something somewnere wanting, 

As if she rather ordered than was granting;. — 

ex. 

Something imperial, or imperious, threw 
A chain o'er all she did ; that is, a chain 

Was thrown, as 'twere, about the neck of you, - 
And rapture's self will seem almost a pi in 

'Vith aught which !o..k- like despotism in view: 
Our souls at' least are free, and 't is in vain 

We would against them make the ficsh ob( v— 

The spirit in the end will have its way. 

CXI. 
Her Very smile was hau !i so swici . 

Her very nod was not an inclination ; 

There was a self-will even in her small feet 

As though they were quite conscious of her stahr.r, 

Tliev trod as upon necks ; an I I 

Her stati' (it is the custom of her nation), 
A poniard deck'd her girdle, as the sign 
£he was a sultan's bride (thank (leaven, r.ot mine). 



M3 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO V. 



cxn. 

♦• To hear and to obey " liad been from birth 

The law of all around her ; to fulfil 
All phantasies which yielded joy or mirth, 

[lad been her slaves' chief pleasure, as her will; 
Hit blood was high, her bcs.uty scarce of earth : 

Jn !ge, thru, if her caprices e'er stood still ; 
but been a Christian, I 've a notion 
Wc should have found out the " perpetual motion." 

CXIII. 
Whate'er she saw and coveted was brought ; 

Whatc'er she did not see, if she supposed 
It might be seen, with diligence was sought, 

And when '( was found straightway the bargain closed: 
There was no end unto the things she bought, 

Nor to the trouble which her fancies caused ; 
Vet evt'ii her tyranny had such a grace. 
The women pardon'd all except her face. 

CXIV. 
Juan, the latest of her whims, had caught 

Her eye in passing on his way to sale ; 
She order'd him directly to be bought, 

And Baba, who bad ne'er been known to fail 
In any kind of mischief to he wrought, 

Had his instructions where and how to deal: 
Sir.' had no prudence, hut he had; and this 
Explains the garb which Juan took amiss. 

CXV. 

His youth and features favour'd the disguise, 
And should you ask how she, a sultan's bride, 

Could risk or compass such strange phantasies, 
This I must leave sultanas to decide : 

Emperors are only husbands in wives' eyes, 
And kings and consorts oft arc mystified, 

As we may ascertain with due precision, 

Some by experience, others by tradition. 

CXVI. 

But to the main point, where we have been tending: — 

She now conceived all difficulties past, 
And deem'd herself extremely condescending 

When being made her property at last, 
Without more preface, in her blue eyes blending 

Passion and power, a glance on him she cast, 
And merely saying, "Christian, canst thou love?" 
Conceived that phrase was quite enough to move. 

CXVII. 
And so it was, in proper time and place ; 

But Juan, who had still his mind o'crflowing 
Willi Haidee's isle and soft Ionian lace, 

Pelt the warm blood, which in his face was glowing, 
Rush hack upon his heart, which fill'd apaci , 

And left his checks as pale as snow-drj 
These words went through his soul like Arab spears, 
So that he spoke not, but burst into tears. 

C XVIII. 
She was a good deal shock'd ; not shock'd at tears, 

For women shed and use them at their liking ; 
Bui there is something when man's eye appears 

Wet, still more disagreeable and striking: 
* woman's •.car-drop melts, a man half sears, 

)<lke molten lead, as if you thrust a pike in 
II. " heart, to force it out, for (to be shorter) 
TV them 't is a relief, to us a torture. 



CXIX. 

And she would have consoled, but knew not how ; 

Having no equals, nothing which had e'er 
Infected her with sympathy till now, 

And never having dreamt what 'twas to hear 
^ughl of a serious so.rowing kind, although 

There might arise some pouting petty care 
To cross her brow, she wonder'd how so near 
Her eves another's eye could shed a tear. 

cxx. 

But nature teaches more than power can spoil, 
Ami when a throng although a strange sensalioi. 

Moves — female hearts are Such a genial soil 
For kinder feelings, whatsoe'er their nation, 

They naturally pour the " wine and oil," 
Samaritans in every situation ; 

And thus Gulbeyaz, though she knew not why 

Felt an odd glistening moisture in her eye. 

CXXI. 

But tears must stop like all things else ; and soon 
Juan, who for an instant had been moved 

To such a sorrow by the intrusii 

Of one who dared to ask if "he had loved," 

Call'd hack the stoic to his eyes, which shone 
Bright with the very weakness he reproved; 

And although sensitive to beauty, he 

Fell most indignant still at not being free. 

CXXII. 
Gulbeyaz, for the first tune in her days, 

Was much embarrass'd, never having met 
In all her life with aught save prayers and praise , 

And as she also risk'd her life to get 
Him whom she meant to tutor in love's ways 

Into a comfortable tete-a-tete, 
To lose the hour would make her quite a martyr, 
And they had wasted now almost a quarter. 

cxxur. 

I also world suggest the fitting time, 

To gentlemen in any such like case, 
Thai is to say — in a meridian clime; 

With us there is more law given to the case, 
But here a small delay forms a great crime ; 

So recollect that the extremes! grace 
Is just two minutes for your declaration — 
A moment more would hurt your reputation. 

CXXIV. 
Juan's was good; and might have been still betlci 

But he had got Haidee into his head : 
However strange, he could not vet forgel her, 
Which made him seem exceedingly ill-bred. 

iz, who look'd on him as her debtor 
For having had him to the palace led, 
to blu h up to the eyes, and then 
adly pale, and then blush back again. 
(XXV. 
At length, in an imperial way, she laid 

Her hand on his, and bending on his eves, 
Which needed not an empire to persuade, 

Look'd into his for love, where none replies : 
Her brow grew black, hut she would not upbraid, 

Thai being the last thing a pr 1 woman tries 

She rose, and, pausing one chaste moment, threw 
Herself upon his breast, and there she grew. 



CANTO V. 



DON JUAN. 



619 



XXVI. 

This was an awkward test, as Juan found, 
But he was steel'd by sorrow, wrath, and pride ; 

With gentle force her white arms he unwound, 
And seated her all drooping by his side. 

Then rising haughtily he glanced around, 
And looking coldly in her face, he cried, 

"The prison'd eagle will not pair, nor I 

Serve a sultana's sensual phantasy. 

C XXVII. 

" Thou ask'st if I can love '! be this the proof 
How much I have loved — that I love not thee! 

In this vile garb, the distaffs web and woof 
Were fitter for me : love is for the free ! 

I am not dazzled by this splendid roof. 

Wliate'er thy power, and great it seems to be — 

Heads bow, knees bend, eyes watch around a throne, 

And hands obey — our hearts are still our own." 

CXXVIII. 

This was a truth to us extremely trite, 

Not so to her who ne'er had heard such tilings ; 

She deem'd her least command must yield delight, 
Earth being only made for queens and kings. 

If hearts lay on the left side or the right 
She hardly knew, to such perfection brings 

Legitimacy its born votaries, when 

Aware of their due royal rights o'er men. 

CXXIX. 

Besides, as has been said, she was so fair 
As even in a much humbler lot had made 

A kingdom or confusion any where ; 
And also, as may be presumed, she laid 

Some stress upon those charms which seldom are 
By the possessors thrown into the shade ; — 

She thought hers gave a double " right divine," 

And half of that opinion 's also mine. 

exxx. 

Remember, or (if you cannot) imagine, 

Ye! who have kept your chastity when young, 

While some more desperate dowager has been waging 
Love with you, and been in the dog-days stung 

By vour refusal, recollect her raging! 
Or recollect all that was said or sung 

On such a subject; then suppose the face 

Of a young downright beauty in this case. 

CXXXI. 

Suppose, but you already have supposed, 

The spouse of Potiphar, the Lady Booby, 
Pliedra, and all which story has disclosed 

Of good examples ; pity that so few by 
Poets and private tutors are exposed, 

To educate — ye youth of Europe — you by! 
But when you have supposed the few we know, 
You can't suppose Gulbeyaz' angry brow. 

CXXXII. 
A. tigress robb'd of young, a lioness, 

Or any interesting beast of prey, 
\re similes at hand for the distress 

Of ladies who cannot have their own way; 
But though my turn will not be served with less, 

These don't express one half what I should say : 
For what is stealing young ones, few or many, 
To cuti ; ng short their hopes of having any? 



CXXXIII. 

The love of offspring 's nature's general law, 

From tigresses and cubs to ducks and ducklings ; 
There 's nothing whets the beak or arms the claw 

Like an invasion of their babes and sucklings , 
And all who have seen a human nursery, saw 

How mothers love their children's squalls and chuck 
lings ; 
This strong extreme effect (to tire no longer 
Your patience) shows the cause must still be stronger 

CXXX1V. 
If I said fire flash'd from Gulbeyaz' eyes, 

'T were nothing — for her eyes flash'd always fire 
Or said her cheeks assumed the deepest dyes, 

I should but bring disgrace upon the dyer, 
So supernatural was her passion's rise; 

For ne'er till now she knew a check'd desire : 
Even you who know what a check'd woman is, 
(Enough, God knows!) would much fall short of this. 

exxxv. 

Her rage was but a minute's, and 'twas well — 

A moment's more had slain her ; but the white 
It lasted, 't was like a short glimpse of hell : 

Nought's more sublime than energetic bile, 
Though horrible to see yet grand to tell, 

Like ocean warring 'gainst a rocky isle ; 
And the deep passions flashing through her form 
Made her a beautiful embodied storm. 

C XXXVI. 
A vulgar tempest 't were to a Typhoon 

To match a common fury with her rage, 
And yet she did not want to reach the moon, 

Like moderate Hotspur on the immortal page ; 
Her anger pitch'd into a lower tune, 

Perhaps the fault of her soft sex and age — 
Her wish was but to " kill, kill, kill," like Lear's, 
And then her thirst of blood was quench'd in tears 

C XXXVII. 
A storm it raged, and like the storm it pass'd, 

Pass'd without words — in fact she could not speak ; 
And then her sex's shame broke in at last, 

A sentiment till then in her but weak, 
But now it flow'd in natural and fast, 

As water through an unexpected leak, 
For she felt humbled — and humiliation 
Is sometimes good for people in her station. 

CXXXVIII. 
It teaches them that they are flesh and blood, 

It also gently hints to them that others, 
Although of clay, are not yet quite of mud ; 

That urns and pipkins are but fragile brothers, 
And works of the same pottery, bad or good, 

Though not all born of the same sires and mother* 
It teaches — Heaven knows only what it teaches, 
But sometimes it may mend, and often reaches. 

XXXIX. 
Her first thought was to cut ofT Juan's heau ; 

llrr second, to cut only his — acquaintance; 
Her third, to ask him where he had been Died , 

Her fourth, to rally him into repentance; 
Her fifth, to call her maids and go to bed; 

llrr sixth, to stab herself; her seventh, to sentence 
The lash to Baba ; — but her grand resource 
Was to sit dewn again, and cry of course 



020 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C\L\TO V 



CXL. 

She thought to stab herself, but then she had 
The danger close at hand, which made it awkward ; 

For eastern stays are little made to pad, 

So that a poniard pierces if 't is stuck hard; 

She thought of killing Juan— but, poor lad I 
Though he deserved it well for In ing bo backward, 

The cutting off his head was not the art 

Most likely to attain her aim — his heart. 

CXLI. 

Juan was moved : he had made up his mind 
To be impaled, or quarter'd as a dish 

For dogs, or to be slain with pangs refined, 
Or thrown to lions, or made baits for fish, 

And thus heroically stood resign'd, 

Rather than sin — except to his own wish: 

But all his great preparatives for dying 

■DissjlveJ like snow Lefure a woman crying. 

CXLII. 

As through his palms Bob Acres' valour oozed, 
So Juan's virtue ebb'd, I know not how ; 

And first he wonder'd why he had refused ; 
And then, if matters could be made up now; 

And next his savage virtue he accused, 
Just as a friar may accuse his vow, 

Or as a dame repents her of her oath, 

Which mostly ends in some small breach of both. 

CXL1II. 

So he began to stammer some excuses ; 

But words are not enough in such a matter, 
Although you borrow 'd all that e'er the muses 

Have sung, or even a dandy's dandiest chatter, 
Or all the figures Castlereagh abuses; 

Just as a languid smile began to Halter 
His peace was making, but before he ventured 
Further, old Baba rather briskly enler'd. 

CXL1V. 

»• Bride of the Sun ! and Sister of the Moon !" 
('T was thus he spake) " and Empress of the Earth ! 

Whose frown would put the spheres all out of tune, 
Whose smile makes all the planets dance with mirth, 

Your slave brings tidings — he hopes not too soon — 
Which your sublime attention may be worth ; 

The Sun himself has sent me like a ray 

To hint that he is coming up this way." 

CXLV. 

"Is it," exclaim'd Gulbeyaz, "as you say? 

I wish to heaven he would not shine till morning! 
B it bid my women form the milky way. 

Hence, my old comet! give the stars due warning — 
And, Christian! mingle with them as you may; 

And, as you'd have me pardon your past scorning — " 
Here they were interrupted by a humming 
Sound, and then by a cry, " the Sultan's coming!" 

CXLV I. 
Fust tame her damsels, a decorous file, 

And then his highness' eunuchs, black and white , 
i'nr tram might reach a quarter of a mile: 

His majesty was always so polite 
As to announce his visits a long while 

Before he came, especial'y at night ; 
Fir being the last wife of the emperor, 
She wa» of course the favourite of the four. 



CXLVII. 
His highness was a man of solemn port, 

ShawPd to the nose, and bearded 10 the eyes, 
Snatch'd from a prison to preside at court, 

His lately bowstrung brother caused his rise; 
lie v. as its good a sovereign of the sort 

As any menlion'd in the histories 
Of Cantemir, or Knolles, where few shine 
Save Solynian, llie glory of their line.' J 

CXLV11I. 
He went to mosque in state, and said Ins prayers 

With more than "oriental scrupulosity;" 
He left to his vizier all state afl 

And sliow'd but little royal curiosity: 
I know not if he hud domestic cures — 

No process proved connubial animosity; 
Four wives and twice five hundred maids, unseen, 
Were ruled as calmly as a Christian queen. 

CXLIX. 
If now and then there happen'd a slight slip, 

Little was heard of criminal or crime ; 
The story Bcarcely i>a-s"d a single lip — 

The sack and sea had settled all in time, 
From which the secret nobody could rip: 

The public knew no more than does this rhvme 
No scandals made the daily press a curse — 
Morals were better, and the fish no worse. 

CL. 

He saw with his own eyes the moon was round. 
Was also certain that the earth was square, 

Because ne had joumey'd fifty miles, and found 
No sign that it was circular any where ; 

His empire also was without a bound: 
'Tis true, a little troubled here and there* 

By rebel pachas, ami encroaching giaouis, 

But then they never came to "tin. Seven l , e - «e'»,' 

CLI. 

Except in shape of envoys, who were sent 
To lodge there when a vai broke out, accorrlinj 

To the true law of ba.Uor.4, v.hicn ne'er meant 
Those scoundrels "i.io have never had a sword ir. 

Their dirty diplomatic hands, to vent 

Their Spleen /:. making strife, and safely wording 

Their lies, y.o,»t despatches, without risk or 

The singeing ol a single inky whisker. 

CLII. 

He had f.Jiv daughters and four dozen sons, 
Of whom all such as came of age were stow'd, 

The Pvwier in a palace, where like nuns 

Thrfy lived till some bashaw was sent abroad, 

When she, whose turn it was, wedded at once, 
Sometimes at six years old — though this see.: 

' I' is true; the reason is, that the bashaw 

Must make a present to his sire in law. 

CLIII. 

■ were kept in prison till they grew 
Of years to fill a bowstring or the throne, 

One or the other, hut wh two 

Could yel be known unto tin fates alone; 

Meantime the education they went thi 

Was princely, as the proofs have always shown 

So that the hen- apparent still was found 

No less deserving to be hang'd than crown'o. 



CANTO V. 



DOX JUAN. 



621 



CLIV. 

His majesty saluted his fourth spouse 

With all the ceremonies of his rank, 
Who clear'd her sparkling eyes and smooth'd her brows, 

As suits a matron who has play'd a prank : 
These must seem doubly mindful of their vows, 

To save the credit of their breaking bank ; 
To no men are such cordial greetings given 
As those whose wives have made them fit for heaven. 

CLV. 
His highness cast around his great black eyes, 

And looking, as he always look'd, perceived 
Juan amongst the damsels in disguise, 

At which he seem'd no whil surprised, nor grieved, 
But just remark'd with air sedate and wise, 

While still a fluttering sigh Gulbeyaz heaved, 
"I see you've bought another girl; 'tis pity 
That a mere Christian should be half so pretty." 

clvi. 

This compliment, which drew all eyes upon 

The new-bought virgin, made Ik r blush and shake. 
Her comrades, also, thought themselves undone: 

Oh, Mahomet ! that his majesty should take 
budi notice of a giaour, while scarce to one 

Of them his lips imperial ever spake ! 
There was a general whisper, toss, and wriggle, 
But etiquette forbade them all to giggle. 

CLVII. 
The Turks do well to shut — at least, sometimes — 

The women up — because, in sad reality, 
1 heir chastity in these unhappy climes 

Is not a thing of that astringent quality, 
Which in the north prevents precocious crimes, 

And makes our snow less pure than our morality ; 
The sun, which yearly melts the polar ice, 
Has quite the contrary effect on vice. 

CLVIII. 
Thus far our chronicle ; and now we pause, 

Though not for want of matter ; but 'tis time, 
According to the ancient epic laws, 

To slacken sail, and anchor with our rhyme. 
Let this fifth canto meet with due applause, 

The sixth shall have a touch of the sublime ; 
Meanwhile, as Homer sometimes sleeps, perhaps 
You '11 pardon to. my muse a few short naps. 



PREFACE 



CAXTOS VI. VII. VIII. 



The details of the siege of Ismail in two of the fol 
lowing cantos (i. e. the 7th and eighth) are taken from a 
French work, entitled "Histoire de laNouvelle Russie." 
Some of the incidents attributed to Don Juan really 
occurred, particularly the circumstance of his saving 
the infant, which was the actual case of the late Due 
de Richelieu, then a young volunteer in the Russian 
service, and afterwards the founder and benefactor of 
Odessa, where his name and memory can never cease 
to be regarded with reverence. In the course of these 
3F 



cantos, a stanza or two will be found relative to the 
late Marquis of Londonderry, but written some time 
before his decease. Had that person's oligarchy died 
with him, liny would have been suppressed ; as it is, I 
am aware of nothing in the manner of his death or of 
his life to prevent the lite expression of the opinions 
of all whom his whole existence was consumed in en- 
deavouring to enslave. That he was an amiable man 
in priiute life, may or may not be true ; but with this 
the public have nothing to do: and as to lamenting his 
death, it will be lime enough when Ireland has ceased 
to mourn for his birth. As a minister, I, for one of 
millions, looked upon him as the most despotic in in- 
tention, and the weakest in intellect, that ever tyran- 
nized over a country. It is the first time indeed since 
the Normans, that England has been insulted by a min- 
uter (at least) who could not speak English, and that 
Parliament permitted itself to be dictated to in the lan- 
guage of Mrs. Malapmp. 

Of the manner of his death little need be said, ex- 
cept that if a poor radical, such as Waddington or 
Watson, had cut his throat, he would have been buried 
in a cross-road, with the usual appurtenances of the 
stake and mallet. But the minister was an elegant 
lunatic — a sentimental suicide — he merely cut the 
"carotid artery" (blessings on their learning!) — and 
lo! the pageant, and the abbey, and "die syllables 
of dolour yelled forth " by the newspapers — and the 
harangue of the coroner in an eulogy over the bleed- 
ing body of the deceased — (an Antony worthy of such 
a Caesar) — and the nauseous and atrocious cant of a 
degraded crew of conspirators against all that is sincere 
or honourable. In his death he was necessarily one of 
two things by the law — a felon or a madman — and in 
either case no great subject for panegyric. 1 In his life 
he was — what all the world knows, and half of it will fee/ 
for years to come, unless his death prove a "moral les- 
son " to the surviving Sejani 2 of Europe. It may at leasl 
serve as some consolation to the nations, that their op- 
pressors arc not happy, and in some instances judge so 
justly of their own actions as to anticipate the sentence 
of mankind. — Let us hear no more of this man, and let 
Ireland remove the ashes of her G rattan from the sanc- 
tuary of Westminster. Shall the Patriot of Humanity 
repose by the Werther of Politics! ! ! 

With regard to the objections which have been made 
on another score to the already published cantos of 
this poem, I shall content myself with two quotations 
from Voltaire : — 

" La pudeur s'est enfuie des cceurs, et s'est refngiee 
sur les levres." 

" Plus les mceurs sont depravees, plus les expressions 
deviennent mesurces ; on croit regagner en langage ce 
qu'on a perdu en vertu." 

This is the real fart, as applicable lo the degraded anil 
hypocritical mass which leavens the present Engllah 
generation, and is the only answer they deserve. The 
hackneyed and lavished title of blasphemer — which 



1 I say by the law of the land— the laws of humanity judge 
more gently; bul as the legitimate! have always the law in 
their mouths, [el them here make the most of it. 

2 From this Dumber muel be excepted Canning. Canning is a 
geaiui, almost a universal one: an orator, a wit, a poet, a 

stall sman ; nuil no man of talent oan long pursue the path o. 
his lute predecessor, Lord C. It ever man saved his country 
Cunning can ; but trill he ? I, for one, bone so. 



622 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO VI 



with radical, liberal, jacobin, reformer, etc., are the 
changes which the hirelings are daily ringing in the 
ears of those who will listen — should be welcome to 
all who recollect on whom it was originally bestowed. 
Socrates and Jesus Christ were put to death publicly 
as bltupkemartf and so have been and may be many 
who dare to oppose the most notorious abuses of the 
name of God and the mind of man. But persecution 
is not refutation, nor even triumph : the wretched infi- 
del, as he is called, is probably happier in his prison 
than the proudest of his assailants. With his opinions 
I have nothing to do — they may be right or wrong — 
but he has sutured for them, and thai very Buffering 
for conscience sake will make more proselytes to Deism 
than the example of heterodox 1 prelates to Christianity, 
suicide statesmen to oppression, or overpensioned hom- 
icides to the impious alliance which insults the world 
with the name of " Holy !" I have no wish to trample 
on the dishonoured or the dead ; but it would be well 
if the adherents to the classes from whence those per- 
sons sprung should abate a little of the cant which is the 
crying sin of this double-dealing and false-speaking time 
of selfish spoilers, and — but enough for the present. 

1 When Lord Sandwich said " he did not know the differ- 
ence between orthodoxy and heterodoxy," — Warburton, the 
bishop, replied, "Orthodoxy, my lord, is my dory, and hete- 
rodoxy is another man's doxy." — A prelate of the present day 
has discovered, it seems, a third kind of doxy, which has not 
greatly exalted in the eyes of the elect, that which Bentham 
calls " Churchof-Englandi-sin.' 



CANTO VI. 



i. 

* There is a tide in the affairs of men 

Which, taken at the flood" — you know the rest, 
And most of us have found it, now and then ; 

At least we think so, though but few have guess'd 
The moment, till too late to come again. 

But no doubt every thing is for the best — 
Of which the surest sign is in the end : 
When things are at the worst, they sometimes mend. 

II. 
There is a tide in the affairs of women 

"Which, taken at the flood, leads" — God knows 
where : 
Those navigators must be able seamen 

Whose charts lay down its currents to a hair; 
Not all the reveries of Jacob Behmen 

With its strange whirls and eddies can compare : 
Men, with their heads, reflect on this and that — 
But women, with their hearts, on Heaven knows what ! 

III. 
And yet a headlong, headstrong, downright she, 

Young, beautiful, and daring — who would risk 
\ throne, the world, the universe, to be 

Beloved in her own way, and rather whisk 
The stars fron. out the sky, than not be free 

As arc the billows when the breeze is brisk — 
Though such a she's a devil (if that there be one), 
Vet she would make full many a Manichean. 



IV. 

Thrones, worlds, et cetera, are so oft upset 

By commonest ambition, that when passion 
O'erthrows the same, we readily forget, 

Or at the least forgive, the loving rash one. 
If Antony be well remcmlx r'd yet, 

'Tis not his conquests keep his name in fashion 
lint Admin, lost for Cleopatra's eyes, 
Outbalance all the Cajsars' victories. 

V. 
He died at fifty for a queen of forty ; 

I wish their years had been fifteen and twenty, 
For then wealth, kingdoms, worlds, arc but a sport — I 

Remember when, though I had no great plenty 
Of worlds to lose, yet still, to pay roj court, I 

Gave what I had — a heart: as the world went, 1 
Gave what was worlh a world ; for worlds could nevei 
Restore me those pure feelings, gone for ever, 

VI. 
'T was the boy's "mite," and, like the " widow's," may 

Perhaps be weigh'd hereafter, if not now ; 
But whether such things do, or do not, weigh, 

All who have loved, or love, will still allow 
Life has nought like it. God is love, they say, 

And Love 's a god, or was before the brow 
Of Earth was wrinkled by the sins and tears 
Of — hut chronology best knows the years. 

VII. 
We left our hero and third heroine in 

A kind of state more awkward than uncommon, 
For gentlemen must sometimes risk their skin 

For that sad tempter, a forbidden woman : 
Sultans too much abhor this sort of sin, 

And don't agree at all with the wise Roman, 
Heroic, stoic Cato, the sententious, 
Who lent his lady to his friend Hortensius. 

VIII. 
I know Gulbeyaz was extremely wrong; 

I own .t, I deplore it, I condemn it ; 
But I detest all fiction, even in song, 

And so must tell the truth, howe'er you blame it. 
Her reason being weak, her passions Btrong, 

She thought that her lord's heart (even could she claim 
«t) 
Was scarce enough ; for he had fifiy-nine 
Years, and a fifteen-hundredth concubine. 

IX. 
I am not, like Cassio, " an arithmetician," 

But by "the bookish theoric" it appears, 
If 'tis summ'd up with feminine precision, 

That, adding to the account his Highness' years, 
The fair Sultana err'd from inanition ; 

For, were the Sultan just to all his dears, 
She could but claim the fifteen-hundredth part 
Of what should be monopoly — the heart. 

X. 
It is observed that ladies are litigious 

Upon all legal objects of possession, 

And not the least so when they are religious, 
Which doubles what they think of the transgression 

With suits and prosecution they besiege us, 
As the tribunals show through many a session, 

When they suspect that anv one goes shares 

In that to which the law nvutes then' sole heirs. 



CANTO VI. 



DON JUAN. 



623 



XI. 

Now, if this holds gowl in a Christian land, 
The heathens also, though with lesser latitude, 

Are apt to carry things with a high hand, 
And take what kings call "an imposing attitude ;" 

And for their rights connubial make a stand, 
When thiirliegc husbands treat them with ingratitude; 

And as (bur wives must have quadruple claims, 

The Tigris has its jealousies like Thames. 

xn. 

Gulbeyaz was the fourth, and (as I said) 

The favourite ; but what 's favour amongst four ? 

Polygamy may well be he'd in dread, 
Not only as a sin, but as a bore : 

Mosl wise men, with onr moderate woman wed] 
Will scarcely find philosophy for more ; 

And all (except Mahometans) forbear 

To make the nuptial couch a " Bed of Ware." 

XIII. 
His highness, I he sublimesl of mankind, — 

So styled according to the usual forms 
Of every monarch, till they are consigned. 

To those sad hungry jacobins, the worms, 
Who on the very loftiest kings have dined, — 

His highness gazed upon Gulbeyaz' charms, 
Expecting all the welcome of a lover, 
(A " Highland welcome " all the wide world over). 

XIV. 

Now here we should distinguish ; for howe'er 
Kisses, sweet words, embraces, and all that, 

Mav look like what is — neither here nor there: 
They are put on as easily as a hat, 

Or rather bonnet, which the fair sex wear, 
Trimm'd either heads or hearts to decorate, 

Which form an ornament, but no more part 

Of heads, than their caresses of the heart. 

XV. 

A slight blush, a soft tremor, a calm kind 

Of gentle feminine delight, and shown 
M..re in the eyelids than the eyes, resign'd 

Rather to hide what pleases most unknown, 
Are the best tokens (to a modest mind) 

Of love, when seated on his loveliest throne, 
A sincere woman's breast, — for over warm 
Or over oold annihilates the charm. 

XVI. 
For over warmth, if false, is worse than truth ; 

If true, 'tis no great lease of its own fire; 
Foi no one, save in very early youth, 

Would like (I think) to trust all to desire, 
Which is but a precarious bond, in sooth, 

And apt to be transferr'd to the first buyer 
At a sad discount : while your over chilly 
Women, on t' other hand, seem somewhat silly. — 

XVII. 
That is, we cannot pardon their bad taste, 

For so it seems to lovers swift or slow, 
Who fain would have a mutual flame confoss'd, 

And see a sentimental passion glow, 
Even were St. Francis' paramour their guest, 

In his Monastic Concubine of Snow ; — 
In short, the maxim for the amorous tribe is 
Horatian, "Medio tu tutissimus ibis." 



XVIII. 

The " tu " 's too much, — but let it stand — the verse 
Requires it, that 'a to say, the English rhyme. 

And not the pink of old Hexameters ; 

lint, after all, there's neither tune nor time 

In the last line, which cannot well be worse, 
And was thrust in to close the octave's chime: 

I own no prosody can ever rato it 

As a rule, but Truth may, if you translate it. 

XIX. 

If fair Gulbeyaz overdid her part, 
I know not — it succeeded, and success 

Is much in mosl things, not less in the heart 
Than other articles of female dress. 

Self-love in man too beats all female art ; 
They lie, we lie, all lie, but love no less: 

And no one virtue yet, except starvation, 

Could stop that worst of vices — propagation. 

XX. 

We leave this royal couple to repose ; 

is not a throne, and they may sleep, 
Whate'er their dreams be, if of joys or woes ; 

Yet disappointed joys are woes as deep 
As any man's '-lay mixture undergoes. 

Our least of sorrows are such as we weep ; 
'T is the vile daily drop on drop which wears 
The soul out (like the stone) with petty cares. 

XXI. 

A scolding wife, a sullen son, a hill 

To pay, unpaid, protested, or discounted 

At a per-centage ; a child cross, dog ill, 

A favourite horse fallen lame just as he's mounted ; 

A iiad old woman making a worse will, 

A\ Inch leaves you minus of the cash you counted 

As certain; — these are paltry things, and yet 

I 've rarely seen the man they did not fret. 

XXII. 

I *m a philosopher ; confound them all ! 

Bills, beasts, and men, and — no ! not womankind ! 
With one good hearty curse I vent my gall, 

And then my stoicism leaves nought behind 
Which it can either pain or evil call, 

And I can give my whole soul up to mind ; 
Though what is soul or mind, their birth or growth 
Is more than I know — the deuce take them both. 

XXIII. 
So now all things are d — n'd, one feels at ease, 

As after reading Athanasius' curse, 
Which doth your true believer so much please: 

I doubt if any now could make it worse 
O'er his worst enemy when at his knees, 

'T is so sententious, positive, and terse, 
And decorates the book of Common Fravei-, 
As doth a rainbow the just clearing air. 

XXIV. 
Gulbeyaz and her lord were sleeping, or 

At least one of them — Oh the heavy night ! 
When wicked wives who love some bachelor 

Lie down in dudgeon to sigh for the light 
Of the gray morning, and look vainly for 

Its twinkle through the lattice dusky quite, 
To toss, to tumble, doze, revive, and quake, 
Lest their too lawful bed-fellow should wakn. 



624 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO VI. 



XXV. 
These are beneath the canopy of heaven, 

Also beneath the canopy of beds, 
Four-posted and silk-enrtain'd, "Inch are given 

For rich men and their brides to lay their heads 
Upon, it) sheets white as what hards call "driven 

.'' \\ r!l! 'i is all hap-hazard when one weds. 
Gulbeyaz was an empress, bul had been 
Perhaps as wretched if a peasant's tjumn. 

XXVI. 

Don Juan, in his feminine disguise, 

With all the damsels in their long array, 

Had bow'd themselves before the imperial eyes, 
And, at the usual BignaJ, ta'en their way 

Back to their chambers, those long galleries 
In the seraglio, where the ladies lay 

Their delicate limbs; a thousand bosoms there 

Beating for love, as the caged bird's for air. 

XXVII. 

I love t!ic sex, and sometimes would reverse 
The tyrant's wish "that mankind only had 

One neck, which he with one fell stroke might pierce :" 
My wish is quite as wide, but not so bad, 

And much more tender on the whole than fierce : 
It being (not rune, but only while a lad) 

That womankind had but one rosy mouth, 

To kiss them all at once from North to South. 

XXVIII. 

Oh enviable Briareus ! with thy hands 

And heads, if thou hadst all things multiplied 

In such proportion! — But my muse withstands 
The giant thought of being a Titan's bride, 

Or travelling in Patagonian lands ; 
So let us back to Lllliput, and guide 

Our hero through the labyrinth of love 

In which we left him several lines above. 

XXIX. 

He went forth with the lovely Odalisques, 

At the given signal join'd to their array; 
And 'hough he certainly ran many risks, 

Yet he could not at times keep by the way, 
(Although the consequences of such frisks 

Are worse than the worst damages men pay 
Tn moral England, where the thing's a tax), 
From ogling all their charms from breasts to backs. 

XXX. 
S'ill he Torgot not his disguise: — along 

The galleries from room to room they walk'd, 
A virgin-like and edifying throng, 

By eunuchs flank'd ; while at their head there stalk'd 
A dame who kept up discipline among 

The female ranks, so that none stirr'd or talk'd 
Without her sanction on their she-parades: 
Her title was "the Mother of the Maids." 

XXXI. 

Whether she was a " mother," I know not, 

Or whether they were "maids" who call'd her mother; 

But this is her seraglio title, got 
I know not how, but good as any other ; 

Bo Cantemir can tell you, or De Tott: 
Her office was to keep aloof or smother 

AU bad propensities in fifteen hundred 

Voting women, and correct them when they blundcr'd. 



XXXII. 

\ sinecure, no doubt ! but made 

More easy by the absence of all men 

Except his Majesty, who, with her aid, 

And guards, and holts, and walls, and now and then 

\ slight example, just to east a shade 
Along the rest, contrived to keep this den 

Of beauties cool as an Italian convent, 

Where all the passions have, alas ! but one vent. 

XXXIII. 

And what is that ? Devotion, doubtless — how 
Could you ask such a question? — but we will 

Continue. As I said, this goodly row 
Of ladies of all countries at the will 

Of one good man, with stately march and slow, 
Like water-lilies floating down a rill, 

Or rather lake — for rills do not run slowly, — 

Paced on most maiden-like and melancholy. 

XXXIV. 

But when they rcach'd their own apartments, there, 
Like birds, or boys, or bedlamites broke loose, 

Waves at spring-title, or women any where 

When freed from bonds (which are of no great use 

After all), or like Irish at a fair, 
Thi ir guards being gone, and, as it were, a truct 

Establish'd between them and bondage, they 

Began to sing, dance, chatter, smile, and play. 

XXXV. 

Their talk of course ran most on the new comer, 
Her shape, her air, her hair, her every thing : 

Some thought her dress did not so much become her 
Or wonder'd at her cars without a ring; 

Some said her years were getting nigh their summer 
Others contended they were but in sprint: ; 

Some thought her rather masculine in height, 

While others wish'd that she had been so (mite. 

XXXVI. 

But no one doubted, on the whole, that she 
Was what her dress bespoke, a damsel fair, 

And fresh, and " beautiful exceedingly," 

Who with the brightest Georgians might compare. 

They wonder'd how Gulbey-az too could be 
So silly as to buy slaves who might share 

(If that his Highness wearied of his bride) 

Her throne and power, and every thing beside. 

XXXVII. 

But what was strangest in this virgin crew, 

Although her beauty was enough to vex, 
After the first investigating view, 

They all found out as few, or fewer, specks. 
In the fair form of their companion new, 

Than is the custom of the gentle sex, 
When they survey, with Christian eyes or Heathen, 
In a new face " the ugliest creature breathing." 

XXXVIII. 
And yet they had their little jealousies, 

Like all the rest; but upon this occasion, 
Whether there are such things as sympathies 

Without our knowledge or our approbation, 
Although they could not see through his disguise, 

All felt a soft kind of concatenation, 
Like magnetism, or devilisrn, or what 
You please — we will not quarrel about that : 



caxto vi. 



DON JUAN. 



62; 



XXXIX. 

But certain 't is, they all fell for their new 

Companion something newer still, as 'tweie 
A sentimental friendship through and through, 

Extremely pun-, v. Inch made them all concur 
In wishing her their sister, save a few 

Who wish'd they had a brother just like her, 
Whom, if they were at home in sweet Cireassia, 
They would prefer to Padisha or Pacha. 

XL. 
Of those who had most genius f >r this sort 

Of sentimental friendship, there were three, 
Lolah, Katinka, and Dudii ; — in short, 

(To save description), fair as fair can be 
Were they, according to the best report, 

Though differing in stature and degree, 
And el me and time, and country and complexion; 
They all alike admired their new connexion. 

XLI. 
Lolah was dusk as India, and as warm ; 

Katinka was a Georgian, white and red, 
With great blue eyes, a lovely hand and arm, 

And leet so small they scarce seem'd made to tread, 
But rather skim the earth ; while Dudu's form 

Look'd more adapted to be put to bed, 
Being somewhat lar<:e and languishing and lazy, 
Yet of a beauty that would drive you crazy. 

XLII. 
A kind of sleepy Venus seem'd Dudu, 

Yet very fit to " murder sleep'' in those 
Who gazed upon her cheek's transcendent hue, 

Her Attic forehead, and her Phidian nose: 
Few angles were there in her form, 'tis true, 

Thinner she might have been, and yet scarce lose ; 
Vet, after all, 't would puzzle to say where 
It would not spoil some separate charm to pare. 

XLIII. 
She was not violently lively, but 

Stole on your spirit like a May-day breaking ; 
Her eyes were not too sparkling, yet, half shut, 

They put beholders in a tender taking ; 
She look'd (this simile's quite new) just cut 

From marble, like Pygmalion's statue waking, 
The mortal and the marble still at strife, 
And timidly expanding into life. 

XLIV. 
Lolah demanded the new damsel's name— 

".luanna." — Well, a pretty name enough. 
Katinka ask'd her also whence she came — 

"From Spain." — "But where is Spain?" — "Don't, ask 
such stuff, 
Nor show your Georgian ignorance — for shame!" 

Said Lolah, with an accent rather rough, 
To poor Katinka: "Spain's an island near 
Morocco, betwixt Egypt and Tangier." 

XLV. 
Ducu said nothing, but sat down beside 

Juanna, playing with her veil or hair ; 
And, looking at her stedfastly, she sigh'd, 

As if she pitied her for being thi re, 
A pretty stranger, without friend or guide, 

And all abash'd too at the general stare 
Which welcomes hapless strangers in all places, 
With kind remarks upon their mien and faces. 
3 r 2 84 



XLVI. 

Hut here the Mother of the Maids drew near, 
With " Ladies, it is time to go to rest. 

I 'm puzzled what to do with you, my dear," 
She added to Juanna, their new guest: 

" Your coining has been unexpected here, 
An 1 every couch is occupied ; you had best 

Partake of mine ; but by to-morrow early 

We will have all things settled for you fairly." 

XLVII. 

Here Lolah interposed — "Mamma, you know 

Vjii don't sleep soundly, and I cannot bear 
That any body should disturb you ; so 

I '11 take .luanna ; we 're a slenderer pair 
Than you would make the half of; — don't say no, 

And I of your young charge will take due care." 
Bui here Katinka interfered and said, 

"She also had compassion and a bed." 
XLVIII. 
" Resides, I hate to sleep alone," quoth she. 

The matron fiown\l : " Why so ?" — "For fear o 
ghosts," 
Replied Katinka; l 'I am sure I see 

A phantom upon each of the four posts ; 
And then 1 have the worst dreams that can be, 

OfGuebres, Giaours, and Ginns, and Goals in hosts." 
The dame replied, " Between your dreams and you, 
I fear Juanna's dreams would be but few. 

XLIX. 

" You, Lolah, must continue still to lie 

Alone, lor reasons which don't matter ; you 
The same, Katinka, until by and by ; 

And I shall place Juanna with Dudu, 
Who's quiet, inoffensive, silent, shy, 

And will not toss and chatter the night through. 
What say you, child ?" — Dudu said nothing, as 
Her talents were of the more silent class ; 

L. 
But she rose up and kiss'd the matron's brow 

Between the eyes, and Lolah on both cheeks, 
Katinka too; and with a gentle bow 

(Curtsies are neither used by Turks nor Greeks), 
She look Juanna by the hand to show 

Their place of rest, and left to both their piques, 
The others pouting at the matron's preference 
Of Dudu, though they held their tongues from deferencu 

LI. 
It was a spacious chamber (Oda is 

The Turkish title), and ranged round the wall 
Were couches, toilets — and much mere man this 

I might describe, as I have seen it all, 
But it suffices — little was amiss ; 

'T was on the whole a nobly furnish'd hall, 
With all things ladies want, save one or two, 
And even those were nearer than they knew. 

LII. 
Dudu, as has been said, was a sweet creature. 

Not very dashing, but extremely winning, 
With the most regulated charms of feature, 

Which painters cannot catch like faces smnm| 
Against proportion — the wild strokes of nature 

Which they hit oil" at once in the beginning, 
Full of expression, right or wrong, that strike, 
Aud, pleasing or unpleasing, still are like. 



G2G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C.TXTO VI 



LIII. 

But she was a soft landscape of mild earlli, 
Where all was harmony and calm and quiet, 

Luxuriant, building; cheerful without mirth, 
Which, if not happiness, is much more nigh it 

Than are your mighty passions and so forth, 

Which some call "the sublime:" I wish they'd try it: 

I \c Been your stormy seas and stormy women, 

And pity lovers rather more than seamen. 

LTV. 

But she w as pensive more than melancholy, 
And serious more than pi nsive, and serene, 

It may hn, more than eilher — not unholy 

Her thoughts, at least till now, appear to have been. 

The strangest thing was, beauteous, she was wholly 
Unconscious, albeit turn'd of quick seventeen, 

That she was fair, or dark, or short, or tall ; 

She never thought about herself at all. 

LV. 
And therefore was she kind and gentle as 

The Age of Gold (when gold was yet unknown, 
By which its nomenclature came to pass ; 

Thus most appropriately has been shown 
" Lucus a mm Lucendo," not what was, 

But what was not; a sort of style that's grown 
Extremely common in this age, whose metal 
The devil may decompose but never settle: 

LVI. 

I think it may be of " Corinthian Brass," 
Which was a mixture of all metals, but 

The bra7.cn uppermost). Kind reader! pass 
This long parenthesis : I could not shut 

It sooner for the soul of me, and class 

My faults even with your own ! which meaneth, put 

A kind construction upon them and me : 

But that you won't — then don't — I am not less free. 

LVII. 

T is time we should return to plain narration, 

And thus my narrative proceeds: — Dudu 
With every kindness short of ostentation, 

Show'd Juan, or Juanna, through and through 
This labyrinth of females, and each station 

Described — what's strange, in words extremely few: 
I have but one simile, and that 's a blunder, 
For wordless women, which is silent thunder. 

LVIII. 
And next she gave her (I say her, because 

The gender still was epicene, at least 
In outward show, which is a saving clause) 

An outline of the customs of the East, 
With all their chaste integrity of laws, 

By which the more a haram is increased, 
The stricter doubtless grow the vestal duties 
Of an)' supernumerary beauties. 

LIX. 

And Oven she gave Juanna a chaste kiss : 
Dudu was fond of kissing — which I'm sure 

That nobody car. ever take amiss, 

Because 't i-< pleasant, so that it be pure, 

And between femal lore than this — 

That thej b»»fl nothing better near, or newer. 

»Ki-s" rhymes to "bliss" in fact as well as verse- 
wish it never led to something worse. 



/ 



LX. 

In perfect innocence she then unmade 
Her toilet, which cost little, for she was 

A child of nature, carelessly array'd ; 
If fond of a chance ogle at her 

'T was like the fawn which, in the lake display'd, 
Beholds her own shy shadowy image pas<, 

When first she starts, and then returns to peep, 

Admiring this new native of the deep. 

LXI. 

And one by one her articles of dress 

Were laid aside; ; but not before she olTer'd 

Hei ai.l to fair Juanna, whose excess 
Of modesty declined the assistance profFer'd — 

Which pass'd well oil" — as she could do no less : 
Though by lias politesse she rather si 

Pricking her fingers with those cursed pins, 

Which surely were invented tor our sins, — 

LXII. 

Making a woman like a porcupine, 

Not to be rashly touch'd. But still more dread, 
Oh ye! whose fate it is, as once 'twas mine, 

In early youth, to turn a lady's maid ; — 
I did my very boyish best to shine 

In tricking her out for a masquerade: 
Tiie pins were placed sufficiently, but not 
Stuck a.l exactly in the proper spot. 

LX1II. 

But these are foolish things to all the wise — 
And I love Wisdom more than she loves me; 

My tendency is to philosophize 

On most things, from a tyrant to a tree ; 

But still the spouseless virgin Knowledge flies. 

What are we? and whence came we? what shall bo 

Our ultimate existence? what's our present? 

Are questions answerless, and yet incessant. 

LXIV. 

There was deep silence in the chamber: dim 

Ami distant from each other bum'd the lights, 
And Slumber hover'd o'er each lovely limb 

Of the fair occupants: if there be sprites, 
They should have walk'd there iii their spriteliest trim, 

By way of change from their sepulchral sites, 
And shown themselves as ghosts of better taste, 
Than haunting some old ruin or wild waste. 

LXV. 
Many and beautiful lay those around, 

Like flowers of diirerent hue and clime and root 
In some exotic garden sometimes found, 

With cost and care and warmth induced to shoot. 
One, with her auburn tresses lightly bound, 

And fair brows gently drooping, as the fruit 
Nods from the tree, was slumbering with soft breath 
And lips apart, which show'd the pearls beneath. 

LXVI. 
One, with her flush'd cheek laid on her white arm, 

And raven ringlets gather'd in dark crowd 

Above her brow, lay dreaming soft and warm ; 

And, smiling through her dream, as through a cloud 
The moon breaks, half unveil'd each further charm, 

As, slightly stirring in her snowy shroud, 

Her beauties seized the unconscious hour of night 
All bashfully to struggle into light. 



CANTO VI. 



DON JUAN. 



G27 



LXVTI. 
Phis is no boll, although it sounds so ; for 

'T was night, but there wore lamps, as hath been said. 
A third's all-paHid aspect ofler'd more 

The traits of sleeping Sorrow, and betray'd 
Throuoh t!ie heaved breast the dream "f s^mi tar shore 

Beloved and deplored: while slowly slray'd 
(As night dew, on a cypress glittering, tinges 
The black bough) tear-drops thro' her eyes' dark fringes. 

LXVIII. 
A fourth, as marble, statue-like and sliil, 

Lav in a breathless, hush'd, and stony sleep J 
White, cold, and pure, as looks a frozen rill, 

Or the snow minaret on an Alpine steep, 
Or Lot's wile done m salt, — or what you will; — 

My similes are gather'd in a heap, 
So pick anil choose — perhaps you 11 be content 
With a carved lady on a monument. 

LXIX. 

And lo ! a fifth appears ; — and what is she ? 

A lady of "a certain age," which mi 
Certainly asred — what her years might be 

I know not, never counting past their teens; 
But there she slept, not quite so fair to see 

As ere that awful period intervi ncs, 
Which lays both men and women on the shelf, 
To meditate upon their sins and self. 

LXX. 

But all this time how slept or dream'd Dudu, 
With strict inquiry I could ne'er discover, 

And scorn to add a syllable untrue ; 

But ere the middle watch was hardly over, 

Just when the fading lamps waned dim and blue, 
And phantoms hover'd, or might seem to hover, 

To those who like their company, about 

The apartment, on a sudden she scream' d out: 

LXXI. 

And that so loudly, that upstarted all 

The Oda, in a general commotion : 
Matron and maids, and those whom you may call 

Neither, came crowding like the waves of ocean, 
One on the other, throughout, the whole hall, 

All trembling, wondering, without the least notion, 
More than I have myself, of what could make 
The calm Dudu so turbulently wake. 

LXXII. 
But wide awake she was, and round her bed, 

With floating draperies and with Hying hair, 
With easier eyes, and light but hurried tread, 

And bosoms, arms, and ancles glancing bare, 
And bright as any meteor ever bred 

By the North Pole, — they sought her cause of care, 
For she seem'd agitated, flush'd, and frighten'd, 
Tier eye dilated and her colour heighten'd. 

Lxxin. 

But what is strange — and a strong proof how great 
A blessing is sound sleep, Joanna Iry 

As fast as ever husband by his mate 
In holy matrimony snores away. 

Not all the clamour broke her happy state 
Of slumber, ere they shook her, — so tiny say, 

At least, — and then she too unclosed her i 

And yawn'd a good deal with discreet surprise. 



LXXIV. 
And now commenced a strict investigation, 

Which, as all spoke at once, and more than once 

luring, wondering, asking a narration, 
Alike might puzzle either wit or dunce 
■ er in a very el' ar oration. 
had never pass'd lor wanting sense, 
But, being "no orator, as Brutus is," 
Could not at first expound what was amiss. 

LXKV. 

At length she said, that, in a slumber sound, 
She dream'd a dream of walking in a wood — 

A "wood obscure." like thai where Dante found 1 
Himself in at the age when ail grow 

I alf-way house, where dames « ith virtue crown'd 
Una much less risk of lovers turning rude; — 

And ilia! this wood was full of pleasant fruits, 

And trees of goodly growth and spreading roots; 

LXXVI. 

And in the mi 1st a g >1 len apple grew, — 
A most prodigious pippin — but it hung 

Rather too high and distant ; that she throw 
Her glances on it, and then, longing, filing 

Stones, and whatever she could pick pp, to 

Bring down the fruit, which still perversely clung 

'P.i its own hough, and dangled yet in sight, 

But always at a most provoking height : — 

LXXVII. 
rhal on a sudden, when she least had hope, 

it fell down of its own accord, before 
Fler feet ; that her first movement was to stoop 

And pick it up, and bite it to the core ; 
That just as her young lip began to ope 

Upon the golden fruit the vision bore, 
A bee tiew out and stung her to the heart, 
And so — she awoke with a great scream and start. 

LXXVIII. 

All this she toll with some confusion and 

Dismay, the usual consequence of dreams 
Of the unpleasant kind, with none at hand 

To expound their vain and visionary gleams. 
I 've known some odd ones which seem'd really plann'c 

Prophetically, or that which one deems 
"A strange coincidence," to use a phrase 
By which such things arc settled novv-a-days. 

LXXIX. 
The damsels, who had thoughts of some great harm, 

Began, as is the consequence of fear, 
To scold a little at the false alarm 

That broke for nothing on their sleeping ear. 
The matron too was wroth to leave her warm 

Bed for the dream she had been obliged to heal. 
And chafed at poor Dudu, who only sigh'd, 
And said thai she was sorry she had cried. 

LXXX. 
" I 've heard of stories of a cock and bull ; 

But visions of an apple and a bee, 
To take us from our natural rest, and pull 

The whole Oda from their beds at half-past thren. 
Would make us think the moon is at its full. 

You surely arc unwell, child ! we must se.o. 
To-morrow, what his highness's physician 
W ill say to this hysteric of a vision. 



62S 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CA.XTO VI 



I.XXXI. 

"And poor Juann.i, too! the child's first night 
Within those walls, to bo broke in upon 

With such a clamour— I had thought it right 
Tlu.t the young stranger should not lie alone, 

And, as t tie quietest of all, she might 

With y<> i, Dudti, a good night's rest have known; 

But now 1 must transfer her to the charge 

Of Lokih — though her couch is not so large." 

LXXXII. 
Lolah's eyes sparkled at the proposition ; 

But poor Dtulu, with large drops in her own, 
Resulting from the scolding or the vision, 

Implored that present pardon might bo shown 
For this first fault, and that on no condition 

(She added in a soft and piteous tone), 
Joanna should be taken from her, and 
Her future dreams should all be kept in hand. 

LXXXIII. 

She promised never more to have a dream, 
At least to dream so loudly as just now ; 

She wonder'd at herself how she could scream — 
'T was foolish, nervous, as she must allow, 

A fond hallucination, and a theme 

For laughter — but she felt her spirits low, 

And begg'd ihey would excuse her ; she 'd get over 

This weakness in a few hours, and recover. 

LXXXIV. 

And here Jnanna kindly interposed, 

And said the fe'.t herself extremely well 

Where she then was, as her sound sleep disclosed 
When all around rang like a tocsin-boll : 

She did not find herself the least disposed 
To quit her gentle partner, and to dwell 

Apart from one who had no sin to show, 

Save that of dreaming once " mal-a-propos." 

LXXXV. 

As thus Juanna spoke, Dudii turn'd round, 

And hid her face within Juanna's breast ; 
Her neck alone was seen, but that was found 

The colour of a budding rose's crest. 
I can't tell why she blush'd, nor can expound 

The mystery of this rupture of their rest; 
All that I know is, that the facts I state 
Are true as truth has ever been of late. 

LXXXVI. 
And so good night to them, — or, if you will, 

Good morrow — for the cock had crown, and light 
Besran to clothe each Asiatic hill, 

And the mosque crescent struggled into sight 
Of the long caravan, which in the chill 

Of dewy dawn wound slowly round each height 
That stretches to the stony belt which girds 
Asia, where Kaff looks down upon the Kurds. 

LXXXV II. 
With tnc first ray, or rather gray of morn, 

Gulbeyaz rose from restlessness; and pale 
As Passion ri^os, with its bosom worn, 

Array VI herself with mantle, gem, and veil : 
i he nightingale that sings with the deep thorn, 

\\ Inch Fable places in her breast of wail, 
)s lighter far of heart and voice than those 
Whose headlong passions form their proper woes. 



LXXXVIII. 

And that 's the moral of this composition, 
If people would but see its real drift j — 

l!iii thai they will not do without suspicion) 
Because all gentle readers have the gift 

Of closing 'gainst the light their orbs of vision; 
While gentle writers also love to lift 

Their voices 'gainst each other, which is natural — 

The numbers are too great for them to flatter all 

LXXXIX. 

Rose the sultana from a bed of splendour, — 
Softer than the soft Sybarite's, w ho cried 

Aloud because his feelings were too lender 
To brook a ruffled rose-leaf by his side, — 

So beautiful that art could little mend her, 

Though pale with conflicts between love and pride:— 

So agitated was she with her error, 

She did not even look into the mirror. 

XC. 

Also arose about the self-same time, 

Perhaps a little later, her great lord, 
Master of thirty kingdoms so sublime, 

And of a wife by whom he was abhorr'J ; 
A thing of much loss import in that clime — 

At least to those of incomes which afford 
The filling up their whole connubial cargo — 
Than where two wives arc under an embargo. 

XCI. 

He did not think much on the matter, nor 

Indeed on any other: as a man, 
He liked to have a handsome paramour 

At hand, as one may like to have a fan, 
And therefore of Circassians had good store, 

As an amusement after the Divan ; 
Though an unusual fit of love, or duty, 
Had made him lately bask in his bride's beauty. 

XCII. 

And now he rose : and after due ablutions, 

Exacted by the customs of the East, 
Ami prayers, and other pious evolutions, 

Hi 1 drank six cups of coffee at the least, 
Anl then withdrew to hear about the Russians, 

Whose victories had recently increased, 
In Catherine's reign, whom glory still adores 

As greatest of all sovereigns and w s. 

XC1II. 
But oh, thou grand legitimate Alexander ! 

Her son's son, let not this last phrase offend 
Thine ear, if it should reach, — and now rhymes wandci 

Almost as far as Petersburg!!, and lend 
A dreadful fmpulse to eaeh loud meander 

Of murmuring Liberty's wide waves, which blcno 
Their roar even with the Baltic's, — so you be 
Your father's son, 'tis quite enough for me. 

XCIV. 
To call men love-begotten, or proclaim 

Their mothers as the antipodes of Timon, 
That hater of mankind, would ho a shame, 

A libel, or whate'er you please to rhyme on • 
But people's ancestors arc history's game ; 

And if one lady's slip could leave a crime on 
All generations, I should like to know 
What pedigree the best would have to show? 



CANTO VI. 



DON JUAN. 



629 



xcv. 

Had Catherine and the sultan understood 

Their own true interest, which kings rarely know, 

Until 'tis taught by lessons rather rude, 

There was a way to end their strife, although 

Perhaps precarious, had they but thought good, 
Without the aid of prince or pleriipo: 

She to dismiss her guards, and he Ins haratn, 

And for their other matters, meet and share 'ein. 

XCVI. 

But as it was, his Highness had to hold 
His daily council upon ways and means, 

How t'j encounter with this martial scold, 
Tlvs Modern Amazon and Queen of queans ; 

And the perplexity could not be told 

Of all the pillars of the stale, which leans 

Som ;'.i;i"-,s a little heavy on the backs 

Of those who cannot lay on a new tax. 

XCVII. 

Meantime Gulbeyaz, when her king was gone, 
Retired into her boudoir, a sweet place 

For love or breakfast; private, pleasing, lone, 
And rich with all contrivances which grace 

Those gay recesses : — many a precious stone 
Sparkled along its roof, and many a vase 

Of porcelain held in the fetter'd flowers, 

Those captive soothers of a captive's hours. 

XCVIII. 

Mother-of-pearl, and porphyry, and marble, 

Vied with each other on this costly spot; 
And singing-birds without were heard to warble ; 

And the stain'd glass which lighted this fair grot 
Varied each ray; — but all descriptions garble 

The true effect, and so we had better not 
Be too minute ; an outline is the best, — 
\ lively reader's fancy docs the rest. 

XC1X. 

\nd here she summon'd Uaba, and required 
Don Juan at his hands, and information 

Of what had pass'd since all the slaves retired, 
And whether he had occupied their station; 

If matters had been managed as desired, 
And his disguise with due consideration 

Kept up ; and, above all, the where and how 

tie had pass'd the night, was what she wish'd to know. 

C. 

Uaba, with some embarrassment, replied 

To this long catechism of questions ask'd 
More easily than answer'd, — that he had tried 

His best to obey in what he had been task'd ; 
But there seeni'd something that he wish'd to hide, 

Which hesitation more betray'd than niask'd; 
He scratch'd his ear, the infallible resource 
To which embarrass'd people have recourse. 

CI. 
Gulbeyaz was no model of true patience, 

Nor much disposed to wait in word or deed ; 
She liked quick answers in all conversations; 

And when she saw him stumbling like a steed 
In his replies, she puzzled him for fresh ones; 

And as his speech grew still more broken-knee'd, 
Her cheek began to flush, her eyes to sparkle, 
^nd her proud brow's blue veins to swell and darkle. 



CII. 

When Baba saw these symptoms, which he knew 
To bode him no great good, he deprecated 

Her anger, and bescecii'd she 'd hear him through- 
He could not help the thing which lie related : 

Then out it came at length, that to Dudu 

Juan was given in charge, as hath been stated; 

But not by Baba's fault, he said, and swore on 

The holy camel's hump, besides the Koran. 

cm. 

The chief dame of the Oda, upon whom 
The discipline of the whole haram bore, 

As soon as they re-enter'd their own room, 
For Baba's function stopp'd short at the door, 

Had settled all ; nor could he then presume 
(The aforesaid Baba) just then to do more, 

Without exciting such suspicion as 

Might make the matter still worse than it was. 

CIV. 

He hoped, indeed he thought he could be sure, 
Juan had not betray'd himself; in fact, 

'Twas certain that his conduct had been pure, 
Because a foolish or imprudent act 

Would not alone have made him insecure, 
Rut ended in his being found out and sacVd 

And thrown into the sea. — Thus Baba spoke 

Of all save Dudu's dream, which was no joke. 

CV. 

This he discreetly kept in the back ground, 

And talk'd away — and might have talk'd till now, 

For any further answer that he found, 

So deep an anguish wrung Gulbeyaz' brow ; 

Her cheek lurn'd ashes, ears rung, brain wJlirl'd round. 
As if she had received a sudden blow, 

And the heart's dew of pain sprang fast and chilly 

O'er her fair front, like morning's on a lily. 

cvr. 

Although she was not of the fainting sort, 

Baba thought she would faint, but there he err'd— - 

It was but a convulsion, which, though short, 
Can never be described ; we all have heard, 

And some of us have feit thus "«.'/ amort," 

When things beyond the common have occurr'd ; 

Gulbeyaz proved in that brief agony 

What she could ne'er express — then how should I ? 

CVII. 

She stood a moment, as a Pythoness 

Stands on her tripod, agonized, and full 
Of inspiration gather'd from distress, 

When all the heart-strings like wild Iforses pull 
Tie; heart asunder; — then, as more or less 

Their speed abated, or their strength grew dull, 
She sunk down on her scat by slow di 
And bow'd her throbbing head o'er trembling knee*. 

CVIII. 
Her face declined, and was unseen ; her hair 

Fell in long tresses like the weeping will 
Sweeping the marble underneath her chair, 

Or i (for it was all pillow, — 

A lovv, sol't ottoman), and black despair 

Stirr'd up and down her bosom like a billow, 
\\ I ill ru hi i" some sh ire, w I s check 

Its farther course, but tnual receive its wreck. 



030 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTu VI 



CIX. 

Her head hung down, and her long hair in stooping 
Conceal'd her features belter than a veil ; 

And one hand o'er the ottoman lay drooping, 
White, waxen, and as alabaster pale : 

Would that I were a painter! to be grouping 
All that a poet drags into detail ! 

Oil that my words were colours! but their tints 

Way serve perhaps as outlines or slight hints. 

CX. 

Baba, who knew by experience when to talk 
And when to hold his tongue, now held it till 

This passion might blow o'er, nor dared to balk 
Gulbeyaz' taciturn or speaking will. 

At length she rose up, and began to walk 
Slowly along the room, but silent still. 

And her brow clcar'd, but not her troubled eye — 

The wind was down, but still the sea ran high. 

cxr. 

She stopp'd, and raised her head to speak — but paused, 
And then moved on again with rapid pace ; 

Then slacken'd it, which is the march most caused 
By deep emotion : — you may sometimes trace 

A feeling in each footstep, as disclosed 
By Sallust in his Catiline, who, chased 

By all the demons of all passions, show'd 

Their work even by the way in which he trode. 

CXII. 

Gulbeyaz stopp'd and beckon'd Baba: — "Slave! 

Bring the two slaves!" she said, in a low tone, 
But one which Baba did not like to brave, 

And yet he shuddcr'd, and seem'd rather prone 
To prove reluctant, and begg'd leave to crave 

(Though he well knew the meaning) to be shown 
What slaves her highness wish'd to indicate, 
For fear of any error like the late. 

CXIII. 

"The Georgian and her paramour," replied 
The imperial bride — and added, " Let the boat 

Be ready by the secret portal's side : 
You know the rest." The words stuck in her throat, 

Despite her injured love and fiery pride ; 
And of this Baba wiliingly took note, 

And begg'd, by every hair of Mahomet's beard, 

She would revoke the order he had heard. 

CXIV. 

*' To hear is to obey," he said ; " but still, 
Sultanr., think upon the consequence : 

It is not that I shall not all fulfil 
Your orders, even in their severest sense ; 

But such precipi'ition may end ill, 

Even at your own imperative expense ; 

I do not mean destruction and exposure, 

In case of any premature disclosure ; 

cxv. 

" But your own feelings. — Even should all the rest 
Be hidden by the rolling waves, which hide 

Already many a once love-beaten breast 
Deep in the caverns of the deadly tide — 

1'ou love this boyish, new seraglio guest, 
And — if this violent remedy be tried — 

hixcuse my freedom, when I here assure you, 

I'lvit killing him is not the way to cure you." 



CXV I. 

"What dost thou know of love or feeling ? — wretch! 

Begone!" she cried, with kindling eyes, "and do 
My billing!" Baba vanish'd ; for to stretch 

His own remonstrance further, he well knew, 
Might end in acting as his own "Jack Ketch;" 

And, though he wish'd extremely to get through 
This awkward business without harm to others, 
He still preferr'd his own neck to another's. 

CXVII. 

Away he went then upon his commission, 

Growling and grumbling in good Turkish phrase 

Against all women, of whate'er condition, 
Especially sultanas and their ways ; 

Their obstinacy, pride, and indecision, 

Their never knowing their own mind two days, 

The trouble that they gave, their immorality, 

Which made him daily bless his own neutrality. 

C XVIII. 

And then he call'd his brethren to his aid, 
And sent one on a summons to the pair, 

That they must instantly be well array'd, 
And, above all, be comb'd even to a hair, 

And brought before the empress, who had made 
Inquiries after them with kindest care : 

At which Dudii look'd strange, and Juan silly; 

But go they must at once, and will I — n»U I. 

CXIX. 

And here I leave them at their preparation 
For the imperial presence, wherein whether 

Gulbeyaz show'd them both commiseration, 
Or got rid of the parties altogether — 

Like other angry ladies of her nation, — 
Are things the turning of a hair or feather 

Mav settle ; but far be 't from me to anticipate 

In wnat way feminine caprice may dissipate. 

cxx. 

I leave them for the present, with good wishes, 
Though doubts of their well-doing, to arrange 

Another part of history; for the dishes 

Of this our banquet we must sometimes change 

And, trusting Juan may escape the fishes, 
Although his situation now seems strange 

And scarce secure, as such digressions are fair 

The muse will take a little touch at warfare. 



CANTO VII. 



i. 

Oh love! Oh glory! what are ye? who fly 

Around us ever, rarely to alight : 
There's not a meteor in the polar sky 

Of such transcendent and more Heeling flight. 
Chill, and chain'd to cold earth, we lift on high 

Our eyes in search of either lovely li 
A thousand and a thousand colours they 
Assume, then leave us on our freezing way. 



CANTO Vlf. 



DON JUAN. 



G31 



II. 

And such as tlipy are, such my present tale is, 
A non-dcscript and ever-varying rhyme, 

A versified Aurora Borealis, 

Which flashes o'er a waste and icy clime. 

When we know what all are, we must bewail us, 
But ne'crtheless, I hope it is no crime 

To l~ugh at all things: for I wish to know 

What, after all, are ail tilings — but a show? 

III. 

They accuse me — me — the present writer of 
The present poem, of — I know not what, — 

A tendency to underrate and scoff 

At human power and virtue, and all that ; 

And this they say in language rather rough. 
Good God ! I wonder what they would be at ? 

I say no more than has been said in Dante's 

Verse, and by Solomon, and by Cervantes; 

IV. 
By Swift, by Machiavel, by Rochefoucault, 

By Fenelon, by Luther, and by Plato ; 
Bv Tillotson, ami Wesley, and Rousseau, 

Who knew this life was not worth a potato. 
'T is not their fault, nor mine, if this be so — 

For my part, I pretend not to be Calo, 
Nur even Diogenes. — We live and die, 
But which is best, you know no more than I. 

V. 

Socrates said, our only knowledge was, 

"To know that nothing could be known ;" a pleasant 
Science enough, which levels to an ass 

Each man of wisdom, future, past, or present. 
Newton (that proverb of the mind), alas! 

Declared, with all his grand discoveries recent, 
That he himself felt only " like a youth 
Picking up shells by the great ocean — truth." 

VI. 

Ecclesiastes said, that all is vanity — 

Most modern preachers say the same, or show it 
By their examples of true Christianity; 

In short, all know, or very soon may know it : 
And in this scene of all-confess'd inanity, 

By saint, by sage, by preacher, and by poet, 
Must I restrain me, through the fear of strife, 
From holding up the nothingness of life 7 

VII. 
Dogs, or men ! (for I flatter you in saying 

That ye are dogs — your betters far) ye may 
Read, or read not, what I am now essaying 

To show ye what ye are in every way. 
As little as the moon stops for the baying 

Of wolves, will the bright Muse withdraw one ray 
From out her skies ; — then howl your idle wrath ! 
While she still silvers o'er your gloomy path. 

VIII. 
** Fierce loves and faithless wars" — lam not sure 

If this he the right reading — 'tis no matter; 
The fact 's about the same ; I am secure ; — 

I sing them both, and am about to batter 
A town which did a famous siege endure, 

And was beleagui r'd 1 » ' ■ r 1 1 by land and water 
By Suvaroff, or anglice" Suwarrow, 
Who loved blood as an alderman loves marrow. 



IX. 

The fortress is call'd Ismail, and is placed 
Upon the Danube's left branch and left bank, 

With buildings in the oriental taste, 

But stiil a fortress of the fureiuost rank, 

Or was at least, unless 't is since defaced, 

Which with your conquerors is a common prink 

It stands some eighty versts from the high sea, 

And measures round of loiscs thousands three. 

X. 

Within the extent of this fortification 
A borough is comprised, along the height 

Upon the left, which, from its loftier station, 
Commands the city, and upon its site 

A Greek had raised around this elevation 
A quantity of palisades upright, 

So placed as to impede the fire of those 

Who held the place, and to asxist the foe's. 

XI. 

This circumstance may serve to give a notion 
Of the high talents of this new Vauban ; 

But the town ditch below was deep as ocean, 
The rampart higher than you'd wish to hang: 

But then there was a great want of precaution, 
(Prithee, excuse this engineering slang), 

Xor work advanced, nor cover'd way was there, 

To hint at least " Here is no thoroughfare." 

XII. 

But a stone bastion, with a narrow gorge, 
And walls as thick as most skulls born as yet ; 

Two butteries, cap-a-pie, as our Saint George, 
Case-mated one, and : t other a "barbette," 

Of Danube's bank took formidable charge ; 
While two-and-twenty cannon, duly set, 

Rose o'er the town's right side, in bristling tier, 

Forty feet high, upon a cavalier. 

XIII. 

But from the river the town 's open quite, 

Because the Turks could never be persuaded 
A Russian vessel e'er would heave in sight ; 

And such their creed was, till they were invaded. 
When it grew rather late to set things right. 

But as the Danube could not well lie waded, 
They look'd upon the Muscovite flotilla, 
And only shouted, "Alia!" and " Bis Millah !" 

XIV. 
The Russians now were ready to attack ; 

But oh, ye goddesses of war and glory ! 
How shall I spell the name of eaoh Cossack 

Who were immortal, could one tell their story? 
Alas ! what to their memory can lack ? 

Achilles self was not more grim and gory 
Than thousands of this new and polish'd nation, 
Whose names want nothing but — pronunciation. 

XV." 
Still I 'II record a few, if but to increase 

Our euphony — there was Strongenolf, and Sli okonotf, 
Meknop, Serge Lwdw, Arseniew of modern <i 

And Tschitsshakoff, and RoguenofT, and CLokenoff, 
And others of twelve consonants apiece: 

And more might be found out, ilT could poke enough 
Into gazettes; but Fame (capricious strumpet!) 
It seems, has got an ear as well as trumpet, 



632 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Csirro vn 



xvr. 

And cannot tunc those discords of narration, 
Whirl) may be Dames at Moscow, into rhyme. 

Yet (hire were several worth commemoration, 
As e'er was virgin of a nuptial chime; 

Soft wor d for the peroration 

Of Londonderry, drawling against time, 

Ending in " ischskin," "ousckin," " inskchy," "ouski," 

Of whom wo can insert but Rousamouski, 

XVII. 
Sclicrcmatoff ami Chrematoff, Koklophti, 
Koclobski, Kourakin, and Mouskin Pouskin, 

Ail proper men of weapons, as e'er scoff'd high 
Against a (be, or ran a sabre through skin: 

Little cared they for Mahomet or Mufti, 

Unless to make their kettle-drums a new skin 

Out of their hides, if parchment had grown dear, 

And no more handy substitute been near. 

XVIII. 
Then there were foreigners of much renown, 

Of various nations, and all volunteers ; 
Not fighting for their country or its crown, 

But wishing to be one (lay brigadiers ; 
Also to have the sacking of a town — 

A pleasant thing to young men at their years. 
'Mongst them wire several Englishmen of pith, 
Sixteen call'd Thompson, and nineteen named Smith. 

XIX. 
Jack Thompson and Bill Thompson ; — all the rest 

Had been call'd "Jemmy," after the great bard; 
I don't know whether they had arms or crest, 

But such a godfather's as good a card. 
Three of the Smiths were Peters ; but the best 

Amongst them all, hard blows to inflict or ward, 
Was he, since so renown'd " in country quarters 
At Halifax ;" but now he served the Tartars. 

XX. 

The rest were Jacks and Gills, and Wills and Bills ; 

But when I've added that the elder Jack Smith 
Was born in Cumberland among the hills, 

And that his father was an honest blacksmith, 
I've said all 1 know of a name that fills 

Three lines of the despatch in taking "Schmacsmith," 
A village of Moldavia's waste, wherein 
He fell, immortal in a bulletin. 

XXI. 
I wonder (although Mars no doubt 's a god I 

Praise) if a man's name in a bulletin 
May make up for a bullet in his body? 

I hope this little question is no sin, 

e, though I am but a simple noddy, 

I think one Shakspcare puts the same thought in 
The mouth of some one in his plays so doating, 
Which many people pass lor wits by quoting. 

XXII. 
Then there were Frenchmen, gallant, young, and gay: 

But I 'in too great a patriot to record 
Their gallic names upon a glorious day; 

I 'd lather tell ten lies than sav a word 
Of truth; — such ti.iths are treason: they betray 

Their ooiintry, and, as traitors are abhorr'd. 
Who name the French and English, save to show 
How peace should make John Hull the Frenchman's foe. 



XXIII. 

The Russians, having built two batteries on 
An isle near Ismail, had two ends in view ; 

The first was to bombard it, and knock down 
The public buildings, and the private too. 

No matter what poor souls might be undone. 
The city's shape suggested this, 't is true ; 

Form'd like an amphitheatre, each dwelling 

Presented a fine mark to throw a shell in. 

XXIV. 

The second object was to profit by 

The moment of the general consternation, 

To attack the Turk's flotilla, which lay nigh, 
Extremely tranquil, anchor'd at its station : 

But a third motive was as probably 
To frighten them into capitulation ; 

A phantasy which sometimes seizes warriors, 

Unless they are game as bull-dogs and fox-terriers, 

XXV. 

A habit rather blameable, which is 

That of despising those we combat with, 

Common in many cases, was in this 
The cause of killing Tchil'chitzkoff and Smith ; 

One of the valorous " Smiths" whom we shall miss 
Out of those nineteen who late rhymed to " pith ;* 

But 't is a name so spread o'er " Sir" and "Madam,'' 

That one would think the first who bore it "Adam.* 

XXVI. 

The Russian batteries were incomplete, 

Because they were constructed in a hurry. 

Thus, the same cause which makes a verse want feet, 
And throws a cloud o'er Longman and John Murray 

When the sale of new books is not so 

As they who print them think is necessary, 

May likewise put olT for a time what storv 

Sometimes calls "murder," and at others "glory." 

XXVII. 
Whether it was their engineers' stupidity, 

Their haste, or waste, I neither know nor care, 
Or some contractor's personal cupidity, 

Saving his soul by cheating in the ware 
Of homicide ; but. there was no solidity 

In the new batteries erected there ; 
They either miss'd, or they were never miss'd, 
And added greatly to the missing list. 

XXVIII. 

A sad miscalculation about distance 

Made all their naval matters incorrect ; 
Three fire-ships lost their amiable existence, 

Before theyreach'd a spot to take effect: 
The match was lit too soon, and no assistance 

Could remedy this lubberly defect ; 
Tbey blew up in the middle of the river, 
While, though 't was dawn, the Turks slept fast as »voi 

XXIX. 
At seven they rose, however, and survey'd 

The Russ flotilla getting under way ; 
'T was nine, when still advancing undismay'd, 

Within a cable's length their vessels lay 
Oil' Ismail, and commenced a cannonade, 

Which was retum'd with interest, I may say, 
And by a fire of musketry and grape, 
And shells and shot of every size and shauc. 






CANTO VII. 



DON JUAN. 



033 



XXX. 

For six hours bore they without intermission 
The Turkish fire ; and, aided by their own 

Land batteries, work'd their guns with great precision: 
At length they found mere cannonade alone 

By no means would produce the town's submission, 
And made a signal to retreat at one. 

One bark blew up ; a second, near the works 

Running aground, was taken by the Turks. 

XXXI. 

The Moslem too had lost both ships and men ; 

Hut when they saw the enemy retire, 
Their Delhis mann'd some boats, and sail'd again, 

And gall'd the Russians with a heavy lire, 
Ami tried to make a landing on the main. 

But here the effect fell short of their desire : 
Count Damas drove them back into the water 
Pell-mell, and with a whole gazette of slaughter. 

XXXII. 
"If" (says the historian here) "I could report 

All that the Russians did upon this day, 
I think that several volumes would fall short, 

And I should still have many things to say ;" 
And so he says no more — but pays his court 

To some distinguished strangers in that fray, 
The Prince de Ligne, and Longeron, and Damas, 
Names great as any that the roll of fame has. 

XXXIII. 

This being the case, may show us what fame is; 

For out of three "preux chevaliers" how 
Many of common readers give a guess 

That such existed ? (and they may live now 
For aught we know). Renown's all hit or miss; 

There 's fortune even in fame, we must allow. 
'T is true the Memoirs of the Prince de Ligne 
Have half withdrawn from him oblivion's skreen 

XXXIV. 

But here are men who fought in gallant actions 

As gallantly as ever heroes fjiiL'lit, 
But buried in the heap of such transactions — 

Their names arc seldom found, nor often sought. 
Thus even good fame may suffer sad contr 

And is extinguish'd sooner than she ought: 
Of all our modern battles, I will bet 
You can't repeat nine names from each gazette. 

XXXV. 
In ahort, this last attack, though rich in glory, 

Show'd that someu , J, there was a fault ; 

And Admiral Ribas (known in Russian story) 

Most strongly recommended an assault ; 
In which In; was opposed by young and hoary, 

Which made a long debate :— hut I must halt; 
For if I wrote down every warrior's speech, 
I doubt few readers e'er would mount the breach. 

XXXVI. 
There was a man, if that he was a man, — 

Not that his manhood could be cali'd in question, 
For, had he not been Hercules, Irs span 

Had been as short in youth as indig 
Made his last illness, when, all worn and wan, 

He died beneath a tree, us much unbless'd on 
The soil of the gri he had wasted, 

As e'er was locust on the land it bla iled ; — 
3 G 



XXXVII. 
This was Potemkin — a great thing in days 

When homicide and harlotry made great, 
If stars and titles could entail long praise, 

His glory might half equal his estate. 
This fellow, being six foot high, could raise 

A kind of phantasy proportionate 
In the tl ■ i of the Russian people, 

Who measured men as you would do a steeple. 

XXXVIII. 

While things were in abeyance, Rihas sent 
A courier to the prince, and he succeeded 

tiers after his own heat. 
I cannot tell the way i:i which he pleaded, 

But shortly he had cause to be content. 
In the mean time the batteries proceeded, 

And fourscore cannon on the Danube's border 

Were briskly fired and auswerd i:i due order. 

XXXIX. 

But on the thirteenth, when already part 
Of the troops were embark'd, the siege to raise, 

A courier on the spur inspired new heart 
Into all panters for newspaper praise, 

As well as dilettanti in war's art, 

By his despatches conch'd in pithy phrase, 

Announcing the appointment of that lover of 

Battles to the command, Field-Marshal Suvaroff. 

XL. 

The tetter of the prince to the same marshal 
Was worthy of a Spartan, had the cause 

Been one to which a good heart could he partial,— 
Defence of freedom, country, or of laws ; 

But as it was mere lust of power to o'er-arch all 
With its proud brow, it merits slight applause, 

Save for its style, which said, all in a trice, 

" You will take Ismail, at whatever price." 

XLI. 

" Let there he light !" said God, " and there was light ."• 
" Let there be blood !" says man, and there's a sea! 

The fiat of this spoil'd child of the night 
(For day ne'er saw his merits) could decree 

More evil in an hour, than thirty bright 

Summers could renovate, though they should be 

Lovely as those which ripen'd Eden's fruit — 

For war cuts up not only branch but root. 

XLII. 

Our friends the Turks, who with loud "Alias" now 

Began to signalize the Russ retreat, 
Were damnably mistaken; few are slow 

In tninking that their enemy is beat 
(Or beaten, if you insist on grammar, though 

1 never think about it in a leal) ; 
But here I say the Turks were lunch mistaken* 
Who, hating hogs, yel wish'd to Bave their bacon. 

XLIII. 
For, on the b, at full gallop drew 

In sight two horsemen, who were deem'd Cossacm 
time, till ihey came in nearer view. 

had hut hill, : their Iricks, 

For i- i" were but threi hirla between the two; 

l!'il on 'i line Ii.icks, 

Till, in approaching, w.re at length descried 
plain pair, Suwarrow aim his guide. 



G31 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO VII. 



XLIV. 

,l Great joy to Loiioon now!" says some great fool, 
Winn London had a grand illumination, 

Which, to that bottle-conjuror, John Hull, 
Is of all dreams the tir.st hallucination ; 

So that the streets of colour'd lamps are full, 
That nse {said John) surrenders at discretion 

His purse, his soul, his sense, and even his nonsense, 

'lo gratify, like a huge moth, this one sense. 

XLV. 
'Tis strange that he should further "damn his eyes," 

For they are damn'd : that once all-famous oath 
Is to the devil now no further prize, 

Since John has lately lost the use of both. 
Debt he calls wealth, and taxes, paradise ; 

And famine, with her gaunt and bony growth, 
Which stares him in the face, he won't examine, 
Or swears that Ceres hath, begotten Famine. 

XLVI. 

Hut to the tale. Great joy unto the camp ! 

To Russian, Tartar, English, French, Cossack, 
O'er whom Suwarrow shone like a gas-lamp, 

Presaging a most luminous attack ; 
Or, like a wisp along the marsh so damp, 

Which leads beholders on a boggy walk, 
He llitted to and fro, a dancing light, 
Which all who saw it fullow'd, wrong or right. 

XLVII. 
But, ccrtcs, matters took a different face ; 

There was enthusiasm and much applause, 
The fleet and camp saluted with great grace, 

And all presaged good fortune to their cause. 
Within a cannon-shot length of the place 

They drew, constructed ladders, repair'd flaws 
In former works, made new, prepared fascines, 
And all kinds of benevolent machines. 

XLVIII. 

Tis thus the spirit of a single mind 
Makes that of multitudes take one direction, 

As roll the waters to the breathing wind, 

Or roams the herd beneath the bull's protection : 

Or as a little dog will lead the blind, 

Or a bcllweather form the flock's connexion 

By tinkling sounds when they go forth to victual: 

Such is the sway of your great men o'er little. 

XLIX. 

The whole camp rung with joy; you would have thought 

That they were going to a marriage-feast, 
(This metaphor, I think, holds good as aught, 

Since there is discord after both at least), 
There was not now a luggage-boy but sought 

Danger and spoil with ardour much increased; 
And why ? because a little, odd, old man, 
Stript to his shirt, was come to lead the van. 

L. 
But so it was ; and every preparation 

Was made with all alacrity ; the first 
Petaehment of three columns took its station, 

And waited but the signal's voice to burst 
Upon the foe : the second's ordination 

Was also in three columns, with a thirst 
Kot glory gaping o'er a sea of slaughter: 
Tl'« third, in columns two, attack'd by water. 



LI 

New batteries were erected ; ami was held 
A general council, in which unanimity, 

That stranger to most councils, here prevail'd, 
As sometimes happens in a great extremity; 

And, every difficulty being expell'd, 

Glory began to dawn with due sublimity, 

While Suvarotf, determined to obtain it, 

Was teaching his recruits louse the bayonet.' 

L1I. 

It is an actual fact, that he, commander- 
in-chief, in proper person deign'd to drill 

The awkward squad, and could afford 'o squander 
His time, a corporal's duties to fulfil : 

Just as you 'd break a sucking salamander 
To swallow llame, and never take it ill ; 

He show'd them how to mount a ladder (which 

Was not like Jacob's) or to cross a ditch. 

LIII. 

Also he dress'd up, for the nonce, fascines 
J, ike men, with turbans, scimitars, and dirks, 

And made them charge with bayonets these machines 
By way of lesson against actual Turks. 

And, when well practised in these mimic scenes, 
He judged them proper to assail the works; 

At which your wise men sneer'd, in phrases witty:— 

He made no answer ; but he took the city. 

LIV. 
Most things were in this posture on the eve 

Of the assault, and all the camp was in 
A stern repose ; which you would scarce conceive : 

Yet men, resolved to dash through thick and thin, 
Are verv silent when they once believe 

That all is settled : — there was little din, 
For some were thinking of their home and friends, 
And others of themselves and latter ends. 

LV. 

Suwarrow chiefly was on the alert, 

Surveying, drilling, ordering, jesting, pondering: 
For the man was, we safely may assert, 

A thing to wonder at beyond most wondering ; 
Hero, buffoon, half-demon, and half dirt, 

Praying, instructing, desolating, blundering; 
Now Mars, now Momus ; and when bent to storm 
A fortress, Harlequin in uniform, 

LVI. 

The day before the assault, while upon drill — 
For this great conqueror play'd the corporal — 

Some Cossacks, hovering like hawks round a hill, 
Had met a party, towards the twilight's fall, 

One of whom spoke their tongue, or well or ill — 
'T was much that he was understood at all ; 

Hut whether from his voice, or speech, or manner, 

They found that he had fought beneath their banner. 

LVII. 

Whereon, immediately at his request, 
They brought him and his comrades to bead-qu 

f heir dress was Moslem, but you might have guess'd 
That these were merely masquerading Tartars, 

And that beneath each Turkish-fashion'' 
Lurk'd Christianity ; who sometimes barters 

Her inward grace for outward show, and makes 

It difficult to shun some strange mistakes. 



CANTO VII. 



DON JUAN. 



635 



Lvm. 

Suwarrow, who was standing in his shirt, 

Before a company of Calmucks, drilling, 

Exclaiming, fooling, swearing at the inert, 

And lecturing on the nobis art of killing, — 
For, deeming human clay but common dirt, 
This great philosopher was thus instilling 
His maxims, which, to martial comprehension, 
Proved death in battle equal to a pension ; — 

LIX. 
Suwarrow, when he saw this company 

Of Cossacks and their prey, turn'd round and cast 
Upon them his slow brow and piercing eye : — 

" Whence come ye ?" — " From Constantinople last, 
Captives just now escaped," was the replv. 

" What are ye ?" — "What you see us." Briefly past 
This dialogue ; for he who answer'd knew 
To whom he spoke, and made his words but few. 

LX. 
" Your names?" — "Mine 's Johnson, and my comrade's 
Juan ; 
The other two are women, and the third 
Is neither man nor woman." The chief threw on 

The party a slight glance, then said : " I have heard 
Your name before, the second is a new one ; 
To bring the other three here was absurd ; 
But let that pass ; — I think I 've heard your name 
In the Nikolaiew regiment ?'' — " The same." — 

LXI. 
"You served at Widin?" "Yes." "You led the attack?" 
" I did."—" What next ?"— « I really hardly know." 
" you were the first i' the breach ?" — " I was not slack, 

At least, to follow those who m ; ght be so." — 
" What follow'd ?" — " A shot kid me on my back, 

And I became a prisoner to the foe." — 
" You shall have vengeance, for the town surrounded 
Is twice as strong as that where you were wounded. 

LXII. 
u Where will you serve ?" — " Where'er you please." — 
" I know 
You like to be the hope of the forlorn, 
And doubtless would be foremost on the foe 
After the hardships you 've already borne. 
And this young fellow ? say what can he do ? — 

He with the beardless chin, and garments torn." — 
"Why, general, if he hath no greater fault 
In war than love, he had better lead the assault." — 

LXIII. 
" He shall, if that he dare." Here Juan bow'd 

Low as the compliment deserved. Suwarrow 
Continued: "Your old regiment's allow'd, 
By special providence, to lead to-morrow, 
Or it may be to-night, the assault : I 've vow'd 

To several saints, that shortly plough or harrow 
Shall pass o'er what was Ismail, and its tusk 
Be unimpeded by the proudest mosque. 

LXIV. 
"So now, my lads, for glory!" — Here he turn'd, 
Acd drill'd away in the most classic Russian, 
Until each high, heroic bosom burn'd 

For cash and conquest, as if from a cushion 
A preacher had held forth (who nobly spurn'd 

All earthly goods save tithes) and bade them push on 
To slay the Pagans who resisted, battering 
The armies of the Christian Empress Catherine 



LXV. 

Johnson, who knew by this long colloquy 
Himself a favourite, ventured to address 

Suwarrow, though engaged with accents high 
In his resumed amusement. " I confess 

My debt, in being thus allow'd to die 

Among the foremost; but if you'd express 

Explicitly our several posts, my friend 

And self would know what duty to attend."— 

LXVI. 
"Right! I was busy, and forgot. Why, you 

Will join your former regiment, which should be 
Now under arms. Ho ! Katskoflf, take him to— 

(Here he call'd up a Polish orderly) — 
His post, I mean the regiment Nikolaiew. 

The stranger stripling may remain with me; 
He 's a fine boy. The women may be sent 
To the other baggage, or to the sick tent." 

LXVII. 

But here a sort of scene began to ensue : 
The ladies, — who by no means had been bred 

To be disposed of in a way so new, 
Although their haram education led 

Doubtless to that of doctrines the most true, 
Passive obedience, — now raised up the head, 

With flashing eyes and starting tears, and flung 

Their arms, as hens their wings about their younp, 

LXVIII. 
O'er the promoted couple of brave men 

Who were thus honour'd by the greatest chief 
That ever peopled hell with heroes slain, 

Or plunged a province or a realm in grief. 
Oh, foolish mortals ! always taught in vain ! 

Oh, glorious laurel ! since for one sole leaf 
Of thine imaginary deathless tree, 
Of blood and tears must flow the unebbing sea . 

LXIX. 

Suwarrow, who had small regard for tears, 
And not much sympathy for blood, survey'd 

The women with their hair about their ears, 
And natural agonies, with a slight shade 

Of feeling : for, however habit sears 

Men's hearts against whole millions, when their trade 

Is butchery, sometimes a single sorrow 

Will toucn even heroes — and such was Suwarrow. 

LXX. 

He said — and in the kindest Calmuck tone — 
" Why, Johnson, what the devil do you mean 

By bringing women here ? They shall be shown 
All the attention possible, and seen 

In safety to the wagons, where alone 

In fact they can be safe. You should have been 

Aware this kind of baggage never thrives : 

Save wed a year, I hate recruits with wives.' 

LXXI. 

"May it please your excellency," thus replied 
Our British friend, " these are the wives of othei* 

And not our own. I am too qualified 
By service with my military brothers;. 

To break the rules by bringing one's own bnrie 
Into a camp ; I know that nought so bother* 

The hearts of the heroic on a charge, 

As leaving a small family at large. 



63G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO V1L 



LXXII. 

«' But these are but two Turkish ladies, who 

With their attendant aided our escape, 
And afterwards accompanied us through 

A thousand perils in this dubious shape. 
To me this kind of life is not so new ; 

To them, poor things ! it is an awkward step ; 
I therefore, if you wish me to fight freely, 
Request that they may both be used genteelly." 

LXXIII. 
Meantime, these two poor girls, with swimming eyes, 

Look'd on as if in doubt if they could trust 
Their own protectors ; nor was their surprise 

Less than their grief (and truly not less just) 
To see an old man, rather wild than wise 

In aspect, plainly clad, besmear'd with dust, 
Stript to his waistcoat, and that not too clean, 
More foar'd than all the sultans ever seen. 

. LXXIV. 
For ever)' thing seem'd resting on his nod, 

As they could read in all eyes. Now, to them, 
Who were accustom'd, as a sort of god, 

To see the sultan, rich in many a gem, 
Like an imperial peacock stalk abroad 

(That royal bird, whose tail's a diadem), 
With all the pomp of power, it was a doubt 
How power could condescend to do without. 

LXXV. 
John Johnson, seeing their extreme dismay, 

Though little versed in feelings oriental, 
Suggested some slight comfort in his way. 

Don Juan, who was much more sentimental, 
Swore they should see him by the dawn of day, 

Or that the Russian army should repent all : 
And, strange to say, thuy found some consolation 
In this — for females like exaggeration. 

LXXVI. 

And then, with tears, and sighs, and some slight kisses, 

They parted for the present — these to await, 
According to the artillery's hits or misses, 

What sages call Chance, Providence, or Fate — 
(Uncertainty is one of many blisses, 

A mortgage on Humanity's estate) — 
While their beloved friends began to arm, 
To burn a town which never did them harm. 

LXXVII. 
Suwarrow, who but saw things in the gross — 

Being much too gross to see them in detail ; 
Who calculated life as so much dross, 

And as the wind a widow'd nation's wail. 
And cared as little for his army's loss 

(So that their efforts should at length prevail) 
As wife and friends did for the boils of Job ; — 
Wlv" was 't to him to hear two women sob? 

LXXV1II. 

r«fothing. The work of glory still went on, 

In preparations for a cannonade 
As terrible as that of Ilicn, 

If Homer hao found mortars ready made ; 
But now, instead of slaying Priam's son, 

We only can but talk of escalade, 
Homos, drums, guns, bastions, batteries, bayonets, 

bullets, 
Hard words which stick in the soft Muses' gullets. 



LXXIX. 

Oh, thou eternal Homer ! who couldst charm 
All cars, though long — all ages, though so short, 

By merely wielding with poetic arm 
Arms to which men will never more resort, 

Unless gunpowder should be found to harm 
Much less than is the hope of every court, 

Which now is leagued young Freedom to annoy; 

Bat they will not find Liberty a Troy: 

LXXX. 

Oh, thou eternal Homer ! I have now 

To paint a siege, wherein more men were slair, 
With deadlier engines and a speedier blow, 

Than in thy Greek gazette of that campaign ; 
And yet, like all men else, I musi allow, 

To vie with thee would be about as vain 
As for a brook to cope with ocean's flood ; 
But still we moderns equal you in blood— 

LXXXI. 

If not in poetry, at least in fact : 

And fact is truth, the grand desideratum ! 

Of which, howe'er the Muse describes each act, 
There should be, ne'ertheless, a slight substratum. 

But now the town is going to be attack'd ; 

Great deeds are doing — how shall I relate 'em? 

Souls of immortal generals ! Phoebus watches 

To colour up his rays from your despatches. 

LXXXII. 

Oh, ye great bulletins of Bonaparte ! 

Oh, ye less grand long lists of kill'd and wounded 
Shade of Leonidas ! who fought so hearty, 

When my poor Greece was once, as now, surrounded 
Oh, Caesar's Commentaries! now impart ye, 

Shadows of glory ! (lest I be confounded) 
A portion of your fading twilight hues, 
So beautiful, so fleeting to the Muse. 

LXXXIII. 
When I call "fading" martial immortality, 

I mean, that every age and every year, 
And almost every day, in sad reality, 

Some sucking hero is compell'd to rear, 
Who, when we come to sum up the totality 

Of deeds to human happiness most dear, 
Turns out to be a butcher in great business, 
Afflicting young folks with a sort of dizziness. 

LXXXIV. 
Medals, rank*, ribbons, lace, embroiderv, scarlet, 

Arc things immortal to immortal man, 
As purple to the Babylonian harlot : 

An uniform to boys is like a fan 
To women ; there is scarce a crimson varlet, 

But deems himself the first in glory's van. 
But glory \s glorv ; and if you would find 
What that is — ask the pig who sees the wind! 

I. XXXV. 
At least he /rets it, and some say he 8( • J, 

e he runs before it like a pig; 
Or, if that simple sentence should displease, 

Say that he scuds before it like a brig, 
A schooner, or — but it is time to ease 

This canto, ere my Muse perceives fatigue. 
The next shall ring a peal to shake all people, 
Like a bob-major from a village-steeple. 



CANTO rin. 



DON JUAN. 



637 



LXXXVI. 

Hark ! through the silence of the cold dull night, 
The hum of armies gathering rank on rank ! 

Lo ! dusky masses steal in dubious sight 
Along the leaguer'd wall and bristling bank 

Of the arm'd river, while with straggling light • 
The stars peep through the vapours dim and dank, 

Which curl in curious wreaths — How soon the smoke 

Of hell shall pall them in a deeper cloak ! 

LXXXVII. 
Here pause we for the present — as even then 

That awful pause, dividing life from death, 
Struck for an instant on the hearts of men, 

Thousands of whom were drawing their last breath ! 
A moment — and all will be life again ! 

The march ! the charge ! the shouts of either faith ! 
Hurra ! and Allah ! and — one moment more — 
The death-cry drowning in the battle's roar. 



CANTO VIII. 



Oh blood and thunder ! and oh blood and wounds ! 

These are but vulgar oaths, as you may deem, 
Too gentle reader ! and most shocking sounds : 

And so they are ; yet thus is Glory's dream 
Unriddled, and as my true Muse e.\ pounds 

At present such things, since they are her theme, 
So be they her inspirers ! Call them Mars, 
Bcllona, what you will — they mean but wars. 

II. 

All was prepared — the fire, the sword, the men 

To wield them in their terrible array. 
The army, like a lion from his den, 

Mareh'd forth with nerve and sinews bent to slay — 
A human Hydra, issuing from its fen 

To breathe destruction on its winding wav, 
Whose heads were heroes, which, cut oir in vain, 
Immediately in others grew again. 

III. 
History can only take things in the gross ; 

But could wc know them in detail, perchance 
In balancing the profit and the loss, 

War's merit it by no means might enhance, 
To waste so much gold for a little dross, 

As hath been done, mere conquest to advance. 
The drying up a single tear has more 
Of honest fame, than shedding seas of gore. 

IV. 
And why? because it brings self-approbation; 

Whereas the other, after all its glare, 
Shouts, bridges, arches, pensions from a rnlion — 

Which (it may be) has not much left to spare — 
A higher title, or a loftier station, 

Though they may make corruption gape or stare, 
Yet, in the end, except in freedom's battles, 
Arc nothing but a child of murder's rattles. 
3g2 



V. 

And such they are — and such they will be found. 

Not so Leonidas and Washington, 
Whose every battle-field is holy ground, 

Which breathes of nations saved, not worlds undone. 
How sweetly on the ear such echoes sound ! 
While the mere victors may appal or stun 
The servile and the vain, such names will be 
A watchword till the future shall be free. 

VI. 
The night was dark, and the thick mist allow'd 
Nought to be seen save the artillery's flame, 
Which arch'd the horizon like a fiery cloud, 

And in the Danube's waters shone the same, 
A mirror'd hell ! The volleying roar, and loud 

Long booming of each peal on peal, o'ercame 
The ear far more than thunder ; for Heaven's flashes 
Spare, or smite rarely — Man's make millions ashes ! 

VII. 
The column order'd on the assault scarce pass'd 

Beyond the Russian batteries a few toises, 
When up the bristling Moslem rose at last, 

Answering the Christian thunders with like voices ; 
Then one vast fire, air, earth, and stream embraced, 
Which rock'd as 't were beneath the mighty noises ; 
While the whole rampart blazed like Etna, when 
The restless Titan hiccups in his den. 
VIII. # 

And one enormous shout of "Allah!" rose 

In the same moment, loud as even the roar 
Of war's most mortal engines, to their foes 
Hurling defiance : city, stream, and shore 
Resounded "Allah!" and the clouds, which close 

With thickening canopy the conflict o'er, 
Vibrate to the Eternal Name. Hark ! througV. 
All sounds it pierceth, "Allah! Allah! Hu!" 1 

IX. 
The columns were in movement, one and all : 
But, of the portion which attack'd by water, 
Thicker than leaves the lives began to fall, 

Though led by Arscniew, that great son of slaughter 
As brave as ever faced both boom and ball. 
" Carnage (so Wordsworth tells you) is God's 
daughter:" 2 
If he speak truth, she is Christ's sister, and 
Just now behaved as in the Holy Land. ■ 

X. 
ThoPrincedeLignewaswour.fi":! in the knee; 
Count Chapeau-Bras too had a ball between 
His cap and bead, which proves the head to De 

Aristocratic as was ever seen, 
Because it then received no injury 

More than the cap; in f act the bull could mean 
No harm unto a right legitimate head: 
"Ashes to ashes" — why not lead to lead? 

XI. 
Also the General Markow, Brigadier, 
Insisting on removal of the jirhirr. 
Amidst some groaning thousands dying ncai, - 

All common fellows, who might writhe and wince. 
And shriek for water into a deaf ear, — 

The General Markow, who could thus evince 
His sympathy for rank, by the same token, 
To teach him greater, had his own )pg broken. 



633 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



caxto viii. 



XII. 
Three hundred cannon threw up their emetic, 

And thirty thousand muskets flung their pills 
Like hail, to make a bloody diuretic. 

Mortality ! thou hast thy monthly bills ; 
Thy plagues, thy famines, thy physicians, yet tick, 

Like the death-watch, within our ears the ills 
Past, present, and to come ; — but all may yield 
To the true portrait of one battle-field. 

XIII. 

There the still varying pangs, which multiply 
Until their very number makes men hard 

By the infinities of agony, 
Which meet the gaze, whate'er it may regard — 

The groan, the roll in dusl, the all-white eye 
Turn'd back within its socket, — these reward 

Your rank and file by thousands, while the rest 

Way win, perhaps, a ribbon at the breast ! 

XIV. 

Yet I love glory ; glory 's a great thing ; 

Think what it is to be in your old age 
Maintain'd at the expense of your good king : 

A moderate pension shakes full many a sage, 
And heroes are but made for bards to sing, 

Which is still better ; thus in verse to wage 
Your wars eternally, besides enjoying 
Half-pay for life, make mankind worth destroying. 

* XV. 

The troops already disembark'd push'd on 
To take a battery on the right ; the others, 

Who landed lower down, their landing done, 
Had set to work as briskly as their brothers: 

Being grenadiers, they mounted, one by one, 

Cheerful as children climb the breasts of mothers, — 

O'er the entrenchment and the palisade, 

Quite orderly, as if upon parade. 

XVI. 
And this was admirable ; for so hot 

The fire was, that were red Vesuvius loaded, 
Besides its lava, with all sorts of shot 

And shells or hells, it could not more have goaded 
Of officers a third fell on the spot, 

A thing which victory by no means boded 
To gentlemen engaged in the assault : 
Hounds, when the huntsman tumbles, are at fault. 

XVII. 
But here I leave the general concern, 

To track our hero on his pah of fame : 
He must his laurels separately earn ; 

For 6Ay thousand heroes, name by name, 
Though ail deserving equally to turn 

A couplet, or an elegy to claim, 
Would form a lengthy lexicon of glory, 
And, what is worse still, a much longer story : 

XVIII. 
And therefore we must give the greater number 

To the gazette — which doubtless fairly dealt 
Bv the deceased, who lie in famous slumber 

In ditches, fields, or wheresoe'er they felt 
rheir ciay for the last time their souls encumber ; — 

Thrice happy he whose name has been well spelt 
In the despatch ; I knew a man whose loss 
Wtis nrinted Grove, although his name was Grose. 1 



XIX. 

Juan and Johnson join'd a certain corps, 

And fought away with might and main, not knowing 

The way which they had never trod before, 

And still less guessing where they might be going , 

Bllt*on they march'd, dead bodies trampling o'er, 
Firing, and thrusiing, slashing, sweating, glowing 

Hut fighting thoughtlessly enough to win, 

To their two selves, one whole bright bulletin. 

XX. 

Thus on they wallow'd in the bloody mire 

Of dead and dying thousands, — sometimes gaining 

A yard or two of ground, which brought them nighetr 
To some odd angle for which all were straining ; 

At other times, repulsed by the close fire, 

Which really pour'd as if all hell were raining, 

Instead of heaven, they stumbled backwards o'er 

A wounded comrade, sprawling in his gore. 

XXI. 

Though 't was Don Juan's first of fields, and though 
The nightly muster and the silent march 

In the chill dark, when courage does not glow 
So much as under a triumphal arch, 

Perhaps might make him shiver, yawn, or throw 
A glance on the dull clouds (as thick as starch, 

Which stifFen'd heaven) as if he wish'd for day;— 

Yet for all this he did not run away. 

XXII. 

Indeed he could not. But what if he had? 

There have been and are heroes who begun 
With something not much better, or as bad: 

Frederic the Great from Molwitz deign'd to run, 
For the first and last time ; for, like a pad, 

Or hawk, or bride, most mortals, after one 
Warm bout, are broken into their new tricks, 
And fight like fiends for pay or politics. 

XXIII. 

He was what Erin calls, in her sublime 

Old Erse or Irish, or it may be Punic, 
(The antiquarians who can settle time, 

Which settles all things, Roman, Greek, or Runic, 
Swear that Pat's language sprung from the same chfe-e 

With Hannibal, and wears the Tynan tunic 
Of Dido's alphabet ; and this is rational 
As any other notion, and not national); — 4 

XXIV. 
But Juan was quite " a broth of a boy," 

A thing of impulse and a child of song f 
Now swimming in the sentiment of joy, 

Cr the sensation (if that phrase seem wrong), 
And afterwards, if he must needs destroy, 

In such good company as always throng 
To battles, sieges, and that kind of pleasure, 
No less delighted to employ his leisure; 

XXV. 
But always without malice. If ne warr'd 

Or loved, it was with what we call " the best 
Intentions," which form all mankind's irump-card, 

To be produced when brought up to the tost. 
The statesman, hero, harlot, lawyer — ward 

Off" each attack when people are in oucst 
Of their designs, by saying they meant well; 
'T is pity "that such meanings should pave hell." 



CANTO VIII. 



DON JUAN. 



G3d 



XXVI. 

I almost lately have begun to doubt 

Whether hell's pavement — if it be so paved — 

Must not have latterly been quite worn out, 
Not by the numbers good intent hath saved, 

But by the mass who go below without 

Those ancient good intentions, which once shaved 

And smoolh'd the brimstone of that street of hell 

Which bears the greatest likeness to Pall Mall. 

XXVII. 

Juan, by some strange chance, which oft divides 
Warrior from warrior in their grim career, 

Like chastest wives from constant husbands' sides, 
Just at the close of the first bridal year, 

By one of those odd turns of fortune's tides, 
Was on a sudden rather puzzled here, 

When, after a good deal of heavy firing, 

He found himself alone, and friends retiring. 

XXVIII. 

I don't know how the thing occurrM — it might 
Be that the greater part were kill'd or wounded, 

And that the rest had faced unto the ri^lit 
About ; a circumstance which has confounded 

Ca'sar himself, who, in the very sight 

Of his whole army, which so much abounded 

In courage, was obliged to snatch a shield 

And rally back his Romans to the field. 

XXIX. 

Juan, who had no shield to snatch, and was 
No Caesar, but a fine young lad, who fought 

He knew not why, arriving at this pass, 
Stopp'd for a minute, as perhaps he ought 

For a much longer time ; then, like an ass — 

(Start not, kind reader ; since great Homer thought 

This simile enough for Ajax, Juan 

Perhaps may find it better than a new one:) — 

XXX. 

Then, like an ass, he went upon his way, 

And, what was stranger, never look'd behind ; 

But seeing, flashing forward, like the day 
Over the hills, a fire enough to blind 

Those who dislike to look upon a fray, 
He stumbled on, to try if he could find 

A path, to add his own slight arm and forces 

To dorps, the greater part of which were corses. 

XXXI. 

Perceiving then no more the commandant 

Of his own corps, nor even the corps, which had 
Quite diaappear'd — the gods know how ! (I can't 

Account for every thing which may look bad 
In history ; but we at least may grant 

It was not marvellous that a mere lad, 
In search of glory, should look on before, 
Nor care a pinch of snufT about his corps:) — 

XXXII. 
Perceiving nor commander nor commanded, 

And left at large, like a young heir, to make 
His way to — where he knew not — single-handed ; 

As travellers follow over bog and brake 
An "ignis fatuus," or as sailors stranded 

Unto the nearest hut themselves betake, 
So Juan, following honour and his nose, 
Rush'd where the thickest fire announced most foes. 



XXXIII. 

He knew not where he was, nor greatly cared, 

For ha was dizzy, busy, and his veins 
Fill'd as with lightning — for his spirit shared 

The hour, as is the case with lively brains ; 
And, where the hottest lire was seen and heard, 

And the loud cannon peal'd its hoarsest strains, 
lie rush'd, while earth and air were sadly shaken 
By thy humane discovery, friar Bacon ! G 

XXXIV. 
And, as he rush'd along, it came to pass he 

Fell in with what was late the second column, 
Under the orders of the general Lascy, 

But now reduced, as is a bulky volume, 
Into an elegant extract (much less massy) 

Of heroism, and took his place with solemn 
Air, 'midst the rest, who kept their valiant faces, 
And levell'd weapons, still against the glacis. 

XXXV. 

Just at this crisis up came Johnson too, 

Who had " retreated," as the phrase is, when 
Men run away much rather than go through 

Destruction's jaws into the devil's den; 
But Johnson was a clever fellow, who 

Knew when and how " to cut and come again," 
And never ran away, except when running 
Was nothing but a valorous kind of cunning. 

XXXVI. 
And so, when all his corps were dead or dying, 

Except Don Juan — a mere novice, whose 
More virgin valour never dreamt of Hying, 

From ignorance of danger, which indues 
Its votaries, like innocence relying 

On its own Strength, with careless nerves and thews,- 
Johnson retired a little, just to rally 
Those who catch cold in " shadows of death's valley." 

XXXVII. 
And there, a little shelter'd from the shot, 

Which rain'd from bastion, battery, parapet, 
Rampart, wall, casement, house — for there was not 

In this extensive city, sore beset 
By Christian soldiery, a single spot 

Which did not combat like the devil as yet, 
He tound a number of chasseurs, all scatter'd 
By the resistance of the chase they batter' d. 

XXXVIII. 
And these he call'd on ; and, what 's strange, they camo 

Unto his call, unlike " the spirits from 
The vasty deep," to whom you may exclaim, 

Says Hotspur, long ere they will leave their home. 
Their reasons were uncertainty, or shame 

At shrinking from a bullet or a bomb, 
And that odd impulse, which, in wars or creeds, 
Makes men, like cattle, follow him who leads. 

XXXIX. 
By Jove ! he was a noble fellow, Johnson, 

And though his name than Ajax or Achilles 
Sounds less harmonious, underneath the sun soon 

We shall not see his likeness : he could kill his 
Man quite as quietly as blows the monsoon 

Her steady breath (which some months the sum 
still is ; ) 
Seldom he varied feature, hue, or muscle, 
And could be verv busv without bustle; 



Ij40 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO VI II. 



XL. 
And therefore, when he ran away, lie ilid so 

I";,"" reflection, knowing that behind 
He would find others who would fain he rid so 

Of idle apprehensions, which, like wind, 
Trouble heroic stomachs. Though their lids so 

Oft are soon closed, all heroes are not blind, 
Dm when tlu.y light upon immediate death, 
Retire a little, merely to take breath. 

XLI. 
lint Johnson only ran off to return 

Wiih many other warriors, as we said, 
Unto that rather somewhat misty bourn, 

Which Hamlet tells us is a pass of dread. 
To Jack, howe'er, this gave but slight concern : 

His soul (like galvanism 'upon the dead) 
Acted upon the living as on wire, 
And led them back into the heaviest fire. 

XL1I. 

Egad ! they found the second time what they 
The first time thought quite terrible enough 

To fly from, malgre all which people say 
Of glory, and all that immortal stuff 

Which fills a regiment (besides their pay, 

That daily shilling which makes warriors tough) — 

They found on their return the self-same welcome, 

Which made some think, arid others know, a hell come. 

XLin. 

They fell as thick as harvests beneath hail, 
Grass before scythes, or corn below the sickle, 

Proving that trite old truth, that life 's as frail 
As any other boon for which men stickle. 

The Turkish batteries thrash' d them like a flail, 
Or a good boxer, into a sad pickle 

Putting the very bravest, who were knock'd 

Upon the head before their guns were coclt'd. 

XLIV. 
The Turks, behind the traverses and flanks 

Of the next bastion, fired away like devils, 
And swept, as gales sweep foam away, whole ranks : 

However, Heaven knows how, the Fate wdio levels 
Towns, nations, worlds, in her revolving pranks, 

So order'd it, amidst these sulphury revels, 
That Johnson, and some few who had not scamper'd, 
Iloach'd the interior talus of the rampart. 

XLV. 

First one or two, then five, six, and a dozen, 
Came mounting quickly up, for it was now 

All neck or nothing, as, like pilch or rosin, 

Flame was shower'd forth above as well 's below, 

So that you scarce could say who best had chosen, — 
The gentlemen that were the first to show 

Their martial faces on the parapet, 

Or these who thought it brave to wait as yet. 

xlvi. 

But those who scaled found out that their advance 
Was favour'd by an accident or blunder : 

JTie Greek or Turkish Cohorn's ignorance 
Had palisadoed in a way you M wonder 

JTo see in forts of Netherlands or France — 

( Though these to our Gioraltar must knock under) — 

Bight in the middle of the parapet 

Just mine,'!, these palisades were prim'.y set: 



XLV II. 
So that or. either side some nine or ten 

Paces were left, whereon you could contrive 
To march; a gnat convenience to our men 

At li :ist to all those who were left alive, 
Who thus could form a line and fight again; 

And that which further aided them to strive 
Was, that they could kick down the palisades, 
Which scarcely rose much higher than grass blades 

XLVIII. 

Among the first, — I will not say the first, 
For such precedence upon such occasions 

Will oftentimes make deadly quarrels burst 
Out between friends as well as allied nations; 

The Briton must be bold who really durst 

Put to such trial John Bali's partial patience, 

As say that Wellington at Waterloo 

Was beaten, — though the Prussians say so too;— 

XL1X. 
And that if Blucher, Bulow, Gneisenau, 

And God knows who besides in " an" and "ou," 
Had not come up in time to cast an awe 

Into the hearts of those who fought till now 
As tigers combat with an emptv craw, 

The Duke of Wellington had ceased to show 
His orders, also to receive his pensions, 
Which are the heaviest that our history mentions. 

L. 

But never mind ; — " God save the king !" and kings ' 
For if he don't, I doubt if men will longer. — 

I think I hear a little bird, who sings, 

The people by and by will be the stronger: 

The veriest jade will wince whose harness wrings 
So much into the raw as quite to wrong her 

Beyond the rules of posting, — and the mob 

At last fall sick of imitating Job. 

LI. 

At first it grumbles, then it swears, and then, 

Like David, tlings smooth pebbles 'gainst a giant, 
At las', it takes to weapons, such as men 

Snatch when despair makes human hearts less pliant. 
Then " conies the tug of war;" — 't will come again, 

I rather doubt ; and I would fain say " fie on 't,' 
If I had not perceived that revolution 
Alone can save the earth from hell's pollution. 

LII. 
But to continue : — I say not the first, 

But of the first, our little friend Don Juan 
Walk'd o'er the walls of Ismail, as if nursed 

Amidst such scenes — though this was quite a new one 
To him, and I should hope to most. The thirst 

Of glory, which so pierces through and through one, 
Pervaded him — although a generous creature, 
As warm in heart as feminine in feature. 

mi. 

An 1 here he was — who, upon woman's breast, 
Even from a child, felt like a child ; howe'er 

The man in all the rest might be confess'd ; 
To him it was Elysium to be there ; 

And he could even withstand that awkward test 
Which Rousseau points out to the dubious fair, 

" Observe your lover when lie lanes your arms ;" 

| But Juan never left them while they 'd charms, 



LIV. 
Unless compeil'd by fate, or wave or wind, 

Or near relations, who are much the same. 
But here he was ! — where each lie that can bind 

Humanity must yield to steel and flame: 
And V, whose very body was all mind, — 

Piling here by fate or circumstance, which tame 
The loftiest, — hurried by (he time and place, — 
Dasli'd on like a spurr'd blood-horse in a race. 

LV. 

So was his blood stirr'd while he found resistance, 
As is the hunter's at the five-bar gate, 

Or double post and rail, where the existence 
Of Britain's youth depends upon their weight, 

The lightest being the safest: at a distance 
He hated cruelty, as all men hate 

Blood, until heated — and even there his own 

At times would curdle o'er some heavy groan. 

LVI. 

The General Lascy, who had been hard prcss'd, 

Seeing arrive an aid so opportune 
As were some hundred youngsters all abreast, ' 

Who came as if just dropp'd down from the moon, 
To Juan, who was nearest him, address'd 

His thanks, and hopes to take the city soon, 
Not reckoning him to be a "base Bezonian" 
(As Pistol calls it), but a young Livonian. 

LVII. 

Juan, to whom he spoke in German, knew 
As much of German as of Sanscrit, and 

In answer made an inclination to 

The general who held him in command ; 

For, seeing one with ribbons black and blue, 
Stars, medals, and a bloody sword in hand, 

Addressing him in tones which seem'd to thank, 

He recognised an officer of rank. 

LVIII. 

Short speeches pass between two men who speak 
No common language; and besides, in time 

Of war and taking towns, when many a shriek 
Rings o'er the dialogue, and many a crime 

Is perpetrated ere a word can break 

Upon the ear, and sounds of horror chime 

In, like church-bells, with sigh, howl, groan, veil, prayer, 

There cannot be much conversation there. 

LIX. 
And therefore all we have related in 

Two long octaves, pass'd in a little minute ; 
But in the same small minute, every sin 

Contrived to get itself comprised within it. 
The very cannon, deafen'd by the din, 

Grew dumb, for you might almost hear a linnet, 
As si ion as thunder, 'midst the general noise 
Of human nature's agonizing voice! 

LX. 
The town was enter'd. Oh eternity ! — 

"God made the country, and man made the town," 
So Cowper says — and I begin to be 

Of his opinion, when I sec cast down 
Rome, Babylon, Tyre, Carthage, Nineveh — 

All walls men know, and many never known; 
And, pondering on the present and the past, 
To deem the woods shall be our home at last. 
86 



LXI. 

Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slayer, 

Who passes for in life and death most lucky, 

Of (he greal names, which iii our faces 

I h General Boon, back-woodsman of Kentucky 

Was happiest amongst mortals any whore; 
For killing nothing but a bear or buck, he 

Enjoy'd the lonely, vigorous, harmless days, 

Of his old age in v. ,/.e. 

LXH. 

Crime came not near him — she is not the child 
Of solitude; health shrank no: from him — for 

Her home is in the rarely-trodden wild, 
Where if men seek her not, and death be more 

Their choice than I. . as beguiled 

By habit to what their own hi arts abhor — 

In cities caged. The , e in p linl I 

Cite is, that Boon lived hunting up to ninety; 

Lxni. 

And what's still stranger, lefl behind a nai 
For which men vainly decimate the throng, — 

Not only famous, but of that good fame 

Without which glory's but a tavern song — 

Simple, serene, the antipodes of shame, 

Which hate nor envy e'er could tinge with wrong; 

An active hermit, even in age the child 

Of nature, or the Man of Boss run wild. 

LXIV. 

'Tis true he shrank from men, even of his nation. 
When they built u p unto his darling trees, — 

He moved some hundred miles oil", for a s;:.;:..n 
U here there were fewer houses and more ease— 

The inconvenience of civilization 

Is, that you neither can be pleased nor please ; — 

But, where he met the individual man, 

lie show'd himself as kind as mortal can. 

LXV. 

He was not all alone : around him grew 
A sylvan tribe of children of the chase, 

Whose young, unwaken'd world was ever new, 
Nor sword nor sorrow yet had left a trace 

On her umvrinkled brow, nor could you view 
A frown on nature's or on human face ; — 

The free-born forest found and kept them free, 

And fresh as is a torrent or a tree. 

LXVI. 

And tall and strong and swift of fiot were they 
Beyond the dwarfing city's pale abortions, 

Because their thoughts had never been the prey 
Of care or gain : the green woods were their portion-*, 

No sinking spirits told them they grew gray; 
No fashion made them apes of her distortions ; 

Simple they were, not savage; and their rifles, 

Though very true, were not yel use I for trifles. 

LXVII. 
Motion was in thi if in their Blum 

And cheerfulness the handmaid of their toil; 
Nor yet too many nor too i\-\\ their numbers; 

Corruption could not make their hearts her soil. 
The lust , the splendour which encumbent, 

With the free foresters divi le no spoil 
Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes 
Of this unsighing people of the woods. 



642 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO VI ll. 



Lxvnr. 

So much for nature : — by way of variety, 
Now back to thy great joys, civilization ! 

Ami the sweet consequence of large society, — 
War, pestilence, the despot's desolation, 

The kingly scourge, the lust of notoriety, 

The millions slain by soldiers for their ration, 

The scenes like Catherine's boudoir at threescore, 

With Ismail's storm to soften it the more. 

LXIX. 

The town was enter'd : first one column made 
Its sanguinary way good — then another ; 

The reeking bayonet and the Hashing blade 

Clash'd 'gainst the scimitar, and babe and mother 

Willi distant shrieks were heard heaven to upbraid ; — 
Still closer sulphury clouds began to smother 

The breath of morn and man, where, foot by foot, 

The madden'd Turks their city still dispute. 

LXX. 

Koutousow, he who afterwards beat back 

(With some assistance from the frost and snow) 

Napoleon on his bold and bloody track, 

It happen'd was himself beat back just now. 

He was a jolly fellow, and could crack 
His jest alike in face of friend or foe, 

Though life, and death, and victory, were at stake — 

But here it seem'd his jokes had ceased to take: 

LXXI. 

For, having thrown himself into a ditch, 
Follow'd in haste by various grenadiers, 

Whose blood the puddle greatly did enrich, 
He climb'd to where the parapet appears ; 

But there his project reach'd its utmost pitch — 
('Mongst other deaths the General Ribaupierre's 

Was much regretted) — for the Moslem men 

Threw them all down into the ditch again : 

LXXII. 

And, had it not been for some stray troops, landing 
They knew not where, — being carried by the stream 

To some spot, where they lost their understanding, 
And wander'd up and down as in a dream, 

Until they reach'd, as day-break was expanding, 
That which a portal to their eyes did seem, — 

The great and gay Koutousow might have lain 

Where three parts of his column yet remain. 

LXXIII. 

And, scrambling round the rampart, these same troops, 

After the taking of the " cavalier," 
Just as Koutousow's most "forlorn" of "hoprs" 

Took, like chameleons, some slight tinge of fear, 
Open'd the gate call'd "Kilia" to the groups 

Of baffled heroes who stood shyly near, 
Sliding knee-deep in lately- frozen mud, 
Now thavv'd into a marsh of human blood. 

LXXIV. 

The Ko/.aks, or if so you please, Cossacks — 
(I don't much pique myself upon orthography, 

So that 1 do not grossly err in facts, 

Statistics, tactics, politics, and geography) — 

Raving been used to serve on horses' backs, 
And no great dilettanti in topography 

Of fortresses, but fighting where it phases 

Ti'eu chieisi to order,- -we r e an cut to pieces. 



LXXV. 

Their column, though the Turkish batteries thunder'd 
Upon them, ne'ertheless had reach'd the rampart, 

And naturally thought they could have plunder'd 
The citv, without being further hamper'd ; 

But, as it happens to brave men, they blunder'd— 
The Turks at lirst pretended to have scatnper'd, 

Only to draw them 'iwixt two bastion corners, 

From whence they sallied on those Christian scorners. 

LXXVI. 
Then being taki n by the tail — a taking 
Fatal to bishops as to soldiers — these 

ks were all cut olf as day was breaking, 
And found their lives were let at a short lease- 
But perish'd without Bhivering or shaking, 

Leaving as ladders their heap'd can' 
O'er which Lieutenant-Colonel Vesouskoi 
March'd with the brave battalion of Polouzki : — 

LXXVII. 

This valiant man kill'd all the Turks he met, 
Hut could not eat them, being in his turn 

Slain by some Mussulmans, who would not yet, 
Without resistance, see their city burn. 

The walls were won, but 't was an even bet 

Which of the armies would have cause to mourn ' 

'Twas blow for blow, disputing inch by inch, 

For one would not retreat, nor t'other flinch. 

LXXVIII. 

Another column also suffcr'd much : 
And here we may remark with the historian, 

You should but, give few cartridges to such 

Troops as are meant to march with greatest glory on : 

When matters must be carried by the touch 

Of the bright bayonet, a>id they all should hurry on. 

They sometimes, with a hankering for existence, 

Keep merely firing at a foolish distance. 

LXXIX. 

A junction of the General Meknop's men 

(Without the General, who had fallen some time 

Before, being badly seconded just then) 

Was made at length, with those who dared, to climb 

The death-disgorging rampart once again ; 

And, though the Turk's resistance was sublime, 

They took the bastion, which the Seraskier 

Defended at a price extremely dear. 

LXXX. 

Juan and Johnson and Borne volunteers, 

Among the foremo t, offer'd him good quarter, 
A word which little suits with Seraskiers, 

Or at least suited not this valiant Tartar. — 
He died, deserving well his country's tears, 

A savage sort of military martyr. 
An English naval officer, who wish'd 
To make him prisoner, was also dish'd. 

LXXXI. 
For all the answer to his proposition 

Was from a pistol-shot that laid him dead ; 
On which the rest, without more intermission, 

Began to lay about with steel and lead, — 
The pious metals most in 

On such occasions : not a single head 
Was spared, — three thousand Moslems perish'd here. 
And sixteen bayonets pierced the Seraskier. 



CANTO VIII. 



DON JUAN. 



64 3 



LXXXII. 

The city 's taken — omy part by part — 

And death is drunk with gore : there 's not a street 
Where fights not to the last some desperate heart 

For those for whom it soon shall cease to beat. 
Here War forgot his own destructive art 

In more destroying nature ; and the heat 
Of carnage, like the Nile's sun-sodden slime, 
Engender'd monstrous shapes of every crime. 

LXXX1II. 

A Russian officer, in martial 'read 

Over a heap of bodies, felt his In el 
Seized fast, as if 't were by the serpent's head, 

Whose fangs Eve taught her human seed to feel. 
In vain he kick'd, and swore, and writhed, and bled, 

And howl'd for help as wolves do for a meal — 
The teeth still kept their gratifying hold, 
As do the subtle snakes described of old. 

LXXXIV. 
A dying Moslem, who had felt the foot 

Of a foe o'er him, snatch'd at it, and bit 
The very tendon which is most acute — 

(That whirli some ancient Muse or modern wit 
Named after thee, Achilles) and quite through 't 

He made the teeth meet, nor relinquish'd it 
Even with his life — for (but they lie) 'tis said 
To the live leg still clung the sever'd head. 

LXXXV. 

However this may be, 't is preity sure 
The Russian officer for life was lamed, 

For the Turk's teeth stuck faster than a skewer, 
And left him 'midst the invalid and maim'd: 

The regimental surgeon could not cure 
His patient, and perhaps was to be blamed 

More than the head of the inveterate foe, 

Which was cut off, and sca:ce even then let go. 

LXXXVI. 

But then the fact's a fact — and 'tis the part 

Of a true poet to escape from fiction 
Whene'er he can ; for there is little art 

In leaving verse more free from the restriction 
Of truth than prose, unless to suit the mart 

For what is sometimes call'd poetic diction, 
And that outrageous appetite for lies 
Which Satan angles with for souls like flies. 

LXXXVII. 
The city's taken, but not render'd! — No! 

There 's not a Moslem that hath yielded sword : 
riie blood may gush out, as the Danube's flow 

Rolls by the city wall ; but deed nor word 
Acknowledge aught of dread of death or foe : 

In vain the yell of victory is roar'd 
By the advancing Muscovite — the groan 
Of the last foe is echoed by his own. 

LXXXVIII. 
The bayonet pierces and the sabre cleaves, 

And human lives are lavish'd every where, 
As the year closing whirls the scarlet leaves, 

When the stripp'd forest bows to the bleak air, 
And groans ; and thus the peopled city grieves, 

Shorn of its best and loveliest, and left bare ; 
But still it falls with vast and awful splinters, 
As oaks blown down with all their thousand winters. 



LXXXIX. 

It is an awful topic — but 'tis not 

My cue for any time to be terrific : 
For chequer'd as it seems our human lot 

Willi good, and bad, and worse, alike prolific 
Of melancholy merriment, to quote 

Too much of one sort would be soporific; 
Without, or with, offence to friends or fees, 
I sketch your world exactly as it goes. 

xc. 

And one good action in the midst of crimes 
Is "quite refreshing" — in the affected phrase 

Of these ambrosial, Pharisaic times, 
With all their pretty milk-and-water ways, — 

And may serve therefore to bedew these rhymes, 
A little scorch'd at present with the blaze 

Of conquest and it > con fences, which 

Make epic poesy so rare and rich. 

XCI. 

Upon a taken bastion, where there lay 
Thousands of siaughtcr'd mcr, a yet warm group 

Of murdcr'd women, who had found their way 
To this vain refuge, made the good heart droop 

And shudder ; — while, as beautiful as May, 

A female child often years, tried to sluop 
And hide her little palpitating breast 
Amidst the bodies luil'd in bloody rest. 

XCII. 
Two villanous Cossacks pursued, the child 

With flashing eyes and weapons: match'd with thcra. 
The rudest brute that roams Siberia's wild 

lias feelings pure and polish'd as a gem,— 
The bear is civilized, the wolf is mild: 

And whom fir this at last must we condemn? 
Their natures, or their sovereigns, who employ 
All arts to teach their subjects to destroy? 

XCIII. 

Their sabres glitter'd o'er her lit'le head. 

Whence her fair hair rose twining with affright, 
Her hidden face was plunged amidst the dead : 

When Juan caught a glimpse of this sad sight. 
I shall not say exactly what he saitl, 

Because it might not solace "ears polite;" 
1!, it what he did, was to lay on their backs, — 
The readiest way of reasoning with Cossacks. 

XCIV. 
One's hip he slash'd, and split the other's shonlnt* 

And drove them with their brutal yells to seek 
If there might be chirurgeons who could solder 

The wounds they richly merited, and shriek 
Their bullied rage and pain ; while waxing colder 

As he turn'd o'er each pale and g<>ry cheek, 
Don Juan raised his little captive from 
The heap a moment more had made her tomb. 

XCV. 
And she was chill as they, .in 1 on her face 

A Blender streak of blood announced how near 
Her fate had hern to that of all her rare ; 

For the same blow which laid her mother here 
Had scarr'd her brow, and let"! its crimson traeo 

As the last link with all siie had heal dear; 
But else unhurt, she open'd her large eyes, 
And gazed on Juan with a wild surprise. 



644 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO VI 11. 



XCVI. 

Just at this instant, while their eyes were fix'd 

Upon each other) with dilated glance, 
In Juan's look, pain, pleasure, hope, fear, mix'd 

With joy to save, and dread of some mischance 
JntO his protege ; while hers, trausfixM 

With infant terrors, glared as from a trance, 
4 pure, transparent, pale, yet radiant face, 
Like .to a lighted alabaster vase ; — 

XCV1I. 
Up came John Johnson — (1 will not say "Jack" 

For that were vulvar, cold, and commonplace 
On great occasions, such as an attack 

On cities, as hath been the present case) — 
Up Johnson came, with hundreds at his back, 

Exclaiming: — "Juan! Juan! On, boy! brace 
Your arm, and I '11 bet Moscow to a dollar, 
That you and I will win Saint George's collar. 8 

XCVIII. 
•' The Seraskier is knock'd upon the head, 

But the stone bastion still remains, wherein 
The old pacha sits among some hundreds dead, 

Smoking his pipe quite calmly, 'midst the din 
Of our artillery and his own : 't is said 

Our kill'd already piled up to the chin, 
Lie round the battery ; but still it batters, 
And grape in volleys, like a vineyard, scatters. 

XCIX. 
"The. up with me!" — But Juan answer'd, "Look 

Upon this child — I saved her — must not leave 
Her life to chance ; but point me out some nook 

Of safety, where she less may shriek and grieve, 
And I am with you." — Whereon Johnson took 

A glance around — and shrugg'd — and twitch'd his 
sleeve 
And black silk neckcloth — and replied, "You're right ; 
Poor thing! what's to be done? I'm puzzled quite." 

C. 
Said Juan — " Whatsoever is to be 

Done, I '11 not quit her till she seems secure 
Of present life a good deal more than we." — 

Quoth Johnson — " IVeitlier will I quite insure ; 
But at the least you may die gloriously." 

Juan replied — " At least I will endure 
Whate'er is to be borne — but not resign 
This child, who 's parentless, and therefore mine." 

CI. 
Johnson said — "Juan, we've no time to lose; 

The child V a pretty child — a very pretty — 
I never saw such eyes — but hark ! now choose 

Between your fame and feelings, pride and pity: 
Hark ! how the roar increases ! — no excuse 

Will serve when there is plunder in a city; — 
I should be loth to march without you, but, 
By God! we'll be too late for the first cut." 

CII. 
But Juan was immoveable ; until 

Johnson, who really loved him in his way, 
Piek'd out amongst his followers with some skill 

Such as he thought the least given up to prey: 
And swearing if the infant came to ill 

That they should all be shot on the next day, 
Bu» if she were de.'ivsr'd safe and sound, 
Tli'-.v should at least have fifty roubles round, 



cm. 

And all allowances besides of plunder 

In fair proportion with their comrades ; — then 

Juan consented to march on through thunder, 
Which thinn'd at every step their ranks of men. 

And yet the rest rush'd eagerly — no wonder, 
For they were heated by the hope of gain, 

A thing which happens every where each day — 

No hero trusted] wholly to half-pay. 

CIV. 
And such is victory, and such is man ! 

At least nine-tenths of what we call so ; — God 
May have another name for half we scan 

As human beings, or his ways are odd. 
But to our subject: a brave Tartar Khan, — 

Or "sultan," as the author (to whose nod 
In prose I bend my humble verse) doth call 
This chieftain — somehow would not yield at all : 

CV. 

But, flank'd by Jive brave sons (such is polygamy, 
That she spawns warriors by the score, where none 

Are prosecuted for that false crime bigamy) 
He never would believe the city won, 

While courage clung but to a single twig. — Am I 
Describing Priam's, Peleus', or Jove's son ? 

Neither, — but a good, plain, old, temperate man, 

Who fought with his five children in the van. 

CVI. 

To take him was the point. The truly brave, 

When they behold the brave oppress'd with odds, 

Are touch'd with a desire to shield or save ; — 
A mixture of wild beasts and demi-gods 

Are they — now furious as the sweeping wave, 

Now moved with pity : even as sometimes nods 
The rugged tree unto the summer wind, 
Compassion breathes along the savage mind. 

CVII. 

But he would not be taken, and replied 

To all the propositions of surrender 
By mowing Christians down on every side, 

As obstinate as Swedish Charles at Bende* 
His five brave boys no less the foe defied : 

Whereon the Russian pathos grew less tender, 
As being a virtue, like terrestrial patience, 
Apt to wear out on trilling provocations. 

CVIII. 
And spite of Johnson and of Juan, who 

Expended all their eastern phraseology 
In begging him, for God's sake, just to show 

So much less fight as might form an apology 
For them in saving such a desperate foe — 

He hew'd away, like doctors of theology 
When they dispute with sceptics; and with curses 
Struck at his friends, as babies beat their nurses. 

CIX. 

Nay, he had wounded, though but slightly, both 
Juan and Johnson, whereupon they fell — 

The first with sighs, the second with an oath — 
Upon his angry Bultanship, pell-mell, 

And all around were grown exceeding wrotn 
At such a pertinacious infidel, 

Atid pour'd upon him and his sons like rain, 

Which they resisted like a sandy plain, 



CANTO VIII. 



DON JUAN. 



645 



ex. 

That drinks and still is dry. At last they perish'd : — 
His second son was levcll'd by a shot ; 

His third was sabred ; and the fourth, most cherish'd 
Of all the five, on bayonets met his lot ; 

The fifth, who, by a Christian mother nourish'd, 
Had been neglected, ill-used, and what not, 

Because deform'd, yet died all game and bottom, 

To save a sire who blush'd that he begot him. 

CXI. 

The el lest was a true and tameless Tartar, 

As great a scorner of the Na/.arcne 
As ever Mahomet piek'd out for a martyr, 

Who only saw the black-eyed girls in green, 
Who make the beds of those who won't take quarter 

On earth, in Paradise; au^, when once seen, 
Those Ilouris, like all other pretty creatures, 
Do just vvhate'er they please, by dint of features. 

CXII. 

And what they pleased to do with the young Khan 
In heaven, I know not, nor pretend to guess ; 

But doubtless they prefer a fine young man 
To tough old heroes, and can do no less ; 

And that's the cause, no doubt, why, if we scan 
A field of battle's ghastly wilderness, 

For one rouch, weather-beaten, veteran body, 

You '11 find ten thousand handsome coxcombs bloody. 

CXIII. 

Your Houris also have a natural pleasure 
In lopping oil" your lately married men 

Before the bridal hours have danced their measure, 
And the sad second moon grows dim again, 

Or dull Repentance hath had dreary leisure 
To wish hira back a bachelor now and then. 

And thus your Houri (it may be) disputes 

Of these brief blossoms the immediate fruits. 

CX1V. 

Thus the young Khan, with Ilouris in his sight, 
Thought not upon the charms of four young brides. 

But bravely rush'd on his first heavenly night. 
In short, howe'er our better faith derides, 

These black-eyed virgins make the Moslems fight, 
As tii. tugh there were one heaven and none besides, — 

Whereas, if all be true we hear of heaven 

And hell, there must at least be six or seven. 

cxv. 

So fully flash'd the phantom on his eyes, 
That when the very lance was in his heart, 

He shouted, "Allah!" and saw Paradise 
With all its veil of mystery drawn apart, 

And bright eternity without disguise 

On his soul, like a ceaseless sunrise, dart,— 

With prophets, houris, angels, saints, descried 

In one voluptuous blaze, — and then he died : 

cxvi. 

But, with a heavenly rapture on his face, 
The good old Khan — who long had ceased to see 

Houris, or aught except his florid raCl , 

Who grew like cedars round him gloriously — 

When he beheld bis latest Ij.tk grace 
The earth, which he became like a fcll'd tree, 

Paused for a moment from the fight, and cast 

K glance on that slain son, his first and last. 
3H 



CXVII. 

The soldiers, who beheld him drop his point. 

Stopp'd as if once more willing to col 
Quarter, in case he bade them not "aroint!" 

As he before had done. He did not heed 

Their pause nor si^us : his heart was out of joint, 

And shook (till now unshaken) like a reed, 

As he look'd down upon his children gone, 
And fell — though done with life — he was alone. 

CXVIII. 
But 'twas a transient tremor: — with a spring 

Upon the Russian steel his breast he flung. 
As carelessly as hurls the ninth her wii.g 

Against the light wherein she dies: he clung 
Closer, that all the deadlier they might wring, 

Unto the bayonets which had pierced his young , 
And, throwing back a dim look on his i 
Id one wide wound pour'd forth his soul at once. 

CXIX. 

'T is strange enough — the rough, tough soldiers, who 
Spared neither sex nor a>:e in their i 

Of carnage, when this old man was pierced through, 
And las' before them with his children near, 

Touch'd by the heroism of him they slew, 

Were melted for a moment ; though no tear 

Flovv'd from their blood-shot eyes, all red with strife, 

They honour'd such determined scorn of life. 

cxx. 

But the stone bastion still kept up its fire, 
Where the chief Pacha calmly held his post: 

Some twenty times lie made the RuSS retire, 
And baffled the assaults of all their host; 

At length he condescended to inquire 
If yet the city's rest were won or lost ; 

And, being told the latter, sent a Bey 

To answer Ribas' summons to give way. 

CXXI. 

In the mean lime, cross-legg'd, with great sang-froid. 
Among the scorching ruins he sat smoking 

Tobacco on a little carpet ; — Troy 

Saw nothing like the scene around ; — yet, looking 

Willi martial Stoicism, nought seem'd to annoy 
His stern philosophy: but gently stroking 

His beard, he puff'd his pipe's ambrosial gales, 

As if he had three lives, as well as tails. 

CXXII. 
The town was taken — whether he might yield 

Himself or bastion, little matter'd now; 
His stubborn valour was no future s : 

Ismail's no more! The crescent's silver bow 
Sunk, and the crimson cro '( r the field, 

But red with no redeeming gore: the glow 
Of burning streets, like moonlight on the water, 
Was imaged back in blood, the sea of slaughter. 

CXXHI. 

All that the mind would shrink from of exc« 
All that the body perpetrates of bad ; 

Ail that we read, hear, dream, of man's distresses ; 
All that tie I do if run stark mad ; 

All that defies the worst which pen > tpr< sses: 
All by which hell is peopled, or ;:s sad 

As hell — mere mortals who their power abuse,- 

Was here (as heretofore and since) let .ooso.. 



646 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



caxto vn. 



cxxiv. 

If here and there some transient trait of pity, 
Was shown, and some more noble heart broke through 

Its bloody bond, and saved perhaps some pretty 
Child, or an aged helpless man or two — 

What 's this in one annihilated city, 

Where thousand loves, and tics, and duties grow ? 

Cockneys of London ! Muscadins of Paris ! 

Just ponder what a pious pastime war is. 

exxv. 

Think how the joys of reading a gazette 

Are purchased by all agonies and crimes: 
Or, if these do not move you, don't forget 

Surh doom may be your own in after times. 
Meantime the taxes, Castlcreagh, and debt, 

Are hints as good as sermons, or as rhymes. 
Read your own hearts and Ireland's present story, 
Then feed her famine fat with Wellesley's glory. 

CXXVI. 
But still there is unto a patriot nation, 

Which loves so well its country and its king, 
A subject of sublimest exultation — 

Bear it, ye Muses, on your brightest wing ! 
Howe'er the mighty locust, Desolation, 

Strip your green fields, and to your harvests cling, 
Gaunt Famine never shall approach the throne — 
Tho' Ireland starve, great George weighs twenty stone. 

CXXVII. 
But let me put an end unto my theme : 

There was an end of Ismail — hapless town ! 
Far flash'd her burning towers o'er Danube's stream, 

And redly ran his blushing waters down. 
The horrid war-whoop and the shriller scream 

Rose still ; but fainter were the thunders grown : 
Of forty thousand who had mann'd the wall, 
Some hundreds breathed — the rest were silent all ! 

CXXVIII. 

In one thing ne'ertheless 't is fit to praise 

The Russian army upon this occasion, 
A virtue much in fashion now-a-days, 

And therefore worthy of commemoration : 
The topic 's tender, so shall be my phrase — 

Perhaps the season's chill, and their long station 
In winter's depth, or want of rest and victual, 
Had made them chaste ; — they ravish'd very little. 

CXXIX. 
Much did they slay, more plunder, and no less 

Might here and there occur some violation 
In the other line ; — but not to such excess 

As when the French, that dissipated nation, 
Take towns by storm : no causes can I guess, 

Except cold weather and commiseration ; 
But all the ladies, save some twenty score, 
Wcro almost as much virgins as before. 

CXXX. 
Some odd mistakes too happen'd in the dark, 

Which show'd a want of lanterns, or of taste — 
Indeed the smoke was such they scarce could mark 

Their friends from foes, — besides such things from 
haste 
Occur, though rarely, when there is a spark 

(M lifht to save the venerably chaste : — 
But mx )ld damsels, each of seventy years, 
Were all ilefioucr'd by difiercrit grenadiers. 



CXXXI. 

But on the whole their continence was great ; 

So that some disappointment there ensued 
To those who had felt the inconvenient state 

Of " single blessedness," and thought it good 
(Since it was not their fault, but only fate, 

To bear these crosses) for each waning prude 
To make a Roman sort of Sabine wedding, 
Without the expense and the suspense of bedding. 

CXXXII. 

Some voices of the buxom middle-aged 
Were also heard to wonder in the din 

(Widows of forty were these birds long caged) 
"Wherefore the ravishing did not begin!" 

But, while the thirst for gore and plunder raged, 
There was small leisure for superfluous sin ; 

But whether they escaped or no, lies hid 

In darkness — I can only hope they did. 

CXXXIII. 
Suwarrow now was conqueror — a match 

For Timor or for Zinghis in his trade. 
While mosques and streets, beneath his eyes, like thatch 

Blazed, and the cannon's roar was scarce allay'd, 
With bloody hands he wrote his first despatch; 

And here exactly follows what he said : — 
"Glory to God and to the Empress!" (Powers 
Eternal! such names mingled!) "Ismail's ours!" 8 

CXXXIV. 

Methinks these are the most tremendous words, 
Since "Men'"', Mene, Tekel," and " Upharsin," 

Which hands or pens have ever traced of swords. 
Heaven help me ! I 'in but little of a parson : 

What Daniel read was short-hand of the Lord's, 
Severe, sublime ; the prophet wrote no farce on 

The fate of nations; — but this Russ, so witty, 

Could rhyme, like Nero, o'er a burning city. 

CXXXV. 

He wrote this polar melody, and see it, 

Duly accompanied by shrieks and groans, 
Which few will sing, I trust, but none forget it — 

For I wil. teach, if possible, the stones 
To rise against earth's tyrants. Never let it 

Be said, that we still truckle unto thrones ; — 
But ye — our children's children ! think how we 
Show'd what things were before the world was free • 

CXXXVI. 
That hour is not for us, but 't is for you ; 

And as, in the great joy of your millennium, 
You hardly will believe such things were true 

As now occur, I thought that I would pen you 'em ; 
But may their very memory perish too ! — 

Yel, if perchance retnember'd, still disdain you 'em, 
More than you scorn the savages of yore, 
Who painted their bare limbs, but not with gore. 

CXXXVII. 
And when you hear historians talk of thrones, 

And those that sate upon them, let it be 
As we now gaze upon the Mammoth's bones, 

And wonder what old world such things could see 
Or hieroglyphics on Egyptian stones, 

The pleasant riddles of futurity — 
Guessing at what shall happily be hid 
As the real purpose of a pyramid. 



CANTO IX. 



DON JUAN. 



64: 



CXXXVIII. 
Reader ! I have kept my word, — at least so far 

As the first canto promised. You have now 
Had sketches of love, tempest, travel, war — 

All very accurate, you must allow, 
And epic, if plain truth should prove no bar ; 

For I have drawn much less with a long bow 
Than my forerunners. Carelessly I sing, 
But Phuebus lends me now and then a string, 

CXXXIX. 

With which I still can harp, and carp, and fiddle. 

What further hath befallen or may befall 
The hero of this grand poetic riddle, 

I by and by may tell you, if at all : 
But now I choose to break off in the middle, 

Worn out with battering Ismail's stubborn wall, 
While Juan is sent off with the despatch, 
For which all Petersburgh is on the watch. 

CXL. 

This special honour was conferr'd, because 

He had behaved with courage and humanity : — 

Which last men like, when they have time to pause 
From llieir ferocities produced by vanity. 

His little captive gain'd him some applause, 
For saving her amidst the wild insanily 

Of carnage, and I think he was more glad in her 

Safely, than his new order of St. Vladimir. 

CXLI. 

The Moslem orphan went with her protector, 
For she was homeless, houseless, helpless : all 

Her friends, like the sad family of Hector, 
Had perish'd in the field or by the wall : 

Her very place of birth was but a spectre 
Of what it had been; there the Muezzin's call 

To prayer was heard no more ! — and Juan wept, 

» nd made a vow to shield her, which he kept. 



CANTO IX 



On, Wellington! (or "Vilainton" — for fame 

Sounds the heroic syllables both ways ; 
France could not even conquer your great name, 

But punn'd it down to this facetious phrase- 
Beating or beaten she will laugh the same) — 

You have obtain'd great pensions and much praise ; 
Glory like yours should any dare gainsay, 
Humanity would rise, and thunder M Nay !" ' 

II. 
I don't think that you used K — n — rd quite well 

In Marir.et's affair — in fact 'twas shabby, 
And, like some other things, won't do to tell 

Upon your tomb in Westminster's old abbey. 
Upon the rest 'tis not worth while to dwell, 

Such tales being for the tea hours of some tabby 
But though your years as man tend fast to zero, 
In fact your grace is still but a young liero. 



III. 

Though Britain owes (and pays you too) so mucn 
Yet Europe doubtless owes you greatly more: 

You have repair'd legitimacy's crutch — 
A prop not quite so certain as before : 

The Spanish, and the French, as well as Dutch, 
Have seen, and felt, how strongly you restore; 

And Waterloo has made the world your debtor— 

(I wish your bards would sing it rather better). 

IV. 

You are "the best of cut-throats:" — do not start; 

The phrase is Shakspeare's, and not misapplied: 
War's a brain-spattering, windpipe-slitting art, 

Unless her cause by right be sanctified. 
If you have acted once a generous part, 

The world, not the world's masters, will decide, 
And I shall be delighted to learn who, 
Save you and yours, have gain'd by Waterloo? 

V. 

I am no flatterer — you 've supp'd full of flattery : 
They say you like it too — 't is no great wonder ■ 

He whose whole life has been assault and battery 
At last may get a little tired of thunder ; 

And, swallowing eulogy much more than satire, he 
May like being praised for every lucky blunder : 

Call'd "Saviour of the Nations" — not yet saved, 

And "Europe's Liberator" — still enslaved. 

VI. 

I 've done. Now go and dine from ofF the plate 

Presented by the Prince of the Brazils, 
And send the sentinel before your gate, 2 

A slice or two from your Luxurious meals : 
He fought, but has not fed so well of late, 

Some hunger too they say the people feels : 
There is no doubt that you deserve your ration- 
But pray give back a little to the nation. 

VII. 
I don't mean to reflect — a man so great as 

You, my Lord Duke ! is far above reflection. 
Tiie high Roman fashion too of Cincinnatus 

With modern history has but small connexion: 
Though as an Irishman you love potatoes, 

You need Kit lake them under your direction ; 
And half a million for your Sabine farm 
Is rather dear ! — I 'm sure I mean no harm. 

VIII. 
Great men have always scorn'd great recompenses, 

Epaminondas saved his Thebes, and died, 
Not leaving even his funeral expenses : 

George Washington had thanks and nought beside, 
Except the all-cloudless glory (which few men's is' 

To free his country : Pitt too had his pride, 
An 1, as a high-soul'd minister of state, is 
Rcnuwii'd for ruining Great Britain, gratis. 

IX. 
Never had mortal man such opportunity, 

Except Napoleon, or abused it more: 
You might have freed tall'ii Europe from the unity 

Of tyrants, ami been btess'd from shore to shore, 
And now — w hat is your fame ? Shall the muse tunc it ye T 

Now — that the rabble's first vain shouts are o'ct J 
Go, hear it in TOUT famish'd country's cries! 
Behold the world ! and curse your victories • 



G48 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO IX. 



As these new cantos touch on warlike feats, 

To you tlie unflattering Muse deigns to inscribe 
Truths that you \w!l not read in the gazettes, 

But which, 'tis time to teach the Hireling tiibc 
Who fatten on tin ir country's gore and debts, 

Must be recite I, and — without a bribe. 
Von did great things; but, nol being great in mind, 

Have left undone the greatest — and mankind. 

XI. 

Death laughs— Go ponder o'er the skeleton 

With which men image out the unknown thing 

That hides the past world, like to a set sun 

Which still elsewhere may rouse a brighter spring : 

Death laughs at all you weep for ; — look upon 
This hourly dread of all who ' iting 

Turns life to terror, even though in its sheath! 

Mark ! how its hpless mouth grins without breath ! 

XII. 
Mark! how it laughs and scorns at all you arc! 

Arid yet was what you are: from ear to ear 
It laughs not — there is now no fleshy bar 

So call'd ; the antic long hath ceased to heir, 
But still he smiles; and whether near or far, 

He strips from man that mantle — (far more dear 
Than even the tailor's) — his incarnate shin, 
White, black, or copper — the dead bones will grin. 

XIII. 

And thus Death laughs, — it is sad merriment, 
But still it is so; and with such example 

Why should not Life be equally content, 
With his superior, in a smile to trample 

Upon the nothings which are daily spent 
Like bubbles on an ocean much less ample 

Than the eternal deluge, which devours 

Suns as rays — worlds like atoms — years like ours? 

XIV. 
"To be, or not to be! that is the question," 

Says Shakspeare, who just now is much in fashion. 
I am neither Alexander nor Hephoestion, 

Nor ever had for at ft <t fame much passion; 
But would much rather have a sound digestion, 

Than Bonaparte's cancer: — could I dash on 
Through fifty victories to shame or fame, 
Without a stomach — what were a good name? 

XV. 

''Oh, dura ilia messorum!" — "Oh, 

Ye rigid guts of reapers !" — I translate 

for the great benefit of those who know 
What indigestion is — that inward fate 

Which makes all Styx through one small liver flow. 
A peasant's sweat is worth his lord's estate : - 

l^et this one toil for bread — that rack for rent, — 

> le who sleeps best may be the most content. 

XVI. 
<v To ne, or not to be!" — Ere I decide, 

I should be glad to know that which is being;. 
I'is true we speculate both far and wide, 
And deem, because we sec, we are all-seeing: 
r'oi my part, I'll enlist on neither side, 

Until I see both sides for once agreeing, 
tor me, I sometimes think that life is death, 
Kathcr than life a mere aii'air of breath. 



XVII. 

"Que sais-je?" was the motto of Montaigne, 

As also of the first academicians : 
That all is dubious which man may attain, 

Was one of their most favourite positions. 
There's no such thing as certainty, that's plain 

As any of mortality's conditions : 
So little do we know what we 're about in 
This world, I doubt if doubt itself be doubting. 

XVIII. 
It is a pleasant voyage perhaps to float, 

Like Pyrrho, on a sea of speculation ; 
l!i t what if carrying sail capsize the boat? 

Your wise men don't know much of navigation, 
And swimming long in the abyss of thought 

Is apt to tire: a calm and shallow station 
Well nigh the shore, where one stoops down and gathers 
Some pretty shell, is best fur moderate bathers. 

XIX. 
" But heaven," as Cassio says, " is above all. — 

No more of this then, — let us pray!" We have . 
Souis to save, since Eve's slip and Adam's fall, 

Which tumbled all mankind into the grave, 
Besides fish, beasts, and birds. "The sparrow's foil 

Is special providence," though how it gave 
Olfence, we know not ; probably it perch'd 
Upon the tree which Eve so fondly search'd. 

XX. 
Oh, ye immortal gods ! what is theogony ? 

Oh, thou too mortal man! what is philanthropy? 
Oh, world, which was and is ! what is cosmogony 7 

Some people have accused me of misanthropy ; 
And yet I know no more than the mahogany 

That forms this desk, of what they mean: — Lykan 
thropy 
I comprehend ; for, without transformation, 
Men become wolves on any slight occasion. 

XXI. 
But I, the mildest, meekest of mankind, 

Like Moses, or Melancthon, who have ne'er 
Done any thing exceedingly unkind, — 

Ami (though I could not now and then forbear 
Following the bent of body or of mind) 

Have always had a tendency to spare, — 
Why do they call me misanthrope? Because 
Tliey liute me, nut 1 them; — And here we'll pause. 

XXII. 
'Tis time we should proceed with our good poem. 

For I maintain that it is really good, 
Not only in the body, but the proem, 

However little both are understood 
Just now, — but by and by the truth will show 'em 

Herself in her sublimest attitude: 
And till she doth, I fain must be content 
To share her beauty and her banishment. 

XXIII. 
Our hero (and, I trust, kind reader! yours) — 

Was left upon his way to the chief city 
Of the immortal Peter's polish'd boors, 

Who still have shown themselves more brave thao 
witty ; 
I know its mighty empire now allures 

Much flattery — even Voltaire's, and that's a pity. 
For me, I deem an absolute autocrat 
Sot a barbarian, but much worse than that. 



CAXTO J A. 



DON JUAN. 



641 



XXIV. 

An.'l I will war, at least in words (and — should 
My chance so happen — deeds) with all who war 

With thought; — and of thought's foes byfarmost rude, 
Tyrants ami sycophants have been ami are. 

I know not who may conquer: if I could 

Have such a prescience, it should be no bar 

To this my plain, sworn, downright detestation 

Of every despotism in every nation. 

XXV. 

It is not that I adulate the people: 

Without mc there are demagogues enough, 

And infidels to pull down every steeple, 

And set up in their stead some proper stuff". 

Whether they may sow scepticism to reap hell, 
As is the Christian dogma rather rough, 

I do not know ; — I wish men to be free 

As much from mobs as kings — from you as me. 

XXVI. 

The consequence is, being of no party, 
I shall offend all parties: — never mind! 

My words, at least, are more sincere and hearty 
Than if I sought to sail before the wind. 

He who has nought to gain can have small art: he 
Who neither wishes to be bound nor bind 

May still expatiate freely, as will I, 

Nor give my voice to slavery's jackal cry. 

XXVII. 
That's an appropriate simile, that jackal; 

I've heard them in the Ephesian ruins howl 
By night, as do that mercenary pack all, 

Power's base purveyors, who for pickings prowl, 
And scent the prey their masters would attack all. 

However the poor jackals arc less foul 
(As being the brave lions' keen providers) 
Than human insects, catering for spiders. 

XXVIII. 
Raise but an arm ! 't will brush their web away, 

And without that, their poison and their claws 
Are useless. Mmd, good people ! what I say— 

(Or rather peoples) — go on without pause ! 
The web of these tarantulas each day 

Increases, till you shall make common cause : 
None, save the Spanish fly and Attic bee, 
As yet are strongly stinging to be free. 

XXIX. 
Don Juan, who had shone in the late slaughter, 

Was left upon his way with the despatch, 
Where bloud was talk'd of as we would of water; 

And carcasses that lay as thick as thatch 
O'er silenced cities, merely served to Halter 

Fair Catherine's pastime — who look'd on the match 
Between these nations as a main of c^jpks, 
Vhcrcin she liked her own to stand like rocks. 

XXX. 
And there in a hibitka here roll'd on 

(A cursed sort of carriage without springs, 
Which on rough roads leaves scarcely a whole bone), 

Pondering on glory, chivalry, and I 
And orders, and on all that he had done — 

And wishing that post-horses had the wings 
Of Pegasus, or at the least post-chaises 
Had feathers, when a traveller on deep ways is. 

3 h 2 87 



XXXI. 
\i every j"!t — and there wore many — still 

He turn'd Ins eyes upon his little charge, 
As if lie wish'd that she should fare less ill 

Thau hi;, in these sad highways left ai large 
To ruts and flints, and love ly nature's skill, 

Who is mi paviour, nor admits a barge 
On her canals, where God lake's sea and land, 
Fishery and farm, both into his own hand. 

XXXII. 
At least he pays no rent, and has best right 

To be the first of what we u 
"Gentlemen farmers" — a race worn out quite, 

Since lati ly there have been no rents at all, 
And "gentlemen" are in a piteous plight, 

And "farmers" can't raise Ceres from her fall 

She fell with Bonaparte: — What strange thoughts 

Arise, when we see emperors fall with oats ! 

XXXIII. 
But Juan turn'd his eyes on the sweet child 

Who'n lie had saved from slaughter — what a trophy 
Oh ! ve who build up monuments, d< fil 

With gore, like Nadir Shah, that costive Sophy, 
Who, after leaving Hindostan a wild. 

And scarce to the .Mogul a cup of coffee 
To soothe his woes withal, was slain, the sinner! 
Because he could no more digest his dinner: — 3 

XXXIV. 

Oh ye ! or we ! or she ! or he ! reflect, 

That one hie saved, especially if young 
Or pretty, is a thing to recollect 

Far sweeter than the greenest laurels sprung 
From the manure of human clay, though deek'd 

With all the praises ever said or sung : 
Though bymtl'd by every harp, unless within 
Your heart joins chorus, fame is but a din. 

XXXV. 
Oh, ye great authors luminous, voluminous ! 

Yet twice ten hundred thousand daily scribes ! 
Whose pamphlets, volumes, newspapers illumine us I 

Whether von 're paid by government in bribes, 
To prove the public debt is not consuming us — 

Or, roughly treading on the "courtier's kibes" 
With clownish heel, your popular circulation 
Feeds you by printing half the realm's starvation :— 

XXXVI. 
Oh, ye great author? ! — " A-propos de bottes" — 

I have forgotten what I meant to say, 
As some! t t have been greater sages' lots: 

'T was something t i allay 

All wrath in barracks, pals 

Certes it would have been but thrown away, 
And that 's 01 \ lee, 

Although no doubt it was beyond all price. 
XXXVII. 

lint let it 20- — it will one day be found 

With oiler relics of "a former world," 
When this world shall be former, underground, 

Thrown topsy-turvy, t\> . nrl'u. 

Baked, fried, or burnt, turn'd inside out, or tirown'O, 

Like all the >, which have been hurl'J 

First out of and then back again to chaos, 
The superstratum winch will overlay us. 



C50 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CJ.XTG IX. 



XXXVIU. 
So Cuvicr says ; — and then shall come again 

Uuio the new creation, rising out 
From our old crash, some mystic, ancient strain 

Of things destroy'd and left in airy doubt: 
Like to the notions wo now entertain 

Of Titans, giants, fellows of about 
Some hundred feet in height, 7i.,c to say miles, 
And mammoths, ami your winged crocodiles. 

XXX!X. 
Think if then George the Fourth should lie dug up 

How the new worldlings of the then new east 
Will wonder where such animals could sup! 

(For they themselves will be but of the least: 
E* en worlds miscarry, when loo oft they pup, 

And every new creation hath decreased 
In size, from overworking the material — 
Men are but maggots of some huge earth's burial). - 

XL. 

//,,... v ,il! — to these young | pie, just thrust out 

From some fresh paradise, and set t.. pli i 

And dig, and sweat, and turn themselves about, 
And plant, and reap, and Spin, and grind, an 

Till all the arts at length arc brought about, 

Especially of war and laving, — bow, 
[ say, will these great relics, when they see 'em, 
Look like the monsters of a new museum! 

XLI. 

But T am apt to grow too metaphysical: 

"The lime is out of joint," — and so am I; 
I quite forget this poem's merely quizzical, 

And deviate into matters rather dry. 
I ne'er decide what I shall say, and this I call 

Much too poetical: men should know why 
They write, and for what end; but, note or text, 
I never ki.ow the word which will come next. 

XLII. 
So on I ramble, now and then narrating, 

Now pondering : — it is time we should narrate: 
1 left Don Juan with his horses baiting — 

Now we '11 get. o'er the ground at a great rate. 
I shall not be particular in slating 

His journey, we've so many tours of late : 
Suppose him then at Petersburg!! ; suppose 
That pleasant capital of painted snows ; 

XLIII. 
Suppose him in a handsome uniform ; 

A scarlet coat, black facings, a long plume, 
Waving, like sails new shiver'd in a storm, 

Over a cock'd hat, in a crowded room, 
And brilliant breei hi -, bright as a Cairn Gorme, 

Of yellow kerseymere we may presume, 
White Blockings drawn, uncurdlcd as new milk, 
O'er limbs whose symmetry set oif the silk : 

XLIV. 
Suppose him, sword by side, and hat in hand, 

Made up by youth, fame, and an army tailor — 
That great enchanter, at whose rod's command 

Beauty springs forth, and nature's self turns paler, 
Seeing how art can make her work more grand, 

(When she don't pin n's lil lbs in like a jailor) — 

Ueho'ul him placed as if upon a pillar! lie 
Se«"mH Love turn'd a lieutenant of artillery ? 



XLV. 

lage s'.ipp'd down into a cravat; 
Ilis wings subdued to epaulets ; his quiver 

Shrunk to a scabbard, wiih his arrows at 

His side as a small-sword, but sharp as ever; 

His bow e. inserted into a cock'd hat; 
lint still so like, that Psyche were more clever 

Than some wives (who make blunders no less stupid) 

If she had not mistaken him for Cupid. 

XLVI. 

The courtiers stared, tie; ladies whispcr'd, and 

i ; the reigning favourite frown'd— 
I quite i of them was in hand 

Just then, as they are rather numerous found, 
Who took by turns that difficult command, 
; ji sty was singly crown'd : 
j were mostly nervous six-foot fellows, 
All lit to make a Patagouian jealous. 

XLVII. 

Juan was none of these, but slight and slim, 
Blushing an ! beardless ; and yet ne'er' heless 

There was a something in his turn of 

W still more in his eye, which seem'd to express, 

VI one of the seraphim, 

There lurk'd a man beneath the Spirit's dress. 
impn ss sometimi s lil cd a hoy, 
And had just buried the fair-faced Lanskoi: 4 

XLV II I. 
Xo wonder then that Yermoloff, or Momonoff, 

hi rlialoil', or any Oth 
Or on, might dread her majesty had not room enough 

nol too tough) 
For a new liame ; a thought to cast of gloom enough 
Along the aspect, v oth or rough, 

Of him who,. in the language of his station, 
Then hold that "high official situation." 

XLIX. 
Oh, gentle belies! should you seek to know 

The import of this diplomatic phrase, 
Rid Ireland's Londonderry's Marquess 5 show 

His parts of speech ; and in the strange displays 
Of that odd string of words all in a row, 

Which none divine, and every one obeys, 

Perhaps you may pick out some queer no-meaning, 
Of that weak wordy harvest the sole gleaning. 

L. 
I think I can explain myself without 

That sad. inexplicable beast of prey — 
That sphinx, whose words Would ever he a doubt, 

Did not Ins deeds unriddle them each dav — 
That monstrous hieroglyphic — thai long snout 

Of blood and water, leaden Castlcreagh! 
And here I must an anecdote relate, 
Hut luckily of no great length or weight. 



LI. 
An English lady ask'd of an Italian, 

What were the actual and official duties 

Of the strange thiyg some w m set a value on, 

Which hovers oft about some married bi autii -, 

• Cavalier Servente?" — a Pygmalion 
Whose statues warm (I fear, alas! too true 'tis) 

Beneath Ins art. The dame, press'd to disclose them, 
Said — " Lady, I beseech you to suppose them." 



CANTO IX. 



DON JUAN. 



65 



LII. 
And thus I supplicate your supposition, 

And mildest, matron-like interpretation 
Of the imperial favourite's condilion. 

'T was a high place, the highest in the nation 
In fact, if not in rank ; and the suspicion ' 

Cf any one's attaining to his station, 
No doubt gave pain, where each new pair of shoulders, 
If rather broad, made stocks rise and their holders. 

LIII. 

Juan, I said, was a most beauteous boy, 
And had retain'd his boyish look beyond 

The usual hirsute seasons, which destroy, 
With beards and whiskers and the like, the fond 

Parisian aspect which upset old Troy 
And founded Doctor's Commons : — I have conn'd 

The history of divorces, which, though chequer'd, 

Calls Ilion's the first damages on record. 

LIV. 

And Catherine, who loved all things (save her lord, 
Who was gone to his place), and pass'd for much, 

Admiring those (bv dainty dames abhorr'd) 
Gigantic gentlemen, yet had a touch 

Of sentiment ; and he she most adored 
Was the lamented Lanskoi, who was such 

A lover as had cost her many a tear, 

And yet but made a middling grenadier. 

LV. 

Oh, thou " teterrima causa" of all "belli!" — 
Thou gate of life and death ! — thou nondescript ! 

Whence is our exit and our entrance, — well I 
May pause in pondering how all souls are dipp'd 

In thy perennial fountain ! — how man Jell, I 

Know not, since knowledge saw her branches stripp'd 

Of her first fruit ; but how he falls and rises 

Since, thou hast settled beyond all surmises.J 

LVI. 
Some call thee " the worst cause of war," but I 

Maintain thou art the best: for, after all, 
From thee we come, to thee we go; and why, 

To get at thee, not baiter down a wall, 
Or waste a world ? Since no one can deny 

Thou dost replenish worlds both great and small : 
With, or without thee, all things at a stand 
Are, or would be, thou sea of life's dry land ! 

LVII. 
Catherine, who was the grand epitome 

(If that great cause of war, or peace, or what 
You please (it causes all the things which be, 

So you may take your choice of this or that) — 
Catherine, I say, was very glad to see 

The handsome herald, on whose plumage sat 
Victory; and, pausing as she saw him kneel 
With his despatch, forgot to break the seal. 

LVIII. 
Then recollecting the whole empress, nor 

Forgetting quite the woman (which composed 
At least three parts of this great whole), she tore 

The letter open with an air which posed 
The court, that watch'd each look her visage wore, 

Until a royal smile at length disclosed 
Fair weather for the day. Though rather spacious, 
Her face was noble, her eyes fine, mouth gracious. 



LIX. 

Great joy was hers, or rather joys ; the first 
Was a ta'en city, thirty thousand slain. 

Glory and triumph o'er her aspect burst, 
As an East-Indian sunrise on the main. 

These quench'd a moment her ambition's thirst- 
So Arab deserts drink in summer's rain : 

In vain ! — As fall the dews en quenchless sands, ' 

Blood only serves to wash ambition's hands ! 

LX. 

Her next amusement was more fanciful ; 

She smiled at mad Suwarrow's rhymes, who threw 
Into a Russian couplet, rather dull, 

The whole gazette of thousands whom he slew. 
Her third was feminine enough to annul 

The shudder which runs naturally through 
Our veins, when things called sovereigns think it bet* 
To kill, and generals turn it into jest. 

LXI. 

The two first feelings ran their course complete, 
And lighted first her eye and then her mouth: 

The whole court look'd immediately most sweet, 
Like flowers well water'd after a long drouth :— 

But when on the lieutenant, at her feet, 
Her majesty — who liked to gaze on youth 

Almost as much as on a new despatch — 

Glanced mildly, all the world was on the watch. 

LXII. 

Though somewhat large, exuberant, and truculent, 
Y\ l.en wroth ; while pleased, she was as fine a figure 

As those, who like things losy, ripe, i.nd succulent, 
Would wish to look on, while they are in vigour. 

She could repay each amatory look you lent 
With interest, and in turn was wont with rigour 

To exact of Cupid's bills the full amount 

At sight, nor would permit you to discount. 

LXIII. 

With her the latter, though at times convenient, 
Was not so necessary : for they tell 

That she was handsome, and, tho' fierce, look'd lenient, 
And always used her favourites too well. 

If once beyond her boudoir's precincts in ve went, 
Your " fortune " was in a fair way " to swell 

A man," as Giles says ; G for, tho' she would widow all 

Nations, she liked man as an individual. 

LXIV. 

What a strange thing is man ! and what a strange* 

Is woman? What a whirlwind is her head, 
And what a whirlpool full of depth and danger 

Is all the rest about her! whether wed, 
Or widow, maid, or mother, she can change her 

Mind like the wind; whatever she has said 
Or done, is light to what she'll say or do; — 
The oldest thing on record, and yet new ! 

J.XV. 
Oh, Catherine! (fur of all interjections 

To thee both oh ! and ah ! belong of ri^ht 
In love and war) how odd are the connexions 

Of human thoughts, which jostle in their flight' 
Just now yours were cut out in difieran 

First, Ismail's capture caught your fancy quite , 
:' new knights the fresh and glorious batch, 
And thirdly, he who brought you the des-iatch ' 



652 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C.iXTO 1* 



LXVI. 
Shakspeare talks of " the herald Mercury 

New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill;" 
And some such visions cross'd her majesty, 

While her young herald knelt before her still. 
'T is verv true the hill seem'd rather high 

For a lieutenant to climb up ; but skill 
Smooth'd even the Sinip'.on's steep, and, by God's bless- 
ing, 
With youth and health all kisses are " heaven-kissing." 

LXVII. 

Her majesty look'd down, the youth look'd up — 

And so they fell in love ; — she with his face, 
His iirace, his God-knows- what: for Cupid's cup 

With the first draught intoxicates apace, 
A quintessential laudanum or "black drop," 

Which makes one drunk at once, without the base 
Expedient of full bumpers ; for the eye 
fn iove drinks all life's fountains (save tears) dry. 

LXVIII. 
He, on the other hand, if not in love, 

Fell into that no less imperious passion, 
Self-love — which, when some sort of thing above 

Ourselves, a singer, dancer, much in fashion, 
Or duchess, princess, empress, "deigns to prove," 

('T is Pope's phrase) a great longing, tho' a rash one, 
For one especial person out of many, 
Makes us believe ourselves as good as any. 

LXIX. 
resides, he was of that delighted age 

Which makes all female ages equal — when 
We don't much care with whom we may engage, 

As bold as Daniel in the lions' den, 
So that we can our native sun assuage 

In the next ocean, which may flow just then, 
To make a twilight in — just as Sol's heat is 
Quench'd in the lap of the salt sea, or Thetis. 

LXX. 
And Catherine (we must say thus much for Catherine), 

Though bold and bloody, was the kind of thing 
Whose temporary passion was quite flattering, 

Because each lover look'd a sort of king, 
Made up upon an amatory pattern — 

A royal husband in all save the ring — 
Which being the damn'dest part of matrimony, 
Scem'd taking out the sting to leave the honey 

LXXI. 
And when you add to this, her womanhood 

In its meridian, her blue eyes, or gray — 
(The last, if they have soul, are quite as good, 

Or better, as the best examples say : 
Napoleon's, Mary's (Queen of Scotland) should 

Lend to that colour a transcendent ray ; 
And Pallas also sanctions the same hue — 
Too wise to look through optics black or blue) — 

LXXII. 
Her swcci smile, and her then majestic figure, 

Her plumpness, her imperial condescension, 
Her preference of a boy to men much bigger 

(Fellows whom Mcssu Una's self would pension), 
Her prime of lifj, just now in juicy vigour, 

With other extras which we need not mention, — 
All these, or any one of these, explain 
KnouL'h to make a stripling very vain. 



LXXIII. 
And that 's enough, fir love is vanity 
end, 
Except where 'tis a mere insanity, 

A maddening spirit which would strive to blend 
Itself with beauty's frail inanity, 

On which the passion's self seems to depend: 
And hence some heathenish philosophers 
Make love the mainspring of the universe. 

LXXIV. 

Besides Platonic love, besides the love 
Of God, the love of sentiment, the loving 

Of faithful pairs — (I needs must rhyme with dove, 
That good old sleam-boa< which keeps verses moving 

'Gainst reason — reason ne'er was hand-and-glove 
With rhyme, but always lean'd less to improving 

The sound than sense) — besides all these pretences 

To love, there are those things which words name senses; 

LXXV. 

Those movements, those improvements in our bodies, 
Which make all bodies anxious to get out 

Of their own sand-pits to mix with a goddess — 
For such all women are at first, no doubt. 

How beautiful that moment ! and how odd is 
That fever which precedes the languid rout 

Of our sensations! What a curious way 

The whole thing is of clothing souls in clay ! 

LXXVI. 

The noblest kind of love is love Platonical, 
To end or to begin with; the next grand 

Is that which may be christen'd love canonical, 
Because the clergy take the thing in hand ; 

The third sort to be noted in our chronicle, 
As flourishing in every Christian land, 

Is, when chaste matrons to their other ties 

Add what may be call'd marriage in disguise. 

LXXVII. 

Well, we won't analyze — our story must 

Tell for itself: the sovereign was smitten, 
Juan much llaller'd by her love, or lust ; — 

I cannot stjop to alter words once written, 
And the two are so mix'd with human dust, 

That he who names one, both perchance may hit on • 
But in such matters Russia's mighty empress 
Behaved no better than a common sempstress. 

LXXVIII. 
The whole court melted into one wide whisper, 

And all lips were applied unto all ears ! 
The elder ladies' wrinkles curl'd much crisper 

As they beheld ; the younger cast some leers 
On one another, and each lovely lisper 

Smiled as she talk'd the matter o'er ; but tears 
Of rivalship rose in each clouded eye 
Of all the standing army who stood by. 

LXXIX. 

All the ambassadors of all the powers 

Inquired, who was this verv new youffg man, 

Who promised to be great in some few hours? 
Which is full soon (though life is but a span). 

Already they beheld the silver showers 
Of roubles rain, as fast as specie can, 

Upon his cabinet, besides the presents 

Of several ribbons and some thousand peasants 



CANTO X. 



DON JUAN. 



653 



LXXX. 

Catherine was generous, — all such ladies are: 
Love, that great opener of the heart and all 

The ways that lead there, be they near or far : 
Above, below, by turnpikes great or small, — 

Love — (though she had a cursed taste for war, 
And was not the best wife, unless we call 

Such Ciytemnestra ; though perhaps 'tis better 

That one should die, than two drag on the fetter) — 

LXXXI. 

Love had made Catherine make each lover's fortune, 
Unlike our own half-chaste Elizabeth, 

Whose avarice all disbursements did importune, 
If history, the grand liar, ever saith 

The truth ; and though grief her old age might shorten, 
Because she put a favourite to death, 

Her vile ambiguous method of flirtation, 

And stinginess, disgrace her se.x and station. 

LXXXII. 

But when the levee rose, and all was bustle 
In the dissolving circle, all the nations' 

Ambassadors began as 't were to hustle 
Round the young man with their congratulations. 

Also the softer silks were heard to rustle 
Of gentle dames, among whose recreations 

It is to speculate on handsome faces, 

Especially when such lead to high places. 

LXXXIII. 

Juan, who found himself, he knew not how, 

A general object of attention, made 
His answers with a very graceful bow, 

As if born for the ministerial trade. 
Though modest, on his unetnbarrass'd brow 

Nature had written "Gentleman." He said 
Little, but to the purpose ; and his manner 
Flung hovering graces o'er him like a banner. 

LXXXIV. 

An order from her majesty consign'd 

Our young lieutenant to the genial care 
Of those in office : all the world look'd kind, 

(As it will look sometimes with the first stare, 
Which youth would not act ill to keep in mind); 

As also did Miss ProtosofF then there, 
Named, from her mystic office, "l'Eprouvcuse," 
A term inexplicable to the Muse. 

LXXXV. 
With her then, as in humble duty hound, 

Juan retired, — and so will I, until 
Mv I'enasus shall tire of touching ground. 

We have just lit on a "heaven-kissing hill," 
So lofly that I feel my brain turn round, 

And all my fancies whirling like a mill ; 
Which is a signal to my nerves and brain 
To take a quiet ride in some green lane. 



****** 



CANTO X. 



i. 

When Newton saw an apple fall, he found 
In that slight startle from his contemplation — 

'T is said (for I '11 not answer above ground 
For any sage's creed or calculation) — 

A mode of proving that the earth turn'd mind 
In a most natural whirl, call'd " gravitation ;" 

And thus is the sole mortal who could gr?iple, 

Since Adam, with a fall or with an apple. 

II. 

Man fell with apples, and with apples rose, 
If this be true ; for we must deem the moA» 

In which Sir Isaac Newton could disclose, 

Through the then unpaved stars, the turnpik" road, 

A thing to counterbalance human woes ; 
For, ever since, immortal man hath glow'd 

With all kinds of mechanics, and full soon 

Steam-engines will conduct him to the moon. 

III. 

And wherefore this exordium ? — Why, just now 
In taking up this paltry sheet of paper, 

My bosom underwent a glorious glow, 
And my internal spirit cut a caper : 

And though so much inferior, as I know, 

To those who, by the dint of glass and vapour, 

Discover stars, and sail in the wind's eye, 

I wish to do as much by poesy. 

IV. 

In the wind's eye I have sail'd, and sail ; but for 

The stars, I own my telescope is dim; 
Hut at the least I 've shunn'd the common shore, 

And, leaving land far out of sight, would skim 
The ocean of eternity: the I isu 

Of breakers has not daunted mv slight, trim, 
But still sea-worthy skiff; and she may float 
Where ships have founder'd, as dolh many a boat. 

V. 
We left our hero Juan in the hhnm 

Of favouritism, hut not vt in the blush; 
And far he it from my Muses to presume 

(For I have more than one Mii.-c at a push) 
To follow him beyond the drawing-room : 

It is enough thai fortune found him tlu-di 
Of youth and vigour, beauty, and ■ 
Which for an instant clip enjoyment's wings. 

VI. 
But. soon they grow again, and leave their nest. 

"Oh!"' saith the Psalmist, "that I had a dove* 

Pinions, to lice away and 

And who, that reCO ' .' years anil lovcs,- 

Though hoary now, and with a withering breast. 

And palsied fancy, which no longer reves 
Beyond its dimm'deye's sphere, — but would much -ithew 
Sigh like his son, than cough like his grandfather 7 



654 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO A 



VII. 

But sighs subside, and tears (even widows') shrink 
Like Arno, in the summer, to a shallow, 

So narrow as to shame their wintry brink, 

Which threatens inundations deep and yellow! 

Such difference doth a few months make. You 'd think 
Grief a rich field which never would lie fallow ; 

No more it doth, its ploughs but change their boys, 

Who furrow some new soil to sow for joys. 

VIII. 

But coughs will come when sighs depart — and now 
And then before sighs cease ; for oft the one 

Will bring the other, ere the lake-like brow 
Is ruffled by a wrinkle, or the sun 

Of life reach ten o'clock : and, while a glow, 
Hectic and brief as summer's day nigh done, 

O'erspreads the cheek which seems loo pure for clay, 

Thousands blaze, love, hope, die — how happy they! — 

IX. 

But Juan was not meant to die so soon. 

We left him in the focus of such glory 
As may be won by favour of the moon, 

Or ladies' fancies — rather transitory 
Perhaps : but who would scorn the month of June, 

Because December, with his breath so hoary, 
Must come? Much rather should he court the ray, 
To hoard up warmth against a wintry day. 

X. 

Besides, he had some qualities which fix 
Middle-aged ladies even more than young: 

The former know what 's what ; while new-fledged chicks 
Know little more of love than what is sung 

In rhymes, or dream'd (for fancy will play tricks), 
In visions of those skies from whence love sprung. 

Some reckon women by their suns or years — 

I rather think the moon should dale the dears. 

XI. 

And why? because she's changeable and chaste. 

I know no other reason, whatsoe'er 
Suspicious people, who find fault in haste, 

May choose to tax me with ; which is not fair, 
Nor flattering to " their temper or their taste," 

As my friend Jeffrey writes with such an air : 
However, I forgive him, and I trust 
He will forgive himself; — if not, I must. 

XII. 

Old enemies who have become new friends 

Should so continue — 'tis a point of honour; 
And I know nothing which could make amends 

For a return to hatred : I would shun her 
Like garlic, howsoever she extends 

Her hundred arms and legs, and fain outrun her. 
Old flames, new wives, become our bitterest foes — 
Converted foes should scorn to join with these. 

XIII. 
This were the worst desertion : rene»adoes, 

Even shuffling Southey — that incarnate lie — 
Would scarcely join again the " reformadoes," 1 

Whom he forsook to fill the laureate's sty: 
And honest men, from Iceland to Barbadoes, 

Whether in Caiedon or Italy, 
fehould not veer round with every breath, nor seize, 
I'? pain, the moment when you cease to please. 



XIV. 

The lawyer and the critic but behold 

The baser sides of literature and life, 
And nought remains unseen, but much untold, 

By those who scour those double vales of strife. 
While common men grow ignorantly old, 

The lawyer's brief is like the surgeon's knife, 
Dissecting the whole inside of a question, 
And with it all the process of digestion. 

XV. 
A legai broom's a moral chimney-sweeper, 

And that's the reason he himself s so dirty; 
The endless soot 2 bestows a tint far deeper 

Than can be hid by altering his shirt; he 
Retains the sable stains of the dark creeper — 

At least some twenty-nine do out of thirty 
In all their habits : not so you, I own ; 
As Ccesar wore his robe you wear your gown. 

XVI. 
And all our little feuds, at least all mine, 

Dear Jeffrey, once my most redoubted foe, 
(As far as rhyme and criticism combine 

To make such puppets of us things below), 
Arc over: Here's a health to "Auld Lang Syne !" 

I do not know you, and may never know 
Your face, — but you have acted on the whole 
Most nobly, and I own it from my soul. 

XVII. 
And when I use the phrase of "Auld Lang Syne!" 

'Tis not address'd to you — the more 's the pity 
For me, for I would rather take my wine 

With yon, than aught (save Scott) in your proud city. 
But somehow, — it may seem a school-boy's whine, 

And yet I seek not to be grand nor witty, 
Hut I am half a Scot by birth, and bred 

A whole one, and my heart flies to my head : — 

XVIII. 

As "Auld Lang Syne" brings Scotland one and all, 

Scotch plaids, Scotch snoods, the blue hills, and clear 
streams, 
The Dee, the Don, Balgounie's Brig's black wall, 3 

All my boy feelings, all my gentler dreams 
Of what I then dreamt, clothed in their own pall, 

Like Banquo's offspring — floating past me seems 
My childhood in this childishness of mine : 
I care not — 't is a glimpse of " Auld Lang Syne." 

XIX. 
And though, as you remember, in a fit 

Of wrath and rhyme, when juvenile, and curly, 
I rail'd at Scots to show my wrath and wit, 

Which must be own'd was sensitive and surly, 
Yet 'tis in vain such sallies to permit — 

They cannot quench young feelings fresh and early: 
I "scntclrt!, not kill'd," the Scotchman in my blood, 
And love the land of "mountain and of flood." 

XX. 
Don Juan, who was real or ideal, — 

For both arc much the same, since what men think 
Exists when the once thinkers are less real 

Than what they thought, for mind can never sink, 
And 'gainst the body makes a strong appeal ; 

And yet 't is very puzzling on the brink 
Of what is call'd eternity, to stare, 
And know no more of wiiat is here than there : — 



CANTO X. 



DON JUAN. 



G5. : > 



XXI. 

Don Juan grew a very poli3h'd Russian — 

How we won't mention, why we need not say: 

Pew youthful minds can stand the strong concussion 
Oi any slight temptation in their way ; 

But fits just now were spread as is a cushion 
Smooth'd for a monarch's seat of honour : gay 

Damsels, and dances, revels, ready money, 

Made ice seem paradise, and winter sunny. 

XXII. 

The favour of the empress was agree: 

And though the duty wax'd a little hard, 

Young people at his time of life should be able 
To come off handsomely in that regard. 

He now was growing up like a green tree, able 
For love, war, or ambition, which reward 

Their luckier votaries, till old age's tedium 

Make some prefer the circulating medium. 

XXIII. 

About this time, as miglit have been anticipated, 
Seduced by youth and dangerous examples, 

Don Juan grew, I fear, a little dissips 
Which is a sad thing, and not only (rumples 

On our fresh feelings, but — as being participated 
With all kinds of incorrigible samples 

Of frail humanity — must make us selfish, 

And shut our souls up in us like a shell-fish. 

XXIV. 

This we pass over. We will also pass 
The usual progress of intrigues between 

Unequal matches, such as are, alas ! 

A young lieutenant's with a not old queen, 

But one who is not so youthful as she was 
In all the royally of sweet seventeen. 

Sovereigns may sway materials, but not matter, 

And wrinkles (the d d democrats) won't (latter. 

XXV. 

And Death, the sovereigns' sovereign, though the great 

Gracchus of all mortality, who levels 
With his Agrarian laws, the high estate 

Of him who feasts, and lights, and roars, and revels, 
To one smali grass-grown patch (which must await 

Corruption for its crop) with the poor devils 
Who never had a foot of land till now, — 
Death 's a reformer, all men must allow. 

XXVI. 
He lived (not Death, but Juan) in a hurry 

Ofwasie, and haste, and glare, arid gloss, and glitter, 
In this gay clime of bear-skins black and furry — 

Which (though I hate to say a thing that's billed 
Peep out sometimes, when things are in a flurry, 

Through all the " purple and fine linen," fitter 
For Babylon's than Russia's royal harlot — 
And neutralize her outward show of scarlet. 

XXVII. 
And this same stale we won't describe : we would 

Perhaps from hearsay, or from recollection; 
Bui getting nigh grim Dante's "obscure wood," 

That horrid equinox, that hateful section 
Of human yens, thai balf-way house, that rude 

Hut, whence wise travellers drive with circumspection 
Life's sad post-horses o'er the dreary frontier 
Of age, and, looking back to youth, give one tear;— 



XXVIII. 
I won't describe — that is, if I can help 

Description: and I won't reflect— that is, 
If I can slave o(f thought, which — as a whelp 

Clings to its teal — licks to roe through the abyss 
Of ibis odd labyrinth; or as the kelp 

Holds by the. rock ; or as a lover's kiss 
Drains its first draught of lips: but, as I said, 
I won't philosophize, and will be read. 

XXIX. 

Juan, instead of courting courts, was courted, 

A thing which happens rarely ; this he owed 

Much to his youth, and much to his reported 

Valour; much also to thi bl 1 he show'd, 

Like a race-horse ; much : i s he sported 

Which set the beauiy off in which he glow'd, 
As purple clouds befringe the sun; but most 

He owed to an old woman and his post. 

XXX. 
lie wrote to Spain : — and all his near relations, 

Perceiving he was in a handsome way 
Of getting on himself, and finding stations 

For cousins also, answer'd the same day. 
Several prepared themselves for emigrations ; 

And, eating ices, were o'erhcard 10 say, 
That with the addition of a plight peli se, 
Madrid's and Moscow's climes were bf a-piece. 

XXXI. 

His mother, Donna Inez, finding too 

That in the lieu of drawing on his banker, 
Where his assets were waxing rather few, 

lie had brought his spending to a handsome anchor- 
Replied, " that she was glad to see. him through 

Those pleasures after which wild youth will banker 
As the sole sign of man's being in his senses 
Is, learning to reduce his past expenses. 

XXXII. 
" She also recommended him to God, 

Ami no less to God's Son, as well as Mother, 
Warn'd him against Greek worship, which looks odd 

In Catholic eyes; but told him loo to smother 
Outward dislike, which don't look well abroad: 

Inform'd him that he had a liitle brother 
Horn in a second wedlock ; and above 
All, praised the empress's maternal lovo. 

XXXIII. 
" She could not too much give her approbation 

I'uto an empress, who preferr'd young men 
Whose age, and, what was better still, whose naticti 

And climate, Stopp'd all scandal (now and then) : — 
At home it might have given bet some vexation, 

But where thermometers Mink down to ten, 
Or five, or one, or zero, she could never 
Believe that virtue thaw'd before the river." 

XXXIV. 
Oh fir a fort;/-; l to chaunt 

Thv praise, hypocrisy ! Oh for a hymn 
Loud a- thou dost loudly vaunt, 

Not practise! Oh tor trumps of cherubim ' 
Or the ear-trumpet of my good old aunt, 

Who, though her spectacles at last grew dim, 
Drew quiet consolation through i's hint, 
When she no more could read the uious print. 



Gj6 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO X 



XXXV. 

She was no hypocrite, at least, poor soul ! 

But went to heaven in as sincere a way 
As any body on the elected roll, 

Which portions out upon the judgment day 
Heaven's freeholds, in a sort of doomsday scroll, 

Such as the conqueror William did /cpay 
His knights with, lotting others' properties 
Into some sixty thousand new knights' fees. 

XXXVI. 

I can't complain, whose ancestors are there, 
Erneis, Radulphus — eight-and-forty manors 

(If that my memory doth not greatly err) 
Were their reward for following Billy's banners ; 

And, though I can't help thinking 't was scarce fair 
To strip the Saxons of their ftyrfes,' like tanners, 

Yet as they founded churches with the produce, 

You '11 deem, no doubt, they put it to a good use. 

XXXVII. 

The gentle Juan flourish'd, though at times 
He felt like other plants — call'd sensitive, 

Which shrink from touch, as monarchs do from rhymes, 
Save such as Southey can afford to give. 

Perhaps he long'd, in bitter frosts, for climes 
In which the Neva's ice would cease to Hve 

Before May-day: perhaps, despite his duty, 

In royalty's vast arms he sigh'd for beauty : 

XXXVIII. 

Perhaps, — but, sans perhaps, we need to seek 
For causes young or old : the canker-worm 

Will feed upon the fairest, freshest check-, 
As well as further drain the withcr'd form : 

Care, like a housekeeper, brings every week 
His bills in, and, however we may storm, 

They must be paid : though six days smoothly run, 

The seventh will bring blue devils or a dun. 

XXXIX. 

I don't know how it was, but he grew sick : 

The empress was alanu'd, and her physician 
(The same who physick'd Peter) found the tick 

Of his fierce pulse betoken a condition 
Which augur'd of the dead, however quiok 

Itself, and show'd a feverish disposition; 
At which the whole court was extremely troubled, 
The sovereign shock'd, and all his medicines doubled. 

XL. 
Low were the whispers, manifold the rumours : 

Some said he had been poison'd by Potemkin ; 
Others talk'd learnedly of certain tumours, 

Exhaustion, or disorders of the same kin ; 
Some said 't was a concoction of the humours, 

Which with the blood too readily will claim kin ; 
Others again were ready to maintain, 
"'Twas only the fatigue of last campaign." 

XLI. 
But here is one prescription out of many : 

" Sodre-sulphat. 3. vi. 3. s. Manure optim. 
Aq. fervent. F. 3. iss. 3. ij. tinct. Senna? 

Haustus ' (and here thesnrgeon came andcupp'dhim) 
" R. Pulv. Com. gr. iii. Ipecacuanha; " 

(With more beside, if Juan had not stopp'd 'cm). 
" Bolus poussnr; sulphuret. sumendus, 
E'. haustus ter in die capiendus." 



XLII. 

This is the way physicians mend or end us, 
Secundum artcm: bi/t although we sneer 
In health — when ill, we call them to attend us, 
il the least propensity to jeer : 

While thai " hiatus maximc deflendus," 

To be fill'd \\]> by spade or mattock, 's near, 
I of gliding graciously down Lei he, 
We tease mild Baillie, or soft Abernethy. 

XLIII. 
Juan demurr'd at this first notice to 

Quit ; and, though dea'h had threaten'd an ejection, 
His youth and constitution bore him through, 

And sent the doctors in a new direction. 
But still his state was delicate: the hue 

Of health but flicker'd with a faint reflection 
Along his wasted cheek, and seem'd to gravel 
The faculty — who said that he must travel. 

XLIV. 

The climate was too cold, they said, f< >r him, 
Meridian-born, to bloom in. This opinion 

Made the chaste Catherine look a little grim, 
Who did not like at first to lose her minion : 

But when she saw his dazzling eye wax dim, 

And drooping like an eagle's with clipp'd pinion, 

She then resolved to send him on a mission, 

But in a style becoming his condition. 

XLV. 

There was just then a kind of a discussion, 

A sort of treaty or negotiation 
Between the British cabinet anil Russian, 

Maintain'd with all the due prevarication 
With which great states such things are apt to push on, 

Something about the Baltic's navigation, 
Hides, train-oil, tallow, and the rights of Thetis, 
Which Britons deem their "uti possidetis." 

XLVI. 

So Catherine, who had a handsome way 

Of fitting out her favourites, conferr'd 
This secret charge on Juan, to display 

At once her royal splendour, and reward 
His services. He kiss'd hands the next dav, 

Received instructions how to play his Card, 
Was laden with all kinds of gifts and honours, 
Which show'd what great discernment was the donor's. 

XLVII. 
But she was lucky, and luck 's all. Your queens 

Are generally prosperous in reigning ; 
Which puzzles us to know what fortune means. 

But to continue : though her years were waning, 
Her climacteric teased her like her teens ; 

And though her dignity brook'd no complaining, 
So much did Juan's setting oil" distress her, 
She could not find at first a fit successor. 

XLVHI. 
But time, the comforter, will come at last ; 

And fbur-and-twenty hours, and twice that number 
Of candidates requesting to be placed, 

Made Catherine taste next night a quiet slumber ! — 
Not that she meant to fix again in haste, 

Nor did she find the quantity encumber, 
But, always choosing with deliberation, 
Kept the place open for their emulation. 



CAXTO X. 



DON JUAN. 



657 



XLIX. 

While this high post of honour 's in abeyance, 
For one or two Jays, reader, we request 

You '11 mount with our young hero the conveyance 
Which wafted him from Pelersburgh ; the best 

Barouche, which had the glory to display once 
The fair Czarina's autocratic crest, 

(When, a new Iphigene, she went to Tanris), 

Was given to her favourite, 6 and now bore his. 

L. 

A bull-dog, and a bull-finch, and an ermine, 
All private favourites of Don Juan ; for 

(Let deeper sages the true cause determine) 
He had a kind of inclination, or 

Weakness, for what most people deem mere vermin — 
Live animals : — an old maid of threescore 

For cats and birds more penchant ne'er display'd, 

Although he was not old, nor even a maid. 

LI. 

The animals aforesaid occupied 

Their station : there were valets, secretaries, 
In other vehicles ; but at his side 

Sat little Leila, who survived the parries 
He made 'gainst Cossack sabres, in the wide 

Slaughter of Ismail. Though my wild Muse varies 
Her note, she don't forget the infant girl 
Whom he preserved, a pure and living pearl. 

LII. 

Poor little thing ! She was as fair as docile, 
And with that gentle, serious character, 

As rare in living beings as a fossile 

Man, 'midst thy mouldy mammoths, "grand Cuvier !" 

Ill fitted with her ignorance to jostle 

With this o'erwhelming world, where all must err: 

But she was yet but ten years old, and therefore 

Was tranquil, though she knew not why or wherefore. 

LHI. 

Don Juan loved her, and she loved him, as 

Nor brother, father, sister, daughter love. 
I cannot tell exactly what it was ; 

He was not yet quite old enough to prove 
Parental feelings, and the other class, 

Call'd brotherly affection, could not move 
His bosom — for he never had a sister : 
Ah ! if he had, how much he would have miss'd her ! 

LIV. 
And still less was it sensual ; for besides 

That he was not an ancient debauchee, 
(Who like sour fruit to stir their veins' salt tides, 

As acids rouse a dormant alkali), 
Although ('< will happen as our planet guides) 

His youth was not the chastest that might be, 
There was the purest platonism at bottom 
Of all his feelings — only he forgot 'em. 

LV. 
Just now there was no peril of temptation ; 

He loved the infant orphan he had saved, 
As patriots (now and then) may love a nation ; 

His pride too felt that she was not enslaved, 
Owing to him ; — as also her salvation, 

Through his means and the church's, might be paved. 
But one thing 's odd, which here must be inserted — 
The little Turk refused to be converted. 
3 I C8 



LVI. 

'T was strange enough she should retain the impression 

Through such a scene of change, and dread, and 
slaughter; 
But, though three bishops told her the transgression, 

She chow'd a great dislike to holy water: 
She also had no passion for confession ; 

Perhaps she had nothing to confess ; — no matter ; 
Whate'er the cause, the church made little of it- 
She still held out that Mahomet was a prophet. 

LVI I. 
In fact, the only Christian she could bear 

Was Juan, whom she scem'd to have selected 
In place of what her home and friends once wire. 

He naturally loved what he protected ; 
And thus they form'd a rather curious pair: 

A guardian green in years, a ward connected 
In neither clime, time, blood* with her defender; 
And yet this want of ties made theirs more tender, 

LVIII. 
Theyjournev'd on through Poland and through Warsaw, 

Famous for mines of salt and yokes of iron : 
Through Courland also, which that famous farce saw 

Which gave her dukes' the graceless name of "Biron." 
'T is the same landscape which the modern Mars saw, 

Who march'd to Moscow, led by fame, the syren' 
To lose, by one month's frost, some twenty years 
Of conquest, and his guard of grenadiers. 

LIX. 

Let not this seem an anti-climax: — "Oh! 

M v guard ! my old guard ! " exclaim'd that god of clay- 
Think of the thunderer's falling down below 

Caroti 1-artery-cutting Castlereagh ! 
Alas ! that glory should be chill'd by snow ! 

But, should we wish to warm us on our way 
Through Poland, there is Kosciusko's name 
Might scatter fire through ice, like Hecla's flame. 

LX. 
From Poland they came on through Prussia Proper, 

And Konigsberg the capital, whose vaunt, 
Besides some veins of iron, lead, or copper, 

Has lately been the great Professor Kant. 
Juan, who cared not a tobacco-stopper 

About philosophy, pursued his jaunt 
To Germany, whose somewhat tardy millions 
Have princes who spur more than their postilions. 

LXI. 
And thence through Berlin, Di'esdcn, and the like, 

Until he reach'd the castellated Rhine : — 
Ye glorious Gothic scenes ! how much ye strike 

All phantasies, not even excepting mine : 
A gray wall, a green ruin, rusty pike, 

Make my soul pass the equinoctial line • 
Between the present and past worlds, and novel 
Upon their airy confine, half-seas-over. 

LXII. 
But Juan posted on through Manheim, Bonn, 

Which Drachenfela frowns o'er, like a spectre. 
Of the good feudal times for ever gone, 

On which I have not time just now to lecture. 
From thence he was drawn onwards to Cologne, 

A city which presents to the inspector 
Eleven thousand maidenheads of bone, 
The greatest numbor flesh hath ever known.* 



653 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO J 



lxni. 

From thence to Holland's Hague and Helvoetaluys, 
That water land of Dutchmen and of ditches, 

\\ ., . Juniper expresses iis beat juice — 
The poor man's sparkling tub titute for ri 

Henates and sagos have condemn'd iti use — 
l!ut to deny 1 1 1 < ^ mob a cordial which is 

Too often .'ill the clothing, meat, or fuel, 

Good government haa left them, seems but cruel. 

LXIV. 
Here he embark'd, and, with a Bowing aail, 

Went bounding fur the island of the free, 
Towards which the impatient wind blew half a gale ; 

High do h'd the spray, the bows dipp'd in I 
And aea-sick passengers turn'd Bomewhal p 

But Juan, Bea on'd, as he well might be 
By former voyages, stood to watch the 
Which pass'd, or oatch tlie first glimpse of the clifTs. 

LXV. 
Ai length they rose, like awhite'wall along 

The blue sea's border j and Dun Juan felt — 
What even young strangers feel a little Btrong 

At the first sight of Albion's chalky bell — 
A kind df pride that he shouid be among 

Those haughty shop-ksepeis, who stcrn'y dealt 
Their goods and edicts out from pole to pole, 
And made the very bilious pu) them toll. 

LXVI. 

I havo no great cause to love that spot of earth, 
Which holds what mierht havt been the noblest nation: 

But, though I owe il little hut my birth, 
I feel a mix'd regret and veneration 

For its decaying fame and former worth. 
Sevon yeara (the usual term of transportation) 

Of absence lay one's old resentments level, 

When a man's country's going lo the devil. 

LXYII. 

Alas! could she but fully, truly, know 

How her great name is now throughout abhorr'd; 

How eager all the earth is for the blow 
Which shall lay bare her bosom to the Bword; 

How all the nations deem her their worst foe, 
That worst! than worst of furs — the once adored 

F dse Iriend, who held oul freedom to mankind, 

And now would chain them to the very nnid ; — 

LXVII1. 
Would she be proud, or boast herself the free, 

WlUi IS but first of slaves? The nations dTO 
In prison; but the jailor, what is he? 

No less a victim to the boll and bar. 
Is the poor privilege to turn the key 

Upon tlie captive, freedom? Ib's as far 

From the enjoyment of the earth ami air 
Who watches o'er the chain, as they who wear. 

LXIX. 
1 >i n .loan now saw Albion's earliest beauties — 
Thy cliffs, dear Dover I harbour, and hotel; 

Thy custom-house with all its delicate duties; 

Thy waiteia running mucks at every bell ; 
Tiiy packets, all whose passengors are booti 

Ti those who Upon land or water dwell; 
And last, not least, to strangers Uninstructed, 
I'll v •'!.,.. long bills, whence nothing is deducted. 



LXX. 
Juan, though careless, young, and magnifique, 

And neb ill roubles, di i and credit, 

Who did not limit much his bills per • 

YeL stared at this a little, though he paid it-- 
(His maggior duomo, tie Gi ci k, 

Before bun summ'd the awful - ad it ) 

Bui doubtless as the air, though aeld sunny) 

l free, the respiration's worth the money. 

LXX I. 
On with the horses! Off to Canterbury ! 

Tramp, tramp o'er pebble, and Bplash, splash through 
puddle ; 
Hurrah! bow swiftly speeds the post bo merry! 

Not like slow Germany, wherein tiny muddle 

Along the road, as if they went to bin v 
Their fare; and also pause, besides, to fud 

With "schnapps" — Bad dog I whom "Iiundsfoi n ct 

" Pi rfliicter" 
Affect no more than lightning a condui tor. 
LXXII. 

Now, there is nothing gives a man such spirits, 

Leavening his blood as Cayenne doth a curry, 
As going at full speed — no matter whei 

Direction be, so 'tis but in a hurry, 
And merely for the sake of its own ineiits ■ 

For the less cause there is for all this Hurry, 
The greater is the pleasure in ai living 
At the great end of travel — winch is driving. 

I. Will. 
They saw at Canterbury the Cathedral; 

Black Edward's helm, and Becket's bloody stone, 
Were pointed oul as usual by the bedral, 

In the i ami- quaint, uninterested tone ■ 
There's glory again for you, gentle reader! all 

Ends in a rusty Casque and dubious bone, 

oh ed into tho le sodas or magm 

Which form that bitter draught, the hi-inan species. 

LXX1V. 
The effect on Juan was of course sublime : 

He breathed a thousand CrCSSys, as he saw 
That casque, which never stoop'd, except to Time. 

Even the bold churchman's tomb excited awe, 

Who died in the then gre.it attempt to climb 

O'er kings, who noil) tit hast innsl talk of law, 
Before they butcher. Little Leila gazed, 
And ask'd why such a structure had been raised: 

LXXV. 
And being told it was "God's house," she said 

Hew. is well lodged, but onlywonder'd how 
He suifer'd infidels in his homesl 
The cruel Nazarenes, who had laid low 

His holy temples in the lands which bred 

The true believers; — and her infant brow 

Was bent With grief that IMahoniet should >< 

A mosque so noble, flung like pearls to swine. 

LXXVI. 
On, on ! through meadows, managed like a garden, 
A paradise of hops and high production 

I'ir. alter years of travel by a bard ill 

Countries of greater heat bill lesser suction, 

A green held is a sight which makes him pardon 
The absence of that more sublime construction 

Which mixes up vims, ohves, precipil I , 
, VOlcanOS, oranges, and il 



I INTO X. 



PON JUAN. 



G50 



LXXVII. 
A d when I think upon a po< of boer 

l3ut I won't weep!— and so, drive on, posl 
An the smart boys spurr'd fast in their can r, 

Juan admired these highways of free millions; 
A country in all senses the most dear 

To foreigner or native, save some silly on< , 
Who »»1 i the pricks" just al this juncture 

And for their pains get only a fresh puncture. 

LXXVIII. 
What a delightful thing's a turnpike i 

Bo smooth, so level, such a node of shaving 
The earth, as scarce the eagle in the broad 

Air t ;h, with his wi'le wings waving 

Had such been cul in Phat ton's tunc, the god 

Had told hi on to atisfy his craving 
With the Vork mail; — but, onward as we roll, 
" Surgit amari aliquid" — the toll! 
LXXIX. 

A ':is ! how deeply painful IS all payment ! 

Take lives, take wives, take aught except men's 

pur i . 
As Machiavel shows those in purple raiment, 
Such is the shortest way to 

They hale a murderer m • I a claimant 

On thai sweet ore, which every body nurses: — 

Kill a man's family, and he may brook it — 
But keep your hands out of Ins breeches' pocket. 

LXXX. 
So said the Florentine: yc monarchs, hearken 

To vour instructor. Juan now was b 
Just as I ;an to wane and darken, 

O'er the high hill which looks with pride or scorn 
Toward the great city: — ye who have a spaik in 

Your veins of Cockney spirit, smile or mourn, 
According as you take things well or ill — 
Bold Britons, we are now on Shooter's Hill! 

LXXXI. 
I'll? sun went down, the smoke rose up, as from . 

A half-iinquench'd volcano, o'er a space 
Which well beseem'd the "Devil's drawing-room," 

As some have qualified that wondrous place. 
But Juan felt, though not approaching lu/mc, 

As one who, though he were not of the race, 
Revered the soil, of (hose true suns the mother, 
Who butcher'd half the earth, and bullied t'other. 3 

LXXXII. 
A mighty mass of brick, and smoke, and shipping, 

Dirty and dusky, hut as wide 
Could reach, with here and there a sail just skipping 

In Sight, then lost amidst the forestry 
Of masts; a wilderness of Steep 

On tiptoe, through their sea-coal canopy ; 
A huge dun cupola, like a foolscap crow n 
On a fool's head — and there is London iown ! 

FXXXIII. 
But Juan saw not this: each wreath of smoke 

Appear'd to him hut as the magic vapour 
Of some alchymic furnace, from whence broke 

The wealth of worlds (a wealth of lax and paper) ; 
The gloomy clouds, which o'er- il as o yoke 

Are bow'd, and put the sun out like a taper, 
Were nothing but the natural al 
Extremely wholesome, though hut rarely clear. 



LXXXIV. 
He paused — and so will I — as doth a crew 

Before they give tln-i r broadside. By and by, 
My gentle countrymen, we will renew 

Our old acquaintance, and at least I'll try 
To tell you truths you will not take as true, 

Because they are so, — a male Mrs. Fry, 
With a soft besom will 1 sweep your ha Is, 
And brush a web or two from off the walls. 

LXXXV. 
Oh, Mrs. Fry! why go to Newgate? Why 

Preach to poor rogues? And wherefore not begin 
With ('— it-n, or with other houses? Try 

Your hand al harden'd and imperial sin. 

< 's an absui 

A jargon, a mere philanthrope 

Unless you make their betters better: — Fie! 
I thought you had more religion, Mrs. Fry. 

LXXXVL 

Teach them the decencies of good threescore: 

Cure them ol tours, Hussar and Highland dri ■ 
Tell them that youth ence gone returns no more; 

lured hllZZaS re leem no land's distr< 
Tell them Sir W-ll— m C-rt-s is a bore, 

Too dull even for the dulli I ol i cesses — 
The witless Palstaff of a hoary Hal, 
A fool whose bells have cea ed to nog at all;— 

I.XXXVII. 
Tell Ihem, though it may be perhaps too late, 

On life's worn confine, jaded, bloated, Bated, 
To Bet up vain pretences of being great, 

'Tis not so to be good; and be il stated, 
The worthies! kings have ever loved least state; 

And tell them but you won't, and I have prated 

.In t now enough; but by and by I'll prattle 
Like Roland's horn in Uoncesvalles' battle. 



CANTO XI. 



i. 

Wheh Bishop Berkeley said "there was no mtttcr' 

Ana proved it — 'twas no matter what he said: 
They say his in vain to batter. 

Too subtle for the airiest human head ; 
And yet who can believe it? I wool. I shatter, 

Gladly, all matters down to stone or lead, 
Or adamant, to find the wo, M a spirit, 
And wear my heal, denying ihal I wear it. 

ii. 

What a sublime discovery 'twas, to make ihe 

Universe ui 
That all's ileal— all Ourttlva? I'll stake tlm 

World (be it what you will) that that 
Oh, doubt ! — if thou be'st doubt, lor whi( h some tah* 

Bul which I doubt extremely — thou sole pn m 
Of the truth's rays, spoil not my draught of spirit 1 

'.. brandy — Otoujjli our brain can hardly bear u 



r>60 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XL 



III. 

For, ever and anon comes indigestion 

(Nut the most "dainty Ariel"), and perplexes 

Our soarings with another sort of question : 
And that which, after all, my spirit vexes 

Is, that I find no spot where man can rest eye on, 
Without confusion of the sorts and sexes, 

Of beings, stars, and this unriddled wonder, 

The world, which at the worst 's a glorious blunder — 

IV. 
If it be chance ; or if it be according 

To the old text, still better! lest it should 
Turn out so, we '11 say nothing 'gainst the wording, 

As several people think such hazards rude: 
They 're right ; our days are too brief for affording 

Space to dispute what no one ever could 
Decide, and every body one day will 
Know very clearly — or at least lie still. 

V. 

And therefore will I leave off metaphysical 
Discussion, which is neither here nor there: 

If I agree that what is, is — then this I call 
Being quite perspicuous and extremely fair. 

The truth is, I've grown lately rather phthisical: 
I don't know what the reason is — the air 

Perhaps ; but as I suffer from the shocks 

Of illness, I grow much more orthodox. 

VI. 

The first attack at once proved the divinity 
(But that I never doubted, nor the devil); 

The next, the Virgin's mystical virginity ; 
The third, the usual origin of evil ; 

The fourth at once establish'd the whole Trinity 
On so incontrovertible a level, 

That I devoutly wish the three were four, 

On purpose to believe so much the more. 

VII. 

To our theme: — The man who has stood on the Acropolis, 
And look'd down over Attica ; or he 

Who has sail'd where picturesque Constantinople is, 
Or seen Tombuctoo, or hath taken tea 

In small-eyed China's crockery-ware metropolis, 
Or sat amidst the bricks of Nineveh, 

May not think much of London's first appearance — 

But ask him what he thinks of it a year hence? 

VIII. 

Don Juan had got oui on Shooter's Hill — 

Sunset the time, the place the same declivity 
Which looks along that vale of good and ill 

Where London streets ferment in full activity ; 
While every thing around was calm and still, 

Except the creak of wheels, which on their pivot he 
Heard — and that bee-like, bubbling, busy hum 
Of cities, that boils over with their scum : — 

IX. 
I say, Don Juan, wrapt in contemplation, 

Walk'd on behind his carriage, o'er the summit, 
And, lost in wonder of so great a nation, 

Gave way to 't, since he could not overcome it. 
•' And here," he cried, " is Freedom's chosen station ; 

Here peals the people's voice, nor can entomb it 
RacKs, prisons, inquisitions ; resurrection 
A *i"» n, eacn new meeting or election. 



X. 

" Here are chaste wives, pure lives ; here people pay 
But what they please ; and if that tilings be dear, 

'T is only that they love to throw away 

Their cash, to show how much they have a-year. 

Here laws are all inviolate; none lay 
Traps for the traveller, every highway's clear: 

Here " he was interrupted by a knife, 

With " Damn your eyes ! your money or vour life." 

XI. 

These free-born sounds proceeded from four pads, 
In ambush laid, who had perceived him loiter 

Behind his carriage ; and, like handy lads, 
Had seized the lucky hour to reconnoitre, 

In which the heedless gentleman who gads 
Upon the road, unless he prove a fighter, 

May find himself, within that isle of riches, 

Exposed to lose his life as well as breeches. 

XII. 

Juan, who did not understand a word 

Of English, save their shibboleth, "God damn!" 
And even that he had so rarely heard, 

He sometimes thought 't was only their " salam," 
Or "God be with you," — and 'tis not absurd 

To think so ; for, half English as I am 
(To my misfortune), never can I say 
I heard them wish " God with you," save that way :— 

XIII. 

Juan yet quickly understood their gesture, 
And, being somewhat choleric and sudden, 

Drew forth a pocket-pistol from his vesture, 
And fired it into one assailant's pudding — 

Who fell, as rolls an ox o'er in his pasture, 
And roar'd out, as he writhed his native mud in. 

Unto his nearest follower or henchman, 

" Oh Jack ! I 'm floor'd by that 'ere bloody Frenchman !" 

XIV. 

On which Jack and his train set off at speed, 
• And Juan's suite, late scatter'd at a distance, 
Came up, all marvelling at such a deed, 

And offering, as usual, late assistance. 
Juan, who saw the moon's late minion bleed 

As if his veins would pour out his existence, 
Stood calling out for bandages and lint, 
And wish'd he 'd been less hasty with his flint. 

XV. 

" Perhaps," thought he, " it is the country's wont 

To welcome foreigners in this way : now 
I recollect some innkeepers who don't 

Differ, except in robbing with a bow, 
In lieu of a bare blade and brazen front. 

But what is to be done? I can't allow 
The fellow to lie groaning on the road: 
So take him up ; I '11 help you with the load." 

XVI. 
But, ere they could perform this pious duty, 

The dying man cried, " Hold ! I 've got my gruel : 
Oh! for a glass of max! We've miss'd our booty ; 

Let me die where I am!" And, as the fuel 
Of life shrunk in his heart, and thick and sooty 

The drops fell from his death-wound, and he drew ill 
His breath, he from his swelling throat untied 
A kerchief, crying "Give Sal that!" — and died. 



CANTO XL 



DON JUAN 



661 



XVII. 

The cravat, stain'd with bloody drops, fell down 
Before Don Juan's feet : he could not tell 

Exactly why it was before him thrown, 

Nor what the meaning of the man's farewell. 

Poor Tom was once a kiddy upon town, 
A thorough varmint, and a real swell, 

Full flash, all fancy, until fairly diddled — 

His pockets first, and then his body riddled. 

XVIII. 

Don Juan, having done the best he could 

In all the circumstances of the case, 
As soon as "crowncr's quest" allow 'd, pursued 

His travels to the capital apace ; — 
Esteeming it a little hard he should 

In twelve hours' time, a very little space, 
Have been obliged to slay a free-born native 
In self-defence : this made him meditative. 

XIX. 

He from the world had cut off a great man, 
Who in his time had made heroic bustle. 

Who in a row like Tom could lead the van, 
Booze in the ken, or at the spellken hustle ? 

Who queer a flat? Who (spite of Bow -street's ban) 
On the high toby-spice so flash the muzzle? 

Who on a lark, with black-eyed Sal (his blowing), 

So prime, so swell, so nutty, and so knowing ? ' 

XX. 

But Tom's no more — and so no more of Tom. 

Heroes must die; and by God's blessing, 'tis 
Not long before the most of them go home. — 

Hail ! Thamis, hail ! Upon thy verge it is 
That Juan's chariot, rolling like a drum 

In thunder, holds the way it can't well miss, 
Through Kcnnington and all the other "tons," 
Which make us wish ourselves in town at once ; 

XXI. 

Through groves, so call'd as being void of trees, 

(Like lucux from no light); through prospects named 
Mount Pleasant, as containing nought to please, 

Nor much to climb ; through little boxes framed 
Of bricks, to let the dust in at your ease, 

With " To be let," upon their doors proclaim'd ; 
Through "rows" most modestly call'd "Paradise," 
Which Eve might quit without much sacrifice ; — 

XXII. 
Through coaches, drays, choked turnpikes, and a whirl 

Of wheels, and roar of voices, and confusion ; 
Here taverns wooing to a pint of "purl," 

There mails fast flying otT like a delusion ; 
There barbers' blocks with periwigs in curl 

In windows ; here the lamp-lighter's infusion 
Slowly distill'd into the glimmering glass — 
(For in those days we had not got to gas): 

XXIII. 
Through this, and much and more, is the approach 

Of travellers to mighty Babylon: 
Whether they come by horse, or chaise, or coach, 

With slight exceptions, all the ways seem one. 
I could sav more, but do not choose to encroach 

Upon the guide-1 k's privilege. The sun 

Had set some time, and nighl was on the ridge 
Of twilight, as the party cross'd the bri 
3 i '2 



XXIV. 

That 's rather fine, the gentle sound of Thamis — 
Who vindicates a moment too his stream — 

Though hardly heard through multifarious "dani'mes." 
The lamps of Westminster's more regular gleam, 

The breadth of pavement, and yon shrine where Fame ia 
A spectral resident — whose pallid beam 

In shape of moonshine hovers o'er the pile — 

Make this a sacred part of Albion's isle. 

XXV. 

The Druids' groves are gone — so much the better: 
Stone-Henge is not — but what the devil is it? — 

Rut Bedlam still exists with its sage fetter, 
That madmen may not bite you on a visit ; 

The Bench too seats or suits full many a debtor; 
The Mansion-house, too (though some people quiz it), 

To me appears a stilT yet grand erection ; 

But then the Abbey's worth the whole collection. 

XXVI. 

The line of lights too up to Charing-Cross, 
Pali-Mall, and so forth, have a coruscation, 

Like gold as in comparison to dross, 

Match'd with the continent's illumination, 

Whose cities night by no means deigns to gloss : 
The French were not yet a lamp-lighting nation, 

And when they grew so — on their new-found lantern, 

Instead of wicks, they made a wicked man turn. 

XXVII. 

A row of gentlemen along the stieits 

Suspended, may illuminate mankind, 
As also bonfires made of country-stats ; 

But the old way is best for the purblind : 
The other looks like phosphorus on sheets, 

A sort of ignis fatuus to the mind, 
Which, though 't is certain to perplex and frighten, 
Must burn more mildly ere it can enlighten. 

XXVIII. 

But London 's so well lit, that if Diogenes 
Could recommence to hunt his honest man, 

And found him not amidst the various progenies 
Of this enormous city's spreading spawn, 

'T was not for want of lamps to aid his dodging his 
Yet undiscover'd treasure. What J can, 

I 've done to find the same throughout life's journey, 

But see the world is only one attorney. 

XXIX. 

Over the stones still rattling, up Pall-Mali, 

Through crowds and carriages — but waxing tlnnnet 
As thunder'd knockers broke the long-scal'd spell 

Of doors 'gainst duns, and to an early dinner 
Admitted a small party as night fell, — 

Don Juan, our young diplomatic sinnei, 
Pursued his path, and drove past some hotels, 
St. James's Palace and St. James's "Hells." 1 

XXX. 
Theyreach'd the hotel: forth stream'd from the front arn* 

A tide of well-clad waiters, and around 
The mob stood, and as usual several score 

Of those pedestrian Paphiana who abound 
In decent London when the daylight's o'er, 

Commodious but immortal, they are found 
Useful, like Malthus, in promoting marriage: 
Hut Juan now is stepping from his lairu^r-. 



£62 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO Xl 



XXXI. 

Into one of the sweetest of hotels, 

Especially fur foreigners — and mostly 
For those whom favour or whom fortune swells, 

And cannot find a bill's small items costly. 
There many an envoy either dwelt or dwells 

(The den of many a diplomatic lost lie), 
Until to some conspicuous square they pass, 
And blazon o'er the door their names in brass. 

XXXII. 

Juan, whose was a delicate commission, 
Private, though publicly important, bore 

No title to point out with due precision 
The exact affair on which he was sent o'er. 

T was merely known that on a secret mission 
A foreigner of rank had graced our shore, 

Young, handsome, and accomplish'd, who was said 

(In whispers) to have turn'd his sovereign's head. 

XXXIII. 

Some rumour also of some strange adventures • 
Had gone before him, and his wars and loves ; • 

And as romantic heads are pretty painters, 
And above all, an Englishwoman's roves 

Into the excursive, breaking the indentures 
Of sober reason, wheresoe'er it moves, 

lie found himself extremely in the fashion, 

Which serves our thinking people for a passion. 

XXXIV. 

I don't mean that they are passionless, but quite 
The contrary ; but then 'l is in the head ; 

Yet, as the consequences are as bright 
As if they acted with the heart instead, 

What after all can signify the site 
Of ladies' lucubrations ? So they lead 

In safety to the place for which they start, 

What matters if the road be head or heart? 

XXXV. 

Juan presented in the proper place, 

To proper p.acemen, every Russ credential ; 
And was received with all the due grimace, 

By those who govern in the mood potential, 
Who, seeing a handsome stripling with smooth face, 

Thought (what in state affairs is most essential) 
That they as easily might do the youngster, 
As hawks may pounce upon a woodland songster. 

XXXVI. 
They err'd, as aged men will do ; but by 

And by we '11 talk of that ; and if we don't, 
T will be because our notion is not high 

Of politicians and theC double front, 
Who lives by lies, yet dare not boldly lie : — 

Now what I love in women is, they won't 
Or can't do otherwise than lie, but do it 
So well, the very truth seems falsehood to it. 

XXXVII. 

And, aftrr all, what is a lie? 'T is but 
The truth in masquerade ; and I defy 

FTistonans, heroes, lawyers, priests, to put 
A fact without some leaven of a lie. 

The very shadow of true truth would shut 
Up annals, revelations, poesy, 

Anil prophecy — except it should be dated 

Some years bcfo'C the incidents related. 



XXXVIII. 
Praised be all liars and all lies! Who now 

Can tax my mild Muse with misanthropy.' 
She rings the world's " Te Dcum," and her bn>w 

Blushes for those who will not: — but to sigh 
Is idle ; let us, like most others, bow, 

Kiss hands, feet — any part of Majesty, 
After the good example of " Green Erin," 
Whose shamrock now seems rather worse for weantrj. 

XXXIX. 

Don Juan was presented, and his dress 

And mien excited general admiration — 
I don't know which was most admired or less: 

One monstrous diamond drew much observation, 
Which Catherine, in a moment of "ivresse" 
(In love or brandy's fervent fermentation), 
Bestow'd upon him as the public learnM ; 
And, to say truth, it had been fairly earn'd. 

XL. 
Besi les the ministe-s and underlings, 

Who must be courteous to the accredited 
Diplomatists of rather wavering kings, 
Until their royal riddle 's fully read, 
The very clerks — those somewhat dirty springs 

Of olficc, or the house of office, fed 
By foul cormption into streams — even they 
Were hardly rude enough to earn their pay: 

XLI. 
And insolence no doubt is what they are 

Employ'd for, since it is their daily labour, 
In the dear offices of peace or war ; 
And should you doubt, pray ask of your next neigh- 
bour, 
When for a passport, or some other bar 

To freedom, he applied (a grief and a bore) 
If he found not this spawn of tax-bom riches, 

Like lap-dogs, the least civil sons of b s. 

XLII. 
But Juan was received with much " empressement :" — 

These phrases of refinement I must borrow 
From our next neighbour's land, where, like a chessman, 

There is a move set down for joy or sorrow, 
Not only in mere talking, but the press. Man, 

In islands, is, it seems, downright and thorough, 
More than on continents — as if the sea 
(See Billingsgate) made even the tongue more free. 

XLIII. 
And yet the British "dam'me"'s rather Attic: 

Your continental oaths are but incontinent, 
And turn on things which no aristocratic 

Spirit would name, and therefore even I won't ancnt J 
This subject quote, as it would be schismatic 

In politesse, and have a sound affronting in't: — 
But u datn'me" 's quite ethereal, though too daring— . 
Platonic blasphemy, the soul of swearing. 

XLIV. 
For downright rudeness, ye may stay at home ; 
For true or false politeness (and scarce thai 
JYow) you may cross the blue deep and white foam— 

The first the emblem (rarely though) of whaJ 
You leave behind, the next of much you come 

To meet. However, 't is no time to chat 
On general topics: poems must confine 
I Themselves to unity, like this of mine. 



1ANT0 XL 



DON JUAN. 



6G3 



XLV. 

m the great world, — which, being interpreted, 
Meaneth the west or worst end of the city, 
And about twice two thousand people bred 
By no means 'to be very wise or witty, 
But to sit up while others lie in bed, 

And look down on the universe with pity- 
Juan, as an inveterate patrician, 
Was well received by persons of condition. 

XLVI. 

He was a bachelor, w hich is a matter 
Of import both to virgin arid to bride, 

The former's hymeneal hopes to flatter ; 

And (should she not hold fast by love or pride) 

'T is also of some moment to the latter : 
A rib 's a thorn in a wed gallant's side, 

Requires decorum, and is apt to double 

The horrid sin — and, what's still worse, the trouble. 

XLVII. 

But Juan was a bachelor — of arts, 

And parts, and hearts : he danced and sung, and had 
An air as sentimental as Mozart's 

Softest of melodies ; and could be sad 
Or cheerful, without any " flaws or starts," 

Just at the proper time ; and, though a lad, 
Had seen the world — which is a curious sight, 
And very much unlike what people write. 

XLVTII. 

Fair virgins blush'd upon him ; wedded dames 
Bloom'd also in less transitory hues ; 

For both commodities dwell by the Thames, 
The painting and the painted ; youth, ceruse, 

Against his heart preferr'd their usual claims, 
Such as no gentleman can quite refuse ; 

Daughters admired his dress, and pious mothers 

Inquired his income, and if he had brothers. 

XLIX. 

The milliners who furnish "drapery misses"* 
Throughout the season, upon speculation 

Of payment ere the honeymoon's last kisses 
Have waned into a crescent's coruscation, 

Thought such an opportunity as this is, 
Of a rich foreigner's initiation, 

Not to be overlook'd, and gave such credit, 

That future bridegrooms swore, and sigh'd, and paid it. 

L. 

1 he Blues, that tender tribe, who sigh o'er sonnets, 

And with the pages of the last review 
Line the interior of their heads or bonnets, 

Advanced in all their azure's highest hue: 
They ta'.k'd bad French of Spanish, and upon its 

Late authors ask'd him for a hint or two ; 
And which was softest, Russian or Castihan ? 
And whether in his travels he saw Ilion ? 

LI. 
Juan, who was a little superficial, 

And not in literature a great Drawcansir, 
Examined by this learned and especial 

Jury of matrons, scarce knew what to answer: 
Kis duties warlike, loving, or official, 

His steady application as a dancer, 
Had kept him from the brink of Hippocrene, 
Which now he found was blue instead of green. 



LH. 

However, he replied at hazard, with 

A modest confidence and calm assurance, 

Which lent his learned lucubrations pith, 

And pass'd for arguments of good endurance. 

That prodigv, Miss Aramiuta Smith, 

(Who al sixteen, translated "Hercules Furens" 

Into as furious English), with her best look, 

Set down his sayings in her commonplace book. 

LIII. 

Juan knew several languages — as well 

He might — and brought them up with skill, in timo 
To save his fame with each accomplished belle, 

Who still regretted that he did not rhyme. 
There wanted but this requisite to swell 

His qualities (with them) into sublime: 
Lady Fitz-Frisky, and Miss Mffivia ."Mannish, 
Hoth long'd extremely to be sung in Spanish. 

LIV. 

However he did pretty well, and was 

Admitted as an aspirant to all 
The coteries, and, as in Banquo's glass, 

At great assemblies or in parlies smart, 
He saw ten thousand living authors pass, 

That being about their average numeral ; 
Also the eighty " greatest living poets," 
As every paltry magazine can show its. 

LV. 

In twice five years the " greatest living poet," 
Like to the champion in the fisty ring, 

Is call'd on to support his claim, or show it, 
Although 't is an imaginary thing. 

Even I — albeit I 'in sure I did not know it, 
Nor sought of foolscap subjects to be king — 

Was reckon'd, a considerable time, 

The grand Napoleon of the realms of rhyme. 

LVI. 

But Juan was my Moscow, and Falicro 
My Leipsic, and my Mont-Saint-Jean seems Cain ; 

"La Belle Alliance" of dunces down at zero, 
Now that the lion's fall'n, may rise again - 

Hut I will fall at least as fell my hero; 
Nor reign at all, or as a monarch reigr. ; 

Or to some lonely isle of jailors go, 

With turncoat Southey for my turnkey Lowe. 

LVII. 
Sir Walter reign'd before me; Moore and Campbe!* 

Hi due and after; but now, grown more holy, 
The Muses upon Sion's hill must ramble 

With poets almost clergymen, or wholly; 



LVI 1 1. 



064 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO Xi 



LIX. 

Then (here's my gentle Euphucs, who, they say, 
Sets up for being a sort of mural me; 

He'll find it rather difficult some day 
To turn out both, or either, it may be. 

Some persons think that Coleridge hath the sway; 
And Wordsworth has supporters, two or three ; 

And that deep-mouth'd Boeotian, " Savage Landor," 

lias taken for a swan rogue Southey's gander. 

LX. 

John Keats — who was kill'd off by one critique, 
Just as he really promised something great, 

If not intelligible, without Greek 

Contrived to talk about the gods of late, 

Much as they might have been supposed to speak. 
Poor fellow ! his was an untoward fate : 

'Tis strange the mind, that very fiery particle, 5 

Should let itself be snuff'd out by an article. 

LXI. 

The list grows long of live and dead pretenders 
To that which none will gain— or none will know 

The cotupieror at least ; who, ere Time renders 
His last award, will have the long grass grow 

Above his burnt-out brain and sapless cinders. 
If I might augur, I should rate but low 

Their chances ; they're too numerous, like the thirty 

Mock tyrants, when Rome's annals wax'd but dirty. 

LXII. 

This is the literary lower empire, 

Where the Praetorian bands take up the matter ; — 
A " dreadful trade," like his who " gathers samphire," 

The insolent soldiery to soothe and flatter, 
With the same feelings as you'd coax a vampire. 

Now, were I once at home, and in good satire, 
I 'd try conclusions with those janizaries, 
And show them what an intellectual war is. 

LXIII. 

1 think I know a trick or two, would turn 

Their flanks ; — but it is hardly worth my while 

With such small gear to give myself concern: 
Indeed I 've not the necessary bile; 

My natural temper's really aught but stern, 
And even my Muse's worst reproof's a smile ; 

And then she drops a brief and modest curtsy, 

And glides away, assured she never hurts ye. 

LXIV. 

My Juan, whom I left in deadly peril 

Amongst live poets and blue ladies, pass'd 
With some small prcfit through that field so sterile. 

Being tired in time, and neither least nor last, 
Left it before tic had been treated very ill ; 

And henceforth found himself more gaily class'd 
Amongst the higher spirits of the day, 
The sun's true son — no vapour, but a ray. 

LXV. 
nis moms he pass'd in business — which, dissected, 

Was like all business, a laborious nothing, 
That .eaas to lassitude, the most infected 

And Centaur Nessus garb of mortal clothing, 
And on our sofas makes us lie dejected, 

And talk in tender horrors of our loathing 
All kinds of toil, save for our country's good — 
«Vhicb grows no better, though 'tis time it should 



LXVI. 

His afternoons he pass'd in visits, luncheons, 
Lounging, and boxing; and the twilight hour 

In riding round those vegetable puncheons, 

Call'd "Parks," where there is neither fruit nor flowo 

Enough to gratify a bee's slight munehings ; 
But after all, it is the only "bower" 

(In Moore's phrase) where the fashionable fair 

Can form a slight acquaintance with fresh air. 

LXVII. 

Then dress, then dinner, then awakes the world ! 

Then glare the lamps, then whirl the wheels, then roa 
Through street and square fast-flashing chariots, hurl'* 

Like hamess'd meteors ! then along the floor 
Chalk'd mimics painting; then festoons are twirl'd, 

Then roll the brazen thunders of the door, 
Which opens to the thousand happy few 
An earthly paradise of "or molu." 

LXVIII. 

There stands the noble hostess, nor shall sink 
With the three-thousandth curtsy; there the waltz—* 

The only dance which teaches girls to think — 
Makes one in love even with its very faults. 

Saloon, room, all o'erflow beyond their brink, 
And long the latest of arrivals halts, 

'Midst royal dukes and dames condemn'd to climb 

And gain an inch of staircase at a time. 

LXIX. 

Thrice happy he who, after a survey 
Of the good company, can win a corner, 

A door that's in, or boudoir out of the way, 
Where he may fix himself, like small "Jack Horner, 

And let the Babel round run as it may, 
And look on as a mourner, or a scorner, 

Or an approver, or a mere spectator, 

Yawning a little as the night grows later. 

LXX. 

But this won't do, save by and by ; and he 
Who, like Don Juan, takes an active share, 

Must steer with care through all that glittering sea 
Of gems and plumes, and pearls and silks, to whert 

He deems it is his proper place to be ; 
Dissolving in the waltz to some soft air, 

Or proudlier prancing with mercurial skill 

Where science marshals forth her own quadrme. 

LXXI. 

Or, if he dance not, but hath higher views 

Upon an heiress, or his neighbour's bride, 
Let him take care that that which he pursues 

Is not at once too palpably descried. 
Full many an eager gentleman oft rues 

His haste : impatience is a blundering guide, 
Amongst a people famous for reflection, 
Who like to play the fool with circumspection. 

LXXII. 
Put, if you can contrive, get next at supper; 

Or, if forestall'd, get opposite and ogle: — 
Oh, ye ambrosial moments! always upper 

In mind, a sort of sentimental bogle, 
Which sits for ever upon memory's crupper, 

The ghost of vanish'd pleasures once in voguw < 
Can tender souls relate the rise and fall 
Of hopes and fears which shake a single ball. 



CANTO XL 



DON JUAN. 



GGb 



LXXIII. 

But these precautionary hints can touch 

Only the common run, who must pursue, 
And watch, and ward ; whose plans a word too much 

Or little overturns ; and not the few 
Or many (for the number's sometimes such) 

Whom a good mien, especially if new, 
Or fame, or name, for wit, war, sense, or nonsense, 
Permits whate'er they please, or did not long since. 

LXXIV. 
Our hero, as a hero, young and handsome, 

Noble, rich, celebrated, and a stranger, 
Like other slaves of course must pay his ransom 

Before he can escape from so much danger 
As will environ a conspicuous man. Some 

Talk about poetry, and " rack and manger," 
Am! ugliness, disease, as toil and trouble ; — 
I wish they knew the life of a young noble. 

LXXV. 
They are young, but know not youth — it is anticipated; 

Handsome but wasted, rich without a sous ; 
Their vigour in a thousand arms is dissipated ; 

Their cash comes from, their wealth goes to, a Jew; 
Both senates see their nightly votes participated 

Between the tyrant's and the tribune's crew ; 
And, having voted, dined, drank, gamed, and whored, 
Tile family vault receives another lord. 

LXXVI. 
• l Where is the world," cries Young, " at eighty? Where 

The world in which a man was born ?" Alas ! 
Where is the world of eight years past? Twos there — 

I look for it — 'tis gone, a globe of glass! 
Crack'd, shiver'd, vanish'd, scarcely gazed on ere 

A silent change dissolves the glittering mass. 
Statesmen, chiefs, orators, queen:;, patriots, kings, 
And dandies, all are gone on the wind's wings. 

LXXVIL 
Where is Napoleon the Grand ? God knows: 

Where little Castlereagh? The devil can tell: 
Where Grattan, Curran, Sheridan, all those 

W T ho bound the bar or senate in their spell ? 
Where is the unhappy queen, with all her woes ? 

And where the daughter, whom the isles loved well? 
Where are those martyr'd saints, the live per cents? 
And where— oil, where the devil are the rents? 

LXXVIII. 
Where's Bruinmel ? Dish'd. Where's Long Pole 
Wellesley ? Diddled. 

Where's Whitbread ? Romi'.ly? Where 's George 
the Third ? 
Where is his will? (That 's not so soon unriddled). 

And where is " Film" the Fourth, our " royal bird.'" 
Gone down it seems to Scotland, to be li 

Unto by Sawney's violin, we have heard : 
"Caw me, caw thee" — for six months bath been hatching 
This scene of royal itch and loyal scratching. 

LXXIX. 
Where is Lord This? And where my Lady That 7 

The Honourable Mistresses and Misses? 
Some laid aside like an old opera-hat, 

Married, unmarried, and remarried — (ibis is 
An evolution oft perform'd <>f late). 

Where are the Dublin shouts — and London hisses ? 
Where are the Grenvilles ? Turn'd, as usual. Where 
ftlv friends the Whigs ? Exactly where they were. 
89 



LXXX. 

Where are the Lady Carolines and Franceses? 

Divorced or doing thereanent. Ye annals 
So brilliant, where the list of routs and dances is — 

Thou Morning Post, sole record of the panels 
Broken in carriages, and all the phantasies 

Of fashion — say what streams now fill those channels? 
Some die, some fly, some languish on the continent, 
Because the times have hardly left them one tenant. 

LXXXI. 
Some who once set their cap at cautious dukes, 
Have taken up at length with younger brothers; 

S heiresses have bit at sharpers 1 hocks; 

Some mauls have been made wives — some merely 
mothers ; 
Others have lost their fresh and fairy looks : 

In short, the list of alterations bothers. 
There's little strange in this, but something strange is 
The unusual quickness of these common changes. 

LXXXII. 

Talk not of seventy years as as. r e ; in seven 

I have seen more changes, down from monarchs to 

The humblest individual under heaven, 

Than might suffice a moderate century through. 

I knew that nought was lasting, but now even 
Change grows too changeable, without being new: 

Nought 's permanent among the human race, 

Except the Whigs not getting into place. 

LXXX1II. 

I have seen Napoleon, who seem'd quite a Jupiter, 

Shrink to a Saturn. I have seen a duke 
(No matter which) turn politician stupider, 

If that can well be, than his wooden look. 
But it is time that I should hoist my " blue Peter,'' 

And sail for a new theme : I have seen — and shook 
To see it — the king hiss'd, and then caress'd ; 
But don't pretend to settle which was best. 

LXXXIV. 
I have seen the landholders without a rap — 

I have seen Johanna Southcote — I have seen 
The House of Commons turn'd to a tax-trap — 

I have seen that sad affair of the late queen — 
I have seen crowns worn instead of a fool's-cap — 

I have seen a Congress doing all that's mean— 
I have seen some nations like o'erloaded asses 
Kick off' their burthens — meaning the high classes. 

LXXXV. 
I have seen small poets, ami great proscrs, and 

Interm i n.-> bit — not eternal — speakers— 
I have seen the funds at war with house and land— 

I Ye seen the eounlrv gentlemen turn squeakers— 
I've seen the people ridden o'er like • 

By slaves on horseback — I have seen malt liquon 

Exchanged for ''thin potations" by John Bull — 
I've seen John half detect himself a fool. 

LXXXVI. 
Bui "carpe diem," Juan, u carpe, carpe!" 

To-morrOW sees another race t 

Ai.d transient, and devoured by the same harpy. 

"Life's a poor player" — then " piay out the pray 
Ye villains!" and, above all, kit ,i a sharp eye 

Much less on what yon do than what you say: 
Be hypocritical) be cautious, bo 
Not what you ieem. but always what you set. 



66G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO X1L 



LXXXVII. 

But how shall I relate in other cantos 

Of what befell our hero, in the land 
Which 't is the common cry and lie to vaunt as 

A morai country ? But I hold my hand — 
For I disdain to write an Atalantis ; 

Hut 'lis as well at once to understand, 
You are not a moral people, and you know it, 
Without the aid of too sincere a poet. 

LXXXVIII. 

What Juan saw and underwent shall be 
My topic, with of course the due restriction 

is required by proper courtesy ; 
And recollect the work is only fiction, 

And that I sing of neither mine nor me. 
Though every scribe, in some slight turn of diction, 

Wiil hint allusions never meant. Ne'er doubt 

This — when I speak, I don't hint, but speak out. 

LXXXIX. 

Whether he married with the third or fourth 
Offspring of some sage, husband-hunting countess, 

Or whether with some virgin of more worth 
([ mean in fortune's matrimonial bounties) 

He took to regularly peopling earth, 

Of which your lawful awful wedlock fount is — 

Or whether he was taken in for damages, 

For being too excursive in his homages— 

XC. 

1= vet within the unread events of time. 

Thus far, go forth, thou lay, which I will back 
Against the same given quantity of rhyme, 

For being as much the subject of attack 
As ever yet was any work sublime, 

By those who love to say that white is black. 
So much the better ! — I may stand alone, 
But would not change my free thoughts for a thr«re 



CANTO XII. 



i. 

Or all the barbarous middle ages, that 

Which is most barbarous is the middle age 
Of man ; it is — I really scarce know what ; 

But when we hover between fool and sage, 
And don't knosv justly what we would be at — 

A period something like a printed pai'p, 
Black-letter upon foolscap, while our hair 
Grows grizzled, and we are not what we were ; — 

II. 
Too old for youth — too young, at thirty-five, 

To herd with buys, or hoard with good threescore- 
( wonacr people should be left alive ; 

But, since they arc, that epoch is a bore : 
Love lingers still, although 'twere late to wive; 

And as for other love, the illusion 's o'er ; 
And money, that most pure imagination, 
Gleams only tnrough the dawn of its creation. 



III. 

Oh gold! why call we misers miserable? 

Theirs is the pleasure that can never pall ; 
The rs is the best bower-anchor, the chain-cable 

Which holds fast other pleasures great and small. 
Ye who but sec the saving man at table, 

And scorn his temperate board, as none at all, 
And wonder bo* the wealthy can !»■ sparing, 
Know not what visions spring from each cheese-paring. 

IV. 
Love or lust makes man sick, and wine much sicker - 

Ambition rends, and gal g gains a loss ; 

But making money, slowly first, then quicker, 
And adding still a little through each cross 

(Which '• ■•'// come over things), heats love or liquor, 
The gamester's counter, or the statesman's dross. 

Oli gold ! I still prefer theo unto paper, 

Which makes bank credit like a bark of vapour. 

V. 

Who hold the balance of the world ? Who reign 
O'er Congress, whether royalist or liberal? 

Who rouse the shirtless patriots of Spain 

(That make old Europe's journals squeak and gib- 
ber all) ? 

Who keep the world, both old and new, in pain 
Or pleasure? Who make politics run giibber all J 

The shade of Bonaparte's noble daring? — 

Jew Rothschild, and his fellow, Christian Baring. 

vr. 

Those, and the truly liberal Lafitte, 

Are the true lords of Europe. Every loan 

Is not a merely speculative hit, 

But seats a nation or upsets a throne. 

Republics also get involved a bit ; 

Colombia's stock hath holders not unknown 
tOn 'Change; and even thy silver soil, Peru, 

Must get itself discounted by a Jew. 

VII. 

Why call the miser miserable ? as 

I said before: the frugal life is his, 
Which in a saint or cynic ever was 

The theme of praise: a hermit would not miss 
Canonization for the self-same cause, 

And wherefore blame gaunt wealth's austerities? 
Because, von '11 say, nought calls for such a trial ; — 
Then there's more merit in his self-denial. 

VIII. 
fie is your only poet ; — passion, pure 

And sparkling on from heap to heap, displa 's, 
Potsess'd, the ore, of which mere hopes allure 

Nations athwart ihe deep: the golden rayy 
Flash up in ingots frcrn the mine obscure ; 

On him the diamord pours its brilliant blai , 
While the mild emerald'; beam shades down i v i »es 
Of other stones, to soothe the miser's eyes. 

IX. 
The lands on either side are his : the sh-p 

From Ceylon, Inde, cr far Cathay, unloads 
For him the fragrant produce of each trip j 

Beneath his cars of Ceres groan the roadi 
And the vine blushes like Aurora's lip; 

His very cellars might be kings' abodes; 
While he, despising every sensual call, 
Commands — the intellectual lord of ail. 



CANTO XII. 



DON JUAN. 



667 



X. 

Perhaps he hath great projects in his mind, 
To build a college, or to found a race, 

A hospital, a church, — and leave behind 

Some dome surmounted by his meagre face : 

Perhaps he fain would liberate mankind 

Even with the very ore which makes them base ; 

Perhaps he would be wealthiest of his nation, 

Or revel in the joys of calculation. 

XL 

But whether all, or each, or none of these 
May be the hoarder's principle of action, 

The fool will cali such mania a disease : — 

What is his own? Go -look at each transaction, 

Wars, revels, loves — do these bring men more ease 
Than the mere plodding thro' each " vulgar fraction ?" 

Or do they benefit mankind? Lean miser! 

Let spendthrifts' heirs inquire of yours — who 's wiser ? 

XII. 

How beauteous are rouleaus ! how charming chests 
Containing ingots, bags of dollars, coins 

(Not of old victors, all whose heads and crests 
Weigh not the thin ore where their visage shines, 

But) of fine unclipp'd gold, where dully rests 

Some likeness which the glittering cirque confines, 

Of modern, reigning, sterling, stupid stamp : — 

Yes ! ready money is Aladdin's lamp. 

XIIL 

" Love rules the camp, the court, the grove," — " for love 
Is heaven, and heaven is love :" — so sings the bard ; 

Which it were rather difficult to prove, 
(A thing with poetry in general hard). 

Perhaps there may be something in M the grove," 
At least it rhymes to "love;" but I'm prepared 

To doubt (no less than landlords of their rental) 

If "courts" and "camps" be quite so sentimental. 

XIV. 

But if love don't, cash does, and cash alone : 

Cash rules the grove, and fells it too besides; 
Without cash, camps were thin, and courts were none ; 

Without cash, Malthus tells you — "take no brides." 
So cash rules love the ruler, on his own 

High ground, as Virgin Cynthia sways the tides ; 
And, as for " heaven" being "love," why not say honey 
Is wax? Heaven is not love, 'tis matrimony. 

XV. 
Is not all love prohibited whatever, 

Excepting marriage? which is bvc, no doubt, 
After a sort ; but somehow people never 

With the same thought the two words have help'd out: 
Love may exist with marriage, and should ever, 

And marriage also may exist without, 
But love sans bans is both a sin and shame, 
And ought to go by quite another name. 

XVI. 

Now if the "court" and "camp" and "grove" be not 
Recruited all with constant married men, 

Who nevci coveted their neighbour's lot, 
I say that line's a lapsus of the pen ; — 

Strange too in my "buon camerado" Scott, 
So celebrated for his morals, when 

My Jeffrey held him up as an example 

To me ; — of which these morals are a sample. 



XVII. 

Well, if I don't succeed, I have succeeded, 
And that 's enough ; succeeded in my youth, 

The only time when much success is needed : 
And my success produced what I in sooth 

Cared most about ; it need not now be pleaded— 
Whate'er it was, 't was mine ; I 've paid, in truth, 

Of late, the penalty of such success, 

But have not learn'd to wish it any less. 

XVIII. 
That suit in Chancery, — which some persons plead 

In an appeal to the unborn, whom they, 
In the faith of their procreative creed, 

Baptize posterity, or future clay, — 
To me seems but a dubious kind of reed 

To lean on for support in any way ; 
Since odds are that posterity will know 
No more of them, than they of her, I trow. 

XIX. 

Why , I 'm posterity — and so are you ; 

And whom do we remember ? Not a hundred. 
Were every memory written down all true, 

The tenth or twentieth name would be butblunder'd : 
Even Plutarch's Lives have but pick'd out a few, 

And 'gainst those few your annalists have thunder'd ; 
And Mil ford, in the nineteenth century, 
Gives, with Greek truth, the good old Greek the lie.' 

XX. 

Good people all, of every degree, 
Ye gentle readers and ungentle writers, 

In this twelfth canto 't is my wish to be 
As serious as if I had for inditers 

Malthus and Wilberforce : the last set free 
The negroes, and is worth a million fighters ; 

While Wellington has but enslaved the whites, 

And Malthus does the thing 'gainst which he writes. 

XXI. 

I 'm serious — so are all men upon paper : 
And why should I not form my speculation, 

And hold up to the sun my little taper ? 
Mankind just now seem wrapt in meditation 

On constitutions and steam-boats of vapour ; 
While sages write against all procreation, 

Unless a man can calculate his means 

Of feeding brats the moment his wife weans. 

XXII. 

That 's noble ! that 's romantic ! For my part, 
I think that "philo-genitiveness" is — 

(Now here 's a word quite after my own heart, 
Though there 's a shorter a good deal than liiis 

If that politeness set it not apart ; 

But I 'm resolved to say nought that 's amiss) - 

I say, mcthinks that "philo-genitiveness" 

Might meet from men a little more forgiveness 

XXIII. 

And now to business. Oh, my gentle Juan ! 

Thou art in London — in that pleasant place 
Where every kind of mischief's daily brewing. 

Which can await warm youth in its wild race. 
'T is true, that thy career is not a new one ; 

Thou art no novice in the headlong chase 
Of early life ; but this is a new land, 
Wluch foreigners can never understand. 



6G8 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XII. 



XXIV. 

What with a small diversity of climate, 

Of hoi or cold, mercurial or sedate, 
I could send forth my mandate like a primate, 

Upon the rest of Europe's social state ; 
But thou art the most difficult to rhyme at, 

Great Britain, which tie Muse may penetrate: 
All countries have their "lions," but in thee 
There is but one superb menagerie. 

XXV. 
But I am sick of politics. Begin, 

" Paulo majora." Juan, undecided 
Amongst the paths of being "taken in," 

Above the ice had like a skaiter glided: 
When tired of play, he flirted without sin 

With some cf those fair creatures who have prided 
Themselves on innocent tantalization, 
And hate all vice except its reputation. 

XXVI. 
But these arc few, and in the end they make 

Some devilish escapade or stir, which shows 
That even the purest people may mistake 

Their way through virtue's primrose paths of snows ; 
And then men stare, as if a new ass spake 

To Balaam, and from tongue to car o'erllows 
Quicksilver small-talk, ending (if you note it) 
With the kind world's amen — " Who would have 
thought it?" 

XXVII. 
The little Leila, with her orient eyes 

And taciturn Asiatic disposition, 
(Which saw all western things with small surprise, 

To the surprise of people of condition, 
Who think that novelties are butterflies 

To be pursued as food for inanition), 
Her charming figure and romantic history, 
Became a kind of fashionable mystery. 

XXVIII. 
The women much divided — as is usual 

Amongst the sex in little things or great. 
Think not, fair creatures, that I mean to abuse you all — 

I have always liked you better than I state, 
Since I 've grown moral : still I must accuse you all 

Of being apt to talk at a great rate ; 
And no.v there was a general sensation 
Amongst you, about Leila's education. 

XXIX. 
In one point only were you settled — and 

You had reason ; 't was that a young child of grace, 
As beautiful as her own native land, 

And far away, the last bud of her race, 
Ilowe'er our friend Don Juan might command 

Himself for live, four, three, or two years' space, 
Would be much better taught beneath the eye 
< tf peeresses whose follies had run dry. 

XXX. 

S< ?.rst there was a generous emulation, 
And then there was a general competition 

To undertake the orphan's education. 
As Juan was a person of condition, 

It had been an affront on this occasion 
To talk of a subscription or petition ; 

But sixteen dowagers, ten unwed she sages, 

Whose tale belongs to "Hallam's Middle Ages," 



XXXI. 

And one or two sad, separate wives, without 
A fruit to bloom upon their withering bough — 

Begg'd to bring vjj the little girl, and " out" — 
For that's the phrase that settles all things now, 

Meaning a virgin's first blush at a rout, 

And all her points as thorough-bred to show: 

Ami I assure you, that like virgin honey 

Tastes their first season (mostly if they have money), 

XXXII. 

How all the needy honourable misters, 

Each out-at-elbow peer, or desperate dandy, 

The watchful mothers and the careful sisters, 
(W T ho, by the by, when clever, are more handy 

At making matches, where "'tis gold that glisters,' 
Than their he relatives), like flies o'er candy, 

Buzz round "the Fortune" with their busy battery, 

To turn her head with waltzing and with flattery! 

XXXIII. 

Each aunt, each cousin hath her speculation ; 

Nay, married dames will now and then discover 
Such pure disinterestedness of passion, 

I 've known them court an heiress for their lover. 
"Tantame!" Such the virtues of high station, 

Even in the hopeful isle, whose outlet's "Dover!' 
While the poor rich wretch, object of these cares, 
Has cause to wish her sire had had male heirs. 

XXXIV. 

Some are soon bagg'd, but some reject three dozen, 
'T is fine to see them scattering refusals 

And wild dismay o'er every angry cousin 
(Friends of the party), who begin accusals 

Such as — " Unless Miss (Blank) meant to have chosen 
Poor Frederick, why did she accord perusals 

To his billets? Why waltz with him? Why, I pray 

Look yes last night, and yet say no to-day? 

XXXV. 

"Why? — Why? — Besides, Fred, really was attached- 

'T was not her fortune — he has enough without : 
The time will come she '11 wish that she had snateh'ii 

So good an opportunity, no doubt: — 
But the old marchioness some plan had hatch'd, 

As I '11 tell Aurea at to-morrow's roui : 
And after all poor Frederick may do better — 
Pray, did you see her answer to his letter ?" 

XXXVI. 
Smart uniforms and sparkling coronets 

Are spurn'd in turn, until her turn arrives, 
After rnalf, loss of time, and hearts, and bets 

Upon the sweep-stakes for substantial wives: 
And when at least the pretty creature gets 

Some gentleman, who fights, or writes, or drives, 
It soothes the awkward squad of the rejected 
To find how very badly she selected. 

XXXVII. 
For sometimes they accept some long pursuer, 

Worn out with importunity ; or fall 
(But here perhaps the instances are fewer) 

To the lot of him who scarce pursued at all. 
A hazy widower turn'd of forty 's sure - 

(If 'tis not vain examples to recall) 
To draw a high prize : now, howe'er he got her, I 
See nought more strange in this than t' other lottery 



CANTO XII. 



DON JUAN. 



G69 



XXXVIII. 
[, for my part — (one "modem instance" more) 

"True, 'tis a pity — pity 'tis, 'tis true" — 
Was chosen from out an amatory score, 

Albeit my years were less discreet than few ; 
But though I also had reform'd before 

Those became one who soon were to be two, 
I 'II not gainsay the generous public's voice — 
That the young lady made a monstrous choice. 

XXXIX. 

Oh, pardon me digression — or at least 
Peruse ! 'T is always with a moral end 

That I dissert, like grace before a feast : 
For like an aged aunt, or tiresome friend, 

A rigid guardian, or a zealous priest, 

My Muse by exhortation means to mend 

All people, at all times, and in most places, 

Which puts my Pegasus to these grave paces. 

XL. 

But now I 'm going to be immoral ; now 
I mean to show things really as they are, 

Not as they ought to be : for I avow, 

That till we see what's what in fact, we're far 

From much improvement with that virtuous plough 
Which skims the surface, leaving scarce a scar 

Upon the black loam long manured by Vice, 

Only to keep its corn at the old price. 

XLI. 

But first of little Leila we '11 dispose ; 

For, like a day-dawn, she was young and pure, 
Or like the old comparison of snows 

Which are more pure than pleasant to be sure, 
Like many people every body knows : 

Don Juan was delighted to secure 
A goodly guardian for his infant charge, 
Who might not profit much by being at large. 

XLII. 

Besides, he had found out he was no tutor, 

(I wish that others would find out the same) : 
And rather wish'd in such things to stand neuter, 

For silly wards will bring their guardians blame : 
So, when he saw each ancient dame a suitor, 

To make his little wild Asiatic tame, 
Consulting the " Society for Vice 
Suppression," Lady Pinchbeck was his choice. 

XLIII. 
Olden she was — but had been very young : 

Virtuous she was — and had been, I believe • 
Although the world has such an evil tongue 

That — but my chaster ear will not receive 
An echo of a syllable that 's wrong : 

In fact, there 's nothing makes me so much grieve 
As that abominable tittle-tattle, 
Which is the cud eschew'd by human cattle. 

XLIV. 
Moreover I've remark'd (and I was once 

A slight observer in a modest way), 
And so may every one except a dunce, 

That ladies in their youth a little gay, 
Besides their knowledge of the world, and sense 

Of the sad consequence of going astray, 
Arc wiser in their warnings 'gainst the woe 
W hich the mere passionless can never know. 
3K 



XLV. 

While the harsh prude indemnities her virtue 
By railing at the unknown and envied passion, 

Seeking far less to save you than to hurt you. 
Or what's still worse, to put you out of fashion,- 

The kinder veteran with calm words will court you, 
Entreating you to pause before you dash on; 

Expounding and illustrating the riddle 

Of epic Love's beginning, end, and middle. 

XLVI. 

Now, whether it be thus, or that they arc stricter, 
As better knowing why they should bo so, 

I think you 'II find from many a family picture, 
That daughters of such mothers as may know 

The world by experience rather than by lecture, 
Turn out much better for the Smithficld show 

Of vestals brought into the marriage mart, 

Than those bred up by prudes without a heart. 

XLVII. 

I said that Lady Pinchbeck had been talk'd about— 
As who has not, if female, young, and pretty ? 

But now no more the ghost of scandal stalk'd about ; 
She merely was deem'd amiable and witty, 

And several of her best bon-mots were hawk'd about ; 
Then she was given to charity and pity, 

And pass'd (at least the latter years of life) 

For being a most exemplary wife. 

XLVIII. 

High in high circles, gentle in her own, 
She was the mild reprover of the young, 

Whenever — which means every day — they 'd shown 
An awkward inclination to go wrong. 

The quantity of good she did 's unknown, 

Or, at the least, would lengthen out my song :— 

In brief, the little orphan of the east 

Had raised an interest in her which increased. 

XLIX. 
Juan too was a sort of favourite with her, 

Because she thought him a good heart at bottom, 
A little spoil'd, but not so altogether ; 

Which was a wonder, if you think who got him, 
And how he had been toss'd, he scarce knew whither : 

Though this might ruin others, it did not him, 
At least entirely — for he had seen too many 
Changes in youth, to be surprised at any. 

L. 
And these vicissitudes tell best in youth; 

For when they happen at a riper age, 
People are apt to blame the fates, forsooth, 

And wonder Providence is not more sage. 
Adversity is the first path to truth : 

He who hath proved w;ir, storm, or woman's rage. 
Whether his winters be eighteen or eighty, 
Hath won the experience which is deem'd so weighty 

LI. 
How far it profits is another matter, — 

Our hero gladly saw his 'ittle charge 
Safe with a lady, whose last grown-up daugntcr 

Being ldiig married, and thus set a.1 large, 
Had left all the accomplishments she taught hei 

To be transmitted, like the lord mayor's barge. 
To the next comer ; 01 — as it will tell 
More muse-like- -like Cythcrca's shell. 



670 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO Ml 



LI I. 

I call such things transmission ; for there is 
A floating balance of accomplishment 

Which forms a pedigree from Miss to Miss, 
Accordin" as their minds or backs are bent. 

Some waltz ; some draw ; some fathom the abyss 
Of metaphysics ; others are content 

With music ; the most moderate shine as wits, 

While others have a genius turn'd for fits. 

LIII. 

But whether fits, or wits, or harpsichords, 

Theology, fine arts, or finer slays, 
May be the baits for gentlemen or lords 

With regular descent, in these our days 
The last year to the new transfers its hoards ; 

New vestals claim men's eyes with the same praise 
Of " elegant," ct cetera, in fresh batches — 
All matchless creatures, and yet bent on matches. 

LIV. 

But now I will begin my poem. 'Tis 

Perhaps a little strange, if not quite new, 
That from the first of cantos up to this 

I 've not begun what we have to go through. 
These first twelve books are merely flourishes, 

Preludios, trying just a string or two 
Upon my lyre, or making the pegs sure ; 
And when so, you shall have the overture. 

LV. 

My Muses do not care a pinch of rosin 

About what 's call'd success, or not succeeding : 

Such thoughts are quite below the strain they 've chosen; 
'Tis a "great moral lesson" they are reading. 

I thought, at setting ofT, about two dozen 
Cantos would do; but, at Apollo's pleading, 

If that my Pegasus should not be founder'd, 

I think to canter gently through a hundred. 

LVI. 

Don Juan saw that microcosm on stilts, 

Yclept the great world ; for it is the least, 
Although the highest : but as swords have hilts 

By which their power of mischief is increased, 
When man in battle or in quarrel tilts, 

Thus the low world, north, south, or west, or east, 
Must still obey the high — which is their handle, 
Their moon, their sun, their gas, their farthing candle. 

LVII. 
He had many friends who had many wives, and was 

Well look'd upon by both, to that extent 
Of friendship which you may accept or pass ; 

It does nor good nor harm, being merely meant 
To keep the wheels going of the higher class, 

And draw them nightly when a ticket's sent: 
4nd what with masquerades, and fetes, and balls, 
For the first season such a life scarce palls. 

LVI1I. 
A joung unmarried man, with a good name 

Arid fortune, has an awkward part to play ; 
For good society is but a game, 

II The royal game of goose," as I may say, 
Where every body nas some separate aim, 

An end to answer, or a plan to lay — 
The single ladies wishing to be double, 
Th* married ones to save the virgins trouble. 



LIX. 

I don't mean this as general, but particular 
Examples may be found of such pursuits : 

Though several also keep their perpendicular 
Like poplars, with good principles tor roots; 

Yet many have a method more relit ular — 

" Fishers for men," like sirens with soft lutes ; 

For talk six times with the same single lady, 

And you may get the wedding-dresses ready. 

LX. 

Perhaps you '11 have a letter from the mother, 
To say her daughter's feelings are trepann'c ; 

Perhaps you'll have a visit from the brother, 
All strut, and stays, and whiskers, to demanr 1 

What "your intentions are?" — One way or other 
It seems the virgin's heart expects your hand ; 

And between pity for her case and yours, 

You '11 add to matrimony's list of cures. 

LXI. 

I 've known a dozen weddings made even thus, 
And some of them high names : I have also ki ivrt 

Young men who — though they hated to discuss 
Pretensions which they never dream 'd to have sho> — 

Yet neither frighten'd by a female fuss, 

Nor by mustachios moved, were let alone, 

And lived, as did the broken-hearted fair, 

In happier plight than if they form'd a pair. 

LXII. 

There's also nightly, to the uninitiated, 
A peril — not indeed like love or marriage, 

But not the less for this to be depreciated : 
It is — I meant and mean not to disparage 

The show of virtue even in the vitiated — 

It adds an outward grace unto their carriage — 

But to denounce the amphibious sort of harlot, 

" Couleur de rose," who's neither while nor scarlet 

• LXIII. 
Such is your old coquette, who can't say " No," 

And won't say " Yes," and keeps you on and off-ing 
On a iee shore, till it begins to blow — 

Then sees your heart wreck'd, with an inward scoffing; 
This works a world of sentimental woe, 

And sends new Werlers yearly to their coffin ; 
But yet is merely innocent flirtation, 
Not quite adultery, but adulteration. 

LXIV. 

"Ye gods, I grow a talker!" Let us prate. 

The next of perils, though I place it sternest, 
Is when, without regard to " Church or State," 

A wife makes or lakes love in upright earnest. 
Abroad, such things decide few women's fate — 

(Such, early traveller ! is the truth thou learnest)— 
But in old England when a young bride errs, 
Poor thing ! Eve's was a trifling case to In is ; 

LXV. 
For 't is a low, newspaper, humdrum, lawsuit 

Country, where a young couple of the same ages 
Can't form a friendship but the world o'erawes it. 

Then there 's the vulgar trick of those d — d damages ' 
A verdict — grievous foe to those who cause it ! — 

Forms a sad climax lo romantic homages ; 
Besides those soothing speeches of the pleaders, 
And evidences which resale all readers ! 



CANTO XII. 



DON JUAN. 



G7I 



LXVI. 

But they who blunder thus are raw beginners ; 

A little genial sprinkling of hypocrisy 
Ha» saved the fame of thousand splendid sinners, 

The loveliest oligarchs of our gynocracy ; 
You may sec such at all the balls and dinners, 

Among the proudest of our aristocracy, 
So gentle, charming, charitable, chaste — 
And all by having tact as well as taste. 

LXVI1. 

Juan, who did not stand in the predicament 
Of a mere novice, had one safeguard more; 

For he was sick — no, 't was not the word sick I meant — 
But he had scan so much oood love before, 

That he was not in heart so very weak ; — 1 meant 
But thus much, and no sneer against the shore 

Of white clilTs, white necks, blue eyes, bluer stockings, 

Tithes, taxes, duns, and doors with double knockings. 

LXVIII. 

But coming young from lands and scenes romantic, 
Where lives, not lawsuits, must be risk'd for passion, 

And passion's self must have a spice of frantic, 
Into a country where 'tis half a fashion, 

Scem'd to him half commercial, half pedantic, 
Howe'er he might esteem this moral nation; 

Besides (alas! his taste — forgive and pity!) 

At first he did not think the women pretty. 

LXIX. 

I say at first — for he found out at last, 
But by degrees, that they were fairer far 

I ban the more glowing dames whose lot is cast 
Beneath the influence of the eastern star — 

1 further proof we should not judge in haste ; 
Yet inexperience could not be his bar 

To taste: — the truth is, if men would confess, 

That nove'ties please less than they impress. 

LXX. 

Though travell'd, I have never had the luck to 

Trace up those shuffling negroes, Nile or Niger, 
To that impracticable place, Tombuctoo, 

Where geography finds no one to oblige her 
With such a chart as may be safely stuck to — 

For Europe ploughs in Afric like "bos piger:" 
But if I had been at Tombuctoo, there 
No doubt I should be told that black is fair. 

LXXI. 
It is. I will not swear that black is white ; 

But I suspect in fact that white is black, 
And the whole matter rests upon my eye-sight. 

Ask a blind man, the best judge. You '11 attack 
Perhaps this new position — but I 'm right ; 

Or if I 'm wrong, I '11 not be ta'en aback: — 
He hath no morn nor night, but all is dark 
Within ; and what see'st thou ? A dubious spark. 

LXX1I. 

But I 'm relapsing into metaphysics, 
That labyrinth, whose clue is of the same 

Construction as your cures for hectic phthisics, 
Those bright moths fluttering round a dying flame : 

And this reflection brings me to plain physics, 
And to the beauties of a foreign dame, 

Compared with those of our pun' pearls of price, 

1 hose Polar summers, all sun, and some ice. 



LXXIII. 

Or say they are like virtuous mermaids, whose 
Beginnings are fair faces, ends mere fishes;— 

Not that there's not a quantity of those; 

Who have a due respect for their own wishes. 

Like Russians rushing from hot baths to snows 3 
Are Ihey, at bottom virtuous even when vicious: 

They warm into a scrape, but keep of course, 

As a reserve, a plunge into remorse. 

LXXIV. 

But this has nought to do with their outsides. 

I said that Juan did not think them pretty 
At the first blush ; for a fair Briton hides 

Half her attractions — probably from pity — 
Ami rather calmly into the heart glides, 

Than storms it as a foe would take a city ; 
But once there (if you doubt this, prithee try) 
She keeps it for you like a true ally. 

LXXV. 

She cannot step as does an Arab barb, 
Or Andalusian girl from mass returning, 

Nor wear as gracefully as Gauls her garb, 
Nor in her eye Ausonia's glance is burning; 

Her voice, though sweet, is not so fit to warb- 
le those bravuras (which I still am learning 

To like, though I have been seven years in Italy, 

And have, or had, an ear that served me prettily);- 

LXXVI. 

She cannot do these things, nor one or two 
Others, in that olf-hand and dashing style 

Which takes so much — to give the devil his due; 
Nor is she quite so ready with her smile, 

Nor settles all things in one interview, 

(A thing approved as saving time and toil); — 

But though the soil may give you time and trouble, 

Well cultivated, it will render double. 

LXXVII. 

And if in fact she takes to a " grande passion," 

It is a very serious thin^ indeed ; 
Nine times in ten 't is but caprice or fashion, 

Coquetry, or a wish to take the lead, 
The pride of a mere child with a new sash on, 

Or wish to make a rival's bosom bleed ; 
But the tenth instance will be a tornado, 
For there 's no saying what they will or may do. 

LXXVIII. 
The reason 's obvious : if there 's an eclat, 

They lose their caste at once, as do theParias, 
And when the delicacies of the law 

Have fill'd their papers with their comments variou*. 
Society, that china without Haw, 

(The hypocrite!) will banish them like Marius, 
To sit amidst the ruins of their guilt : 
For Fame 's a Carthage not so soon rebuilt. 

LXXIX. 
Perhaps this is as it should be ; — it is 

A comment on the Gospel's "Sin no more. 
And be thy sins forgiven :" — but upon this 

I leave the saints, to settle their own score. 
Abroad, though doubtless they do much amiss. 

An erring woman finds an open door 
For her return to virtue — as they call 
The lady who should be at home to all. 



672 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO Xlll 



LXXX. 

For me, I leave the matter where I find it, 
Knowing thai such uneasy virtue leads 

less in fact to mind it, 
Ami care but IV discoveries and not deeds. 

An I as tor chastity, you'll never bind it 

By all the laws the strietest lawyer pleads, 
But aggravate the crime you have not prevented, 
By rendering desperate those who had else repented. 

LXXXI. 

But Juan was no casuist, nor had pondcr'd 

Upon the moral lessons of mankind : 
Besides, he had not seen, of several hundred, 

A lady altogether to his mind. 
A little "blase" — 'tis not to be wonder' d 

At, that his heart had got a tougher rind: 
And though not vainer from his past success, 
No doubt his sensibilities were less. 

LXXXII. 

He also had been busy seeing sights — 
The parliament and all the other houses ; 

Had sate beneath the galleries at nights, 

To hear debates whose thunder mused (not rouses) 

The world to gaze upon those northern lights 4 
Which flash'd as far as where the musk-bull browses : 

He had also stood at times behind the throne — ■ 

But Grey was not arrived, and Chatham gone. 

LXXXIII. 

He saw, however, at the closing session, 

That noble sight, when really free the nation, 

A king in constitutional possession 

Of such a throne as is the proudest station, 

Though despots know it not — till the progression 
Of freedom shall complete their education. 

'T is not mere splendour makes the show august 

To eye or heart — it is the people's trust. 

LXXX1V. 

There too he saw (whate'er he may be now) 

A prince, the prince of princes, at the time 
With fascination in his very bow, 

And full of promise, as the spring of prime. 
Though royalty was written on his brow, 

He had then the grace too, rare in every clime, 
Of being, without alloy of f >p or beau, 
A finish'd gentleman from top to toe. 

LXXXV. 
And Juan was received, as hath been said, 

Into the best society : and there 
Occurr'd what often happens, I 'm afraid, 

However disciplined and debonnairc : 
The talent and good humour he display'd, 

Besides the mark'd distinction of his air, 
Exposed him, as was natural, to temptation, 
Even though himself avoided the occasion. 

LXXXVI. 
But what, and where, with whom, and when, and why 

Is not to be put hastily together; 
And as my object is morality 

(Whatever people say), I don't know whether 
I'll leave a single reader's eyelid dry, 

But harrow up his feelings till they wither, 
And hew out a huge monument of pathos, 
As Philip's son proposed to do with Athos.* 



LXXXVI1. 
Here the twelfth canto of our introduction 

Ends. When the body of the book's begun, 
You'll find ii of a different construction 

From what some people say 't will be when done: 
The plan at present 's simply in concoction. 

I can't oblige you, reader ! to read on ; 
That's your affair, not mine: a real spirit 
Should neither court neglect, nor dread to bear it. 

LXXXVIII. 
njid if my thunderbolt not always rattles, 

Remember, reader! you have had befire 
The worst of tempests and the best of battles 

That e'er were brew'd from elements of gore, 
Besides the most sublime of — Heaven knows what else 

An usurer could scarce expect much more — 
But my best canto, save one on astronomy, 
Will turn upon " political economy." 

LXXXIX. 

That is your present theme fir popularity: 
Now that the public hedge hath scarce a stake, 

It grows an act of patriotic charity, 

To show the people the best way to break. 

My plan (but I, if but for singularity, 
Reserve it) will be very sure to take. 

Meantime read all the national debt-sinkers, 

And teli me what you think of your great thinkers 



CANTO XIII. 



i. 

I now mean to be serious ; — it is time, 

Since laughter now-a-days is deem'd too seriouj 
A jest at vice by virtue 's call'd a crime, 

And critically held as deleterious : 
Besides, the sad 's a source of the sublime, 

Although when long a little apt lo weary us • 
And therefore shall my lay soar high and solemn, 
As an old temple dwindled to a column. 

II. 
The Lady Adeline Amundcville 

'T is an old Norman name, and to be found 
In pedigrees by those who wander still 

Along the last fields of that Gothic ground) 
Was high-born, wealthy by her father's w ill, 

And beauteous, even where beauties most abound 
In Britain — which of course true patriots find 
The goodliest soil of body and of mind. 

III. 

I'll not gainsay them; it is not my cue: 
I leave them to their taste, no doubt the best : 

An eye's an eye, and whether black or blue, 
Is no great matter, so 'tis in recpiest: 

'T is nonsense to dispute about a hue — 
The kindest may be taken as a test. 

The fair sex should be always fair ; and no man, 

Till thirty, should perceive there 'rf a plain woman. 



CANTO XIIT. 



DON JUAN. 



073 



IV. 

And after that serene and somewhat dull 
Epoch, that awkward corner turu'd for days 

More quiet, when our moon's no more at full, 
We may presume to criticise or praise; 

Because indifference begins to lull 

Our passions, and we walk in wisdom's ways ; 

Also because the figure and the face 

Hint, that 'tis time to give the younger place. 

V. 

I know that some would fain postpone this era, 

Reluctant as all placemen to resign 
Their post ; but theirs is merely a chimera, 

For they have pass'd life's equinoctial line ; 
But then they have their claret and madeira 

To irrigate the dryness of decline ; 
And county meetings and the Parliament, 
And debt, and what not, for their solace sent. 

VI. 

And is there not religion and reform, 

Peace, war, the taxes, and what's call'd the "nation?" 
The struggle to be pilots in a storm ? 

The landed and the moneyed speculation ? 
The joys of mutual hate to keep them warm, 

Instead of love, that mere hallucination? 
Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure ; 
Men love in haste, but they detest at leisure. 

VII. 

Rouuh Johnson, the great moralist, profess'd, 
Right honestly, "he liked an honest hater" — ' 

The only truth that yet has been confess'd 
Within these latest thousand years or later. 

Perhaps the fine old fellow spoke in jest ; — 
For my part, I am but a mere spectator, 

And gaze where'er the palace or the hovel is, 

Much in the mode of Goethe's Mephistopheles ; 

VIII. 

But neither love nor hate in murh excess ; 

Though 't was not once so. If I sneer sometimes, 
It is because I cannot well do less, 

And now and then it also suits my rhymes. 
I shoul \ be very willing to redress 

Men's wrongs, and rather check than punish crimes, 
Had not Cervantes, in that too true tale 
Of Quixote, shown how all such efforts fail. 

IX. 

Of all tales, 't is the saddest — and more sad, 

Because it makes us smile; his hero's right, 
And still pursues the riifht ; — to curb the bad, 

His only object, and 'gainst odds to fight, 
His cnerdon: 'tis bis virtue makes him mad! 

But his adventures form a sorry sight ; — 
A sorrier still is the great moral taught 
By that real epic unto all who have thought. 

X. 
Redressing injury, rcvengins wrong, 

To aid the da>nsel and destroy the caitiff; 
Opposing singly the united strong, 

From foreign yoke to free the helpless native ; — 
Alas ! must noblest views, like an old song, 

Be for mere fancy's sport a tiling creative? 
A. jest, a riddle, fame through thin and thick sought? 
And Socrates himself but Wisdom's Quixote? 
3 k -2 90 



XI. 

Cervantes smiled Spain's chivalry away ; 

A single laugh demolish'd the right arm 
Of his own country ; — seldom since that day 

Has Spain had heroes. While Romance could charm, 
Tin' world gave ground before her bright array ; 

And therefore have his volumes done such harm, 
That all their glory as a composition 
Was dearly purchased by his land's perdition. 

XII. 
I'm "at my old Lunes" — digression, and forget 

The Lady Adeline Aimmdeville ; 
The fair most fatal Juan ever met, 

Although she was not evil nor m^ant ill; 
But Destiny and Passion spread the net, 

(Fate is a good excuse for our own will), 
And caught them ; what do they not catch, methinks? 
But I'm not CEdipus, and life 's a sphinx. 

XIII. 
I tell the tale as it is told, nor dare 

To venture a solution: " Davus sum!" 
And now I will proceed upon the pair. 

Sweet Adeline, amidst the gay world's hum, 
Was the queen bee, the glass of all that's fair; 

Whose charms made all men speak, and women 
dumb, 
The last 's a miracle, and such was reckon'd, 
And since that time there has not been a second. 

XIV. 
Chaste was she to detraction's desperation, 

And wedded unto one she had loved well — ■ 
A man known in the councils of the nation, 

Cool, and quite English, imperturbable, 
Though apt to act with fire upon occasion, 

Proud of himself and her ; the world could tell 
Nought against either, and both seem'd secure — 
She in her virtue, he in his hauteur. 

XV. 
It chanced some diplomatical relations, 

Arising out of business, often brought 
Himself and Juan in their mutual stations 

Into close contact. Though reserved, nor caught 
By specious seeming, Juan's youth, and patience, 

And talent, on his haughty spirit wrought, 
And form'd a basis of esteem, which ends 
In making men what courtesy calls friends. 

XVI. 
And thus Lord Henry, who was cautious as 

Reserve and pride could make him, and full slow 
In judging men — wdien once his judgment was 

Determined, right or wrong, on friend or foe, 
Had all the pertinacity pride has, 

Which knows no ebb to its imperious flow, 
And loves or hates, disdaining to he guided, 
Because its own good [pleasure bath decided. 

XVIF. 
His friendships, therefore, and no less aveisio.is, 

Though oft well founded, which conErm'd but more 
His prepossessions, like the laws of Persians 

And Medes, would ne'er revoke what went before, 
His feelings had not those strange fits, like tertian*. 

Of common likings, which make some deplore 
Whal they should laugh at — the mere a"ue still 
Of men's regard, the fever or the chill. 



". 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO X11L 



XVIII. 

" 'T is not in mortals to command success ; 

15 tit do you more, Sempronius — don't deserve it." 
Ami take my wo>d, you won't liave any less : 

Be wary, watcli the time, and always serve it ; 
Give gemlv way, where there's too great a press; 

And for your conscience, only learn to nerve it, — 
For, like a racer or a boxer training, 
'T will make, if proved, vast efforts without paining. 

XIX. 

Lord Henry also liked to he superior, 
As most men do, the little or the great ; 

The very lowest find out an inferior, 
At least they think so, to exert their state 

Upon : for there are very few things wearier 
Than solitarv pride's oppressive weight, 

Which mortals generously would divide, 

By bidding others carry while they ride. 

XX. 

In birth, in rank, in fortune likewise equal, 
O'er Juan he could no distinction claim ; 

In years he had the advantage of time's sequel ; 
And, as he thought, in country much the same — 

Because bold Britons have a tongue and free quill, 
At which all modern nations vainly aim ; 

And the Lord Henry was a great debater, 

So that few members kept the House up later. 

XXI. 

These were advantages: and then he thought — 
It was his foible, but by no means sinister — 

That few or none more than himself had caught 
Court mysteries, having been himself a minister: 

He liked to teach that which he had been taught, 
Ami greatly shone whenever there had been a stir ; 

And reconciled all qualities which grace man, 

Always a patriot, and sometimes a placeman. 

XXII. 

He liked the gentle Spaniard for his gravity ; 

He almost honour'd him for his docility, 
Because, though young, he acquiesced with suavity, 

Or contradicted but with proud humility. 
He knew the world, and would not see depravity 

In faults which sometimes show the soil's fertility, 
If that the weeds o'er-live not the first crop, — 
For then they are very difficult to stop. 

XXIII. 
And then he talk'd with him about Madrid, 

Constantinople, and such distant places ; 
Where people always did as they were bid, 

Or did what they should not with foreign graces. 
Of coursers also spake they: Henry rid 

Well, like most Englishmen, and loved the races : 
And Juan, like a true-born Andalusian, 
Could back a horse, as despots ride a Russian. 

XXIV. 
And thus acquaintance grew, at noble routs, 

And diplomatic dinners, or at other — 
For Juan stood well both with Ins and Outs, 

As in Freemasonry a higher brother. 
Upon bis t'ient Henry had no doubts, 

His manner show'd him sprung from a high mother; 
Alio at- men like to show their hospitality 
To him whose breeding marches with his quality. 



XXV. 

At Blank- Blank Square ; — for we will break no squares 
Bv naming streets : since men are so censorious, 

And apt to sow an author's wheat with tares, 
Reaping allusions private and inglorious, 

Where none were dreamt of, unto love's atfairs, 
Which were, or are, or are to be notorious, 

That therefore do I previously declare, 

Lord Henry's mansion was in Blank-Blank Square. 

XXVI. 

Also there bin a another pious reason 

For making squares and streets anonymous ; 

Which is, that there is scarce a single season 
Which doth not shake some very splendid house 

With some slight"eart-quakc of domestic treason— 
A topic scandal doth delight to rouse : 

Such I might stumble over unawares, 

Unless I knew the very chastest squares. 

XXVII. 
'T is true, I might have chosen Piccadilly, 

A place where peccadilloes are unknown ; 
But I have motives, whether wise or silly, 

For letting that pure sanctuary alone. 
Therefore I name not square, street, place, until I 

Find one where nothing naughty can be shown, 
A vestal shrine of innocence of heart : 
Such are — but I have lost the London chart. 

XXVIII. 
At Henry's mansion then in Blank-Blank Square, 

Was Juan a recherche, welcome guest, 
As many other noble scions were ; 

And some who had but talent for their crest ; 
Or wealth, which is a passport everywhere; 

Or even mere fashion, which indeed 's the best 
Recommendation, and to be well dress'4 
Will very often supersede the rest. 

XXIX. 

And since " there 's safety in a multitude 

Of counsellors," as Solomon has said, 
Or some one for him, in some sage grave mood:— 

Indeed we see the daily proof display'd 
In senates, at the bar, in wordy Ct\u\, 

Where'er collective wisdom can parade, 
Which is the only cause that we can guess 
Of Britain's present wealth and happiness ; — 

XXX. 
But as "there's safety grafted in the number 

Of counsellors " for men, — thus for li 
A large acquaintance lets not virtue slumber; 

Or, should it shake, the choice will more perplex— 
Variety itself will more encumber. 

'.Midst many rocks we guard more against wrecks; 
And thus with women: howsoe'er it shock some's 
Self-love, there 's safety in a crowd of coxcombs. 

XXXI. 
Bui Adeline had not the least occasion 

For such a shield, which leaves but little merit 
To virtue proper, or good education. 

Her chief resource was in her own high spirit. 
Which judged mankind at their due estimation ; 

And for coquetry, she disdain'd to wear it: 
Secure of admiration, its impression 
Was faint, as of an every-day possession. 



CANTO XIII. 



DON JUAN. 



675 



XXXII. 

To all she was polite without parade ; 

To some she show'd attention of that kind 
Winch Hatters, but is Battery cortvcy'd 

In such a sort as cannot leave behind 
A trace unworthy either wife or maid ; — 

A gentle genial courtesy of mind, 
To those who were, or pass'd for, meritorious, 
Just to console sad Glory for being glorious: 

XXXIII. 

Which is in all respects, save now and then, 
A dull and desolate appendage. Gaze 

Upon the shades of those distinguished men 
Who were or are the puppet-shows of praise, 

The praise of persecution. Gaze a_ r .iiii 

On the most favour'd ; and, amidst the blaze 

Of sunset halos o'er the laurel-brow'd, 

What can ye recognise? — A gilded cloud. 

XXXIV. 

There also was of course in Adeline 
That calm patrician polish in the address, 

Which ne'er can pass the equinoctial line 
Of any thing which Nature would express: 

Just as a Mandarin finds nothing fine, — 
At least his manner suffers not to guess 

That any thing he views can greatly please. 

Perhaps wc have borrow'd this from the Chinese — 

XXXV. 

Perhaps from Horace: his il Nil atlmirari" 
Was what he call'd the "Art of Happiness ;" 

An art on which the arlists greatly vary, 
And have not yet attain'd to much success. 

However, 't is expedient to be wary : 

Indifference certes don't produce distress; 

And rash enthusiasm in good society 

Were nothing but a moral inebriety. 

XXXVI. 

But Adeline was not indifferent : for, 

(Now for a commonplace!) beneath the snow, 

As a volcano holds the lava more 

Within — et cetera. Shall I go on? — No! 

I hate to hunt down a tired metaphor: 
So let the often-used volcano go. 

Poor thing ! how frequently, by me and others, 

It hath been stirr'd up, till its smoke quite smothers ! 

XXXVII. 
I '11 have another figure in a trice : 

What say you to a bottle of champagne ? 
Frozen into a very vinous ice, 

Which leaves few drops of that immortal rain, 
Vet in the very centre, past all price, 

About a liquid glassful will remain ; 
And this is stronger than the strongest grape 
Could e'er express in its expanded shape : 

XXXVIII. 
'T is the whole spirit brought to a quintessence ; 

And thus the chilliest aspects may concentre 
A hidden nectar under a cold presence, 

And such are many — though I only meant her 
From whom I now deduce these moral lessons, 

On which the Muse has always sought to enter: — 
And vour cold people are beyond all price, 
When once you 've broken their confounded ice. 



XXXIX. 

IJut after all (hey are a North-West passage 

Unto the glowing India of the soul; 
And as the good ships sent upon that message 

Have not exactly ascerlain'd tlie Pole, 

Parry's efforts look a lucky presage), 

Thus gentlemen may run upon a shoal ; 
For if the Pole's not open, but all frost, 
(A chance still), 'tis a voyage or vessel lost. 

XL. 
And voting beginners may as well commence 

With quiet cruising o'er I he ocean woman ; 
Wliiie those who Ve not beginners, should have sense 

Enough to make for port, ere Time shall summon 
With lus gray signal-Rag; and the past tense, 

The dreary u fuimus n of all things human, 
Must be declined, whilst life's thin spun ou 

Between the gaping heir and gnawing gout. 

XLI. 
But heaven must be diverted: its diversion 

Is sometimes truculent — but never mind: 
The world noon the whole is worth the assertion 

(If but for comfort) that all things are kind: 
And that same devilish doctrine of the Persian, 

Of the two principles, but leaves behind 
As many doubts as any other doctrine 
Has ever puzzled Faith withal, or yoked her in. 

XLII. 

The English winter — ending in July 

To recommence in August — now was done. 

'Tis the postilion's paradise: whirls fly; 

On roads east, south, north, west, there is a run. 

Put for post-horses who finds sympathy? 
Man's pity 's for himself, or for his son, 

Always premising that said son at college 

Has not contracted much more debt than knowledge. 

XLIII. 

The London winter's ended in July — 
Sometimes a little later. I don't err 

In this : whatever other blunders lie 
Upon my shoulders, here I must aver 

My Mine a glass of Weathcrology, 
For Parliament is our barometer; 

Let Radicals its other acts attack, 

Its sessions form our only almanac. 

XLIV. 

When its quicksilver 's down at zero, — lo ! 

Coach, chariot, luggage, ba<*!:age, equipage! 
Wheels whirl from Carlton Palace to Solio. 

And happiest they who horses can engage; 
The turnpikes glow with dust, and Rotten Row 

Sleeps from the chivalry of this bright age: 
And tradesmen, with long bills and longer face, 
Sigh, as the post-boys fasten on the traces. 

XLV. 
They and their bills, "Arcadians both," 5 are left 

To the Greek kalends of another session. 
Alas! to them of ready cash bereft, 

What hope remains? Of hope the full possess>oii. 
Or generous draft, conceded as a gilt, 

At a long date — till they can get a fresh one, 
IIa>\k'd about at a discount, small or large; — 
Also the solace of an overcharge. 



676 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAN'l o xm. 



XLVI. 
But these are trifles. Downward flies my Lord, 

Nodding beside my Lady in his carriage. 
Away! away! "Fresh horses!" are the word, 

And changed as quickly as hearts after marriage ; 
The obsequious landlord hath 'he change restored ; 

The post-boys have no reason to disparage 
Their fee ; but, ere the water'd wheels may hiss hence, 
The ostler pleads for a reminiscence. 

XLVII. 
T is granted ; and the valet mounts the dickey — 

That gentleman of lords and gentlemen ; 
Also my Lady's gentlewoman, tricky, 

Trick'd out, but modest more than poet's pen 
Can paint, "Cost viaggino i ricchi .'" 

(Excuse a foreign slipslop now and then, 
If but to show I've travell'd ; and what's travel, 
Unless it teaches one to quote and cavil?) 

XLVIII. 
The London winter and the country summer 

Were well nigh over. 'Tis perhaps a pity, 
When Nature wears the gown that doth become her, 

To lose those best months in a sweaty city, 
And wait until the nightingale grows dumber, 

Listening debates not very wise or witty, 
Ere patriots their true country can remember; — 
But there's no shooting (save grouse) till September. 

XLIX. 
1 've done with my tirade. The world was gone ; 

The twice two thousand for whom earth was made, 
Were vanish'd to be what they call alone, — 

That is, with thirty servants for parade, 
As many guests or more ; before whom groan 

As many covers, duly, daily, laid. 
Let none accuse old England's hospitality — 
Its quantity is but condensed to quality. 

L. 
Lord Henry and the Lady Adeline 

Departed, like the rest of their compeers, 
The peerage, to a mansion very fine ; 

The Gothic Babel of a thousand years. 
None than themselves could boast a longer line, 

Where time through heroes and through beauties 
steers ; 
And oaks, as olden as their pedigree, 
Told of their sires, a tomb in every tree. 

LI. 
A paragraph in every paper told 

Of tbeir departure : such is modern fame : 
'T is pity that it takes no further hold 

Than an advertisement, or much the same ; 
When, ere the ink be dry, the sound grows cold. 

The Morning Post was foremost to proclaim — 
•' Departure, for his country-seat to-day, 
Lord H. Amundeville and Lady A. 

m. 

M We understand the splendid host intends 

To entertain, this autumn, a select 
And numerous party of his noble friends ; 

'Midst whom, we have heard from sources quite 
correct, 
The Duke of D the shooting season spends, 

With many more by rank and fashion deck'd ; 
Also a foreigner of high condition, 
The envoy of the secret Russian mission." 



LIII. 

And thus we see — who doubts the Morning Post ' 
(Whose articles are like the "thirty-nine,"' 

Which those most swear to who believe them most)— 
Our gay Russ Spaniard was ordain'd to shine, 

Deck'd by the rays reflected from his host, 

With those who, Pope says, " greatly daring dine.' 

'Tis odd, but true, — last war, the news abounded 

More with these dinners than the kill'd or wounded.— 

LIV. 

As thus : " On Thursday there was a grand dinner ; 

Present, lords A. B. C." — Earls, dukes, by name 
Announced with no less pomp than victory's winner : 

Then underneath, and in the very same 
Column : " Date, Falmouth, There has lately been here 

The slap-dash regiment, so well known to fame ; 
Whose loss in the late action we regret : 
The vacancies are fill'd up — see Gazette." 

LV. 

To Norman Abbey whirl'd the noble pair, 
An old, old monastery once, and now 

Still older mansion, of a rich and rare 
Mix'd Gothic, such as artists all allow 

Few specimens yet left us can compare 
Withal: it lies perhaps a little low, 

Because the monks? preferr'd a hilt behind, 

To shelter their devotion from the wind. 

LVI. 

It stood emhosom'd in a happy valley, 

Crown'd bv high woodlands, where the Druid oak 

Stood like Caraetacus in act to rally 

His host, with broad arms 'gainst the thunder-stroke ; 

And from beneath his boughs were seen to sally 
The dappled foresters — as day awoke, 

The branching stag swept down with all his herd, 

To quaff a brook which murmur'd like a bird. 

LVII. 

Before the mansion lay a lucid lake, 

Broad as transparent, deep, and freshly fed 

By a river, which its soften' d way did take 
In currents through the calmer water spread 

Around: the wild fowl nestled in the brake 
And sedges, brooding in their liquid bed: 

The woods sloped downwards to its brink, and stood 

With their green faces fis'd upon the flood. 

LVIII. 

Its outlet dash'd into a deep cascade, 

Sparkling with foam, until again subsiding 

Its shriller echoes — like an infant made 
Quiet — sank into softer ripples, gliding 

Into a rivulet ; and, thus allay'd, 

Pursued its course, now gleaming, and now hiding 

Its windings through the woods ; now clear, now blue, 

According as the skies their shadows threw 7 . 

LIX. 
A glorious remnant of the Gothic pile 

(While yet the church was Bome's) stood half apart 
In a grand arch, which once screen'd many an aisle. 

These last hail disappear'd — a loss to art: 
The first yet frown'd superbly o'er the soil, 

And kindled feelings in tne roughest heart, 
Which mourn'd the power of time's or tempest's march, 
In gazing on that venerable arch. 



CANTO XIII. 



DON JUAN. 



677 



LX. 

Within a niche, nigh to its pinnacle, 

Twelve saints had once stood sanctified in stone : 
But these had fallen, not when the friars fell, 

But in the war which struck Charles from his throne, 
\\ hen each house was a fortalicc — as tell 

The annals of full many a line undone,— 
The gallant cavaliers, who fought in vain 
For those who knew not to resign or reign. 

LXI. 

But in a higher niche, alone, but crown'd, 
The Virgin Mother of the God-born child, 

With her son in her bless'd arms, look'd round, 
Spared by some chance when all beside was spoil'd ; 

She made the earth below seem holy ground. 
This may be superstition, weak or wild, 

But even the faintest relics of a shrine 

Of any worship wake some thoughts divine. 

LXII. 

A mighty window, hollow in the centre, 
Shorn of its glass of thousand colourings, 

Through which the deepen'd glories once could enter, 
Streaming from oil" the sun like seraph's wings, 

Now yawns all desolate : now loud, now fainter, 
The gale sweeps through its fretwork, and oft sings 

The owl his anthem, where the silenced quire 

Lie with their hallelujahs quench'd like fire. 

LXIII. 

But in the noontide of the moon, and when 

The wind is winged from one point of heaven, 
There moans a strange unearthly sound, which then 

Is musical — a dying accent driven 
Through the huge arch, which soars and sinks again. 

Some deem it but the distant echo given 
Back to the night-wind by the waterfall,' 
And harmonized by the old chorall wall : 

LXIV. 
Others, that some original shape or form, 

Shaped by decay perchance, hath given the power 
(Though less than that of Memnon's statue, warm 

In Egypt's rays, to harp at a fix'd hour) 
To this gray ruin, with a voice to charm. 

Sad, but serene, it sweeps o'er tree or tower : 
The cause I know not, nor can solve ; but such 
The fact: — I've heard it,— once perhaps too much. 

LXV. 
Amidst the court a Gothic fountain play'd, 

Symmetrical, but deck'd with carvings quaint — 
Strange faces, like to men in masquerade, 

And here perhaps a monster, there a saint : 
The spring rush'd through grim mouths, of granite made, 

And sparkled into basins, where it spent 
Its little torrent in a thousand bubbles, 
Like man's vain glory, and his vainer troubles. 

LXVI. 
The mansion's self was vast and yCierable, 

With more of the monastic than ha» been 
Elsewhere preserved : the cloisters still were stable. 

The cells ioo and refectory, I ween : 
\n exquisite small chapel had been able, 

Still unimpair'd, to decorate the scene ; 
The ret had been rofbrm'd, replaced, or sunk, 
And spoke more of the baron than the monk. 



Lxvn. 

Huge halls, long galleries, spacious chambers, joinM 
By no quite lawful marriage of the arts, 

Might shock a connoisseur: but, when combined, 
Form'd a whole which, irregular in parts, 

Yet left a grand impression on the mind, 

At least of those whose eyes are in their hearts. 

We gaze upon a giant for his stai 

Nor judge at first if all be true to nature. 

lxviit. 

Steel Iwons, molten the next generation 
To silken rows of gay and garter'd earls, 

Glanced from the walls in goodly preservation ; 
And Lady Marys, blooming into girls, 

With fair long locks, had also kept their station J 
And countesses mature in robes and pearls: 

Also some beauties of Sir Peter LVlv, 

Whose drapery hints we may admire them freely : 

LXIX. 
Judges, in very formidable ermine, 

Were there, with brows that did not much invito 
The accused to think their lordships would determine 

His cause by leaning much from might to right: 
Bishops, who had not left a single sermon; 

Attorneys-general, awful to the sight, 
As hinting more (unless our judgments warp us) 
Of the "Star Chamber" than of "Habeas Corpus." 

LXX. 

Generals, some all in armour, of the old 

And iron time, ere lead had ta'en the lead ; 

Others in wigs of Marlborough's martial fold, 
Huger than twelve of our degenerate breed : 

Lordlings, with staves of white or keys of gold: 
Nimrods, whose canvas scarce contain'd the steo 1 ; 

And here and there some stern high patriot stood, 

Who could not get the place for which he sued. 

LXXI. 

But, ever and anon, to soothe your vision, 

Fatigued with these hereditary glories, 
There rose a Carlo Dolce or a Titian, 

Or wilder group of savage Salvatore's : 4 
Here danced Albano's boys, and here the sea shone 

In Vernet's ocean lights ; and there the stories 
Of martyrs awed, as Spagnoletto tainted 
His brush with all the blood of all the sainted. 

LXXII. 
Here sweetly spread a landscape of Lorraine ; 

There Rembrandt made his darkness equal light, 
Or gloomy Caravaggio's gloomier stain 

Bronzed o'er some lean and stoic anchorite:— 
But lo ! a Teniers WOOS, and not in vain, 

Your eyes to revel in a livelier sight: 
Her bcll-mouth'd goblet makes me feel quite Danish 
Or Dutch with thirst— What ho! a flask of Rhenish. 

LXXIII. 
Oh, reader ! if that thou canst rcod, — and know 

T is not enough to spell, or even to read, 
To constitute a reader ; there up 

Virtues of which both you and 1 have need. 
firstly, begin with the beginning ('hough 

That clause is hard), and secondly, proceed ; 
Thirdly, commence not with th" end — or, sinning 
In this sort, end at least with the beginning. 



678 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CJN70 XI 11. 



LXXIV. 
But, reader, thou hast patient been of late, 

While I, without remorse of rhyme, or fear, 
Have buill and laid out ground at such a rate, 

Dan Phoebus takes me for an auctioneer. 
That poets were so from their earliest date, 

By Homer's "Catalogue of Ships" is clear; 
But a mere modern must be moderate — 
I spare you, then, the furniture and plate. 

LXXV. % 

The mellow autumn came, and with it came 

The promised party, to enjoy its sweets. 
The corn is cut, the manor full of game ; 

The pointer ranges, and the sportsman beats 
In russet jacket: — lynx-like is his aim, 

Full grows his Ijag, and wonderful his feats. 
Ah, nut-brown partridges ! ah, brilliant pheasants ! 
And ah, ye poachers! — 'T is no sport for peasants. 

LXXVI. 

An English autumn, though it hath no vines, 
Blushing with Bacchant coronals along 

The paths, o'er which the fair festoon entwines 
The red grape in the sunny lands of song, 

Hath yet a purchased choice of choicest wines; 
The claret light, and the madeira strong. 

If Britain mourn her bleakness, we can tell her, 

The very best of vineyards is the cellar. 

LXXVII. 

Then, if she hath not that serene decline 

Which makes the southern autumn's day appear 

As if 't would to a second spring resign 
The season, rather than to winter drear, — 

Of in-door comforts still she hath a mine, — 
The sea-coal fires, the earliest of the year; 

Without doors too she may compete in mellow, 

As what is lost in green is gain'd in yellow. 

LXXVIII. 

And for the effeminate villeggiatura — 

Rife with more horns than hounds — she hath the chase, 
So animated that it might allure a 

Saint from his beads to join the jocund race ; 
Even Nimrod's self might leave the plains of Dura, 6 

And wear the Melton jacket for a space : — 
If she hath no wild boars, she hath a tame 
Preserve of bores, who ought to be made game. 

LXXIX. 

The noble guests, assembled at the Abbey, 

Consisted of — we give the sex the pas — 
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke ; the Countess Crabbey ; 

The Ladies, Scilly, Busey ; Miss Echit, 
Miss Bombazeen, Miss Mackstay, Miss O'Tabby, 

And Mrs. Rabbi, the rich banker's squaw : 
Also the Honourable Mrs. Sleep, 
Who look'd a white lamb, yet was a black sheep. 

LXXX. 
With other countesses of Blank — but rank ; 

At onco the "lie" and the " elite " of crowds ; 
»V1k> pass '.ike water filtcr'd in a tank, 

All puiged and pious from their native clouds; 
Or paper turn'd to money by the Bank : 

No matter how or why, the passport shrouds 
The "passee" and the past; for good society 
Is ni» les> famed for tolerance than piety: 



LXXXI. 

That is, pp to a certain point; which point 
Forms the most difficult in punctuation. 

Appearances appear to' form the joint 
On which it hinges in a higher station ; 

And so that no explosion cry "aroint 
Thee, witch!" or each Medea has her Jason; 

Or (to the point with Horace and with Pulci), 

" Omae tu'it punctum, qure 7niscuit utile dulci." 

LXXXII. 

I can't exactly trace their rule of right, 
Which hath a little leaning to a lottery; 

I've seen a virtuous woman put down quite 
By the mere combination of a coterie : 

Also a so-so matron boldly fight 

Her way back to the world by dint of plottery, 

Ami shine the very Siria of the spheres, 

Escaping with a few slight scarless sneers. 

LXXXIII. 

I've seen more than I'll say: — but we will see 

How our villeggiatura will get on. 
The party might consist of thirty-three 

Of highest caste — the Bramins of the ton. 
I've named a few, not foremost in degree, 

But ta'en at hazard as the rhyme may run. 
By way of sprinkling, scatter'd amongst these, 
There also were some Irish absentees. 

LXXXIV. 
There was Parolles, too, the legal bully, 

Who limits all his battles to the bar 
And senate: when invited elsewhere, truly, 

He shows more appetite for words than war. 
There was the young hard Rackrhyme, who had newly 

Come out and glimmer'd as a six-weeks' star. 
There was Lord Pyrrho, too, the gTeat free-thinker ; 
And Sir John Pottledeep, the mighty drinker. 

LXXXV. 

There was the Duke of Dash, who was a — duke, 

"Ay, every inch a" duke ; Vhere were twelve peers 
Like Charlemagne's — and all such peers in look 

And intellect, that neither eyes nor ears 
For commoners had ever them n.istook. 

There were the six Miss Rawbolds — pretty d^ars ! 
All song and sentiment; whose hearts were set 
Less on a convent than a coronet. 

LXXXVI. 
There were four Honourable Misters, whoa* 

Honour was more before their names tna»* ^Aor* 
There was the preux Chevalier de la Ruse, 

Whom France and Fortune lately deign'd to Waft ii*/* 
Whose chiefly harmless talent was to amuse; 

But the Clubs found it rather serious laughter, 
Because — such was his magic power to please,— 
The dice seem'd charm'd too with his repartees 

LXXXVII. 

There was Dick Dubious, the metaphysician, 
Who loved philosophy and a good dinner; 

An<de, the soi-disant mathematician ; 

Sir Henry Silver-cup the great race-winner; 

There was the Reverend Rodomont Precisian ; 
Who did not hate so much the sin as sinner; 

And Lord Augustus Fitz-Plantagenct, 

Good at all things, but better at ? bet. 



CANTO XIII. 



DON JUAN. 



G70 



LXXXVIII. 

There was Jack Jargon, the gigantic guardsman ; 

And General Fireface, famous in the field, 
A great tactician, and no less a swordsman, 

Who ate, last war, more Yankees than he kill'd. 
There was the waggish Welsh Judge, Jefferies Hards- 
man, 

In his grave office so completely skill'd, 
That when a culprit came for condemnation, 
He had his judge's joke for consolation. 

LXXXIX. 
Good company's a chess-board — there are kings, 

Queens, bishops, knights, rooks, pawns ; the world 's 
a game ; 
Save that the puppets pull at their own strings ; 

Methinks gay Punch hath something of the same. 
My Muse, the butterfly, hath but her wings, 

Not stings, and flits through ether without aim, 
Alighting rarely: were she but a hornet, 
Perhaps there might be vices which would mourn it. 

XC. 
I had forgotten — but must not forget — 

An orator, the latest of the session, 
Who had deliver'd well a very set 

Smooth speech, his first and maidenly transgression 
Upon debate : the papers echoed yet 

Willi this debut, which made a strong impression, 
And rank'd with what is every day display'd — . 
"The best first speech that ever yet was made." 

XCI. 
Proud of his "Hearhims!" proud too of his vote, 

And lost virginity of oratory, 
Proud of his learning (just enough to quote), 

He revell'd in his Ciceronian glory : 
With memory excellent to get by rote, 

With wit to hatch a pun or tell a story, 
Graced with some merit and witli more effrontery, 
" His country's pride," he came down to the country. 

XCII. 
There also were two wits by acclamation, 

Longbow from Ireland, Strongbow from the Tweed, 
Both lawyers, and both men of education ; 

But Strongbow's wit was of more polish'd breed : 
Longbow was rich in an imagination 

As beautiful and bounding as a steed, 
But sometimes stumbling over a potatoe, — 
While Strongbow's best things might have come from 
Cato. 

xcm. 

Strongbow was like a new-tuned harpsichord ; 

But Longbow wild as an .lEolian harp, 
With which the winds of heaven can claim accord, 

And make a music, whether flat or sharp. 
Of Strongbow's talk you would not change a word ; 

At Longbow's phrases you might sometimes carp : 
Both wits — one born so, and the other bred, 
This by his heart — his rival by his head. 

XCIV. 
If all these seem a heterogeneous mass, 

To be assembled at a country-si at, 
Yet think a suecimen of every class 

Is better than a humdrum tete-a-tete. 
The days of comedy are gone, alas ! 

When Congreve's fool could vie with Molierc's btte. 
Society is smoothed to that excess, 
That manners hardly differ more than dress. 



xcv. 

Our ridicules are kept in the back ground, 

Ridiculous enough, but also dull ; 
Professions too are no more to be found 

Professional ; and there is nought to cull 
Of folly's fruit ; for though your fools abound, 

They 're barren, and not worth the pains to pull. 
Society is now one polish'd horde, 
Form'd of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored. 

XCVI. 

But from being farmers, we turn gleaners, gleaning 
The scanty hut right well thresh'd ears of truth ; 

And, gentle reader! when you gather meaning, 
You may be Boaz, and I — modest Ruth. 

Further I'd quote, but Scripture, intervening, 
Forbids. A great impression in my youth 

Was made by Mrs. Adams, where she cries 

" That scriptures out of church are blasphemies."' 

XCVII. 

But when we can, we glean in this vile age 
Of chaff, although our gleanings be not grist. 

I must not quite omit the talking sage. 
Kit-Cat, the famous conversationist, 

Who, in his commonplace book, had a page 

Prepared each morn for evenings. " List, oh list !"- 

"Alas, poor ghost!" — What unexpected woes 

Await those who have studied their bons-mots ! 

XCVIII. 

Firstly, they must allure the conversation 
By many windings to their clever clinch ; 

And secondly, must let slip no occasion, 
Nor bate (abate) their hearers of an inrl,, 

But lake an ell — and make a great sensation, 
If possible ; and thirdly, never flinch 

When some smart talker puts them to the test, 

But seize the last word, which no doubt 's the best. 

XCIX. 

Lord Henry and his lady were the hosts ; 

The party we have touch'd on were the guests • 
Their table was a hoard to tempt even ghosts 

To pass the Styx for more substantial feasts. 
I will not dwell upon ragouts or roasts, 

Albeit all human history attests 
That happiness for man — the hungry sinner — 
Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner, 

C. 

Witness the lands which " flow'd with milk and honey,' 
Hold out unto the hungry Israelites: 

To this we 've added since the love of money, 
The only sort of pleasure which requites. 

Youth fades, and leaves our days no longer sunny; 
We tire of mistresses and parasites : 

But oh, ambrosial cash ! ah ! who would lose thee ? 

When we no more can use, or even abuse thee ! 

CI. 
The gentlemen got <>d betimes to shoot, 

Or hunt ; the young because they liked the sport- 
The first thing boys like after play and fruit : 

The middle-agcrl, to make the day more short ; 
For ennui is a growth of English root, 

Though nameless in our language; wcretcii 
The fad for winds, and lit the French translate 
That awful yawn which sleep cannot abate, 



680 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CIA iO XIV. 



CII. 
The elderly walk'd through the library, 

AnJ tumble 1 books, or criticised the ])icturcs, 
Or saunter'd through the gardens piteously, 

And made upon the hothouse several strictures, 
Or rode a nag which trotted not too high, 

Or on the morning papers read their lectures, 
Or on the watch their longing eyes would fix, 
Longing, at sixty, for the hour of six. 

cm. 

But none were " gem' :" the great hour of union 
Was rung by dinner's knell ; till then all were 

Masters of their own time — ay in communion, 
Or solitary, as they chose to bear 

The hours, which how to pass is hut to few known. 
Each rose up at his own, and had to spare 

What time he chose; for dress, and broke his fast 

Where, when, and how he chose for that repast. 

CIV. 

The ladies — some rouged, some a little pale — 
Met the morn as they might. If fine, they rode, 

Or walk'd ; if foul, they read, or told a tale ; 
Sung, or r»hearsed the last dance from abroad ; 

Discuss'd the fashion which might next prevail ; 
And settled bonnets by the newest code; 

Or cratnm'd twelve sheets into one little letter, 

To make each correspondent a new debtor. 

CV. 

For some had absent lovers, all had friends. 

The earth lias nothing like a she epistle, 
And hardly heaven— because it never ends. 

I love the mystery of a female missal, 
Which, like a creed, ne'er says all it intends, 

But full of cunning as Ulysses 1 whistle, 
When he allured poor Dolon : — you had better 
Take care what you reply to such a letter. 

CVI. 

Then there weie billiards ; cards too, but no dice; 

Save in the Ch'bs no man of honour plays ; — 
Boats when 't was water, skaiting when 't was ice, 

And the hard frosts desiroy'd the scenting days : 
And angling too, that solitary vice, 

Whatever Isaac Walton sings or says: 
The quaint, old, cruel coxcomb, in his gullet 
Should have a hook, and a small trout to pull it. 8 

cm 

Witn evening came the banquet and the wine ; 

The conversazione ; the duet, 
A:tuned by voices more or less divine, 

(My heart or head aches with the memory yet). 
The four Miss Rawbolds in a glee would shine; 

But the two youngest loved more to be set 
Down (o the harp — because to music's charms 
They added graceful necks, while hands and arms. 

CVIII. 

Sometimes a dance (though rarely on field days, 
For then the gentlemen were rather tired) 

Display'd some sylph-like figures in its maze : 
Then there was small-talk ready when required ; 

Piirtation — bul decorous ; the mere praise 

Of charms that si Id or si Id not be admired ; 

The. hunters fought their fox-hunt o'er again, 

And 'hen retreated soberly — at ten. 



CIX. 

The politicians, in a nook apart, 

Discuss'd the world, and settled all the spheres ; 
The wits watch'd every loop-hole for their art, 

To introduce a bon-inot head and ears ; 
Small is the rest of those who would be smart — 

A moment's good thing may have cost them years 
Before they find an hour to introduce it, 
And then, even tlien, some bore may make them lose it, 

ex. 

But all was gentle and aristocratic 
In this our party ; polish'd, smooth, and cold, 

As Phidian forms cut out of marble Attic, 
There now are no Squire Westerns, as of old ; 

And our Sophias arc not so emphatic, 
But fair as then, or fairer to behold. 

We 've no accomplish'd blackguards, like Tom Jones, 

Hut gentlemen in stays, as stilF as stones. 

CXI. 

They separated at an early hour ; 

That is, ere midnight — which is London's noon: 
But in the country, ladies seek their bovver 

A little earlier than the waning moon. 
Peace to the slumbers of each folded flower — 

May the rose call back its true colours soon ! 
Good hours of fair cheeks are the fairest tinters, 
And lower the price of rouge — at least some winters 



CANTO XIV. 



If from great Nature's, or our own abyss 
Of thought, we could but snatch a certainty, 

Perhaps mankind might find the path they miss- 
But, then 't would spoil much good philosophy. 

One system eats another up, and this 
Much as old Saturn ate his progeny; 

For when his pious consort gave him stones 

In lieu of sons, of these he made no bones. 

II. 

But system doth reverse the Titan's breakfast, 
And eats her parents, albeit the digestion 

Is difficult. Pray tell me, can you make fast, 
After due search, your faith to any question? 

Look back o'er ages, ere unto the stake fast 

You bind yourself, and call some mode the best one. 

Nothing more true than not to trust your senses ; 

And yet what are your other evidences? 

III. 
For me, I know nought ; nothing I deny, 

A. Inn!, reject, contemn ; and what know you, 
Except perhaps that you were born to die/ 

And both may after all turn out untrue. 
An age may come, font of eternity, 

When nothing shall be either old or new. 
Death, so call'd, is a thing which makes men weep, 
And yet a third of life is pass'd in sleep. 



CANTO XIV. 



DON JUAN. 



631 



IV. 
A sleep without dreams, after a rough c!ay 

Of toil, is what we covet most ; and yet 
How clay shrinks back from more quiescent clay ! 

The very suicide that pays his debt 
At once without instalments (an old way 

Of paying debts, which creditors regret) 
Lets out impatiently his rushing breath, 
Less from disgust of life than dread of death. 

V. 

'Tis round him, near him, here, there, every where; 

And there 's a courage which grows out of fear, 
Perhaps of all most desperate, which will dare 

The worst to know it: — when the mountains rear 
Their peaks beneath your human loot, and there 

You look down o'er the precipice, and drear 
The gulf of rock yawns, — you can't gaze a minute 
Without an awful wish to plunge within it. 

VI. 
'Tis true, you don't — but, pale and struck with terror, 

Retire: but look into your past impression! 
And you will find, though shuddering at the mirror 

Of your own thoughts, in all their self-confession, 
The lurking bias, be it truth or error, 

To the unknown; a secret prepossession, 
To plunge with all your fears — but where? Youknownot, 
And that 's the reason why you do — or do not. 

vi r. 

But what's this to the purpose? you will say. 
Gent, reader, nothing ; a mere speculation, 
For which my sole excuse is — 'tis my way. 

Sometimes with and sometimes without occasion, 
I write what 's uppermost, without delay ; 

This narrative is not meant for narration, 
But a mere airy and fantastic basis, 
To build up common things with commonplaces. 

VIII. 
You know, or don't know, that great Bacon saith, 
"Fling up a straw, 'twill show the way the wind 
blows ;" 
Vnd such a straw, borne on by human breath, 

Is poesy, according as the mind glows ; 
V paper kite which flies 'twixt life and death, 
•A shadow which the onward soul behind throws: 
Vnd mine's a bubble not blown up for praise, 
iul just to play with, as an infant plays. 

IX. 
The world is all before me — or behind; 

For I have seen a portion of that same, 
\nd quite enough fi>r me to keep in mind; — ■ 

Of passions, too, I've proved enough to blame, 
To the great pleasure of our friends, mankind, 

Who like to mix some slight alloy with fame: 
For I was rather famous in my time, 
Until I fairly knock'd it Up with rhyme. 

X. 
[ have brought this world about my ears, and eke 

The other: that's to Bay, the clergy — who 
Upon my head have bid their thunders break 

In pious libels by no means .. 
And yet I can't help scribbling once a week, 

Tiring old readers, nor new. 

In youth I wro my mind was full, 

And now because I feel it growing dull. 
3L 91 



XI. 



But "why then publish?" — There are no rewards 
Of fame or profit, when the world grows weary. 

I ask in turn., — why do you play at cards? 

Why drink 1 Why read .' — To make some hour less 
dreary. 

It occupies me to turn back regards 

On what I've seen or ponder'd, .-ad or cheery; 

And what I write I cast upon the stream, 

To swim or sink — I have had at least my dream. 

XII. 

I think that were I certain of success, 

I hardly could compose another line: 
So long I've battled either more or less, 

That no defeat can drive rne from the Nine. 
This feeling 'tis not easy to exp 

Anil yet 'lis not affected, I opi 
In play, there are two pleasures fir vour choosing — 
The one is winning, and the other losing. 
XIII. 
I, my Muse by no menus deals in fiction: 

She gathers a repertory of facts, 
Of course with some reserve and slight restriction. 

Hot mostly sings of human things and acts — 
And that's one cause she meets with contradiction ; 

For too much truth, at first sight, ne'er attracts, 
And were her object only what's call'd glory, 
With more ease too, she'd tell a different story. 

XIV. 
Love, war, a tempest — surely there's variety: 

Also a seasoning slight of lucubration; 
A bird's-eye view too of that wild, Society ; 

A slight glance thrown on men of every station. 
If you have nought else, here's at least satiety 

Both in performance and in preparation; 
And though these lines should onlv line poi manteaus, 
Trade will be ail the better for these cantos. 

XV. 
The portion of this world which I at present 

Have taken up to fill the following sermon, 
Is one of which there's no description recent. 

The reason why, is easy to determine: 
Although it seems both prominent and pleasant, 

There is a sameness in its gems and ermine, 
A dull and family likeness through all ages, 
Of no great promise for poetic pages. 

XVI. 
With much to excite, there 's little to exalt ; 

Nothing that speaks to all men and all times; 
A sort of varnish over every fault; 

A kind of commonplace, even in their crimes; 
Factitious passions, wit without much salt, 

A want of that true nature which sublimes 
Whate'er it shows with truth; a smooth monotony 
Of character, in those at least who have got any. 

XVII. 
Sometimes, indeed, like soldiers off pat , 

They break their ranks and gladly leave the drill, 
But then the roll-call draws them back afraid, 

And they must I. • seem what tiny were: StiH 

Doubtless it is a brilliant masquerade; 

Hut when of the first sight you have had voui fill. 
• did so upon me, 

'I'll!-; paradise of pleasure ana '-miili. 



682 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XI V 



Will. 
When we have marie our love, ami gamed our gaming, 

Dress'd, voted, shone, and, may be, something more; 
With dandies dined J heard senators declaiming; 

Seen beauties brought to market l>y ilic score ; 
Sad rakes to sadder husbands chastely taming ; 

There's little loft but to be bored or bore. 
Witness those "o-det/anl jeunes famines " "ho stem 
The stream, nor leave the world which leaveth them. 

XIX. 

'T is said — indeed a genera! complaint — 
That no one has succeeded in describing 

The mnnde exactly as they ought to paint. 
Some say, that authors only snatch, by bribing 

The porter, some slight scandals strange and quaint, 
To furnish matter fur their moral gibing; 

And that their books have but one style in common — 

My lady's prattle, filter'd through her woman. 

XX. 

But this can't well be true, just now; for writers 
Arc grown of the beau monde a part potential: 

I've seen them balance even the scale with fighters, 
Especially when young, for that's essential. 

Why do their sketches fail them as inditers 

Of, what they deem themselves most consequential, 

The real portrait of the highest tribe? 

T is that, in fact, there 's little to describe. 

XXI. 

"llml ignara hquor: n these are mtgte, " quarum 
Pars parva fui" but still art and part. 

Now I could much more easily sketch a haram, 
A battle, wreck, or history of the heart, 

Than these things ; and besides, I wish to spare 'etn, 
For reasons which I choose to keep apart. 

" Velabo Cereris sacrum qui vulgarit" 

Which means, that vulgar people must not share it. 

XXII. 

And therefore what I throw off is ideal — 

Lower'd, lcaven'd, like a history of Freemasons ; 
Which bears the same relation to the real, 

As Captain Parry's voyage may do to Jason's. 
The grand Arcanum 's not for men to see all ; 

My music has some mystic diapasons ; 
And there is much which could not be appreciated 
In any manner by the uninitiated. 

XXIII. 
Alas ! worlds fall — and woman, since she fcll'd 

The world (as, since that history, less polite 
Than true, hath been a creed so strictly held), 

Has not yet given up the practice quite. 
Poor thing of usages ! coerced, compell'd, 

Victim when wrong, and martyr oft when right, 
Condcmn'd to child-bed, as men, for their sins, 
Have shaving too cntail'd upon their chins, — 

XXIV. 
A daily plague which, in the aggregate, 

Ma)' average on the whole with parturition. 
But as to women, who can penetrate 

The real sufferinj/s of their she condition? 
Man's very sympathy with their estate 

Has much of selfishness and more suspicion. 
Their love, their virtue, beauty, education, 
Uui *bim good housekeepers, to breed a nation. 



XXV. 

All this were very well, and can't he better; 

But even this is difficult, Heaven knows ! 
So many troubles from her birth beset her. 

Such small distinction between friends and foes, 
The gilding wears so soon from off her fetter, 

That but ask any woman if she 'd choose 

(Take her at thirty, that is) to have been 
Female or male? a school-boy or a queen? 

XXVI. 
"Petticoat influence" is a great reproach, 

Which even those who obey would fain bethought 
To 11 v from, as from hungry pikes a roach; 

But, since beneath it upon earth we arc brought 
By various joltings of life's hackney-coach, 

I for one venerate a petticoat — 
A garment of a mystical sublimity, 
No matter whether russet, silk, or dimity. 

' XXVII. 
Much I respect, and much I have adored, 

In my young days, that chaste and goodly \eil. 
Which holds a treasure, like a miser's hoard, 

And more attracts by all it doth conceal — 
A golden scabbard on a Damasque sword, 

A loving letter with a mystic seal, 
A cure for grief — for what can ever rankle 
Before a petticoat and peeping ancle? 

XXVIII. 

And when upon a silent, sullen day, 

With a Sirocco, for example, blowing, — 

When even the sea looks dim with all its spray 
And sulkily the river's ripple's flowing, 

And the sky shows that very ancient gray, 
The sober, sad antithesis to glowing, — 

'Tis pleasant, if then anything is pleasant, 

To catch a glimpse even of a pretty peasant. 

XXIX. 

We left our heroes and our heroines 

In that fair clime which don't depend on climate 
Quite independent of the Zodiac's signs, 

Though certainly more difficult to rhyme at, 
Because the sun and stars, and aught that shines 

Mountains, and all wc can be most sublime at,» 
Are there oft dull and dreary as a dun — 
Whether a sky's or tradesman's, is all one. 

XXX. 
And in-door life is less poetical; 

And out-of-door hath showers, and mists, and sleet 
With which I could not brew a pastoral. 

But be it as it may, a bard must meet 
All difficulties, whether great or small, 

To spoil his undertaking or complete, 
And work away like spirit upon matter, 
Embarrass'd somewhat both with lire and water. 

XXXI. 
.luan — in this respect at least like saints — 

Was all things unto people of all sorts, 
And lived contentedly, without complaints. 

In camps, in ships, in cottages, or courts- - 
Born with that happy soul which seldom funis, 

And mingling modestly in toils or sports. 

Hi- likewise could be most things to all women, 
Without 'he coxcombry of certain .«•';( men. 



LAXTO XIV- 



DON JUAN. 



683 



XXXII. 
A fox-hunt to a foreigner is strange ; 

'T is also subject to the double danger 
Of tumbling first, and having in exchange 

Some pleasant jesting at the awkward stranger ; 
But Juan had been early taught to range 

The wilds, as doth an Arab ttirn'd avenger, 
So that his horse, or charger, hunter, hack, 
Knew that he had a rider on his back. 

XXXIII. 

And now in this new field, with some applause, 

He clear'd hedge, ditch, and double post, and rail, 
And never crane'!, 1 and made but few "faux pas," 

And only fretted when the scent 'gan fail. 
He broke, 'tis true, some statutes of the laws 

Of hunting — for the sagest youth is frail ; 
Rode o'er the hounds, it may be, now and then, 
And once o'er several country gentlemen. 

XXXIV. 
But, on the whole, to general admiration 

He acquitted both himself and horse : the squires 
Marvell'd at merit of another nation : 

The boors cried " Dang it ! who 'd have thought 
it ?" — Sires, 
The Nestors of the sporting generation, 

Swore praises, and recall'd their former fires ; 
The huntsman's self relented to a grin, 
And rated him almost a whipper-in. 

XXXV. 
Such were his trophies ; — not of spear and shield, 

But leaps, and bursts, and sometimes foxes' brushes; 
Yet I must own, — although in this I yield 

To patriot sympathy a Briton's blushes,— 
He thought at heart like courtly Chesterfield, 

Who, after a long chase o'er hills, dales, bushes, 
ind what not, though he rode beyond all price, 
Ask'd, next day, " if men ever hunted twice ?" 

XXXVI. 
He also had a quality uncommon 

To early risers after a long chase, 
Who wake in winter ere the cock can summon 

December's drowsy day to his dull race,— 
A quality agreeable to woman, 

When her soft liquid words run on apace, 
Who likes a listener, whether saint or sinner, — 
He did not fall asleep just after dinner. 

XXXVII. 
But, light and airy, stood on the alert, 

And shone in the best part of dialogue, 
By humouring always what they might assert, 

And listening to the topics most in vogue ; 
Now grave, now gay, but never dull or pert ; 

And smiling but in secret — cunning rogue ! 
He ne'er presumed to make an error clearer ; 
In short, th«>fe never was a better hearer. 

XXXVIII. 
And then he danced ; — all foreigners excel 

The serious Angles in the eloquence 
Of pantomime ; — he danced, I say, right well, 

With emphasis, and also with good sense — 
A thing in footing indispensable : 

He danced without theatrical pretence, 
Not. like a ballet-master in the van 
Of his drill'd nymphs, but like a gentleman. 



XXXIX. 

Chaste were his steps, each kept within due botmd, 
And elegance was sprinkled o'er his figure ; 

Like swift Camilla, he scarce skimm'd the ground. 
And rather held in than put forth his vigour; 

And then he had an ear for music's sound, 
Which might defy a crotchet-critic's rigour. 

Such classic pas — sans flaws — set ofF our hero, 

He glanced like a personified bolero ; 

XL. 

Or, like a flying hour before Aurora, 
In Guido's famous fresco, which alone 

Is worth a tour to Rome, although no more a 
Remnant were there of the old world's sole throne. 

The " tout ensemble" of his movements wore a 
Grace of the soft ideal, seldom shown, 

And ne'er to be described ; for, to the dolour 

Of bards and prosers, words are void of colour. 

XLI. 

No marvel then he was a favourite ; 

A full-grown Cupid, very much admired ; 
A little spoil'd, but by no means so quite ; 

At least he kept his vanity retired. 
Such was his tact, he could alike delight 

The chaste, and those who are not so much inspireo. 
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke, who loved " tracasserie," 
Began to treat him with some small " agacerie." 

XLII. 

She was a fine and somewhat full-blown blonde, 

Desirable, distinguish'd, celebtated 
For several winters in the grand, grand monde. 

I 'd rather not say what might be related 
Of her exploits, for this were ticklish ground ; 

Besides there might be falsehood in what's stated: 
Her late performance had been a dead set 
At Lord Augustus Fitz-Plantagenet. 

XLIII. 

This noble personage began to look 

A little black upon this new flirtation ; 
But such small licenses must lovers brook, 

Mere freedoms of the female corporation. 
Wne to the man who ventures a rebuke ! 

'T will but precipitate a situation 
Extremely disagreeable, but common 
To calculators, when they count on woman. 

XLIV. 
The circle smiled, then wlusper'd, and then sneer'd ; 

The Misses bridled, and the matrons frow-ii'd ; 
Some hoped things might not turn out as they fear'it >, 

Some would not deem such women could be found : 
Some ne'er believed one-half of what thev heard ; 

Some look'd pcrplex'd, and others look'd profound ; 
And several pitied with sincere regret 
Poor Lord Augustus Fitz-Plantagenet. 

XLV. 
But, what is odd, none ever named the duke, 

Who, one might think, was something in the affau. 
True, he was absent, and, 'twas rumour'd, took 

But small concern about the when, or where, 
Or what his consort did : if he could brook 

Her gayeties, none had a right to stare • 
Theirs was that best of unions, past all doubt, 
Which never meets, and therefore can't fall ouu 



084 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XiV 



XLVI. 
But, oli that I should ever pen so sad a line ! 

Fired with an abstract love of virtue, she, 
My Dian of the Ephesians, Lady Adeline, 

Began to think the duchess' conduct free ; 
Regretting much that she hail chosen, so had a line, 

And waxing chiller in her court' sy, 
Look'd grave and pale to see her friend's fragility, 
Fur which most friends reserve their sensibility. 

XLVII. 
There's nought in this bad world like sympathy: 

'T is so becoming to the soul and face ; 
Sets to soft music the harmonious sigh, 

And robes sweet friendship in a Brussels lace. 
Without a friend, what were humanity, 

To hunt our errors up with a good grace? 
Consoling us with — "Would you had thought twice! 
An ! if you had but follow'd my advice !" 

XLVIII. 
Oli, Job! you had two friends: one's quite enough, 

Especially when we are ill at ease; 
They're but bad pilots when the weather's rough, 

Doctors less famous for their cures than fees. 
Let no man grumble when his friends fall o(T, 

As they will do like leaves at the first breeze : 
When your affairs come round, one way or t' other, 
Go to the coffee-house, and take another. 2 

xux. 

But this is not my maxim : had it been, 

Some heart-aches had been spared me ; yet I care 
not — 
I would not be a tortoise in his screen 

Of stubborn shell, which waves and weather wear not: 
'T is better on the whole to have felt and seen 

That which humanity may bear, or bear not : 
'T will teach discernment to the sensitive, 
And not to pour their ocean in a sieve. 

L. 
Of all the horrid, hideous notes of woe, 

Sadder than owl-songs or the midnight, blast, 
Is that portentous phrase, " I told you so," 

Utter'd by friends, those prophets of the past, 
Who, 'stead of saying what you now should do, 

Own they foresaw that you would fall at last, 
And solace your slight lapse 'gainst u bonos moriaf* 
With a long memorandum of old stories. 

LI. 
The Lady Adeline's serene severity 

Was not confined to feeling for her friend, 
Whose fame she rather doubted with posterity, 

Unless her habits should begin to mend j 
But Juan also shared in her austerity, 

But mix'd with pity, pure as o'er was penn'd : 
His inexperience moved her gentle ruth, 
And (as her junior by six weeks) his youth. 

LII. 
These forty days' advantage of her years — 

And hers were those which can face calculation, 
Boldly referring to the list <<f peers, 

And noble births, nor dread the enumeration — 
l.iave her a right to have maternal fears 

For a young gentleman's fit education, 
Thougn she was far from that leap-year, whose leap, 
In female dates, strikes time all of a heap. 



LIU. 
This may be fix'd at somewhere before thirty — 

Say seven-and-rwenty ; for I never knew 
The strictest in chronology and virtue 

Advance beyond, while they could pass for new. 
Oh, Time ! why dost not pause ! Thy scythe, so dirty 

With nist, should surely cease to hack and hew. 
Reset it ; shave more smoothly, also slower, 
if but to keep thy credit as a mower. 

L1V. 
But Adeline was far from that ripe age, 

Whose ripeness is but bitter at the best : 
'T was rather her experience made her sage, 

F"r she had seen the world, and stood its test, 
As I have said in — I forget what p:i _'•' ; 

My Muse despises reference, as you have guess'd 
Bv this time ; — but strike six from seven-and-lwenty 
And you will find her sum of years in plenty. 

LV. 
At sixteen she came out ; presented, vaunted, 

She put all coronets into commotion: 
At seventeen too the world was still enchanted 

With the new Venus of their brilliant ocean : 
At eighteen, though below her feet still panted 

A hecatomb of suitors with devotion, 
She had consented to create again 
That Adam, call'd " the happiest of men." 

LVI. 
Since then she had sparkled through three glowing 
winters, 

Admired, adored ; but also so correct, 
That she had puzzled all the acutest hinters, 

Without the apparel of being circumspect ; 
They could not even glean the slightest splinters 

From off the marble, which had no defect. 
She had also snatch'd a moment since her marriage 
To bear a son and heir — and one miscarriage. 

LVII. 
Fondlv the wheeling fire-Hies flew around her, 

Those little glittercrs of the London night ; 
But none of these poscess'd a sting to wound her — 

She was a pitch beyond a coxcomb's flight. 
Perhaps she wish'd an aspirant profounder; 

But, whatsoe'er she wish'd, she acted right ; 
And whether coldness, pride, or virtue, dignify 
A woman, so she 's good, what does it signify ? 

LVIII. 
I hate a motive like a lingering bottle, 

Which with the landlord makes too long a stand, 
Leaving all claretless the unmoistcn'd throttle, 

Especially with politics on hand ; 
I hale it, as 1 hate a drove of cattle, 

Who whirl the dust as Simooms whirl the sanu , 
I hate it, as I hate an argument, 
A laureate's ode, or servile peer's •' content." 

FIX. 
'T is sad to hack into the roots of things, 

They are so much intertwisted with the earth: 
So that the branch a goodly verdure flings, 

I reek not if an acorn gave it birth. 
To trace all actions to their secret springs 

Would make indeed some melancholy mirth : 
But this is not at present my concern, 
And I refer you to wise Oxensliern.' 



CANTO XIV. 



DON JUAN. 



686 



LX. 

With the kind view of saving an cclfit, 
Ruth to the duchess and diplomatist, 

The Lady Adeline, as soon 's she saw 
That Juan was unlikely to resist — 

(For foreigners don't know that a faux pas 
In England ranks quite on a dilfurcnt list 

From those of other lands, unbless'd with juries, 

Whose verdict for such sin a certain cure is)— 

LXI. 

The Lady Adeline resolved to take 

Such measures as she thought might best impede 
The further progress of this sad mistake. 

She thought with some simplicity indeed ; 
But innocence is bold even at the stake, 

And simple in the world, ami doth not need 
Nor use those palisades by dames erected, 
Whose virtue lies in never being detected. 

LXII. 

[t was not that she fear'd the very worst : 
His grace was an enduring, married man, 

And was not likely all at once to burst 
Into a scene, and swell the clients' clan 

Of Doctors' Commons ; but she dreaded first 
The magic of her grace's talisman, 

And next a quarrel (as he seem'd to fret) 

With Lord Augustus Fitz-Plantagenet. 

LXIII. 

Her grace too pass'd for being an intrigante, 
And somewhat mcchante in her amorous sphere ; 

One of those pretty, precious plagues, which haunt 
A lover with caprices soft and dear, 

That like to make a quarrel, when they can't 
Find one, each day of the delightful year; 

Bewitching, torturing, as they freeze or glow, 

And — what is worst of all — won't let you go: 

LXIV. 

The sort of thing to turn a young man's head, 
Or make a Werter of him in the end. 

No wonder then a purer soul should dread 
This sort of chaste liaison for a friend ; 

It were much better to be wed or dead, 
Than wear a heart a woman loves to rend. 

'T is best to pause, and think, ere you rush on, 

If that a "bonne fortune'" be really "bonne" 

LXV. 

And first, in the o'crfiV.ving of her heart, 

Which reallv knew or thought it knew no guile, 
She call'd her husband nrjw and then apart, 

And bade him counsel Juan. With a smile, 
Lord Henry heard her plans of artless art 

To wean Don Juan from the siren's wile ; 
And answer'd, like a statesman or a prophet, 
In such guise that she could make nothing of it. 

LXVI. 
Firstly, he said, " he never interfered 

In anybody's business but the king's:" 
Next, that "he never judged from what appcar'd, 

Without strong reason, of those sorts ol things:" 
Thirdlv, that "Juan had more brain than beard, 

And was not to be held in leading-strings;" 
Am! fourthly, what need hardly be said twice, 
♦That good but rarely came from good advice." 
3 l 2 



LXVII. 

And, therefore, doubtless, to approve the truth 
Of the last axiom, he advised his spouse 

To leave the parties to themselves, forsooth, 
At least as far as bienssdance allows : 

That time would temper Juan's faults of youth ; 
That young men rarely made monastic vows , 

That opposition only more attaches 

But here a messenger brought in despatches : 

LXVIII. 

And being of the council call'd "the privy," 

Lord Henry walk'd into his cabinet, 
To furnish matter for some future Livy 

To tell how he reduced the nation's debt ; 
And if their full contents I do not give ye, 

It is because I do not know them yet : 
But I shall add them in a brief appendix, 
To come between mine epic and its index. 

LXIX. 

But ere he went, he added a slight hint, 
Another gentle commonplace or two, 

Such as are coin'd in conversation's mint, 
And pass, for want of better, though not new : 

Then broke his packet, to see what was in 't, 
And having casually glanced it through, 

Retired ; and, as he went out, calmly kiss'd her, 

Less like a young wife than an aged sister. 

LXX. 

He was a cold, good, honourable man, 

Proud of his birth, and proud of every thing, 

A goodly spirit for a state divan, 
A figure fit to walk before a king ; 

Tall, stately, form'd to lead the courtly van 

On birih-days, glorious with a star and strin; , 

The very model of a chamberlain — 

And such I mean to make him when I reign. 

LXXI. 

But there was something wanting on the whole- - 

I don't know what, and therefore cannot tell- - 
Which pretty women — the sweet souls! — call sou* 

Certes it was not body , he was well 
Proportion'd, as a poplai or a pole, 

A handsome man, that human miracle; 
And in each circumstance of love or war, 
Had still preserved his perpendicular. 

LXXfl. 
Still there was something wanting, as I've said— 

That undefinable u je ne seas own," 
Which, for what I know, may of yore have led 

To Homer's Iliad, since it drew to Troy 
The Greek Eve,*Helen, from the Spartan's bed, 

Though on the whole, no doubt, the Dardan buy 
Was much inferior to King Menelaos , — 
But thus it is some women will betray us. 

LXXIII. 
There is an awkward thing which much perpiexes. 

Unless like wise Tiresias we had proved 
By turns the difference of the several sexes: 

Neither can show quite hoxc ihey would be lovcn 
The sensual for a Bhort time but connects us — 

The sentimental boasts to be unmoved: 
But Imtli together form a kind of centaur, 
Upon whose back 'tis better not to venture. 



086 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XIV 



LXXIV. 

A something all-sufficient for the heart 

Is that for which the sex are always seeking ; 

But how to fill up that same vacant part — 

There lies the rub — and this they are but weak in. 

Frail mariners afloat without a chart, 

They run before the wind through high seas breaking ; 

And when they have made the shore, through every shock, 

'T is odd, or odds, it may turn out a rock. 

LXXV. 

There is a flower call'd "love in idleness," 

For which see Shakspeare's ever-blooming garden; — 

I will not make his great description less, 

And beg his British godship's humble pardon, 

If, in my extremity of rhyme's distress, 

I touch a single leaf where he is warden ; 

But though the flower is different, with the French 

Or Swiss Rousseau, cry, " vaiUi la pervenchc!" 

LXXVI. 

Eureka! I have found it! What I mean 

To say is, not that love is idleness, 
But that in love such idleness has been 

An accessory, as I have cause to guess. 
Hard labour 's an indifferent go-between ; 

Your men of business are not apt to express 
Much passion, since the merchant-ship, the Argo, 
Convey'd Medea as her Bupercargo. 

LXXVII. 

*' Bealus Me proml!" from "negotits," 

Saith Horace ; the great little poet's wrong; 

His other maxim, " Noscitur a suciis" 

Is much more to the purpose of his song ; 

Though even that were sometimes too ferocious, 
Unless good company he kept too long ; 

But, in his teeth, wbate'er their state or station, 

Thrice happy they who have an occupation ! 

LXXV III. 

Adam exchanged his paradise for ploughing ; 

Eve made up millinery with fig-leaves — 
The earliest knowledge from the tree so knowing, 

As far as I know, that the church receives: 
And since that time, it need not cost much showing 

That many of the ills o'er which man grieves, 
And still more women, spring from not employing 
Some hours to make the remnant worth enjoying. 

LXXIX. 
And hence high life is oft a dreary void, 

A rack of pleasures, where we must invent 
A something wherewithal to be annoy'd. 

Bards may sing what they please about content; 
Contented, when translated, means but cloy'd ; 

And hence arise the woes of sentiment, 
Blue devils, and blue-stockings, and romances 
Reduced to practice, and pcrform'd like dances. 

LXXX. 
1 do declare, upon an affidavit, 

Romances I ne'er read like those I have seen ; 
Nor, if unto the world I ever gave it, 

Would some believe that such a tale had been: 
But such intent I never had, nor have it; 

Some truths are better kept behind a screen, 
Especially when they would l<*cl; nite lies j 
1 therefore deal if generalities. 



LXXXI. 

•' An oyster may be cross'd in love," — and why ? 

Because he mopeth idly in his shell, 
And heaves a lonely sublerraqueous sigh, 

Much as a monk may do within his cell: 
And // propos of monks, their piety 

With sloth hath found it difficult to dwell; 
Those vegetables of the Catholic creed 
Are apt exceedingly to run to seed. 

LXXXIII. 

Oh, Wilberforce! thou man of black renown, 
Whose merit none enough can sing or say, 

Thou hast struck one immense colossus down, 
Thou moral Washington of Africa ! 

But there's another little thing, I own, 

Which you should perpetrate some summer's day, 

And set the other half of earth to rights: 

You have freed the blacks — now pray shut up the whites. 

LXXXIII. 

Shut up the bald-coot bully Alexander ; 

Ship off" the holy three to Senegal ; 
Teach them that " sauce for goose is sauce for gander," 

And ask them how they like to be in thrall. 
Shut up each high heroic salamander, 

Who eats fire gratis (since the pay's but small)' 
Shut up — no, not the king, but the pavilion, 
Or else 't will cost us all another million. 

LXXXIV. 

Shut up the world at large ; let Bedlam out, 
And you will be perhaps surprised to find 

All things pursue exactly the same route, 
As now with those of soi-itisunt sound mind. 

This I could prove beyond a single doubt, 
Were there a jot of sense among mankind ; 

But till that point <f appui is found, alas! 

Like Archimedes, I leave earth as 't was. 

LXXXV. 

Our gentle Adeline had one defect — 

Her heart was vacant, though a splendid mansion ; 
Her conduct had been perfectly correct, 

As she had seen nought claiming its expansion. 
A wavering spirit may be easier wreck'd, 

Because 'l is frailer, doubtless, than a staunch one ; 
But when the latter works its own undoing, 
Its inner crash is like an earthquake's ruin. 

LXXXVI. 
She loved her lord, or thought so ; but that love 

Cost her an effort, which is a sad toil, 
The stone of Sysiphus, if once we move 

Our feelings 'gainst the nature of the soil. 
She had nothing to complain of, or reprove, 

No bickerings, no connubial turmoil : 
Their union was a model to behold, 
Serene and noble, — conjugal but cold. 

LXXXVII. 
There was no great disparity of years, 

Though much in temper ; but they never clash'd .' 
They moved like stars united in their spheres, 

Or like the Rhone by Leman's waters uasli'd. 
Where mingled and yet separate appears 

The river from the lake, all blucly dttsh'd 
Through the serene and placid glassy deep, 
Which fain would lull its river-child to sleep. 



CANTO XIV. 



DoN JUAN. 



CS7 



LXXXVIII. 

Now, when she once had ta'en an interest 
In any thins;, however she might flatter 

Herself that her intentions were the best, 
Intense intentions are a dangerous matter: 

Impressions were much stronger than she gucss'd, 
And gather'd as they run, like growing water, 

Upon her mind ; the more so, as her breast 

Was not at first too readily impross'd. 

LXXXIX. 

But when it was, she had that lurking demon 
Of double nature, and thus doubly named — 

Firmness yclept in heroes, kings, and seamen, 
That is, when they succeed ; hut greatly blamed 

As obstinacy, botli in men and women, 

Whene'er their triumph Dales, or star is tamed : — 

And 'twill perplex the casuists in morality, 

To fix the due bounds of this dangerous quality. 

XC. 

Had Bonaparte won at Waterloo, 

It had been firmness ; now 'l is pertinacity : 

Must the event decide between the two? 
I leave it to votir people of sagacity 

To draw the line between the false and true, 
If such can e'er be drawn by man's capacity : 

Mv business is with Lady Adeline, 

Who in her way too was a heroine. 

XCI. 

She knew not her own heart ; then how should I ? 

I think not she was then in love with Juan : 
If so, she would have had the strength to lly 

The wild sensation, unto her a new one : 
She merely felt a common sympathy 

(I will not say it was a false or true one) 
In him, because she thought he was in danger — 
Her husband's friend, her own, young, and a stranger. 

XCII. 

She was, or thought she was, his friend — and this 

Without the farce of friendship, or romance 
Of Platonism, which leads so oft amiss 

Ladies who have studied friendship but in France, 
Or Germany, where people purely kiss. 

To thus much Adeline would not advance ; 
But of such friendship as man's may to man be, 
She was as capable as woman can be. 

XCI1I. 
No doubt the secret influence of the sex 

Will there, as also in the ties of blood, 
An innocent predominance annex, 

And tune the concord to a finer mood. 
If free from passion, which all friendship checks, 

And your true feelings fully understood, 
No friend like to a woman earth discovers, 
So that you have not been no.- will be lovers. 

XCIV. 
Love hears within its breast the very germ 

Of change; and how should this be otherwise? 
That violent things more quickly find a term 

Is shown through Nature's whole analogies: 
And how should the most fierce of all be firm ? 

Would you have endless lightning in the skies ? 
Mcthinks love's very title says enough: 
How should " the tender passion" e'er be tough ? 



xcv. 

Alas ! by all experience, seldom yet 

(I merely quote what I have heard from many) 
Had lovers not some reason to regret 

The passion which made Solomon a Zany. 
I 've also seen some wives (not to forget 

The marriage state, the best or worst of any) 
V\ ho were the very paragons of wives, 
Yet made the misery of at least two lives. 

XCVI. 
I've also seen some female friends ('tis odd, 

But true — as, if expedient, I could prove) 
That faithful were, through thick and thin, abroad, 

At home, far more than ever vet was love — 
Who did not quit me when oppression trod 

Upon me; whom no scandal could remove; 
Who fought, and light, in absence too, my battles, 
Despite the snake society's loud rattles. 

XCVII. 
Whether Don Juan and chaste Adeline 

Grew friends in this or any other sense, 
Will he discuss'd hereafter, I opine : 

At present I am glad of a pretence 
To leave them hovering, as the effect is fine, 

And keeps the atrocious reader in suspense: 
The surest way for ladies and for books 
To bait their tender or their tenter hooks. 

XCVIII. 

Whether they rode, or walk'd, or studied Spanish, 
To read Don Quixote in the original, 

A pleasure before which all others vanish ; 

Whether their talk was of the kind call'd "small,' 

Or serious, are the topics I must banish 
To the next canto; where, perhaps, I shall 

Say something to the purpose, and display 

Considerable talent in my way. 

XCIX. 
Above all, I beg all men to forbear 

Anticipating aught about the matter : 
They 'il only make mistakes about the fair, 

And Juan, too, especially the latter. 
An 1 I shall take a much more serious air 

Than I have yet done in this epic satire. 
It is not clear that Adeline and Juan 
Will fall ; but if they do, 't will be their ruin. 

C. 
But great things spring from little : — would you thinly 

That, in our youth, as dangerous a passion 
As e'er brought man and woman to the brink 

Of ruin, rose from such a slight occasion 
As few would ever dream could form the link 

Of such a sentimental situation ? 
You '11 never guess, I'll bet you millions, milliard.- — 
It all sprung from a harmless game at billiards. 

CI. 
'T is strange — but true; for truth is always strange 

Stranger than fiction : if it could be told, 
How much would novels gain by the exchange! 

How differently the world would men behold! 
How oft would vice and virtue ulaces change 

The new world would be nothing to the old 
If some Columbus of the moral seas 
Would show mankind their souls' antipodes 



GG3 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C.l.XTO XV 



CII. 

What "atilrcs vast and deserts idle" then 
Would be discover'd in the human soul! 

What ice-bergs in the hearts of mighty men, 
With self-love in the centre as their pole! 

What Anthropophagi are nine of ten 
Of those who hold the kingdoms in control ! 

Were things but only call'd by their right name, 

Cesar himself would be ashamed of fame. 



CANTO XV. 



i. 

An ! what should follow slips from my reflection : 

Whatever follows ne'ertheless may be 

As a propos of hope or retrospection, 

As though the lurking thought had follow'd free. 

All present, life is but an interjection, 
An "Oh!" or "Ah!" of joy or misery, 

Or a " Ha ! ha !" or " Bah !" — a yawn, or " Pooh !" 

Of which perhaps the latter is most true. 

II. 

But, more or less, the whole 's a synocope, 
Or a singultus — emblems of emotion, 

The grand antithesis to great ennui, 
Wherewith we break our bubbles on the ocean, 

That watery outline of eternity, 
Or miniature at least, as is my notion, 

Which ministers unto the soul's delight, 

In seeing matters which are out of sight. 

III. 

But all are better than the sigh supprest, 

Corroding in the cavern of the heart, 
Making the countenance a mask of rest, 

And turning human nature to an art. 
Few men dare show their thoughts of worst or best ; 

Dissimulation always sets apart 
A corner for herself; and therefore fiction 
Is that which passes with least contradiction. 

IV. 
Ah! who can tell? Or rather, who can not 

Remember, without telling, passion's errors? 
The drainer of ob.ivion, even the sot, 

Hath got blue devils for his morning mirrors : 
What though on Lethe's stream he seem to float, 

He cannot sink his tremors or his terrors ; 
The ruby glass that shakes within his hand, 
Leaves a sad sediment of Time's worst sand. 

V. 
And as .for love — Oh, Love ! We will proceed. 

The Lady Adeline Amundeville, 
A pretty name as one would wish to read, 

Must perch harmonious on my tuneful quill. 
There 's music in the sighing of a reed; 

There 's music in the gushing of a rill ; 
There s music in all things, if men had ears : 
Their earth s but an echo of the suho'-es 



VI. 

The Lady A. Mine, right honourable, 

And hemnur'd, ran a risk of growing less so; 

Por few of the soft sex are very stable 

In their resolves — alas! that I should say so ! 

They differ as wine dilfers from its label, 

When once decanted ; — I presume to guess so, 

But will not swear: yet both upon occasion, 

Till old, may undergo adulteration. 

VII. 
Bui Adeline was of the purest vintage, 
The unmingled essence of<the grape; and yet 

Bright as a new Napoleon from its mintage, 

Or glorious as a diamond richly set ; 
A page where Time should hesitate to print age, 

And for which Nature might forego her debt — 
Sole creditor whose process doth involve in 't 
The luck of finding every body solvent. 

VIII. 

Oh, Death ! thou dunnesl of all duns ! tnou daily 
Knockest at doors, at first with modest tap, 

Like' a meek tradesman when approaching palely 
Some splendid debtor he would take by sap : 

But oft denied, as patience 'gins to fail, he 
Advances with exasperated rap, 

And (if let in) insists, in terms unhandsome, 

On ready money, or " a draft on Ransom." 

IX. 

Wliate'er thou takest, sp.-ire awhile poor Beauty! 

She is so rare, and thou hast so much prey. 
What lho:igh she now and then may slip from duly, 

The. more 's the reason why you ought to stay. 
Gaunt Gourmand ! with whole nations for your booty 

You should be civil in a modest way : 
Suppress then some slight feminine diseases, 
And take as many heroes as Heaven pleases. 

X. 

Fair Adeline, the more ingenuous 

Where she was interested (as was said), 

Because she was not apt, like some of us, 
To like too readily, or too high bred 

To show it — points we need not now discuss— 
Would give up artlessly both heart and head 

Unto such feelings as seem'd innocent, 

For objects worthy of the sentiment. 

XI. 

Some parts of Juan's history, which rumour, 
That live gazette, had scatter'd to disfigure, 

She had heard ; but women hear with more good humour 
Such aberrations than we men of rigour. 

Besides his conduct, since in England, grew more 
Strict, and his mind assumed a manlier vigour ; 

Because he had, like Alcibiades, 

The art of living in all climes with case. 

Xll. 

His manner was perhaps the more seductive, 
Because he ne'er seemed anxious to seduce ; 

Nothing affected, studied, or constructive 
Of coxcombry or conquest : no abuse 

Of his attractions marr'd the fair perspective, 
To indicate a Cupidon broke loose, 

And seem to say, "resist us if you can" — 

Which makes a dandy while it suoils a man. 



€ANTO XV. 



DON JUAN. 



GSO 



XIII. 
ITicy are wrong — that 's n<>i the way to set about it ; 

As, if they told the truth, could well be shown. 
But, right or wrong, Don Juan was without it ; 

In fact, his manner was Ins own alone: 
Sincere he was — at least you could nol doubt it, 

In listening merely to his voice's tone. 
The devil hath not in all his quiver's choice 
An arrow for the heart like a sweet voice. 

XIV. 
By nature soft, his whole address held off 

Suspicion : though not timid, his regard 
Was such as rather seem'd to keep aloof, 

To shield himself, than put you on your guard : 
Perhaps 'twas hardly quite assured enough, 

But modesty's at times its own reward, 
Like virtue ; and the absence of pretension 
Will go much further than there's need to mention. 

XV. 
Serene, accomplish'd, cheerful, but not loud ; 
Insinuating without insinuation; 

Observant of the foibles of the crowd, 

Yet ne'er betraying this in conversation ; , 

Proud with the proud, yet courteously proud, 
So as to make them feel he knew his station 

And theirs; — without a struggle for priority, 

lie neither brook'd nor claim'd superiority. 

XVI. 

That is, with men : with women, he was what 
They pleased to make or take him for ; and their 

Imagination's quite enough fjr that: 
So that the outline's tolerably fair, 

They fill the canvas up — and " verbum sat," 
If once their phantasies be brought to bear 

Upon an object, whether sad or playful, 

They can transfigure brighter than a Raphael. 

XVII. 

Adelin°, no deep judge of character, 

Was apt to add a colouring from her own. 

'T is thus the good will amiably err, 

And eke the wise, as has been often shown. 

Experience is the chief philosopher, 
But saddest when his science is well known: 

And persecuted sages teach the schools 

Their folly in forgetting there are fools. 

XVIII. 

Was it not so, great Locke? and greater Bacon? 

Great Socrates? And thou, diviner still, 1 
Whose lot it. is by man to be mistaken, 

And thv pure creed made sanction of all ill? 
Redeeming worlds to be by bigots shaken, 

How was thy toil rewarded ? We might fill 
Volumes with similar sad illustrations, 
But leave them to the conscience of the nations. 

XIX. 
I perch upon an humbler promontory, 

Ami 1st life's infinite variety: 
With no great cure lor what is nicknamed glory, 

But speculating as I cast mine eye 
On what may SUil or may not suit my story, 

And never straining hard to versify 
1 rattle on exactly as I 'd talk 
With any body in a ride or walk. 
92 



XX. 

I don'l know that there maybe much ability 
Shown in this son of desultory rhyme ; 

But there's a conversational facility, 

Which may round off an hour upon a time. 

Of this I'm sure at least, there's no servility 
In mine irregularity of chime, 

Which rings what's uppermost of new or hoary. 

Just as I feel the " improvvisatore." 

XXI. 
"Omnia vult hclle Matho dicere — die aliquaodo 

Kt hnir, die neutruTn, die aliquando male. n 
The first is rather more than mortal can do ; 

The second may be sadly done or gailj ; 
The third is still more difficult to stand to; 
The fourth we hear, and see, and say too, daily : 
lie together is what I could wish 
To serve in this conundrum of a dish. 

XXII. 

A modest hope — but modesty 's my forte, 
And pride my foible: — let us ramble on. 

I meant to make this poem very short, 

But now I can't tell where it may not run. 

No doubt, if I hal wish'd to pay my court 
To critics, or to hail the setting sun 

Of tyranny of all kinds, my concision 

Were more ; — but I was born for opposition. 

XXI11. 
But then 't is mostly on the weaker side : 

So that I verily believe if they 
Who now are basking in their full-blown pride, 

Were shaken down, and "dogs had had their day,*" 
Though at the first I might by chance deride 

Their tumble, I should turn the other way, 
And wax an ultra-royalist in loyalty, 
Because I hate even democratic royalty. 

XXIV. 

I think I should have made a decent spouse, 
If I had never proved the soft condition ; 

I think I should have made monastic vows, 
Bui for my own peculiar superstition: 

'Gainst rhyme I never should have knock'd my brows. 
Nor broken my own head, nor that of Priscian , 

Nor worn the motley mantle of a poet, 

If some one had not told me to forego it. 

XXV. 

But " laissez allcr" — knights and dames I sing, 

Such as the times may furnish. 'T is a flight 
Which seems at first to need no lofty wing, 

Plumed by Longinus or the Stagvrite: 
The difficulty lies in colouring 

(Keeping the due proportions still in sight) 
With nature manners which are artificial, 
And rendering general that which is especial. 

XXVI. 
The difference is, that in the days of old 

Men made the manners ; manners now make men 
Pinn'd like a Rock, and R< eced t".> in their fold, 

At least nine, and a ninth beside of ten. 
Now (his at all events must n nder cold 

Your writers, who must either draw again 
Days belli r drawn before, or else assume 

The present, with their commonplace cosfamn 



GOO 



EYRONS WORKS. 



CANTO XV. 



XXVII. 
We '11 do our best to make the best on 't : — March ! 

March, my Muse! If you cannot fly, yet flutter ; 
And when you may not be sublime, be arch, 

Or starch, as are the edicts statesmen utter. 
We surely shall find something worth research: 

Columbus found a new world in a cutter, 
Or brigantine, or pink, of no great tonnage, 
While yet America was in her non-age. 

XXVIII. 

When Adeline, in all her growing sense 

Of Juan's merits and his situation, 
Felt on the whole an interest intense — 

Partly perhaps because a fresh sensation, 
Or that he had an air of innocence, 

Which is for innocence a sad temptation, — 
As women hate half measures, on the whole, 
She 'gan to ponder how to save his soul. 

XXIX. 

She had a good opinion of advice, 

Like all who give and eke receive it gratis, 

For which small thanks arc Still the market price, 
Even where the article at highest rate is. 

She thought upon the subject twice or thrice, 
And morally decided, the best state is, 

For morals, marriage ; ami, this question carried, 

She seriously advised him to get married. 

XXX. 

Juan replied, with all becoming deference, 

He had a predilection for that lie ; 
But that at present, with immediate reference 

To his own circumstances, there might lie 
Some difficulties, as in his own preference, 

Or that of her to whom he might apply ; 
That still he'd wed with such or such a lady, 
If that they were not married all already. 

XXXI. 

Next to the making matches for herself, 

And daughters, brothers, sisters, kith or kin, 
Arranging them like books on the same shelf, 

There 's nothing women love to dabble in 
More (like a stockholder in growing pelf) 

Than match-making in general : 't is no sin 
(!ertes, but a preventative, and therefore 
That is, no doubt, the only reason wherefore. 

XXXII. 
But never yet (except of course a miss 

Unwed, or mistress never to be wed, 
Or wed already, who object to this) 

Was there chaste dame who had not in her head 
Some drama of the marriage unities, 

Observed as strietlv both at board and bed, 
As those oT Aristotle, though sometimes 
They turn out melodrames or pantomimes. 

XXXIII. 
They .generally have some only son, 

Some heir to a largo property, some friend 
Of an old family, some gay Sir John, 

Or grave Lord George, with whom perhaps might end 
A line, and leave posterity undone, 

Unless a marriage was applied to mend 
Th" piospect and their mora < : and besides, 
They have at hand a blooming glut of brides. 



XXXIV. 

From these they will be careful to select, 

For this an heiress, and for that a beauty ; 
For one a songstress who hath no defect, 

For t'other one who promises much duty; 
For this a lady no one can reject, 

Whose sole accomplishments were quite a booty; 
A second for her excellent connexions ; 
A third, because there can be no objections. 

XXXV. 
When Bapp the harmonist embargo'd marriage 2 

In his harmonious settlement — (which flourishes 
Strangely enough as yet without miscari 

Because it breeds no more mouths than it nourishes, 
Without those sad expenses which disparage 

What Nature naturally most encourages) — 
Why call'd he "Harmony" a state sans wedlock? 
Now here I have got the preacher at a dead lock. 

XXXVI. 
Because he either meant to sneer at harmony 

Or marriage, by divorcing them thus o 
But whether reverend Rapp learn'd this in Germany 

Or no, 'tis said his seel is rich and ■_ 
Pious and pure, beyond what I can term any 

Of ours, although they propagate more broadly. 
My objection 's to his rule, not his ritual, 
Although I wonder how it grew habitual. 

XXXVII. 
But Rapp is the reverse of zealous matrons, 
Who favour, malgre Malthus, generation — 

Professors of that genial art, and patrons 
Of all the modest part of propagation, 
Which after all at such a desperate rate runs, 

That half its produce tends to emigration, 
That sad result of passions and potatoes — 
Two weeds which pose our economic Catos. 

XXXVIII. 
Had Adeline read Malthus? I can't tell ; 

I wish she had: his book's the eleventh commandment 
Which says, "thou shalt not marry " — unless well; 

This he (as far as I can understand) meant : 
'Tis not my purpose on his views to dwell, 

Nor canvass what " so eminent a hand " meant ;' 
But certes it conducts to lives ascetic, 
Or turning marriage into arithmetic. 

XXXIX. 
But Adeline, who probably presumed 

That Juan had enough of maintenance, 
Or Separate maintenance, in case 't was doom'd— 

As on the whole it is an even chance 
That bridegrooms, after they are fairly groomed, 

May retrograde a little in the dance 
Of marriage — (which might form a painter's fame, 
Like Holbein's "Dance of Death" — but 'lis the same)-. 

XL. 
But Adeline determined Juan's wedding, 

In her own mind, and that "s enough for woman. 
But I hen, with whom? There was the sage Miss Beading, 
Miss Raw, .Miss Flaw, Miss Showman, and Miss 
Knowinan, 
And the two fair co-heiresses Giitbedding. 

She dcem'd his merits something more than common* 
All these wire unobjectionable ma 
And might go on, if well wound up, iii;« watches. 



CANTO XV- 



DON JUAN. 



691 



XLI. 

There was Miss Millpood, smooth as summer's sea, 

That usual paragon, an only daughter, 
Who seem'd the cream of equanimity, 

Till skimni'd — and then there was some milk and 
water, 
With a slight shade of Blue too it might be, 

Beneath the surface; but what did it mailer? 
Love's riotous, but marriage should hive <]uiut, 
And, being consumptive, live on a milk diet. 

XLII. 
And then there was the Miss Andaeia Shoestring, 

A dashing demoiselle of good estate, 
Whose heart was fix'd upon a slar of bluestring; 

But whether English dukes grew r:ire of late, 
Or that she nad not barp'd upon the *rue string, 

By which such sirens can attract our great, 
She took up with some foreign younger brother, 
A Russ or Turk — the one 's as good as t' oilier. 

XLI1I. 

And then there was — but why should I <jo on, 

Unless the ladies should go off? — there was 
In leed a certain fair and fairy one, 

Of the best class, and belter than her claSi, — 
Aurora Raby, a young star who shone 

O'er life, too sweet an image for such glas-, 
A lovelv being, scarcely form'd or moulded, 
A rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded ; 

XL1V. 
Rich, noble, but an orphan ; left an only 

Child to the care of guardians good and kind; 
But still her aspect had an air so lonely! 

Blood is notwaier; and where shall we find 
Feelings of youth like those which overthrown lie 

By death, when we are left, alas ! behind, 
To feel, in friendless palaces, a home 
Is wanting, and our best lies in the tomb? 

XLV. 
Early in years, and yet more infantine 

In figure, she had something of sublime 
In eyes which sadly shone, as seraphs' shine. 

All youth — but with an aspect beyond time; 
Radiant and grave — as pitying man's decline ; 

Mournful — but mournful of another's crime, 
She look'd as if she sat by Eden's door, 
And grieved for those who could return no more. 

XLVI. 
She was a Catholic too, sincere, austere, 

As far as her own gentle heart allow'd, 
And deem'd that fallen worship far more dear, 

Perhaps because 't was fallen : her sires were proud 
Of deeds and days when they had fill'd the car 

Of nations, and had never bent or bow'd 
To novel power; and as she was the last, 
She held their old faith and old feelings fast. 

XLV II. 
She gazed upon a world she scarcely knew, 

As seeking not to know it ; silent, ioi.o, 
As grows a flower, thus quietly she grow, 

And kept her heart serene within its zone. 
There was awe in the homage which she drew; 

Her spirit seem'd as seated on a throne 
Apart from the surrounding world, and strong 
In its own strength — most strange in one so young. 



XLVIII. 
Xow it so hn^p'.n'd, in the catalogue 

Of Adeime, Aurora was omitted, 
Although her birth and wealth had given her vogue 

Beyond the charmers we have already cited: 
Her Deauty also seem'd to form no cli g 

Against her being inen'ion'.l as well fitted 
By many virtues, to be worth the trouble 
Of single gentlemen who would be double. 

XLIX. 

And this omission, like that of the bust 
Of Brutus at the pageant of Tiberius, 

Made Juan wonder, as no doubt he must. 
Tins he express'd half smiling and half serious, 

When Adeline replied "lib some disgust, 

And with an air, to say the least, imperious, 

She marvell'd "what he saw in such B 

As tliat prim, silent, cold Aurora Raby .'"' 

L. 
Juan rcjoin'd — "She was a Catholic, 

And therefore fittest, as of his persuasion; 
Since lie was sure Ins mill her would fall sick, 

And :hi' Pope thunddf i scomiriunication, 
If " Bui here Adeline, who seem'd to pique 

Herself extremely on the inoculation 
Of others with her own opinions, stated — 

As usual — the same reason which she late di 1. 

LI. 
And wherefore not? A reasonable reason, 

If good, is none the worse for repetition ; 
If bad, ihe best way 's certainly to tease on 

And simplify: you lose much by concision, 
W lienas insisting in or out of season 

Convinces all men, even a politician; 
Or — what is just the same — it wearies out. 
So the end's gain'd, v. bat signifies liie route? 

LIL 

IVkg Adeline had this slight prejudice — 

For prejudice it was — against a creature 
As pure as sanctity itself from vice, 

With all the added charm of form and feature, 
For me appears a question far too nice, 

Since Ad. line was liberal by nature; 
Bat nature's nature, and has more caprices 
Than I have time, or will, to take to pieces. 

LIII. 
Perhaps she did not like the quiet way 

With which Aurora on those baubles look'd, 
Which charm most | pie in their earlier day: 

For there are few things by mankind less brook* 
And womankind too, if we so may Bay, 

Than finding thus their genius stand rebuked, 
Like "Antony's by Caesar," by the few 
Who look upon them as they ought to do. ' 

LIV. 
It was not envy — Adeline had none ; 

Her place was far beyond it, and her mind. 
It was not scorn — which could not light on one 

Whose greatest Jault was leaving few to find. 
It was not jealousy, I think: but shun 

Following the "ignes fatui" of mankind. 

It was not but 'lis easier far, alas • 

To sav what it was not, th*n what it was. 



C92 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XV 



LV. 

Little Aurora deem'd she was the theme 

Of such discussion. She was there a guest, 

A beauteous ripple of the brilliant stream 
Of rank and youth, though purer than the rest, 

Which Bow'd on for a moment in the beam 
Time sheds a moment o'er each sparkling crest. 

Had she known this, she would have calmly smiled — 

She had so much, or little, of the child. 

LVI. 

The dashing and proud air of Adeline 

Imposed not upon her : she saw her blaze 
Much as she would have seen a glow-worm shine, 

Then turn'd unto the stars for loftier rays. 
Juan was something she could not divine, 

Being no sibyl in the new world's ways ; 
Yet she was nothing dazzled by the meteor, 
Because she did not pin her faith on feature. 

LVH. 
His fame too,— for he had that kind of fame 

Which sometimes plays the deuce with womankind, 
A heterogeneous mass of glorious blame, 

Half virtues and whole vices being combined-, 
Faults which attract because they are not tame ; 

Follies trick'd out so brightly that they blind : — 
These seals upon her wax made no impression, 
Such was her coldness or her self-possession. 

LVIII. 
Juan knew nought of such a character — 

High, yet resembling not his lost Haidce; 

Yet each was radiant in her proper sphere: 

The island girl, bred up by the lone sea, 

More warm, as lovely, and not less sincere, 

Was nature's all : Aurora could not be 
Nor would be thus ; — the difference in them 
Was such as lies between a flower and gem. 

LIX. 
Having wound up with this sublime comparison, 

Methinks we may proceed upon our narrative, 
And, as my friend Scott says, "I sound my Warison ;" 

Scott, the superlative of my comparative — 
Scott, who can paint your Christian knight or Saracen, 
Se,rf, lord, man, with such skill as none would share 
it, if 
There had not been one Shakspcare and Voltaire, 
Of one or both of whom he seems the heir. 

LX. 
I say, in my slight way I may proceed 

To play upon the surface of humanity. 
1 write the world, nor care if the world read, 
At least for this I cannot spare its vanity. 
My Muse hath bred, and still perhaps may breed 

More foes by this same scroll : when I began it, I 
Thought that it might turn out so — now I know it, 
But still I am, or was, a pretty poet. 

LXI. 
The conference or congress (for it ended 
As congresses of late do) of the Lady 
Adeline and Don Juan rather blended 

Some acids with the sweets — for she was heady; 

But. wo the matter comu oe marr'd or mended, 

The silvery bell rung, not for "dinner ready," 

But for that hour, call'd half-hour, given to dress, 

Though ladies' robes seem scant enough for less. 



LXII. 

Great things were now to be achieved at table, 
With massy plate for armour, knives and forks 

For wea| s; but what Muse Bince Homer 's able 

(His feasts are not the worst pari of his works; 

To draw up in array a single day-bill 

Of modern dinners? where more mystery lurks 

In soups or sauces, or a sole rag 

Than witches, b—ches, or physicians brew. 

LXIII. 

There was a goodly "soupe a la bonne femme" 

Though (Mid knows whence it came from; (here was too 
A turbot for relief of those who cram, 
Relieved with dindon a la Perigueux ; 

There also was the sinner that I am ! 

How shall I get this gourmand stanza through? 
Soupe a la Beauveau, whose relief was dory, 
Relieved itself by pork, for greater glory. 

LXIV. 
But I must crowd all into one grand mess 

Or mass ; for should I stretch into detail, 
My Muse would run much more into excess, 

Than when some squeamish people deem her frafl. 
Hut, though a " bonne vivantc," I must confess 

Her stomach's not her peccant part: this tale 
However doth require some slight refection, 
Just to relieve her spirits from dejection. 

LXV. 
Fowls a la Conde, slices eke of salmon, 

With sauces Gcnevoisc, and haunch of venison ; 
Wines too which might again have slain young Amnion, 
A man like whom I hope we sha'n't see many soon; 
They also set a glazed Westphahan ham on, 
Whereon Apicius would bestow his benison ; 
And then there was champagne with foaming whirls, 
As while as Cleopatra's melted pearls. 

LXVI. 
Then there was God knows what "a l'Allemands," 
" A l'Espagnole," "timballe," and " Salpicon B — 
With things I can't withstand or understand, 

Though swallow'd with much /est upon the whole ; 
And "entremets" to piddle with .it hand, 
Gently to lull down the subsiding soul ; 
While great Lucullus' robe triomphale muffles 
(There's f time) — young partridge fillets, deck'd with 
truffles. 4 

LXVII. 
What are the .fillets on the victor's brow 

To these ? They are rags or dust. Where is the arch 
Which nodded to the nation's spoils bi 

Where the triumphal chariot's haughty march? 
Gone to where victories must like dinners go. 

Further I shall not follow the research : 
But oh ! ye modem heroes with your cartridges, 
When will your names lend lustre even to partridges 7 

LXVIII. 
Those truffles too are no bad accessaries, 

Follow'd by " petits puits d'amour," — a dish 
Of which perhaps the cookery rather varies, 

So every one may dress it to his wish, 
According to the best of dictionaries, 

Which encyclopedise both flesh and Bsh ; 
But even sans "confitures,* 1 it no less true is, 
There's pretty picking in those "petits puits."* 



CANTO XV. 



DON JUAN. 



693 



LXIX. 

Die mind is lost in mighty contemplation 
Of intellect expended on two courses ; 

And indigestion's grand multiplication 
Requires arithmetic beyond my forces. 

Who would suppose, from Adam's simple ration, 
That cookery could have call'd forth such resources, 

as form a science and a nomenclature 

From out the commonest demands of nature? 

LXX. 

The glasses jingled, and the palates tingled; 

The diners of celebrity dined well ; 
The ladies with more modi ration mingled 

In the feast, pecking less than I can ti ill ; 
Also the younger men too; for a springald 

Can't like ripe age in gourmandise exc< I, 

But thinks less of i' i eating than the whisper 

(When seated next him) of some pretty lisper. 

LXX I. 
Alas ! I must leave undescribed the gibier, 

The salmi, the consommee, the puree, 
All which I use to make my rhvmes rim glibber 

Than could roasl beef in on- rough John Hull way: 
I must not introduce even a spare rib here, 

"Bubble and squeak" would spoil my liquid lay; 
But I have dined, and must forego, alas ! 
The chaste description even of a " becasse," 

LXXI. 

And fruits, and ice, and all that art refines 
From nature for the service of the gout, — 

Tusle or the gout, — pronounce it as inclines 

Your stomach. Ere you dine, the French will do ; 

Hut after, there are sometimes certain sij;us 
Which prove plain English truer of the two. 

Hast ever had the gout ? I have not had it — 

But I may have, and you too, reader, dread it. 

LXXI1I. 

The simple olives, best allies of wine, 

Must I pass over in my bill of fare ? 
I must, although a favourite "plat" of mine 

In Spain, and Lucca, Athens, every where: 
On them and bread 't was oft my luck to dine, 

The grass my table-cloth, in open air, 
On Sunium or Hymettus, like Diogenes, 
Of whom half my philosophy the progeny is. 

LXXIV. 
Amidst this tumult of fish, flesh, and fowl, 

And vegetables, all in masquerade, 
The guests were placed according to their roll, 

But various as the various meats display 'd : 
Don Juan sate next an " a l'Espagnole " — 

No damsel, but a dish, as hath been said ; 
But so far like a lady, that 't was drcst 
Superbly, and contain'd a world of zest. 

LXXV^ 
Bv some odd chance too he was placed between 

Aurora and the Lady Adeline — 
A situation difficult, 1 ween, 

For man therein, with eyes and heart, to dine. 
Also the conference which we have seen 

Was not such as to encourage him to shine ; 
For Adeline, addressing few words to him, 
With two transcendent eyes seem'd to look through him. 
3M 



LXXVI. 

I sometimes almost think that eyes have ears: 
This much is sure, that, out of ear-shot, things 

Ire somehow echoed to the pretty dears, 
Of which 1 can't tell whence their know ledge springs; 

Like thai same mystic music of the spheres, 

Which no one hears so loudly though it rings. 

'T is wonderful how oft the sex have heard 
Long dialogues which pass'd without a. word! 

LXXY1I. 
Aurora sat with that indifference 

\\ hieh piques a preux chevalier — as it ought: 
Of all offences that's the worst < 

Which seems to hint you are not worth a thought. 
Now Juan, though no coxcomb in preO 

Was not exactly pleased to be so caught • 
Like a good ship entangled among ice, 
And after so much excellent advice. 

LXXVIII. 

To his gay nothings, nothing was replied, 
Or something which was nothing, as urbanity 

Required. Aurora scarcely look'd aside, 
Nor even smiled enough for any vanity. 

The devil was in the girl! Could it be pride, 
Or modesty, or absence, or inanity? 

Heaven knows ! But Adeline's malicious eyes 

Sparkled with her successful prophecies, 

LXXIX. 

And look'd as much as if to say, "I said it;"— 
A kind of triumph I 'II not recommend, 

Because it sometimes, as I've seen or read it, 
Both in the case of lover and of friend, 

Will pique a gentleman, for his own credit, 
To bring what was a jest to a serious end; 

For all men prophesy wdiat IS or was, 

And hale those who won't let them come to pass. 

LXXX. 

Juan was drawn thus into some attentions, 

Slight but select, and just enough to express, 
To females of perspicuous comprehensions, 

That he would rather make them more than less. 
Aurora at the last (so history mentions, 

Though probably much less a fact than guess) 
So far relax'd her thoughts from their sweet prison, 
As once or twice to smile, if not to listen, 

LXXXI. 
From answering, she began to question : tins 

With her was rare; and Adeline, who as yet 
Thought her predictions went not much amiss, 

Began to deal she'd thaw to a coquette — 
So very difficult, they say, it is 

To keep extremes from meeting, when once sei 
In motion ; lml she here too much refined — 
Aurora's spiril was not of that kind. 
LXX XI I. 

Cut Juan had a sort of winning wav, 
A proud humility, if such tin re be, 

Which slio-.v'd Buch deference to wbai females saj, 

As if each charming word weri 
His tact too leraper'd him from grave to gay, 

And taught him when to he n served 01 U\:<;: 

He had the art of drawing people out, 

Without their seeing what ho was about 



69-1 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



C.iAlO AT. 



LXXXIII. 

Aurora, who in her indifference 

Confounded him in common with the crowd 
Of flutterere, though she dcem'd he had more sense 

Than whispering foplings, or than wit.ings .oud, — 
Commenced (from such slight things will great com- 
mence) 

To feel that flattery which attracts the proud 
Rather by deference than compliment, 
And wins even by a delicate dissent. 

LXXXIV. 
And then he had good looks ; — that point was carried 

Neil. con. amongst the women, which I grieve 
To say, leads oft to crim. con. with the married — 

A case which to the juries we may leave, 
Since with digressions we too long have tarried. 

Now though we know of old that looks deceive, 
And always have done, somehow these good looks 
Make more impression than the best oi books. 

LXXXV. 
Aurora, who look'd more on books than faces, 

Was very young, although so very sage, 
Admiring more Minerva than the Graces, 

Especially upon a printed page. 
But virtue's self, with all her tightest laces, 

Has not the natural stays of strict old age ; 
And Socrates, that model of all duty, 
Own'd to a penchant, though discreet, for beauty. 

LXXXVI. 
And girls of sixteen are thus far Socratic, 

But innocently so, as Socrates : 
And really, if the sage sublime and Attic 

At seventy years had phantasies like these, 
Winch Plato in his dialogues dramatic 

Has shown, I know not why they should displease 
In virgins — always in a modest way, 
Observe ; for that with me 's a " sine qua." 8 

LXXXVII. 
Also observe, that like the great Lord Coke, 

(See Littleton) whene'er I have express'd 
Opinions two, which at first sight may look 

Twin opposites, the second is the best. 
Perhaps I have a third too in a nook, 

Or none at all — which seems a sorry jest ; 
But if a writer should be quite consistent, 
How could he possibly show things existent? 

LXXXVI II. 
If people contradict themselves, can I 

Help contradicting them, and every body, 
Even my veracious self? — but that 's a lie ; 

I never did so, never will — how should I ? 
Ho who doubts all things, nothing can deny ; 

Truth's fountains may be clear — her streams are 
muddy, 
And cut through such canals of contradiction, 
That she must often navigate o'er fiction. 

LXXXIX. 
Apologue, fable, poesy, and parable, 

Are false, but may be render'd also true 
Bi those who sow them in a land that's arable. 

'1' is wonderful what fable will not do ! 
*Tis said it makes reality more bearable: 

I? vt what's reality? Who has its clue? 
Philosophy? No; she too much rejects. 
Religion? Vex- but which of all her sects? 



XC. 

Some millions must be wrong, that 's pretty clear ; 

Perhaps it may turn out that all were right. 
Goo help us! Since we 've need on our career 

To keep our no.y beacons aiways Wight, 
'T is time that some new prophet should appear 

Or old indulge man with a second-sight. 
Opinions wear out in some thousand years, 
Without a small refreshment from the spheres. 

XCI. 

But here again, why will I thus entangle 
Myself with metaphysics? None can hate 

So much as I do any kind of wrangle ; 
And yet such is my folly, or my fate, 

I always knock my head against some angle 
About the present, past, and future state ; 

Yet I wish well to Trojan and to Tyrian, 

For 1 was bred a moderate Presbyterian. 

XCII. 
But though I am a temperate theologian, 

And also meek as a metaphysician, 
Impartial between Tyrian and Trojan, 

As Eldon on a lunatic commission, — 
In politics, mv duty is to show John 

Bull something of the lower world's condition. 
It makes my blood boil like the springs of Hecla, 
To see men let these scoundrel sovereigns break law. 

XCIII. 

But polities, and policy, and piety, 
Are topics which I sometimes introduce, 

Not only for the sake of their variety, 
But as subservient to a moral use ; 

Because my business is to dress society, 
And sturf with sage that very verdant goose. 

And now, that we may furnish with some matter aO 

Tastes, we are going to try the supernatural. 

XCIV. 

And now I will give up all argument : 
And positively henceforth no tempation 

Shall " fool me to the top up of my bent ; w 
Yes, I '11 begin a thorough reformation. 

Indeed I never knew what people meant 
By deeming that my Muse's conversation 

Was dangerous ; — I think she is as harmlws 

As some w ho labour more and yet may charm less. 

XCV. 

Grim reader! did you ever see a ghost? 

No; but you've heard — I understand — be dumb! 
.And don't regret the time you may have lost, 

For you have got that pleasure still to come : 
And do not think I mean to sneer at most 

Of these things, or by ridicule benumb 
That source of the sublime and the mysterious - — 
For certain reasons my belief is serious. 

XCVI. 
Serious? You laugh: — you may; that will I not; 

My smiles must be sincere or not at all. 
I say I do believe a haunted spot 

Exists — and where? That shall I not recall, 
Because I 'd rather it should be forgot. 

"Shadows the soul of Richard " may appal : 
In short, upon that subject I 've some qualms, v"ry 
Like those of tin/ philosopher of Molmsburv.' 



CtAJTO XVI. 



DON JUAN. 



69c 



xcvn. 

The night (I sing by night — sometimes an owl, 
And now and then a nightingale) — is dim, 

And the loud shriek of sage Minerva's fowl 
Rattles around me her discordant hymn: 

Old porn-aits from old walls upon me scowl — 
I wish to heaven they would not look so grim ; 

The dying embers dwindle in the grate — 

I think too that I have sate up too late: 

XCVIII. 

And therefore, though 't is by no means my way 
To rhyme at noon — when I have other things 

To think of, if I ever think, — I say 

I feel some chilly midnight shuddcrings, 

And prudently postpone, until mid-day, 
Treating a topic which, alas ! but brings 

Shadows ; — but you must be in my condition 

Before you learn to call this superstition. 

XCIX. 

Between two worlds life hovers like a star, 

'Twixt night and morn, upon the horizon's verge : 

How little do we know that which we are! 

How less what we may be ! The eternal surge 

Of time and tide rolls on, and bears afar 
Our bubbles ; as the old burst, new emerge, 

Lash'd from the foam of ages ; while the graves 

Of empires heave but like some passing waves. 



CANTO XVI. 



i. 

The antique Persians taught three useful things, — 

To draw the bow, to ride, and speak the truth. 
This was the mode of Cyrus — best of kings — 

A mode adopted since by modern youth. 
Bows have they, generally with two strings; 

Horses they ride without remorse or ruth ; 
At speaking truth perhaps they are less clever, 
Bui draw the long bow better now than ever. 

II. 
The cause of this efTect, or this defect, 

" For this efTect defective comes by cause,'' — 
Is what I have not leisure to inspect ; 

But this I must say in my own applause, 
Of all the Muses that I recollect, 

Whate'er may be her follies or her (laws 
In some things, mine 's beyond all contradiction. 
The most sincere that ever dealt in fiction. 

III. 
And as she treats all things, and ne'er retreats 

From any thing, this Epic will contain 
A wilderness of the most rare conceits, 

Which yon might elsewhere hope to finl in vain 
'Tis true there be some bitters with the sweets, 

Yd mix'd so slightly that you can't complain, 
But wonder they so few are, since my tale is 
"Dc rebus cunctis et quibusdam aliis." 



IV. 

But of a!! truths which she has told, the most 
True is that which she is about to tell. 

I said it was a story of a ghost — 
Whit then? I only know it so befell. 

Have you explored the limits of the coast 

Where all the dwellers of the earth must dwell? 

'T is time to strike such puny doubters dumb as 

The sceptics who would not believe Columbus. 

V. 

Some people would impose now with authority, 
Turpin's or Monmouth GootTry's Chronicle ; 

Men whose historical superiority 
Is always greatest at a miracle. 

But Saint Augustine has the great priority, 
Who bids all men believe tne impossible, 

Because '< is s». Who nibble, scribble, quibble, he 

Quiets at once with u qtaa impossible." 

VI. 

And therefore, mortals, cavil not at all; 

Believe: — if 'tis improbable you mu.it; 
And if it is impossible, you shall: 

'Tis always best to take things upon trust. 
I do not speak profanely to recall 

Those holier mysteries, which the wise and jusl 
Receive as gospel, and which grow more rooted, 
As all truths must, the more they are disputed. 

VII. 

I merely mean to say what Johnson said. 

That in the course of some six thousand years, 

All nations have believed that from the dead 
A visitant at intervals appears ; 

And what is strangest upon this strange head, 
Is that whatever bar the reason rears 

'Gainst such belief, there 's something stronger stilt 

In its behalf, let those deny who will. 

VIII. 
The dinner and the soiree too were done, 

The supper loo discuss'd, the dames admired, 
The banqueters bad dropp'd olT one by one — 

The song was silent, and the dance expired : 
The last thin petticoats were vanish'd, gone, 

Like fleecy clouds into the sky retired, 
And nothing brighter gleam'd through the saloon 
Than dying tapers — and the peeping moon. 

IX. 
The evaporation of a joyous day 

Is like the last glass of champagne, without 
The foam which made its virgin bumper gay ; 

Or like a system coupled with a doubt ; 
Or like a soda-bottle, when its spray 

Has sparkled and let half its spirit out ; 
Or like a billow left by storms behind, 
Without the animation of the wind ; 

X. 
Or like an opiate which brings troubled rest, 

Or none; or like — like nothing that I knvw 
Except itself; — such is the human breast; 

A thing, of which similitudes can show 
No real likeness, — like the old Tyrian vest 

Dyed purple, none at present can tell how 
If from a shell-fish or from cocnincal. 1 
So perish every tyrant's *obe piecemeal • 



G9G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XVI 



XI. 
But next to dressing for a rout cr ball, 

Undressing is a wee; our robe-de-chambre 
Mav sit like that of Ncssus, and recall 

Thoughts quite as yellow, but less clear than amber. 
Thus exclaim'd, "I've lost a day!" Of all 

The nights and days most peop.c can remember, 
(I have had of both, some not to be disdain'd), 
I wish they 'd state how many they have gain'd. 

XII. 

And Juan, on retiring fir the night, 
Felt restless and perplex'd, and compromised; 

He thought Aurora Baby's eyes more bright 
Than Adeline (such is advice) advised; 

If he hail known exactly his own plight, 
He probably would have philosophized ; 

A great resource to all, and ne'er denied 

Till wanted ; therefore Juan only sigh'd. 

XIII. 

He sigh'd ; — the next resource is the full moon, 
Where all sighs are deposited; and now, 

It happen'd luckily, the chaste orb shone 
As clear as such a climate will allow ; 

And Juan's mind was in the proper tone 

To hail her with the apostrophe— " Oh, thou !" 

Of amatory egotism the tuism, 

Which further to explain would be a truism. 

XIV. 
But lover, poet, or astronomer, 

Shepherd, or swain, whoever may behold, 
Feel some abstraction when they gaze on her: 

Great thoughts we catch from thence (besides acold 
Sometimes, unless my feelings rather err); 

Deep secrets to her rolling light are told ; 
1 he ocean's tides and mortals' brains she sways, 
And also hearts, if there be truth in lays. 

XV. 

Juan felt somewhat pensive, and disposed 

For ( templat.ion rather than his pillow; 

The Gothic chamber, where he was enclosed, 

Let in the rippling sound of the lake's billow, 
With all the mystery by midnight caused ; 

Below his window waved (of course) a willow ; 
And he stood gazing out on the cascade 
That fiash'd and after darken'd in the shade. 

XVI. 
Upon his table or his toilet — which 

Of these is not exactly asccrtain'd — 
(I state this, for I am cautious to a pitch 

Of nie ly, where a fact is to be gain'd) 
A lamp hurn'd high, while he leant from a niche, 

WTiere many a Gothic ornament remain'd, 
In chisell'fj stone and painted glass, and all 
That time has left our fathers of their hall. 

XVII. 
Then, as the night was clear, though cold, he threw 

His chamber-door wido open — and went forth 
Into a gailery, of a sombre hue, 

Long, fiimish'd with old pictures of great worth, 
Of knights and dames heroic and chaste too, 

As doubtless should be people of high birth. 
But by dun lights the portraits of the dead 
Have something ghj , and dread. 



XVIII. 
The funis of the grim knights and pictured saints 

Look living in the moon ; and as you turn 
Backward and forward to the echoes faint 

Of your own footsteps — voices from the urn 
Appear lo wake, and shadows wild and quaint 

Start from the frames which fence their aspects st«>-«t 
As if to ask how can you dare to keep 
A vigil there, where all but death should sleep. 

XIX. 

And the pale smile of beauties in the grave, 
The charms of other days, in starlight gleams 

Glimmer on high; their buried locks still wave 
Along the canvas ; their eyes glance like dreams 

On ours, or spars within some dusky cave, 

But death is imaged in their shadowy beams. 

A picture is the past ; even ere its frame 

Be gilt, who sate hat h ceased to be the same. 

XX. 

As Juan mused on mutability, 

Or on his mistress — terms synonymous — 
No sound except the echo of his sigh 

Or step ran sadly through that antique house, 
When suddenly he heard, or thought so, nigh, 

A supernatural agent — or a mouse, 
Whose little nibbling rustic will embarrass 
.Most people, as it plays along the arras. 

XXI. 

It was no mouse, but lo ! a monk, array'd 
In cowl and beads and dusky garb, appear'd, 

Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade, 
With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard ; 

His garments only a slight murmur made ; 
lie moved as shadowy as the sisters weird, 

Hut slowly; and as he pass'd Juan by, 

Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye. 

XXII. 

Juan was petrified ; he had heard a hint 

Of such a spirit in these halls of old, 
But thought, like most men, there was nothing in ' 

Bevond the rumour which such spots unfold, 
Coin'd from surviving superstition's mint, 

Which passes ghosts in currency like gold, 
But randy seen, like gold compared with paper. 
And did he see this? or was it a vapour? 

XXIII. 
Once, twice, thrice pass'd, repass'd — the thing of ail 

Or earth beneath, or heaven, or 't other place; 
And Juan gazed upon it with a stare, 

Vet could not speak or move ; but, on its base 
As stands a statue, stood: lie felt his hair 

Twine like a knot of snakes around his face ; 
lie tax'd his tongue fir words, which were not granted 
To ask the reverend person what he wanted. 

XXIV. 
The third time, after a still longer pause, 

The shadow pass'd away — but where ? the hall 
Was long, and thus far there was no great cause 

To think his vanishing unnatural: 
Doors there were many, through which, by the lawa 

Of physics, bodies, whether short or tall, 
Might come, or go; hut Juan could not state 
Through which the spectre scem'd to cvapora'.e. 



CANTO XVI. 



DON JUAN. 



097 



XXV. 

He stood, how long he knew not, but it seero'd 
An age — expectant, powerless, with his eyes 

Strain'd on the spot where first the figure gloam'd ; 
Then by degrees recall'd his energies, 

And would have pass'd the whole oh" as a dream, 
But could not wake ; he was, he did surmise, 

Waking already, and return'd at length 

Back to his chamber, shorn of half his strength. 

XXVI. 

All there was as he left it ; still his taper 
Burnt, and not blue, as modest tapers use, 

Receiving sprites with sympathetic vapour ; 
He rubb'd his eyes, and they did not refuse 

Their office; he took up an old newspaper ; 
The paper was right easy to peruse ; 

He read an article the king attacking, 

And a long eulogy of " Patent Blacking." 

XXVII. 

This savour'd of this world ; but his hand shook— 
He shut his door, and after having read 

A paragraph, I think about Home Tooke, 
Undress'd, and rather slowly went to bed. 

There, couch'd all snugly on his pillow's nook, 
With what he'd seen his phantasy he fed, 

And though it was no opiate, slumber crept 

Upon him by degrees, and so he slept. 

XXVIII. 

He woke betimes ; and, as may be supposed, 
Ponder'd upon his visitant or vision, 

And whether it ought not to be disclosed, 
At risk of being quizz'd for superstition. 

The more he thought, the more his mind was posed ; 
In the mean time his valet, whose precision 

Was great, because his master brook'd no less, 

Knock'd to inform him it was time to dress. 

XXIX. 

He dress'd ; and, like young people, he was wont 
To take some trouble with his toilet, but 

This morning rather spent less time upon 't ; 
Aside his very mirror soon was put : 

His curls fell negligently o'er his front, 

His clothes were not curb'd to their usual cut, 

His very neckcloth's Gordian knot was tied 

Almost a hair's breadth too much on one side. 

XXX. 

And when he walk'd down into the saloon, 

He sate him pensive o'er a dish of tea, 
Which he perhaps had not discover'd soon, 

Had it not happen'd scalding hot to be, 
Which made him have recourse unto his spoon ; 

So much distrait he was, that all could see 
That something was the matter — Adeline 
The first — but what she could not well divine. 

XXXI. 
She look'd and saw him pale, anil turn'd as pale 

Herself; then hastily look'd down and mutter'd 
Something, but what's not stated in my tale. 

Lord Henry said, his muffin was ill butter'd J 
The Duchess of Fitz-Fulke play'd with her veil, 

And look'd at Juan hard, but nothing Utter'd. 
Aurora Raby, with her large dark eyes, 
Survcy'd him with a kind of calm surprise. 
3 m 2 9? 



XXXII. 
Hut seeing him all cold and silent still, 

And every body wondering more or less, 
Fair Adeline inquired if he were ill? 

lie sta. led, and said, "Yes — no — rather — yes." 
'rhc family physician had great skill, 

And, being present, now began to express 
His readiness to feel Ins pulse, and tell 
The cause, but Juan said, " he was quite well." 

XXXIII. 

"Quite well; yes, no." — These answers were myste- 
rious, 

Rind yet his looks appcar'd to sanction both, 
However they might savour of delirious ; 

Something like illness of a sudden growth 
Weigh'd on Ins spirit, though by no means serious.. 

But f >r the rest, as he himself scem'd loth 
To state the case, it might be la'en fir granted, 
It was not the physician that he wanted. 

XXXIV. 
Lord Henry, who had now discuss'd his chocolato, 

Also the muffin, whereof he complain'd, 
Said, Juan had not got his usual look elate, 

At which he marvell'd, since it had not rain'd ; 
Then ask'd her grace what news were of the duke of late? 

Her grace replied, his grace was rather pain'd 
With some slight, light, hereditary twinges 
Of gout, which rusts aristocratic hinges. 

XXXV. 

Then Henry turn'd to Juan, and address'd 

A few words of condolence on his state : 
"You look," quoth he, "as if you 'd had your rest 

Broke in upon by the Black Friar of late." 
"What friar?" said Juan ; and he did his best 

To put the question with an air sedate, 
Or careless ; but I he effort was not valid 
To hinder him from growing still more pallid. 

XXXVI. 
"Oh! have you never heard of the Black Friar 7 

The spirit of these walls ?" — " In truth not I." 
" Why fame — but fame you know sometime 's a liar— 

Tells an* odd story, of which by the bv : 
Whether with time the spectre has grown shyer, 

Or that our sins had a more gifted eye 
For such sights, though the tale is half believed, 
The friar of late has not been oft perceived. 

XXXVII. 
" The last time was " " I pray," said Adeline— 

(Who watch'd the changes of Don Juan's brow, 
And from its context thought she could divine 

Connexions stronger than he chose to avow 
With this same legend), — " if you but di 

To jest, you 'II choose some other theme just now, 
Because the present tale has oft been told, 
And is not much improved by growing old." 

xxxviii. 

"Jest!" quoth Milor, "Why, Adeline, you know 
That we ourselves — 'twas in the boney-moon— 

Saw " "Well, no matter, 'twas so long ;v g„; 

Bui come, I'll set your story to a tune." 

Graceful as Dian when she draws her how, 

ber harp, whose strings were kindled «xm 
As touch'd, and plaintively began to play 

The air of " 'T was a Friar of Orders Gray." 



C98 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XVI 



XXXIX. 

" But add iho words," cried Henry, " which you made, 

For Adeline is half a poetess," 
Turning round to the rest, he smiling said. 

Of course the others could not but express 
In courtesy their wish to see display'd 

By one three talents, for there were no less — 
The voice, the words, the harper's skill, at once 
Could hardly be united by a dunce. 

XL. 

After some fascinating hesitation, — 

The charming of these charmers, who seem bound, 
I can't tell why, to this dissimulation — 

Fair Adeline, with eyes fix'd on the ground 
At first, then kindling into animation, 

Added her sweet voice to the lyric sound, 
And sang with much simplicity, — a merit 
Not the less precious, that we seldom hear it. 

1. 

Beware! beware! of the Black Friar, 

Who sitleth by Norman stone, 
For he mutters his prayer in the midnight air, 

And his mass of the days that are gone. 
When the Lord of the Hill, AmundeviUe, 

Made Norman Church his prey, 
And expell'd the friars, one friar still 

Would not be driven away. 

2. 
Though he came in his might, with King Henry's right, 

To turn church lands to lay, 
Willi swo.-d in hand, and torch to light 

Their walls, if they said nay, 
A monk remain'd, unchased, unchairi'd, 

And he did not seem form'd of clay, 
For he 's seen in the porch, and he 's seen in the church, 

Though he is not seen by day. 

3. 

And whether f_r good, or whether for ill, 

It is not mine to say ; 
But still to the house of AmundeviUe, 

He abideth night and day. 
By the marriage-bed of their lords, 't is said, 

He flits on the bridal eve; 
And 'tis held as faith, to their bed of death 

He comes — but not to grieve. 
4. 
When an heir is born, he is heard to mourn, 

And when aught is to befall 
That ancient line, in the pale moonshine 

He walks from hall to hall. 
His form you may trace, but not his face, 

'T is shadow'd by his cowl ; 
But his eyes may be seen from the folds between, 

And they seem of a parted soul. 
5. 
But beware ! beware of the Black Friar, 

He still retains his sway, 
For he is yet the church's heir, 

Whoever may be the lay. 
AmundeviUe is lord by day, 

But the monk is lord by night, 
Nor wine not wassail could raise a vassal 

To question that friar's right. 



6. 

Say nought to him as he walks the hall, 

And he '11 say nought to you : 
I!.- -weeps along in his dusky pall, 

As o'er the grass the dew. 
Then gramercy ! for the Black Friar ; 

Heaven sain him! fair or foul, 
And whatsoe'er may be his prayer, 

Let ours be for his soul. 

XLI. 

The lady's voice ceased, and the thrilling wires 
Died from the touch that kindled them to sound, 

And the pause follow'd, which, when song expires, 
Pervades a moment those who listen round ; 

And then of course the circle much admires, 
Nor less applauds, as in politeness bound, 

The tones, the feeling, and the execution, 

To the performer's diffident confusion. 

XLII. 

Fair Adeline, though in a careless way, 
As if she rated such accomplishment 

As the' mere pastime of an idle day, 
Pursued an instant for her own content, 

Would now and then as 't were without display, 
Yet with display in fact, at times relent 

To such performances with haughty smile, 

To show she could, if it were worth her while. 

sua. 

Now this (hut we will whisper it aside) 
Was — pardon the pedantic illustration — 

Trampling on Plato's pride with greater pride, 
As did the Cynic on some like occasion ; 

Deeming the sage would be much mortified, 
Or thrown into a philosophic passion, 

For a spoil'd carpet — but the " Attic Bee " 

Was much consoled by his own repartee. 2 

XLIV. 

Thus Adeline would throw into the shade 

(By doing easily, whene'er she chose, 
What dilettanti do with vast parade), 

Their sort of half profession : for it grow 
To something like this when loo oft display'd, 

And that it is so every body knows 
Who 've heard Miss That or This, or Lady T' other 
Show off — to please their company or mother. 

XLV. 
Oh ! the long evenings of duets and trios ! 

The admirations and the speculations ; 
The "Mamma Mias !" and the "Amor Mios!" 

The " Tanti Palpitis " on such occasions : 
The "Lasciamis," and quavering •♦Addios!" 

Amongst our own most musical of nations ; 
Willi " Tu mi chamases " from Portingale, 
To soothe our ears, lest Italy should fail. 3 , 

XLVI. 
In Babylon's bravuras — as the home 

Heart-ballads of Green Erin or Gray Highlands, 
That bring Lochaber back to eyes that roam 

O'er far Atlantic continents or islands, 
The calentures of music wnich o'ercome 

All mountaineers with dreams that they are nigh Kncs, 
No more to be beheld but in such visions,-- 
Was Adeline well versed as compositions. 



CANTO XVI. 



DON JUAN. 



699 



XLVII. 

She also had a twilight tinge of " Blue," 
Could write rhymes, and compose more than she wrote; 

Made epigrams occasionally too 

Upon her friends, as every body ought. 

But still from that sublimer azure hue, 

So much the present dye, she was remote ; 

Was weak enough to deem Pope a great poet, 

And, what was worse, was not ashamed to show it. 

XLVIII. 
Aurora — since we are touching upon taste, 

Which now-a-days is the thermometer 
By whose degrees all characters are class'd — 

Was more Shakspearian, if I do not err. 
The worlds beyond this world's perplexing waste 

Had more of her existence, for in her 
There was a depth of feeling to embrace 
Thoughts, boundless, deep, but silent too as space. 

XLIX. 

Not so her gracious, graceful, graceless grace, 
The full-grown Hebe of Fitz-Fulke, whose mind, 

If she had any, was upon her face, 
And that was of a fascinating kind. 

A little turn for mischief you might trace 

Also thereon, — but that 's not much ; wc find 

Few females without some such gentle leaven, 

For fear we should suppose us quite in heaven. 

L. 

I have not heard she was at all poetic, 

Though once she was seen reading the " Bath Guide," 

And " Hayley's Triumphs," which she deem'd pathetic, 
Because, she said, her temper had been tried 

So much, the bard had really been prophetic 
Of what she had gone through with, — since a bride. 

But of all verse what most insured her praise 

Were sonnets to herself, or "bouts rimes." 

LI. 

'Twere difficult to say what was the object 
Of Adeline, in bringing this same lay 

To bear on what appear'd to her the subject 
Of Juan's nervous feelings on that day. 

Perhaps she merely had the simple project 
To laugh him out of his supposed dismay; 

Perhaps she might wish to confirm him in if, 

Though why I cannot say — at least this minute. 

LII. 

But so far the immediate effect 

Was to restore him to his self-propriety, 
A thing quite necessary to the elect, 

Who wish to take the tone of their society ; 
In which you cannot be too circumspect, 

Whether the mode be persiflage or piety, 
But wear the newest mantle of hypocrisy, 
On pain of much displeasing the gynocracy. 

LIII. 
And therefore Juan now began to rally 

His spirits, and, without more explanation, 
To jest upon such themes in many a sally. 

Her grace too also seized the same occasion, 
With various similar remarks to tally, 

But wish'd for a still more detail'd narration 
Of this same mystic friar's curious doings, 
About the present family's deaths and wooinga. 



LIV. 

Of these few could say more than has been said ; 

They pass'd, as such things do, for superstition 
With some, while others, who had more in dread 

The theme, half credited the strange tradition ; 
And much was talk'd on all sides on that head ; 

But Juan, when cross-question'd on the vision, 
Which some supposed (though he had not avow'd it) 
Had stirr'd him, answer'd in a way to cloud it. 

LV. 
And then, the mid-day having worn to one, 

The company prepared to separate : 
Some to their several pastimes, or to none ; 

Some wondering 't was so early, some so late. 
There was a goodly match, too, to be run 

Between some grayhounds on my lord's estate, 
And a young race-horse of old pedigree, 
Match'd for the spring, whom several went to see. 

LVI. 
There was a picture-dealer, who had brought 

A special Titian, warranted original, 
So precious that it was not to be bought, 

Though princes the possessor were besieging all. 
The king himself had cheapen'd it, but thought 

The civil list (he deigns to accept, obliging a!! 
His subjects by his gracious acceptation) 
Too scanty, in these times of low taxation. 

LVH. 
But as Lord Henry was a connoisseur, — 

The friend of artists, if not arts, — the owner, 
With motives the most classical and pure, 

So that he would have been the very donor 
Rather than seller, had his wants been fewer, 

So much he deem'd his patronage an honour, 
Had brought the capo d'opera, not for sale, 
But for his judgment, — never known to fail. 

LVIII. 

There was a modern Goth, I mean a Gothic 

Bricklayer of Babel, call'd an architect, 
Brought to survey these gray walls, which, though so 
thick, 

Might have from time acquired some slight defect , 
Who, after rummaging the Abbey through thick 

And thin, produced a plan, whereby to erect 
New buildings of correctest conformation, 
And throw down old — which he call'd restoriAion. 

LIX. 
The cost would be a trifle — an "old song," 

Set to some thousands ('t is the usual burthen 
Of that same tune, when people hum it long)— 

The price would speedily repay its worth in 
An edifice no less sublime than strong, 

By which Lord Henry's good taste would go forth m 
Its glory, through all ages shining sunny, 
For Gothic daring shown in English money.* 

LX. 
There were two lawyers busy on a mortgage 

Lord Henry wish'd to raise for a new purchase ; 
Also a lawsuit upon terares burgage, 

And one on tithes which sure are discord's torches 
Kindling Religion till she throws down her ga"e, 

"Untying" squires "to tight against the churches;" 
There was a prize ox, a prize pig, and ploughman, 
For Henrv was a sort of Sabine showman. 



'00 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO XVI 



LXI. 

1 here were two poachers caught in a steel trap, 
Ready for jail, their place of convalescence ; 

There was a country girl in a close cap 

And scarlet cloak (I hate the sight to see, since — 

Since — since — in youth I had the sad mishap — 
But luckily I 've paid few parish fees since). 

That scarlet cloak, alas ! unclosed with rigour, 

Presents the problem of a double figure. 

LXII. 

A reel within a bottle is a mystery, 

One can't tell how it e'er got in or out, 

Therefore the present piece of natural history 
I leave to those who are fond of solving doubt, 

And merely state, though not for the consistory, 
Lord Henry was a justice, and that Sc.out 

The constable, beneath a warrant's banner, 

Had bagg'd this poacher upon Nature's manor. 

LXIII. 

Now justices of peace must judge all pieces 
Of mischief of all kinds, and keep the game 

And morals of the country from caprices 

Of those who 've not a license for the same ; 

And of all things, excepting tithes and leases, 
Perhaps these are most difficult to tame: 

Preserving partridges and pretty wenches 

Are puzzles to the most precautious benches. 

LXIV. 

The present culprit was extremely pale, 

Pale as if painted so ; her cheek being red 

By nature, as in higher dames less hale, 

'T is white, at least when they just rise from bed. 

Perhaps she was ashamed of seeming frail, 
Poor soul ! for she was country born and bred, 

And knew no better in her immorality 

Than to wax white — for blushes are for quality. 

LXV. 

Her black, bright, downcast, yet espiegle eye 

Had gather'd a large tear into its corner, 
Which the poor thing at times cssay'd to dry, 

For she was not a sentimental mourner, 
Parading all her sensibility, 

Nor insolent enough to scorn the scorner, 
But stood in trembling, patient tribulation, 
To be call'd up for her examination. 

LXVI. 
Of course these groups were scatter'd here and there, 

Not nigh the gay saloon of ladies gent. 
The lawyers in the study ; and in air 

The prize pig, ploughman, poachers ; the men sent 
From town, viz. architect and dealer, were 

Both busy (as a general in his tent 
Writing despatches) in their several stations, 
Exulting in their brilliant lucubrations. 

LXVII. 
But this poor girl was left in the great hall, 

While Scout, the parish guardian of the frail, 
Piscuss'd (he hated h.;er yciept the "small") 

A mighty mug of moral double ale: 
.She waited until Justice could recall 

Its kind attentions to their proper pale, 
To r;.mo a thing in nomenclature rather 
Ptncxing foi most virgins — a child's father. 



LXVIII. 

You sec here was enough of occupation 
For the Lord Henry, link'd with dugs and horses, 

There was much bustle too and preparation 
Below stairs on the score of second courses, 

Because, as suits their rank and situation, 
Those who in counties have gnat land resources, 

Have "public days," when all men may carouse, 

Though not exactly what 's call'd " open house " — 

LXIX. 

Cut once a week or fortnight, j/ninvited 
(Thus we translate a general invitation). 

All country gentlemen, esquired or knighted, 

May drop in without cards, and take their station 

At the full board, and sit alike delighted 
With fashionable wines and conversation ; 

And, as the isthmus of the grand connexion, 

Talk o'er themselves, the past and next election. 

LXX. 

Lord Henry was a great electioneercr, 

Burrowing for boroughs like a rat or rabbit, 

But country contests cost him rather dearer, 

Because the neighbouring Scotch Earl of Giftgabhit 

Had English influence in the self-same sphere here 
His son, the Honourable Dick Dice-drabbit, 

Was member for "the other interest" (meaning 

The self-same interest, with a different leaning). 

LXXI. 

Courteous and cautious therefore in his countv, 
He was all things to all men, and dispensed 

To some civility, to others bounty, 

And promises to all— which last commenced 

To gather to a somewhat large amount, he 
Not calculating how much they condensed ; 

But, what with keeping some and breaking others, 

His word had the same value as another's. 

LXX1I. 

A friend to freedom and freeholders — yet 

No less a friend to government — he held 
That he exactly the just medium hit 

'Twixt place and patriotism — albeit compell'd, 
Such was his sovereign's pleasure (though unfit, 

He added modestly, when rebels rail'd), 
To hold some sinecures he wish'd abolish'd, 
But that with them all law would be demolish'd. 

LXXTII. 
He was " free to confess" — (whence comes this phrase 7 

Is 't English? No — 'tis only parliamentary) 
That innovation's spirit now-a-days 

Had made more progress than for the last century. 
He would not tread a factious path to praise, 

Though for the public weal disposed to venture high ; 
As for his place, he could but say this of it, 
That the fatigue was greater than the profit. 

LXXIV. 
Heaven and his friends knew that a private life 

Had ever been his sole and whole ambition ; 
But could he quit his king in times of strife 

Which threaten'd the whole country with perdition? 
When demagogues would with a butcher's knifo 

Cut through and through (oh! damnable incision!) 
The Gordian or the Geordian knot, whose strings 
Have tied together Commons, Lords, and K in 



CANTO XV t. 



DON JUAN. 



701 



I.XXV. 

Sooner "come plact> .<tto the civil list, 

And champion him to the utmost " — he would keep it, 
Till duly disappointed or dismiss'd : 

Profit he cared not for, let others reap it ; 
But should the day come when place ceased to exist, 

The country would have far more cause to weep it ; 
For how could it go on ? Explain who can ! 
He gloried in the name of Eng'ishman. 

LXXVI. 
He was as independent — ay, much more — 

Than those who were not paid for independence, 
As common soldiers, or a common shore 

Have in their several arts or parts ascendance 
O'er the irregulars in lust or gore 

Who do not give professional attendance. 
Thus on the mob all statesmen are as eager 
To prove their pride, as footmen to a beggar. 

LXXVI I. 
All this (save the last stanza) Henry said, 

And thought. I say no more — I 've said too much ; 
For all of us have either heard or read 

Of — or upon the hustings — some slight such 
Hints from the independent heart or head 

Of the official candidate. I '11 touch 
No more on this — the dinner-bell hath rung, 
And grace is said ; the grace I should have sung — 

LXXVIII. 
But I 'm too late, and therefore must make play. 

'T was a great banquet, such as Albion old 
Was wont to boast — as if a glutton's tray 

Were something very glorious to behold. 
But 't was a public feast and public day, — 

Quite full, right dull, guests hot, and dishes cold, 
Great plenty, much formalitv, small cheer, 
And every body out of their own sphere. 

LXXIX. 
The squires familiarly formal, and 

My lords and ladies proudly condescending ; 
The very servants puzzling how to hand 

Their plates — without it might be too much bending 
From their high places by the sideboard's stand — 

Yet, like their masters, fearful of offending ; 
For any deviation from the graces 
Might cost both men and masters too — their places. 

LXXX. 
There were some hunters bold, and coursers keen, 

Whose hounds ne'er err'd, nor grayhounds deign'd 
to lurch ; 
Some deadly shots too, Scptembrizcrs, seen 

Earliest to rise, and last to quit the search 
Of the poor partridge through his stubble screen. 

There were some massy members of the church, 
Takers of tithes, and makers of good matches, 
And several who sung fewer psalms than catches. 

LXXXl. 
There were some country wags, too, — and, alas ! 

Some exiles from the town, who had been driven 
To gaze, instead of pavement, upon grass, 

And rise at nine, in lieu of long eleven. 
And lo ! upon that day it came to pass, 

I sate next that o'erwhelming son of Heaven, 
The very powerful parson, Peter Pith, 
Tho loudest wit I e'er was deafcn'd w^V 



LXXXII. 

I knew him in his livelier London days, 
A brilliant d'.ner-out, though but a curate ; 

And not a joke he cut but earn'd its praise, 
Until preferment, coming at a sure rate, 

(Oh, Providence ! how wondrous are thy ways, 
Who would suppose thy gifts sometimes obdurate?) 

Gave him, to lay the devil who looks o'er Lincoln, 

A fat fen vicarage, and nought to think on. 

LXXXIII. 

His jokes were sermons, and his sermons jokes ; 

But both were thrown away amongst the fens ; 
For wit hath no great friend in aguish folks. 

No longer ready ears and short-hand pens 
Imbibed the gay bon-mot, or happy hoax : 

The poor priest was reduced to common sense, 
Or to coarse efforts very loud and long, 
To hammer a hoarse laugh from the thick throng. 

LXXXIV. 

There is a difference, says the song, "between 
A beggar and a queen," or was (of late 

The latter worse used of the two we 've seen— 
But we'll say nothing of affairs of state) — 

A difference " 'twixt a bishop and a dean," 
A difference between crockery-ware and plate, 

As between English beef and Spartan broth — 

And yet great heroes have been bred by both. 

LXXXV. 

But of all Nature's discrepancies, none 
Upon the whole is greater than the difference 

Beheld between the country and the town, 
Of which the latter merits every preference 

From those who've few resources of their own, 
And only think, or act, or feel with reference 

To some small plan of interest or ambition — 

Both which are limited to no condition. 

LXXXVI. 

But "en avant!" The light loves languish o'er 
Long banquets and too many guests, although 

A slight repast makes people love much more, 
Bacchus and Ceres being, as we know, 

Even from our grammar upwards, friends of yore 
With vivifying Venus, who doth owe 

To these the invention of champagne and truffles 

Temperance delights her, but long fasting ruffles. 

LXXXVII. 

Dully pass'd o'er the dinner of the day ; 

And Juan took his place he knew not where, 
Confused, in the confusion, and distrait, 

And sitting as if nail'd upon his chair ; 
Though knives and forks clang'd round as in a fraj 

He seem'd unconscious of all passing there, 
Till some one, with a groan, expressed a wish 
(Unheeded twice) to have a fin of fish. 

LXXXVIII. 
On which, at the third asking of the bans, 

He started ; and, perceiving smiles arouna 
Broadening to grins, he coloured more than once. 

And hastily — as nothing can confound 
A wise man more than laughter from a dunce- 

Inflictcd on the dish a deadly n ound, 
And with such hurry that, cic he could curb A, 
He 'd paid his neighbour's prayer with half a turooi. 



02 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CANTO XVI 



LXXXIX. 

This was no bad mistake, as it occurr'd, 

The supplicator being an amateur ; 
But others, who were left with scarce a third, 

Were angry — as they we'd might, to be sure. 
They wonder'd how a young man so absurd 

Lord Henry at his table should endure ; 
And this, and his not knowing how much oats 
Haa fallen last market, cost his host three votes. 

XC. 

They little knew, or might have sympathized, 
That he the night before had seen a ghost ; 

A prologue, which but slightly harmonized 
With the substantial company engross'd 

By matter, and so much materialized, 

That one scarce knew at what to marvel most 

Of two things — how (the question rather odd is) 

Such bodies could have souls, or souls such bodies, 

XCI. 

But what confused him more than smile or stare 
From all the 'squires and 'squiresses around, 

Who wonder'd at the abstraction of his air, 
Especially as he had been renown'd 

For some vivacity among the fair, 

Even in the country circle's narrow bound — 

(For little things upon my lord's estate 

Were good small-talk for others still less great) — 

XCII. 

Was, that he caught Aurora's eye on his, 
And something like a smile upon her cheek. 

Now this he really rather took amiss : 

In those who rarely smile, their smile bespeaks 

A strong external motive ; and in this 

Smile of Aurora's there was nought to pique, 

Or hope, or love, with any of the wiles 

Which some pretend to trace in ladies' smiles. 

XCIII. 
'T was a mere quiet smile of contemplation, 

Indicative of some surprise and pity ; 
And Juan grew carnation with vexation, 

Which was not very wise and still less witty, 
Since he had gain'd at least her observation, 

A most important outwork of the city — 
As Juan should have known, had not his senses 
By last night's ghost been driven from their defences. 

XCIV. 
But, what was bad, she did not blush in turn, 

Nor stem embarrass'd — quite the contrary ; 
Her aspect was, as usual, still — not stern — 

And she withdrew, but cast not down, her eye, 
yet grew a little pale — with what? concern? 

1 know not ; but her colour ne'er was high — 
Though sometimes faintly flush'd — and always clear 
As deep seas in a sunny atmosphere. 

xcv. 

But Adeline was occupied by fame 

This day ; and watching, witching, condescending 
To the consumers of fish, fowl, and game, 

And dignity with courtesy so blending, 
As all must blend whose part it is to aim 

^Especially as the sixth year is ending) 
At Uieir lord's, soil's, and similar connexions' 
Sate conduct through the rocks of re-elections. 



XCVI. 

Though this was most expedient on the whole, 
And usual — Juan, when he cast a glance 

On Adeline while playing her grand role, 

Which she went through as though it were a dance 

(Betraying only now and then her soul 
By a look scarce perceptibly askance 

Of weariness or scorn), began to feel 

Some doubt how much of Adeline was real; 

XCVII. 

So well she acted all and every part 

By turns — with that vivacious versatility, 

Which many people take for want of heart. 
They err — 't is merely what is call'd mobility, 6 

A thing of temperament, and not of art, 

Though seeming so, from its supposed facility ; 

And false — though true ; for surely they 're sincerest, 

Who 're strongly acted on by what is nearest. 

XCVIII. 
This makes your actors, artists, and romancers, 

Heroes sometimes, though seldom — sages never ; 
But speakers, bards, diplomatists, and dancers, 

Little that's great, but much of what is clever; 
Most orators, but very few financiers, 

Though all Exchequer Chancellors endeavour, 
Of late vears, to dispense with Cocker's rigours, 
And grow quite figurative with their figures. 

XCIX. 

The poets of arithmetic are they, 

Who, though they prove not two and two to be 
Five, as they would do in a modest wc. f, 

Have plainly made it out that four a,e three, 
Judging by what they take and what tlxy pay. 

The Sinking Fund's unfathomable s; a, 
That most unliquidating liquid, leaves 
The debt unsunk, yet sinks all it receives. 

C. 

While Adeline dispensed her airs and graces, 

The fair Fitz-Fulke seem'd very much at ease ; 
Though loo well-bred to quiz men to tlvoir faces. 

Her laughing blue eyes with a glance cvuld sei?«. 
The ridicules of people in all places — 

That honey of your fashionable bees — 
And store it up for mischievous enjoyment. ; 
And this at present was her kind employment. 

CI. 
However, the day closed, as days must close ; 

The evening also waned — and coffee came. 
Each carriage was announced, and ladies rose, 

And curtsying off", as curtsies country dame, 
Retired: with most unfashionable bows 

Their docile esquires also did the same, 
Delighted with the dinner and their host, 
But with the lady Adeline the most. 

CII. 
Some praised her beauty ; others her great grace ; 

The warmth of her politeness, whose sincerity 
Was obvious in each feature of her face, 

Whose traits were radiant with the rays of verity. 
Yes : she was truly worthy her high place ! 

No one could envy her deserved prosperity : 
And then her dress — what beautiful simplicity 
Draperied her form with curious felicity! 7 



CANTO XVI. 



DON JUAN. 



703 



cm. 

Meanwhile sweet Adeline deserved their praises, 

By an impartial indemnification 
For all her past exertion and soft phrases, 

In a most edifying conversation, 
Which turn'd upon their late guests' miens and faces, 

And families, even to the last relation ; 
Their hideous wives, their horrid selves and dresses, 
And truculent distortion of their tresses. 

CIV. 

True, she said little — 't was the rest that broke 

Forth into universal epigram: 
. But then 't was to the purpose what she spoke : 

Like Addison's "faint praise" so wont to damn 
Her own but served to set off every joke, 

As music chimes in with a melodrame. 
How sweet the task to shield an absent friend ! 
I ask but this of mine, to not defend. 

cv. 

There were but two exceptions to this keen 
Skirmish of wits o'er the departed ; one, 

Aurora, with her pure and placid mien ; 
And Juan too, in general behind none 

In gay remark on what he'd heard or seen, 
Sate silent now, his usual spirits gone : 

In vain he heard the others rail or rally, 

He would not join them in a single sally. 

CVI. 
T is true he saw Aurora look as though 

She approved his silence ; she perhaps mistook 
Its motive for that charity we owe 

But seldom pay the absent, nor would look 
Further; it might or it might not be so: 

But Juan, sitting silent in his nook, 
Observing little in his reverie, 
Yet saw this much, which he was glad to see. 

cm 

The ghost at least had done him this much good, 

In making him as silent as a ghost, 
If in the circumstances which ensued 

He gain'd esteem where it was worth the most. 
And certainly Aurora had renevv'd 

In him some feelings he had lately lost 
Or harden'd ; feelings which, perhaps ideal, 
Arc so divine, that I must deem them real : — 

CVIII. 

The. love of higher things and better days ; 

The unbounded hope, and heavenly ignorance 
Of what is call'd the world, and the world's ways; 

The moments when we gather from a glance 
More joy than from all future pride or praise, 

Which kindle manhood, but can ne'er entrance 
The heart in an existence of its own, 
Of which another's bosom is the zone. 

CIX. 
Who would not sigh Ai ai rav Kvdnpciavl 

That hath a memory, or that luid a heart? 
Alas ! her star must wane like that of Dian, 

Hay fades on ray, as years on years depart. 
Anaereon only had the soul to tie on 

Unwithering myrtle round the unblunted dart 
Of Eros ; but, though thou hast play'd us many tricks, 
Still we respect thee, "Alma Venus Genitrix !" 



CX. 

And full of sentiments, sublime as billows 

Heaving between this world and worlds beyond, 

Don Juan, when the midnight hour of pillows 
Arrived, retired to his ; but to despond 

Rather than rest. Instead of poppies, willows 
Waved o'er his couch; he meditated, fond 

Of those sweet bitter thoughts which banish sleep, 

And make the worldling sneer, the youngling weep. 

cxr. 

The night was as before: he was undrest, 
Saving his night-gown, which is an undress: 

Completely "sans culotte," and without vest ; 
In short, he hardly could be clothed with less ; 

But, apprehensive of his spectral : 

He sate, with feelings awkward to express 

(By those who have not had such visitations), 

Expectant of the ghost's fresh operations. 

CXII. 

And not in vain he listen'd — Hush! what's that? 

I see — I see — Ah, no! 'tis not — yet 'tis — 
Yc powers! it is the— the — the — Pooh! the cat! 

The devil may take that stealthy pace of his ! 
So like a spiritual pit-a-pat, 

Or tiptoe of an amatory Miss, 
Gliding the first time to a rendezvous, 
And dreading the chaste echoes of her shoe. 

CXI1I. 

Again what is 't ? The wind ? No, no, — this time 

It is the sable friar as before, 
With awful footsteps, regular as rhyme, 

Or (as rhymes may be in these days) much more. 
Again, through shadows of the night sublime, 

When deep sleep fell on men, and the world won) 
The starry darkness round her like a girdle 
Spangled with gems — the monk made his blood curdle. 

CXIV. 

A noise like to wet fingers drawn on glass, 3 

Which sets the teeth on edge; and a slight clatter : 

Like showers which on the midnight guests will pass 
Sounding like very supernatural water, — 

Came over Juan's ear, which throbb'd, alas! 
For immaterialism's a serious matter: 

So that even those whose faith is the most great 

In souls immortal, shun them tete-a-tete. 

cxv. 

Were his eyes open? — Yes! and his mouth too. 

Surprise has this effect — to make one dumb, 
Yet leave the gate which eloquence slips thror'^h 

As wide as if a long speech were to come. 
Nigh and more nigh the awful echoes drew, 

Tremendous to a mortal tympanum : 
His eyes were open, and (as was before 
Stated) his mouth. What open'd next? — ihe door 

CXVI. 
It open'd with a most infernal creak, 

Like, that of hell. " Lasciatc ogm speranza, 
Vio che entrate!" The hinge soem'd to speak. 

Dreadful as Dante's rima, or this stanza ; 
Or — but all words upon such themes are weak: 

A single shade 's sufficient to entrance i 
Hero — for what is substance to a spoil? 
Or how is 't matter trembles to come near i 7 



701 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



CAXTO XVI 



CXVII. 
The door flew wide, noi swiftly— but, as fly 

The Bea-gulls, with a Bteady, sober flight — 
And then swung back; nor close — but stood awry, 

Half letting in long shadows on the light, 
Which Bt'dl in Juan's candlesticks bnrn'd high, 

For he had two, both tolerably bright, — 
And in the door-way, darkening darkness, stood 
The sable friar in his solemn hood. 

C XVIII. 

Don Juan shook, as erst he had been shaken 
The night before ; but, being sick of shaking, 

He first inclined to think he had been mistaken, 
And then to be ashamed of such mistaking ; 

His own internal ghost began to awaken 

Within him, and to quell his corporal quaking — 

Hinting, that soul and body on the whole 

Were odds against a disembodied soul. 

CXIX. 

And then his dread grew wrath, and his wrath fierce; 

And he arose — advanced — the shade retreated ; 
But Juan, eager now the truth to pierce, 

Follow'd ; his veins no longer cold, but heated, 
Resolved to thrust the mystery carte and tierce, 

At whatsoever risk of being defeated: 
The ghost Stopp'd, menaced, then retired, until 
He reach'u the ancient wall, then stood stone still. 

cxx. 

Juan put forth one arm — Eternal Powers ! 

It touch'd no soul, nor body, but the wall, 
On which the moonbeams fell in silvery showers 

Chequer'd with ah the tracery of the hall : 
He shudder'd, as no doubt the bravest cowers 

When he can't tell what 't is that doth appal. 
How odd, a single hobgoblin's nonentity 
Should cause more fear than a whole host's identity. 9 

CXXI. 

But still the shade remain'd ; the blue eyes glared, 

And rather variably for stony death ; 
Yet one thing rather good the grave had spared — 

The ghost had a remarkably sweet breath. 
A straggling curl show'd he had been fair-hair'd ; 

A red lip, with two rows of pearl beneath, 
Gleam'd forth, as through the casement's ivy shroud 
The moon peep'd, just escaped from a gray cloud. 

CXXII. 

And Juan, puzzled, hut still curious, thrust 

His other arm forth — Wonder upon wonder ! 
It press'd upon a hard but glowing bos', 

Which beat as if there was a warm heart under. 
lie found, as people on most trials must, 

That he had made at fW a silly blunder, 
And that in his confusion he .:ad caught 
Only the wall instead of what he sought. 

CXXIII. 
The gliost, if ghost it were, seem'd a sweet soul, 

As ever lurk d beneath a holy hood : 
A dimpled chin, a neck of ivory, stole 

Forth into something much like flesh and blood; 
Back fill the sable frock and dreary cowl, 

Ami they reveal'd (alas! that e'er they should!) 
In full, Vo'.uptuous, hut not o'rrgrown bulk, 
The phantom of iter frolic grace — Fitz-Fulke ! 



NOTES. 



CANTO I. 

Note 1. Stanza v. 

Brave men were living before Agamemnon. 

" Vixerc fortes anto Agamemnona," etc. — Horace. 

Note 2. Stanza xvii. 
Save thine "incomparable oil," Macassar! 
" Description des verbis incomparabks de l'huile de 
Macassar." — See the advertisement. 

Note 3. Stanza xlii. 
Although Longinus toll* us there is no hymn 
Where the sublime soars forth on win^s more ample. 

See Longinus, Section 10, Iva pi) tv rt ntpl alrf/v 
irdQos <paivriraL, xaQiov 5i ox'i'ocJo?. 

Note 4. Stanza xliv. 
They only add them all in an appendix. 
Fact. There is, or was, such an edition, with all \he 
obnoxious epigrams of Martial placed by themselves at 
the end. 

Note 5. Stanza lxxxviii. 
Thn bard I quote from does not sing amiss, 
Campbell's Gertrude of Wyoming; (I think) the 
opening of Canto II. but quote from memory. 

Note 6. Stanza cxlviii. 
I« it for this that General Count O'Reilly, 
Who took Algiers, declares I used him vilely? 

Donna Julia here made a mistake. Count O'Reilly 
did not take Algiers — hut Algiers very nearly took him ; 
he and his army and fleet retreated with great loss, and 
not much credit, from before that city, in the year 17 — . 

Note 7. Stanza cexvi. 
My days of love are o'er, me no more. 
" Me nee Remina, lire puer 
Jam, nec Bpea animi ciedula BlUtui; 

Nee certure juvat mero, 
Nec vincirc novis tempore floribus." 



CANTO III. 



Note 1. Stanza xlv. 
For none likes more to hear himself converse 
Rispose allor Margutte: a dirtel toato, 

lu non credo piu al aero, ch 1 n I'azzurro; 

Ma nel cappone, o lasso, o vuogli arrosto; 

K credo alcana volta anco nel burro. 

No la cervogia, e quando' io n' ho nel mosto; 

F. molto piu ne 1'aspro che il mangurro; 

Ma BOpra tntto nel boon vino bo fade; 

E credo che BIB salvo chi gli crede. 
PULCI, Morgantt Maggiore, Canto 18, Stanza 115 

Note 2. Stanza lxxi. 

That e'er by precious metal was held in. 

This dress is Moorish, and the bracelets and bar are 

worn in the manner described. The reader will per 

reive hereafter, that, as the mother of Haidee was of 

Fez, her daughter wore the garb of the country. 



DON JUAN. 



705 



Note 3. Stanza lxxii. 
A liko po!d liar, above her instep roll'.!. 
The bar of gold above the instep is a mark of sov- 
ereign rank in the women of the families of the Deys, 
and is worn as such by their female relatives. 

Note 4. Stanza Ixxiii. 
Her person if allow'd at large to run. 
This is no exaggeration ; there were four women 
whom I remember to have seen, wno possessed their 
hair in this profusion ; of these, three w ore English, the 
other was a Levantine. Their hair was of thai 
and quantity that, when let down, it almost entirely 
shaded the person, so as nearly to render dress a su- 
perfluity. Of these, only one had dark hair; the Ori- 
ental's iiad, perhaps, the lightest eolour of the four. 

Note 5. Stanza cvii. 
Oh Hesperus ! ilion bringest all good things. 
'Ecr-qu, -navra ^epcif, 
Qcpei; oivov, 4''l>' l i atya, 
il't/jrtj ftarcpt iron .<. 

Fragment of Snjipho. 

• Note C. Stanza cviii. 
Soft hour ! which wakes llic wish and melts the heart 
" Era giii I" ora ehe volge 'I disk), 

A' navigaoti e 'ntencrisce il cuire 
L.i ih eh' ban dettu a' dolci amici addio, 

E che lo nnovo peregrin d' amore 
Punge, se ode Squilla di lontano 
Che paja '1 gioroo piangei che si muore." 

DANTE'S I'urgataru, Canto viii. 

This last line is the first of Gray's Elegy, taken by 
him without acknowledgement. 

Note 7. Stanza cix. 

Some hands unseen Btrew'd flowers upon his tomb. 

Sec Suetonius for this fact. 



CANTO IV. 



Note I. Stanza xii. 
" Whom the gods love, die young," was said of yore. 
See Herodotus. 

Note 2. Stanza lix. 
A vein had burst. 
This is no very uncommon effect of the violence of 
conflicting and different passions. The Dose Francis 
Foseari, on his deposition, in 1 457, hearing the bell 
of St. Mark announce the election of his successor, 
"mourut aobitement d'une hemorrhagic causee par une 
vcinc qui s'ecla'.a dans i\ poitrine," (see Sismondi and 
Darn, vols. i. vid ii. ) %'- tha age of eighty years, when 
* who woulil hav.i thought the old man hail so much blood 
in him?" Before I was sixteen years of age, I was 
witness to a melancholy instance of the same effect 
of mixed passions upon a young person ; who, how- 
ever, oid not die in consequence, at that time, but fell 
a victim some years afterwards to a seizure of the same 
kind, arising from causes intimately connected with 
agitation of mind. 

Note 3. Stanza lxxx. 
Pint fold by the impresario at no bigh rate. 

This is a t ict A few years ago, a man engaged a 
8 N 94 



company for some foreign theatre; embarked them at 
an Italian port, and, carrying them to Algiers, sold 
them all. One of the women, returned from her cap- 
tivity, I heard sing, by a strange coincidence, in Ros- 
sini's opera of " L'ltaliana in Algie.i," at Venice, m 
the beginning of 1817. 

Note 4. Stanza Ixxxvi. 
Prom ftll the pope mikes yearly, 't Wi 
To find three perfect pipes of the Mr 

It is strange that it should be the pope and ths sultan 
who are the chief encouragers of this branch of trade- 
women being prohibited us singers at St. Trier's, and 
not deemed trustworthy as guardians of the haram. 

Note 5. Stanza ciii. 
While weeds and ordure rankle round the baso 
The pillar which records the battle of Ravenna, is 
about two miles from the city, on the oppo :!•• side of 
the liver to the road towards Forli. Gaston de Foix, 
who gained the battle, was killed in it; there fell on 
both sides twenty thousand men. The present state 
of the pillar and its site is described in the text. 



CANTO V. 



Note 1. Stanza Hi. 

The ocean stream. 

This expression of Homer has been much criticised. 

It hardly answers to our Atlantic ideas of the ocean, 

but is sufficiently applicable to the Hellespont, and the 

Hosphorus, with the iEgean, intersected with islands. 

Note 2. Stanza v. 
"The Giant's Grave." 
"The Giant's Grave" is a height on the Asiatic 
shore of the Hosphorus, much frequented by holiday 
parties ; like Harrow and Highgate. 

N.ie 3. Stanza xxxiii. 
And running out as fabl 1 was able. 
The assassination alluded to took place on the eighth 

of December, 1820. in the streets of R , not a 

hundred paces from the residence of the writer. The 
circumstances were as described. 

Note 4. Stanza xxxiv. 
Kill'd by five Lullets from an old gun-barrel. 
There was found close by him an old gun-barrel, 
sawn half off: it had just been discharged, and was 
still warm. 

Note 5. Stanza liii. 
Prepared for supper with a glass of rum. 
In Turkey, nothing is more common, than for the 
Mussulmans to take several glasses of strong spirits by 
way of appetizer. I have seen them take as many as 
six of raki before dinner, and swear thai they dined 
(lie better fir it ; I tried the experiment, bin was Iko 
the Scotchman, who having heard that the birds called 
k ill iew iaks w ere admirable v. nets, air si\ of ihrin, and 

complained that "Ae was no hungrier (Aon when nt 

began.'' 

Note 6. S anza Iv. 
Splendid hut silent, save in one, where, dropping, 
A ininble fountain echoes. 

A common furniture. — I recollect being received o» 



70G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Ali Pacha, in a room containing a marble basin and 
fountain, etc., etc., etc. 

Note 7. Stanza lxxxvii. 
Tlic gate bo splendid was in all its jeatures. 
Features of a gate — a ministerial metaphor ; " the 
feature upon which this question hinges." — See the 
"Fudge Family," or hear Gasilcrcagh. 

Note 8. Stanza cvi. 
Though on more thorough-bred or fairer fingers. 
There is perhaps nothing more distinctive of birth 
than the hand : it is almost the only sign of blood 
which aristocracy can generate. 

Note 9. Stanza cxlvii. 
Save Solyman, the glory of their line. 

It may not be unworthy of remark, that Bacon, in 
liis essay on "Empire," hints that Solyman was the 
last of his line ; on what authority, I know not. These 
are his words : " The destruction of Mustapha was so 
fatal to Solyrnan's line, as the succession of the Turks 
from Solyman, until this day, is suspected lo be untrue, 
and <>f strange blood ; for that Solymus the Second was 
thought to be supposititious." But Bacon, in his his- 
torical authorities, is often inaccurate. I could give 
half a dozen instances from his apophthegms onlv. 

Being in the humour of criticism, I shall proceed, 
after having ventured upon the slips of Bacon, to touch 
on one or two as '-rifling in the edition of the British 
Poets, by the justly-celebrated Campbell. — But I do 
ibis in good will, and trust it will be so taken. — If any 
thing could add to my opinion of the talents and true 
feeling of that gentleman, it would be his classical, 
honest, and triumphant defence of Pope, against the 
vulgar cant of the day, and its existing Grub-street. 

The inadvertencies to which I allude, are, — 

Firstly, in speaking of Anstey, whom he accuses of 
having taken " his leading characters from Smollett." 
Anstey's Bath Guide was published in 1766. Smollett's 
Humphry Clinker (the only work of Smollett's from 
which Tabitha, etc., etc. co?/W have been taken) was 
written during Smulleti's last resilience at Leghorn, in 
1770. — " Argid," if there has been any borrowing, 
Anstey must be the creditor, and not the debtor. 1 
relcr Mr. Campbell to his own data in his lives of Smol- 
Utt and Anstey. 

Secondly, Mr. Campbell says, in the life of Cowper 
(note to page 358, vol. 7), that " he knows not to whom 
Cowper alludes in these lines : 

" Nor he who. for the bane of thousand-! born, 
liuilt God u church, and laugh'd Ins word to BCOrn." 

The Calvinist meant Voltaire, and the church of Fer- 
ney, with its inscription, " Deo ercxit Voltaire." 

Thirdly, in the life of Burns, Mr. C. quotes Shak- 
spcare thus, — 

"To gild refined gold, to paint the rose. 
Or add fresh perfume to the violet." 

This version by no means improves the original, 
wrucn is as follows : 

' Tc; gild refined p d, to paint the lihi. 
To throw a perfimi on the violet." etc. 

King John. 

A great pt?t, quoting another, should be correct ; he 
enould also *2 accurate when he. accuses a Parnassian 



brother of that dangerous charge "borrowing:" a 
poet had better borrow any thing (excepting money) 
than the thoughts of another they are always sure to 
be reclaimed : but it is very hard, having been the 
lender, to be denounced as the debtor, as is the case of 
Anstey versus Smollett. 

As there is " honour amongst thieves," let there be 
some amongst poets, and give each his due, — none can 
afford to give it more than Mr. Camubell himself, who, 
with a high reputation for originality, and a fame which 
cannot be shaken, is the only poet of the times (except 
Rogers) who can be reproached (and in him it is in- 
deed a reproach) with having written too LitUe. 



CANTO VI. 



Stanza Ixjcv. 
A " wood obscure," like that where Dante found. 
" Nel mezzo del oammin' di nostra vita 
Mi ritrovai per una selva oscura," etc., etc., etc. 



CANTO VII. 



Stanza li. 

Was teaching his recruits to use the bayonet. 

Fact: Souvarolfdid this in person. 



CANTO VIII. 



Note 1. Stanza viii. 
All sounds it pierceth, " Allah ! Allah ! Hn !" 
" Allah ! Hu !" is properly the war-cry of the Mns 
sulmans, and they dwell long on the last syllable, which 
gives it a very wild and peculiar eliect. 
Note 2. Stanza ix. 
"Carnage (so Wordsworth tells you) is God's daughter." 
" But tin/ most dreaded instrument 
In working out a pure intent. 
Is man array'd for mutual slaughter; 
Yea, Carnage is thy daughter I" 

WORDSWORTH'S Thanksgiving Ode. 

To wit, the deity's. This is perhaps as pretty a 
pedigree for murder as ever was found out by Garter- 

Eing-at-arms What would have been said, had any 

free-i poken people discovered such a lineage? 

Note 3. Stanza xviii. 
Was printed Grove, although ! Grose. 

A fact ; see the Waterloo Gazettes. I recollect re- 
marking at the time to a friend ; — " There is fame! a 
man is killed — his name is Grose, and they print it 
Grove." I was at college with the deceased, who 
was a very amiable and . lever man, and his society in 
great request for his wit, gayety, and "chansons a 
boire." 

Note 4. Stanza xxiii. 

A any other notion, ami not nationnr. 

See Maji Valiancy and Sir Lawrence Parso'ts. 



DON JUAN. 



707 



Note 5. Stanza xxv. 
'T U pity "lhat such meanings alioulJ pave hell." 
The Portuguese proverb says that " Hell is paved with 
good intentions." 

Note 6. Stanza xxxiii. 
By thy humane discovery, Friar Kacon! 
Gunpowder is said to have been discovered by this 
friar. 

Note 7. Stanza xlvii. 
Which scarcely rose much higher than grass blades. 
They were but two feet high above the level. 

Note S. Stanza xcvii. 
That you unci I will win Saint George's collar. 
The Russian military order. 

Note 9. Stanza cxxxiii. 

(Poirrrs 
Eternal' such names mingled!) " Ismail 'sours'." 

In the original Russian — 

"Slava bogu ! slava vam ! 
KrepoBt V'/.ala, y ia tain." 

A kind of couplet ; for he was a poet. 



CANTO IX. 



Note 1. Stanza i. 
Humanity would rise, and thunder "Nay!" 

Query, NcyJ — Printer's Devil. 

Note 2. Stanza vi. 
And send the sentinel before your gate 
A slice or two from your luxurious moalB, 

"I at this time got a post, being for fatigue, with four 
others. — We were sent to break biscuit, and make a 
mess for Lord Wellington's hounds. I was very hungry, 
and thought it a good job at the time, as we got our own 
111 while we broke the biscuit, — a thing I had not not 
for some days. When thus engaged, the Prodigal Son 
was never once out of my mind ; and I sighed, as I fed 
the dogs, over my humble situation and my ruined 
hopes." — Journal of a Soldier of the "1st Regt. during 
the war in Spain. 

Note 3. Stanza xxxiii. 
Because ho could no more digest his dinner. 
He was killed in a conspiracy, after his temper had 
ieen exasperated, by his extreme costivity, to a degree 
of insanity. 

Note 4. Stanza xlvii. 
And had just buried the fair-faced Lanskoi. 
He was the "grande passion" of the graude Cathe- 
rine. — See her Lives, under the head of " Lanskoi." 

Note 5. Stanza xlix. 

Hid Ireland's Londonderry's Marquess show 
His parts of speech. 
This was written long before the suicide of that 
oerson. 



Note 6. Stanza lxiii. 
Ynnr " fortune" was in a fair way " to swell 

A man," as (jiles says. 

" If is fortune swells him, it is rank, he 's married."— 
Sir Giles i )verreach; Massi.ngek. — Seo"al New Way 
to Pay Old Debts." 



CANTO X. 



Note 1. Stanza xiii. 
Would scarcely join again the " reformadoes." 
"Reformers," <>r rather M Reformed." The Raron 
Bradwardine, in Waverley, is authority for the word. 

Note 2. Stanza xv. 
The endless <>>"! bestows a lint far deeper 
Thau can be hid by altering his slnrt. 

Query, suit ? — Printer's Devil. 

Note 3. Stanza xviii. 
Balgounie's Brig's black irull. 
The brig of Don, near the "auld t.uiu" of Aberdeen, 
wilh its one arch and its black deep salmon stream below, 
is in my memory as yesterday. I si ill remember, thougn 
perhaps I may misquote, the awful proverb which made 
me pause to cross it, and yet lean over it wilh a childish 
delight, being an only sou, at least by the mother's side. 
The saying, as recollected by me, was this — but I have 
never heard or seen it since I was nine years of age ; — 

" Brig of Balgounie, black's your wn'; 
V.Y n wife's "( son and a mear's ae foal, 
Down ye shall fa'!" 

Note 4. Stanza xxxiv. 

Oh, for a fortij-parson power to chaunt 
Thy praise, hypocrisy ! 

A metaphor taken from the "forty-horse power" of 
a steam-engine. That mad wag, the Reverend S. S., 
sitiiug by a brother-clergyman at dinner, observed after 
wards that his dull neighbour had a "twelve-parson 
power" of conversation. 

Note 5. Stanza xxxvi. 

To strip the Saxons of their hydts, like tanners. 
" Hyde." — I believe a hyde of land to be a legitimate 
word, and as such subject to the tax of a quibble. 

Note 6. Stanza xlix. 
Was given to her favourite, and now bore hi&. 
The Empress went to the Crimea, accompanied bj 
the Emperor Joseph, in the year — I forget which. 

Note 7. Stanza lviii. 
Which gave her dukes the graceless name, of " Birnn." 
In the Empress Anne's time, Biren her favourite as 
sinned the name and arms of the " Birons" of France, 
which families are yet extant wilh that of England. 
There are stili the daughters of Com land of lhat name ; 
one of them I remember seeing in England in the blessed 
year of the Allies — the Duchess of S. — to whom tho 
English Duchess of S 1 presented ine as a name- 
sake. 



703 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Note S. Stanza lxii. 
Eleven thousand maidenheads of bone. 

The greatest number flesh halh ever known. 

St. Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins were still 
extant in 1816, and may be so yet as much as ever. 

Note 9. Stanza IxzxL 
Who butchcr'il halt" the earth, and bullied t' other. 
India. America. 



CANTO XL 



ing-lhe "drapery" of an " untnehered" but "pretty vir- 
ginities" (like Mrs. Anne Page) of the then day, which 
has now been some years yesterday : — she assured me 
that the thing was common in London ; and as her own 
thousands, and blooming looks, and rich simplicity of 
array, put any suspicion in her own case out of the 
question, I confess I gave some credit to the allegation. 
If necessary, authorities might be cited, in which easel 
could quote both " drapery" and the wearers. Let us 
hope, however, that it is now obsolete. 

Note 5. Stanza lx. 
*T is strange the mind, that very fiery particle, 
Should let itself be snuff'd out by an article. 

" Divinse particular)! auras." 



Note 1. Stanza xix. 
Who on a lark, with black-eyed Sal (his blowing) 
So prime, so swell, so nutty, and so knowing? 

The advance of science and of language has rendered 
it unnecessary to translate the above good and true 
English, spoken in its original purity by the select 
mobility and their patrons. The following is a stanza 
of a song which was very popular, at least in my early 
uays : — 

" On the hi?h toby-spice flash the muzzle, 

In spite of each gallows old scout ; 
If you at the spelken can't hustle. 

You'll be hobbled in making a Clout. 

Then your blowing will wax gallows haughty. 
When she hears of" your scaly mistake, 

She 'II surely turn snitch tor the forty. 
That her Jack may bo regular weight." 

If there be any gem'man so ignorant as to require a 
traduction, I refer him to my old friend and corporeal 
pastor and master, John Jackson, Esq., Professor of 
Pugilism ; who I trust still retains the strength and 
symmetry of his model of a form, together with bis 
good humour, and athletic as well as mental accom- 
plishments. 

Note 2. Stanza xxix. 
St. James's Palace and St. James's " Hells." 
" Hells," gaming-houses. What their number may 
now be in this life, I know not. Before I was of age 
I knew them pretty accurately, both "gold" and 
•'silver." I was once nearly called out by an acquaint- 
ance, because when he asked me where I thought that 
his soul would be found hereafter, I answered, "In 
Silver Hell." 

Note 3. Stanza xliii. 

and therefore even I won't anent 

This subject quote. 

"Anent" was a Scotch phrase, meaning "concerning," 
''with regard to." It has been made English by the 

Scotch Novels; and, as the Frenchman said — "If it be 

not, ought to be English." 

Note 4. Stanza xlix. 
Tho millinerB who furnish " drapery misses." 
•* Drapery misses" — This term is probably any thing 
now but a mystery. It was however almost so to rac 
when I first returned from the East in 1811-1812. It 
-ncans a pretty, a high-horn, a fashionable young fe- 
male, well instructed by her friends, and furnished by 
her milliner with a wardrobe upon credit, to be repaid, 
when married, by the husband. The riddle was first 
iwid to me by a young and pretty heiress, on my prais- 



CANTO XII. 



Note 1. Stanza xix. 
Gives, with Greek truth, the good old Greek the lie 
See Mitford's Greece. "Gracia Vcrax." His great 
pleasure consists in praising tyrants, abusing Plutarch, 
spelling oddly, and writing quaintly; and, what is strange 
after all, his is the best modern history of Greece in any 
language, and he is perhaps the best of all modem his- 
torians whatsoever. Having named his sins, it is but 
fair to state his virtues — learning, labour, research, 
wrath, and partiality. I call the latter virtues in a 
writer, because they make him write in earnest. 

Note 2. Stanza xxxvii. 
A hazy widower turn'd of forty 's sure. 
This line may puzzle the commentators more tnan tho 
present generation. 

Note 3. Stanza lxxiii. 
Like Russians rushing from hot baths to snows. 
The Russians, as is well known, run out from then 
hot baths to plunge into the Neva: a pleasant practical 
antithesis, which it seems does them ro harm. 

Note 4. Stanza Ixxxii. 

The world to gaze upon those northern lights. 

For a description and print of this inhabitant of the 

polar region and native country of the aurora borealis 

see Parkv's Voyage in search of a North-JVest Pas 

sage. 

Note 5. Stanza lxxxvi. 
As Philip's son proposed to do with Athos. 
A sculptor projected to hew Mount Athos into a staluo 
of Alexander, wilh a city in one hand, and, I believe, 3 
river in his pocket, with various other similar devices. 
15ut Alexander 's gone, and Athos remains, I trust, ere 
long, to look over a nation of freemen. 



CANTO XIII. 



Note 1. Stanza vii. 
Right honestly, "he liked an honest hater." 
" Sir, I like a good hater."— See the Life of Di 
Johnson, etc. 



DON JUAN. 



'(V3 



Note 2. Stanza xxvi. 
Also there bin another pious reason. 
' Willi every tiling that pretty bin. 
My lady sweet arise." — Slia'cspcare. 

Note 3. Stanza xlv. 
They and their hills, "Arcadians both," are left. 
"Arcades anibo." 

Note 4. Stanza lxxi. 
Or wilder group of savage Salvatore's. 
Salvator Rosa. 

Note 5. Stanza lxxii. 
His hell-mouth'd goblet makes me feel quite Danish. 
If I err not, "Your Dane" is one of Iago's Catalogue 
of Nations "exquisite in their drinking." 

Note 6. Stanza Ixxviii. 
Even Nimrod's self might leave the plains of Dura. 
In Assyria. 

Note 7. Stanza xcvi. 
"That Scriptures out of church are blasphemies." 
" Mrs. Adams answered Mr. Adams, that it was blas- 
phemous to talk of Scripture out of church." This 
dogma was broached to her husband — the best Chris- 
tian in any book. See Joseph Andrews, in the latter 
chapters. 

Note 8. Stanza cvi. 
The quaint, old, cruel coxcomb, in his gullet 
Should have a hook, and a small trout to pull it. 

It would have taught him humanity at least. This 
sentimental savage, whom it is a mode to quote (amongst 
the novelists) to show their sympathy for innocent sports 
and old songs, teaches how to sew up frogs, and break 
their legs by way of experiment, in addition to the art 
of angling, the cruellest, the coldest, and the stupidest 
of pretended sports. They may talk about the beauties 
of nature, hut the angler merely thinks of his dish of 
fish ; he has no leisure to take his eyes from off the 
streams, and a single bite is worL. to him more than all 
the scenery around. Besides, some fish bite best on a 
rainy day. The whale, the shark, and the tunny fishery 
have somewhat of noble and perilous in them; even net- 
fishing, trawling, etc., are more humane and useful — but 
angling ! — No angler can be a good man. 

" One of the best men I ever knew — as humane, del- 
icate-minded, generous, and excellent a creature as any 
in the world — was an angler: true, he angled with 
painted flies, and would have been incapable of the 
extravagances of I. Walton." 

The above addition was made by a friend in reading 
over the MS. — " Audi alteram partem" — I leave it to 
counterbalance my own observation. 



CANTO XIV. 



Note I. Stanza xxxiii. 
And never craned, and made but few "Jaux pas." 
Craning. — "To mine' 1 '' is, or was, an expression used 
to denote a gentleman's stretching out his neck over a 
3k2 



hedge, "to look before he leaped:" — a pause in his 
lt vaulting ambition," which in the field doth occasion 
some delay and execration in those who may be imme- 
diately behind the equestrian sceptic. " Sir, if you don't 

• i" take the leap, let me" — was a phrase which 

generally sent the aspirant on again ; and to good pur- 
pose: for though "the horse and rider" might fall, they 
made a gap, through which, and over him and his steed, 
the field might follow. 

Note 2. Stanza xlviii. 
Go to the coffee-house, and lake another. 

In Swift's or Horace Wai.poi.e's iAtttrs^l think 
it is mentioned that somebody regretting the loss of a 
friend, was answered by a universal Pylades : " When 
1 lose one, I go to the Saint James's Colfce-house, and 
take another." 

I recollect having heard an anecdote of the same kind. 
Sir W. 1). was a great gamester. Coming in one day to 
the club of which he was a member, he was observed to 
look melancholy. "What is the matter, Sir William?" 
cried Hare, of facetious memory. "Ah!" replied Sir W. 
" I have just lost poor Lady D." " Lost ! What ! at— 
Quinze or Hazard?" was the consolatory rejoinder of 
the querist. 

Note 3. Stanza lix. 
And I refer you to wise Oxensticrn. 

The famous Chancellor Oxcnstieni said to his son, on 
the latter expressing his surprise upon the great effects 
arising from petty causes in the presumed mystery of 
politics : " You see by this, my son, with how little wis- 
dom the kingdoms of the world are governed." 



CANTO XV. 



Note I. Stanza xviii. 

And thou, Diviner still, 

Whose lot it is by man to be mistaken 

As it is necessary in these times to avoid ambiguity, 
I say, that I mean, by "Diviner still," Christ. If ever 
God was Man — or Man God — he was both. I never ar- 
raigned his creed, but the use — or abuse — made of it. 
Mr. Canning one day quoted Christianity to sanction 
Negro Slavery, and Mr. Wilberforee had little to say in 
reply. And was Christ crucified, that black men might 
be scourged? If so, he had better been born a Mulatto, 
to give both colours an equal chance of freedom, or at 
least salvation. 

Note 2. Stanza xxxv. 
When Rapp the Harmonist embargoed marriage 
In his harmonious settlement. 

This extraordinary and flourishing German colony in 
America does not entirely exclude matrimony, as tno 
" Shakers" do; but lays such restrictions upon it as pre- 
vent more than a certain quantum of births within a 
certain number of years ; which births (as Mr. Ilulino 
observes) generally arrive " in a little flock like those of 
a farmer's lambs, all within the same month perhaps." 
These Harmonists (so called from the name oftheir set- 
tlement) are represented as a remarkably flourishing, 
pious, and quiet people. See the various recent uri'en 
on America. 



710 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Note 3. Stanza xxxviii. 
Nor canvass what " so eminent a hand " meant. 
Jacob Tonson, according to Mr. Pope, was accustomed 
to call his writers " able pens "—" persons of honour," 
and especially "eminent hands." Vide correspond- 
ence, etc., etc. 

Note 4. Stanza lxvi. 

While great Lucullus' robe triomphale mudlw — 

- fame) — young partridge fillets, deck'd with truffles. 

A dish " a la Lucullus." This hero, who conquered 
the East, has left his more extended celebrity to the 
transplantation of cherries (which he first brought into 
Europe) and the nomenclature of some very good dishes; 
— and I am not sure that (barring indigestion) he has 
not done more service to mankind by his cookery than 
by Ins conquests. A cherry-tree may weigh against a 
bloody laurel ; besides, he has contrived to earn celeb- 
rity from both. 

Note 5. Stanza lxviii. 

But even sans " confitures," it no less true is, 

There 's pretty picking in those "petits puits." 

u . Petits puits d'amourgarnisde confitures," a classical 

and well-known dish for part of the flank of a second 

course. 

Note 6. Stanza lxxxvi. 
For that with me 's a " sine qua.' ' 
Subauditur " Non" omitted for the sake of euphony. 

Note 7. Stanza xcvi. 
In short, upon that subject I 've some qualms very 
Like those of the Philosopher of Malmsbury. 

Hobbes ; who, doubting of his own soul, paid that 
compliment to the souls of other people as to decline 
iheir visits, of which he had some apprehension. 



CANTO XVI. 



Note 1. Stanxa x. 

If from a shell-fish or from cochineal. 

The composition of the old Tyrian purple, whether 

from a shell-fish, or from cochineal, or from kermes, 

is still an article of dispute ; and even its colour — some 

say purple, others scarlet : I say nothing. 

Note 2. Stanza xliii. 
For a spoil'd carpet — but the " Attic Bee " 
Was much consoled by his own repartee. 

I think that it was a carpet on which Diogenes trod, 
with — " Thus I trample on the pride of Plato !" — "With 
greater pride," as the other replied. But as carpets 
are meant to be trodden upon, my memory probably 
misgives me, and it might be a robe, or tapestry, or a 
lable-cloth, or some other expensive and uncynical piece 
of furniture. 

Note 3. Stanza xlv. 
With " Tu mi chamaseg " from Portingalo, 
To 60otho our ears, lest Italy should fail. 
I remember that the mayoress of a provincial town, 



somewhat surfeited with a similar display from foreign 
parts, did rather indecorously break through the ap- 
plauses of an intelligent audience — intelligent, I mean, 
as to music, — for the words, besides being in recondite 
languages (it was some years before the peace, ere all 
the world had travelled, and while I was a collegian) — 
were sorely disguised by the performers; — this mayoress, 
I say, broke out with, "Rot your Italianos ! for my 
part, I loves a simple ballat !" Rossini will go a good 
way to bring most people to the same opinion some 
day. Who would imagine that he was to be the suc- 
cessor of Mozart? However, I state this with diffidence, 
as a liege and loyal admirer of Italian music in general, 
and of much of Rossini's : but we may say, as the con- 
noisseur did of painting, in the Vicar of Wakefield, 
"that the picture would be better painted if the painter 
had taken more pains." 

Note 4. Stanza lix. 
For Gothic daring shown in English money. 
" Ausu Romano, are Veneto " is the inscription (and 
well inscribed in this instance) on the sea walls between 
the Adriatic and Venice. The walls were a republican 
work of the Venetians ; the inscription, I believe, im- 
perial, and inscribed by Napoleon. 

Note 5. Stanza Ix. 
"Untying" squires "to fight against the churches." 
"Though ye untie the winds, and bid them fight 
Against the churches." — .Macbeth. 

Note 6. Stanza xcvii. 
They err — 'tis merely what is call'd mobility. 
In French "mobilite." I am not sure that mobility 
is English ; but it is expressive of a quality which rather 
belongs to other climates, though it is sometimes seen 
to a great extent in our own. It may be defined as an 
excessive susceptibility of immediate impressions — at 
the same time without losing the past ; and is, though 
sometimes apparently useful to the possessor, a most 
painful and unhappy attribute. 

Note 7. Stanza cii. 
Draperied her form with curious felicity. 
" Curiosa felicitas." — Petronius Arbiter. 

Note 8. Stanza cxiv. 
A noise like to wet fingers drawn on glass. 
See the account of the ghost of the uncle of Prince 
Charles of Saxony, raised by Schroepfcr — " Karl-— Karl 
— was — wait wolt mich?" 

Note 9. Stanza cxx. 
How odd, a single hobgoblin's nonentity 
Should cause more fear than a whole host's identity! 

" Shadows to-night 
Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard 
Than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers." etc., eh. 
See Richard II f. 



711 



[Tlie following productions of Lord Byron" 1 s pen were not published dming his life; 
and, with the exception of two or three of them which were attributed to him upon uncertain 
grounds, they have made their appearance, for the first time, in Mr. Murray's recent and 
authoritative edition of the Life and Writings of Byron. From that work they have been 
carefully selected, and added to the present volume, with a view of rendering it in every 
respect a complete edition of Byron's Poetical Works.] 



ffyints Crow borate* 



BEING AN ALLUSION IN ENGLISH VERSE TO THE EPISTLE " AD PISOXES, DE ARTE TOETICA," AND 
INTENDED AS A SEQUEL TO " ENGLISH CARDS AND SCOTCH REVIEWERS." 



" Erjn fu&g&r vice cutis, acutum 
Reddere qua: firrum valet, exsors ipsa Becandi." 

HOR. lie Jrtt Poet. 304, 30,3. 

" Rhymes are difficult thing*-- they are stubborn thines. sir." 

FIELDING'S Amelia, Vol. lii. Book i. Chip. 5. 



Athens, Capuchin Convent, March 12th, 1811. 

Who would tint laugh, if Lawrence, hired to grace 
His costly canvas with each flatter'd face, 

Abused his art, till Nature, with a blush, 
Saw cits "row centaurs underneath his brush? 
Or, should some limner join, for show or sale, 
A maid of honour to a mermaid's tail? 
Or low* Dubost (as once the world has seen) 
Degrade God's creatures in his graphic spleen? 
Not all that forced politeness, which defends 
Fools in their faults, could ea; his grinning friends. 
Believe me, Moschus, like that picture seems 
The book which, sillier than a sick man's dreams, 
Displays a crowd of nsures incomplete. 
Poetic nightmares, without head or feet. 

Poets and painters, as all artists know, 
May shoot a little with a lengthen'd bow; 
We claim this mutual mercy for our task, 
And grant in turn the pardon which we ask; 
But make not monsters spring from gentle dams — 
Birds breed not vipers, tigers nurse not lambs. 

A labour'd, long exordium, sometimes tends 
(Like patriot speeches) but to paltry ends: 
And nonsense in a lofty note goes down, 
As pertness passes with a lesal crown: 
Thus many a bard describes in pompous strain 
The clear brook babbling through the goo;!!y plain; 

ITtimano capiti cervicem pictor equinnm 
Jungere si velit, et varias induccre phi mas, 

Uudique collatis n tbris, ul turpiter at rum 

Desin.it in pjscem mulier formosa snperne; 
Spectatum admissi risum teneatis, amici? 
Credite, Pisones, iste tabula; fore librum 
Persimilem, cujus, velul tegri Bomnia, vans 
Fineentur species, ut nee pes, nee caput uni 
Reddatur firm::'. Pictoribus alque poetis 
Otuidtibet aitdendi semper fuil equa pntestas. 
Scimus, ethane veniam petimusque damusque vicis- 

sim : 
Fed nun Ut placidis coe'ant immitin ; non ut 
Serpentes avibua geminentur, tigribus agni. 

[ncteptis gravibus plerumque et magna professi 
Purpureas, late qui splendent, unus et alter 



* In an En/li'h newspaper, which finds III way ahrnad wherever there 
are Englishmen, 1 nw i this intv dauber^ oaricanrreof Mr. 

H , an'l ttic consequent action, kc. The circumstance is probably too 

woll kjiown to require further comment. 



The groves of Granta, and her gothic halls, 

King's Coll., Cam's stream, stain'd windows, and old 

walls: 
Or, in advent'rous numbers, neatly aims 
To paint a rainbow, or the river Thamcs.t 

Vou sketch a tree, and so perhaps may shine — 
But daub a shipwreck like an alehouse sign; 
5fou plan a vase — it dwindles to a pot; 
Then glide down Grub-street— fasting and forgot; 
Laugh'd into Lethe by some quaint review, 
Whose wit is never troublesome till— true. 

In fine, to whatsoever you aspire, 
Let it at least be simple and entire. 

The greater portion of the rhyming tribe 
(Give etir, my friend, for thou hast been a scribe) 
Are led astray by some peculiar lure. 
I labour to be brief— become obscure; 
One falls while following elegance too fast; 
Another soars, inflated with bombast; 
Too low a third crawls on, afraid to rly, 
lie spins his subject to satiety; 
Absurdly varying, he at last engraves 
Fish in the woods, and boars beneath the waves! 

Unless your care's exact, your judgment nice, 
The flight from folly leads but into vice; 
None are complete, all wanting in some part, 
Like certain tailors, limited in art. 

Assuiter pannus; cum lucus et ara Diana?, 
El properantis aqua; per amcenos ambitus atrrox, 
\nt flumi it Rhenum, aut pluvius describitur nrctif 
P.-d nunc non eral his locus; et fortasse cupressum 
Scis simulare: quid hoc, si fractis enatal exspea 
Navibus, aire dato qui pingitur? ampora cocpit 
Iiistitui: currente rota cur urceua exit? 
Denique sit quod vis, simplex duntaxat et itmiro. 

Maxima pars vatum, pater, el juvenes patre dignl 
It cipimur specie recti. Brevis esse laboro, 
Obscurus fio: sectantem levia, nervi 
Deflciunl animique: professus grandia, target: 

Serpil Inimi, tutus nimium, timidusque procelhe I 

Qui variare cupit rem prodigialiter unam, 
Delphinura aylvis appingit fluctibus aprum. 
In vitium ducit culpa fuga, si caret arte. 
.AS milium circa linlum fa her unus et utiL'ttes 

Evptiniet, et molles imitabitct a.-e capillos, 



t "Wberepure description held the place o' i 



For galligaskins Sh.wshcars is your man, 

Hut oats must claim another artisan.* 

Now this to me, I own, seems much the same 

A> Vulcan a feet to bear Apollo's frame; 

Or, w iih a fair complexion, t'> i 

Black eyes, black ringlets, hut— a bottle nose! 

Dear anth irs! a lit your topics to your strength, 
And ponder well your subject, and its length; 
Nor lift your load, before you're quite aware 
What weight your shoulders will, or will not, bear. 

Iiut lucid Order, ami Wit's siren voice, 

Await the ii... >t, skilful in his choice; 
With native eloquence he soars along, 
Grace in his thoughts, ami music in his song. 

Let judgment teach him wisely to combine 
Willi future pans the now omitted line; 

This shall the author choose, or that reject, 

Precise in style, and cautious to select. 

Nor Blight applause will candid pens a i r, , r J 

To him who furnishes a wanting word. 

Then fear not if 'tis needful to produce 

Seme term unknown, or obsolete in use, 

>As fpitt lias furnish'd us a word or two, 

Which lexicographers declined to do;) 

80 you indeed, with care,— (but be content 

To take this license rai vly )--may invent. 

New words find credit in these latter days, 

If neatly crafted on a Callie phrase. 

What Chaucer, Spenser did, we scarce refuse 

To Dry den 'a or to Pope's maturer muse. 

If you can add a little, say why not, 

As well as William Pitt and Walter Scott? 

Since they, by force of rhyme and force of lungs, 

Enricll'd our Island's ill-united tongues; 

'Tis then— am! shall be— lawful to present 

Reform in writing, as in parliament. 

As forests shed their foliage by degrees, 
So fade expressions which in season please. 

Iufelix operis summa, quia ponere totum 
Nesciet. Hunc ego me, si quid coraponere curetn. 
Non magis esse veliiu, qiiaui pravn \ here Daso, 

Spectandum nigris oculis nigroque capillo. 

Samite mati.riem vestris, qui scribitis, equain 

Virions; et versate din quid ferre recusent 
Quid valeant humeri. Cui lecta poteutererit res, 
Nee facundia deseret hunc nee lucidus ordo, 

Ordinis haec virtus erit et venus, aut ego fallor, 
Ut jam nunc dicat, jam nunc debentia t'.ici 
Pleraque differat, et prresena in tempus omittat; 
Hoc amet, Imc spernat promissi carminis auctor, 

In \criiis etiam tenuis cautusque serendis: 
Dixeris egrcgie, notum si callida verbum 
Reddiderii junctura novum. Si forte necesse eat 
Indiciis monstrare recentibua abdita rerum, 
Fingere cinctutis non exaudita Cethegis 
Oontinget; dabiturque licentia sumpta pud 
Et nova factaque nuper habebunt verba fidem -1 
Graeco fonte cadant, parce detorta. Quid autem 
Ciccilio Plautoque dabit Romanus, aderaptum 
Virgilio Varioque? ego cur, acquirere pauca 
Si possum, invideor; cum lingua Catonis et Enni 
Bermonein patrium ditaverit, et nova rerum 
Nomina protulerit? Licuit, semperque licehit, 
Signaturo presente nota producere nomen. 

I't silvse foliis pronos mutantur in annos; 
Prima cadunt: ita verhoruin vctus intent tetaa, 
Et juvenum ritu florent modo Data, vigentque- 
Debemur morti nos nostraque: sive receptua 



Mere commnn mortals were commonly content with onetailor&nd with 

' pal ' r geill : ml il imp. -,iM 

, II . I , 
(inning nl 1809: what reform may bare since taken place I neither know 
not di >ii u> know. 

* Mr. Pitt was libera] in Ms additions 'n our parliamentary 
stay be seen in 



And we and ours, alas! are due to fate, 
And works and words but dwindle to a date. 

1 as a monarch nods, and commerce calls, 
Impetuous rivers stagnate in canals; 
Though swamps subdued, and marshes drain'd, sustain 
The heavy ploughshare and the yellow grain, 
And rising ports along the busy shore 
Protect the vessel from old ocean's roar, 
All, all must perish; but, surviving last, 
The love of letters half preserves the past. 
True, some decay, yet not a few revive ;J 
Though those shall sink, which now appear tc thrive 
As custom arbitrates, whose shifting sway 
Our life and language must alike ob sy. 

The immortal wars which gods and angels wage, 
Are they not shown in .Milton's sacred page? 
Mis strain will teach what numbers best belong 
To themes celestial told in epic song. 

The slow, sad stanza will correctly paint 
I01 rs anguish or the friend's complaint. 
Hut which deserves the laurel, rhyme or blank? 
Which holds on Helicon the higher rank? 
Let squabbling critics l>y themselves dispute 
This point, as puzzling as a Chancery suit. 

Satiric rhyme first sprang from selfish spleen. 
Von doubt— sec Dry den, Pope, St. Patrick's dean.§ 

Blank verse is now, with one consent, allied 
To Tragedy, and rarely quits her side. 

h mad Almanzor rhymed in Dryden's days, 
No Sing-song hero ranis in modern plays; 

While modi st Comedy her verse foregoes 

For jest and pun\ in very middling prose. 

X it that our Hens or Beaumonts show the worse, 

1 ir lose one point, because they wrote in verse. 

But so Thalia pleases to appear, 

Poor virgin '. damxi'd some twenty times a year! 

Whate'er the scene, let this advice have weights- 
Adapt your language to your hero's state. 

Terra Neptunus classes aquilonibus arcct, 
If igis opus; sterilisve diu palus, aptaque remis 
Vicinas urbes alit, 1 itit aratrum: 

Sen cursum mutavit iniquum frugibus amnia, 
Doctus iter melius; mortalia facia peribunt: 
Nedum sermonum stel honos, et gratia vivax. 
Multa rehascentur, que jam cecidere; cadentque, 
(lice nunc sunt in ho'nore vocahula, si volet usus; 
Quem penes arbitrium est, et jus, et norma loquendj 

Res gestte regumque ducumque et tristia bulla, 
Quo scribi possent numero monstravit Homerua. 

Versibus impariter junctis querimonia primuin; 
Post etiam inclusa est voti sententia compos. 
Quis tameii exiguos elegos emiserit auctor, 
Gramraatici certant, et adhuc sub judice lis est. 

Archill, cum proprio rallies armavit iambo; 
Hunc socci cepere pedem grandesque cothurni, 
Alteruis aptum sermon ibus, et populares 
Vincentem strepitus, et natiim rebus agendis. 

Masa dedit fidibus divos, puerosque oeorum 
Et pugilem victorem, et equum certamine primum 
El juvt 111 curas et libera vina reform. 

Descriptas servare vices operumque colores, 
Our ego, si nequeo ignoroque, poeta sa tutor? 
Cur nescire pudens prave, quam discere mulo? 

Versibus exponi tragicis res comica non vult 
Indignatur item privatis, ac prope socco 



J Old ballads, oM plays, and old women's siorles, are at present in as 

much request us - Kl si ine or new speech) s. In 1 ict, this is the mUlenDiuu 

of black-letter: thanks to our flebera, YVebere, rod Scotls ! 

k M ic Flecnoe, the Ounciad, ami all Swifts lampooning baltadfl. What 

1 th< 11 'ii! work* ma) I \ Un • iiri.'iuatiti iii personal teeting*, and 

satires « le. 
ivjnal character cf 

il W'ilh all the vulgar applause ami critical abhorrence 01' punt, they hava 

''ir -1 i, ivii ' 1'iTinits them to orators, and gives tbem couse 
queuu' by agl 



HINTS FROM HORACE. 



13 



At times Melpomene forgets to groan, 

And brisk Thalia takes a serious toi e; 

Nor unregarded will the net pass by 

Where angry Townly lifts his voice on high. 

Again, our Shakspeare limits verse to I 

When common prose will serve for common things; 

AimI lively Hal resigns heroic ire, 

To 'hollowing Hotspur"" and the sceptred sire. 

'Tis not enough, ye bards, with all your art, 
To polish poems; they must touch the heart: 
Where'er the scene be laid, whate'er the song, 
.Still let it bear the hearer's soul along; 
Command your audience or to smile or weep, 
Whiche'er may please you — anything but sleep, 
The poet claims our tears; but, by his leave, 
Before I shed them, let me see him grieve. 

If banish'd Romeo feign'd nor > i - 1 1 noi tear, 
Lull'il by his languor, I should sleep or sneer. 
Bad words, no doubt, become a serious face, 
And men look angry in the proper place. 
At double meanings folks seem wondrous sly, 
And sentiment prescribes a pensive eye; 
For nature funn'd at first the inward man, 
And actors copy nature— when they can. 
She bids the beating heart with rapture bound. 
Raised to the stars, or leveH'd with the ground; 

And for expression's aid, 'tis said or sung, 
She gave our mind's interpreter — the tongue, 
Who, worn with use, of late would fain dispense 
At least in theatres) with common sense; 
J'erwhelm with sound the boxes, gallery, pit, 
And raise a laugh with anything but wit. 

Dignis carminiBUS narrari crpna Thyesta?. 
Singula quffique locum teneant sortita decenter. 
Interduni tamen et vocem comcedia tollit, 
[ratusqtie Chremes tumido delitigai ore: 
Et tragicus plerumque dolet sermone pedestri. 
Telephus et Peleus, cum pauper et exul, uterque 
Projicit am pull as, et Besquipedalia verba; 
Si curat cor spectantis tetigisse querela. 

Non satis est pulchra esse poemata; dulcia sunto, 
Et quocunquc volent, animuui auditoris agunto. 
IJt ridentibiis arrident, ita flentibus ai ill 
Ilumani vultus; si vis me Here dolendnin est 
rrinium ipsi tilii ; tunc tua me infortunia Isdent. 
Telephe, vel Peleu, mail . loqueris, 

Aut dormitaho, aut rideho: tristia moesium 
Vultum verba decent; iratum, plena ininarum; 
Ludentem, lasciva; scverum, stria dictu. 
Format-enim natura prius non intus ad omnem 
Fortunarum habitum; juvat. aut impellit ad iram! 
Aut ad humum mcerore grnvi deducil, el angit; 
Post effert animi motus interprete lingua. 
Si dicentis erunt fortunis absOna dicta, 
Romani toll -quo cachinnmn. 

Intererit multuin, Davnsne loquatur an heros; 
Maturusrie senex, an adhuc fiorentc juventa 
Fervidus; an matrons pnt diila nutrix; 

Mercatorne vagus, cultorne virentis agelli; 
Colchus an Assyrius; Thebis nutritus, an Argis. 

Aut famam cequere, aut Bibl convenientia 
Script or honoratum si forte reponis Achiliem; 
Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer, 
Jura negel sibi nata, nihil non arroget armis. 
sit Medea ferox invictaque, t' bills [no; 
Perfidus Ivion; lo vaga ; tristis Orestes; 
HI quid inexpertui inmittis, el audes 

Personam formate ii etur ad iinum 

Qnalis nb incepto processerit, el Ribi en 

Difficile est proprie commuuia rlicere; tuque 
Rectius lliaciun carmen deducis in a 
Quam si proferres ignota indictaque primus. 
Publica materies privati juris erit, si 
Nee circa vilem patuluin ris errbem; 

Nee verbum verbo curabis reddere lidos 
Injerpres, n c ' dies imitator in arc tum 



To skilful writers it will much import, 
'•' < tree spring their scenes, from common life or ccjrt 
Whether Ihoj plause by smile or tear, 

I'o i raw a ■■ Lying Valet/ 1 or a " Lear," . 

or rakish youngster wild from school, 
A wandering -Peregrine," or plain "John Hull;" 
All persons please, when nature's voice prevails, 
ii or Irish, bom in Wilts or Wales. 

Ur follow com, non fame, or forge a plot. 
Win cares if mimic heroes lived or not? 

i )ne pi ne : 

have breu. 
ir \ou a- pjre to draw, 
Pres ml bim ra\ ing, and abo^ e all law: 
it' female furies in your sch on' are plann'd, 
Macbeth's fierce dame i- ready to your hand; 
Poi tears and treachary, for good or evil, 
Uonstai i :. and t lie Devi!! 

But if a m ign iU dare i say, 

. fr mi the l' raten way, 
Trui- to your characters, till all be past, 
consisi mcj IV:. in first to last. 

"i'is hard to venture where our butters fail, 
Or lend fri sli interest to a twice-told tale; 
And yet, perchance, 't is wiser to prefer 
A hackney'd plot, than choose a new, and err. 
Vi t copy not too closely, but record, 
Voi • justly, thought for thought than word for word: 
iVor trace your prototype through narrow ways, 
But only follow where he merits praise. 

For you. young bard! whom luckless fate may Icarf 
'i'o tremble on the nod of all who read, 
Ere your first score of cantos time unrolls. 
Beware — for God's sake don't begin like Bowles !f 
■• Awake a louder and a loftier strain," 
And pray, what follows from this boiling brain? — 
ile sinks to South, y's level in a trice, 
Whose epic mountains never fail ,n mice) 

T'nde pedem proferre pudor vetct; aut nperis lex. 
Nee mi- incipies, us icriptor Cyclicus olim: 
'■ Pnrtunara Priardj cantabo, et nobile helium." 
Quid dignum tauto fret hie prnmissor llialu 
Parturiutil montes: nascctur ridiculus mus. 
(iuanio rectius hie. qui nil molitur inepte! 
" 1 )n nnlii, .M.eii. virum captte post tempera Troja 
Qui more.- hnminum multnrum vidit, et urbes." 
fumum ex fulgore, sed ex furao dare lucem 
Cogitat, et speci isa dehinc miracula prouiat, 
Antiphaten, Scyllamquc, et cum < !yclope Charybdim, 
Nee redjium Diomcdis ab inleritu Meleagri, 
Nee ■ : i Trojanum orditur ab ovo. 



« "And in lie i-ar I'll I, ill". Mortimer:"—! 



t A' "ur I-. i ng tnaii, i inied Townsend, was announced 

by Mr. r. ■ 

r poem to be i i nen promto 

.. lid Mr ToAVl " :. 

■. 
I 

i to Mr. Cumberlai 

■ 

I 

ittyibyde 

Mt. Town 

I not depre- 

■ 

i i« !ah ihc au'drr 

i ■<■ epic po 

II 'hp-.iniior poet 

. 
■ ■.-..,.. ... 

■ . .i . 
hero h" I-- ill fir I en ■ I Miem, his 

reward. I knnw ton well u th mely^and 

! boM who 

eirj (o K\y 

vrbich Itava moet of \>. I irust lhal Mr. Townsend^i share will 
mvy:— In- will so^n know mankind well enough not tf Attribute Uin ex 



714 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Not so of yore awoke your mighty fire 
The tempera warblii.es of his master lyre; 
Bolt as Hi ' gentler breathing of 
"Of man's iii -i disobedience and the fruit" 

aks, bnl as hi ■ subjecl swi lis along, 
Earth, hi avcn, an I ba les ei lio w itii the song. 
Still to the midsl of things he hastens on, 
As if we witness'd all already done; 
Leaves on ins path whatever seems mo mean 
To raise the subject, or adorn the scene; 
Gives, as each page improves upon the sight, 

: ke from brightness, bul from darkness— light ; 
And truth and fiction wiiii Bueh art compounds, 
We know not win-re to fix their several bounds. 
If you would please the public, deign to hear 
What soothes the many-steaded monster's ear; 

If your heart triumph when the hands of all 
Applaud in thunder at the curtain's fall, 

i those plaudits— study nature's 
And sketch the striking traits of every age; 
While varying man and varying years unfold 
Life's little tale, so Oft, so vainly told. 
Observe his simple childhood's dawning days, 

His pranks, his prate. Ins playmates, and Ins plays; 
Till time at length the mannish tyro weans, 
And prurient vice outstrips his tardy t 

Behold him freshman! forced no more to groan 
O'er *Virgil's devilish verses ana his own, 
Travcrs are too tedious, lectures too abstruse, 
He "flies from T— v— l's frown to'Tordham's Mows :" 
(Unlucky T— v— 1! doom'd to daily cares 
By pugilistic pupils and by bears t,) 
Fines, tutors, tasks, conventions, threat in vain, 
Before hounds, hunters, and Newmarket plain. 
Rough with his elders, with his equals rash, 
Civil to sharpers, prodigal of cash ; 
Constant to naught— save hazard and a whore. 
Yet cursing both— for both have made him sore; 
Unread (unless, since books beguile disease, 
The p-x becomes his passage to degre 
Fool'd, pillaged, dunn'd, he wastes his terra away, 
And, UJUexpeU'd perhaps, retires M. A. 
Master of arts! as hells and clvis\ pre/claim, 
Where scarce a blackleg bears a brighter name ! 

Launch'd into life, extinct his early fire, 
He apes the selfish prudence of his sire ; 
Marries for money, chooses friends for rank. 
Buys land, and shrewdly trusts not to the Bank; 

Simper ad eventual festinat; et in medias res 
Not) secus ac notas, auditorem rapit, et quat 
Desperal tractate nitescere posse, relinquit: 
Atipie ita nieutitur, sic veris falsa remiscet, 
Trimo ne medium, medio ne discrepet imum. 

Tu, quid ego et populus tnecum desideret, audi. 
Pi plausoris eges auhea manenlis, et usque 
,i, donee cantor, Vos plaudite, dicat; 
/Etatis cujusque uotandi sunt tibj mores, 
Mobilibusque decor naturis dandus et annis. 
Reddere qui voces jam scit pier, et pede Min 
Sign at bumum; gestit paribus colludere, et iram 
Colligit ac ponit temere, et mutatur in boras. 

Imberbis juvenis, tandem custode remoto, 



• If.arvev, \hf circulator of the circulation I In f.in» 

■way Vir;'!iin bis ecslacy of admiration, soil say, '* the book had 

i. hi rather Uriah lhai Ibe devil bad the !>>"k ; nol from any ■: i-,lik*> to the 
poet, but iwi I Indeed the j 

of" Iiiiij and abort" e m ugh i" I agel an an hj t,i p«cj(rj for 

il.i residue of a man's life, ami. perhaps, so far ma; be an advantage. 

t " Infaodum, regina, jnbee renovare dolorem. 91 I dare say Mr. T — a — I 
(I'liMimii I mean no affront) will taideratand > niatterwhe- 

-ToUieaboveevenfa, "qua que ipse mtsferruna 
y,-!i t-i quorum pan tiiagna I'm." aM timet and t<rm* bear lea imony. 

J " Hell, K) called, where you I El little, and are client - 

nJ i good dm.. " Club," a nleasanl pura%tory, whore 
tie out supposed to be cheated at all 



Sits in the senate; gets a son and heir; 

.. , for himself was there 
Mute, though he votes, unless when call'd to ch:ei 
His son's so sharp— he'll see the dog a peer] 
Manhood dei palsies every limb; 

He quits the scene— or else the scene quits him; 

i-.i alth, o'er each departing penny grieves 
And avarice seizes all ambition li 
Counts cent, per rent, and smiles, or vainly frets, 
o'er hoards diminish'd by young Hopeful's debts; 
eli and wisely what to sell or buy. 
iii all lif but to die; 

Peevish and spiteful, doting, hard to please, 

tiding every time, save- times like these; 
Crazed, querulous, forsaken, half forgot, 
Expires unwept— is buried — let him rot! 
But from the drama let me not digri 

pts, though they please you less 
ii weep, and hardest hearts an: stivr'd 
When what is t\un<: is rather seen than heard, 
V. i many die' preserved in history's pag-i 

: I r till! than acted on the st; 

sustains what shocks the timid eye, 
An I 1mm r thus subsi les to sympathy. 
True Briton a!! beside, I here am French — 
Bloodshed 'tis surely better to retrench; 
I ■_' "• we teach to (low 

!" tragic scene disgusts, though hut in show; 
We hate the carnage while we see the trick. 
And find small sympathy in being sick. 
Not on the stage the regicide Macbeth 

i audience with a monarch's death; 
To gaze when Bable Hubert threats to sear 
Y. ung Arthur's eyes, can ours, or vuturt bear? 
AShalter'd heroine Johnson sought to slay — 

We saved Irene, but half damn'd the play. 

And Heaven lie praised '.jour tolerating times 

S;:;:t metamorphoses to pantomimes, 

Ami Lewis' self, with ail his sprites, would quake 
To change Tul Osmond's negro to a snake I 
Because, in scenes exciting joy or grief, 
We loathe the action which exceeds belief: 
And yet, God knows! what may not authors do. 
Whose postscripts irate of dyeing "heroines blue?' 

Above all things, Dan Poet, if you can, 
Eke out your acts, I pray, with mortal man; 
Nor call a ghost, unless some cursed scrape 
.Must open ten trap doors for your escape. 

Gaudet equis canibusque, et aprici pramine campi; 
Cereus in vitiura fleet i, monitoribus asper, 
Ut ilium tardus provisor, prodigus a'ris, 
Sublimis, cupidusque, et amata relinquere pernix 

< \ui\ i r.-is studiis, a tas animusque viiilis 
Gtusrit opes, et amicitias, inservil honori; 
misisse cavet quod mox mulare laboret. 

Multa senera conveniunl incommoda ; vel quod 
Qn&rit, et inventis miser abstinet, ac timet uti; 
Vel quod ns nmncs timtde gelideque mimstrat, 
Dilator, spe longus, iners, avidusque futttri; 

, laudator temporis acti 
Be puero, castigator censorque minorum. 
Multa ferunt anui venientes conimoda serum. 
Mo lta recedentes adimunt. Ne forte seniles 
Mandentur juveni paries, pueroque viriles, 
Semper in adjunctis, tevoque morabiraur aptis. 

Aut agitur res in seen is, aut acta refertur, 



' r geek : but 

i ■ ■ . , ltd uff the 

r*c're" Mr. Lfi»i» tells taj, that though 
tla- ks u.r, unkm w» in 1,. '•■ -■' he lut 

, >_i quote bun— "blue be would hn« 

iu-"l, t,« r ;'' 



HINTS FROM HORACE. 



715 



Of all the monsoons things I'd fain forbid, 
I loathe an opera worse than Dennis did ; 
Where good and evil persons, right or wrong, 
Rage, love, and aught but moralize, in 
Hail, last memorial of our foreign friends 
Which Gaul allows, and still Hesperia lends! 
Napoleon's edicts no embargo lay 
On whores, spies singers, wisely shipp'd away. 
Our giant capital, whose squares are spread 
Where rustics earn'd, and now may beg, their bread 
In all, iniquity is grown so nice. 
It scorns amusements which are not of price. 
Hence the pert shopkeeper, whose throbbing ear 
Aches with the orchestras he pays to hear, 
Whom shame, not sympathy, forbids to snore, 
His anguish doubling by his own "em 
Squeezed in "Fop's Alley," jostled by the beaux, 
Teased with his hat, and trembling for his toes; 
Scarce wrestles through the night, nor taste of ease 
Till the dropp'd curtain gives a glad release; 
Why this, and more, ho suffers— can ye guess? — 
Because it costs him dear, and makes him dressl 

So prosper eunuchs from Etruscan schools 
Give us but fiddlers, and they're sure of fools! 
Ere scenes were play'd by many a reverend clerk* 
(What harm, if David danced before the ark ?) 
In Christinas revels, simple country folks 
Were pleas'd with morrice-mumm'ry and coarse jokes 
Improving years, with things no longer known, 
Produced blithe Punch and merry Madame Juan. 
Who still frisk on with feats so lewdly low, 
Tis strange Benvolio suffers such a showjf 
Suppressing peer! to whom each vice gives place, 
Oaths, boxing, begging, — all, save rout and race. 

Farce follow'd Comedy, and reach'd her prime 
In ever-laughing Foote's fantastic time : 
Mad wag! who pardon'd none, nor spared t>e best, 
And turn'd some very serious things to jest. 
Nor church nor state escaped his public sneers, 
Arms nor the gown, priests, lawyers, volunteers: 
"Alas, poor Yorick !" now for ever mute! 
Whoever loves a laugh must sigh for Foote. 

We sruile, perforce, when histrionic scenes 
A.pe the swoln dialogue of kings and queens, 
vYhen "Cnrononhotontholoe/os must die," 
And Autlur struts in mimic majesty. 

Moschual with whom once more I hope to sit 
Vnd smil6 at folly, if we can't at wit; 

Segnius irritant animns demissa p^r aurem 
Quam qua; sunt oculis Bubjecta fldelibus, et qua; 
Ipse sibi tradit spectator. Non tamen intus 
Digna geri, promes in scenam ; multaque tolles 
Ex oculis, quae mox narret facandia prasens. 
Ne pueros coram popnlo Medea trucidel ; 
Ant human a palam eoquat exta nefarius Atreus; 
Aut in avem Progne vertatur, Cadmus in anguem. 
Quodcunque oetendis mihi Bic, kncredulus odi. 

Neve minor, neu sit quinto productior actu 
Fahula, qua; posci vult, et spectata repoui. 
Nee dens intcrsit. nisi dignus vindice nodus 
Incident. * * * 

I'.x nolo Return carmen sequar. ut sibi quivis 
Speret idem: Budet multum, frustraque lab.. ret 
Ausua idem: tantum series juncturaque pollet; 
Tantum de medio Bumtis accedit honoris. 



* " The first theatrical representatlooa, entitled ' MystcrEea anl Hbrali. 
ties. 1 u-rre generally enacted at Chriatmaa, by monks (as the only persons 
who could read), and Utterly by the i I of the uinreraities. 

The dram.' Adam, rVter, Cosleatia, Faith, Vice," 

kc. &c. — Vide rVaflon'i History of EngHxh Poetry. 

t Hen vol in ,lnps not bet : but every man who maintains race-horses is a 
promoter of all the concomitant evifa of the turf. Avoiding t-i I i-r ; * a le 
tie Pharisaical. Is it an exculpation ? I think not. I 
bawd praised for chs herself did col commit formication. 



Yes, friend ! for thee I'll quit my cynic cell, 
Ami hear Swift's motto, "Vive la bagatelle!" 
Which channel our days in each .(Egean clime. 
As oft at home, with revelry and rhyme. 
Then may Euphrosyne, who sped the past, 
Soothe thy life's scenes, nor leave thee in the last 
lint find in thine, like pagan Plato's} bed, 
Some merry manuscript of mimes, when dead. 

Now to the Drama let hj bend our eyes. 
Where fetter'd by whig Walpole low she lies; 
Corruption foil'd her, for she fear'd her glance; 
Decorum left her for an opera dance! 
Yei ^Chesterfield, whose polisb'd pen inveighs 
'Gainst laughter, fought for freedom to our plays; 
Uncheck'd by megrims of patrician brains. 
And damning dullness of lonl chamberlains. 
Repeal that act! again let Humour roam 
Wild o'er the stage— we've time for tears at home, 
Let "Archer" plant the horns on "Sullen's" brows 
And "Estifania" gull her "Copper||" spouse; 
The moral's scant— but that may be excused, 
Men go not to be lectured, Lut amused. 
He whom our plays dispose to good or ill 
Must wear a head in want of Willis' skill; 
Ay. hut Mackheath's example— psba !— no morel 
It form'd no thieves— the thief was form'd before; 
And spite of puritans and Collier's curse.TT 
Plays make mankind no better, and no worse. 
Then spare our stage, ye methodislic men I 
Nor burn damn'd Drury if it rise again. 
But why to brain-scorch'd bigots thus appeal! 
Can heavenly mercy dwell with earthly zeal? 
For times of fire and fagot let them hope; 
Times dear alike to puritan or pope. 
As pious Calvin saw Servetus blaze, 
So would new sects on newer victims gaze. 
E'en now thi songs of Solyma begin ; 
Faith cants, ««erplex'd apologist of sin! 
While the Lord's servant chastens whom he loves, 
And Simeon kicks where **Baxter only "shoves." 

Whom nature guides, so writes, that every dunce, 
Enraptured, thinks to do the same at once; 
But after inky thumbs and bitten nails, 
And twenty scatter'd quires, the coxcomb fails. 

Let pastoral be dumb; for who can hope 
To match the youthful eclogues of our Pope? 
Yet his and Philips' faults, of different kind, 
For art too rude, for nature too refined, 

Silvis deduct! caveant, me judire, Fauni, 
Ne vtliit innati triviis, ac pene forc-nses, 
Aut niraium teneris Juvenentur versibus unquam. 
Ant immunda crepent, ignominiosaque dicta. 
Ofienduntur enim, quibus est equus, et pater, et res: 
Nee, si quid fricti ciceris pr.ibat et nucis emtor, 
/Equie accipiunt animis, donantve corona. 

Syllaba longa brevi subjects, vocatur iambus. 
Pes citus: nnde etiam trimetris accrescerc jussit 
Women iambeis, cum senos redderet ictus. 
Primus ad extremum similis sibi: non ita pridem. 



t Under Plato's pillow a volume of the MEmes of Sophron was found Ilia 
day lie die '.— Vnie Pnrthdrmi, De Paitin, ot Diozenes LassHua, if a*iee- 
able.' De I' Cumberland, iu his Observer, terms it 

moral, like the say In 
§ His speech on the licensing act is one of his most eloquent efforts. 

Perez, the "Copper Captain," in " Rule a Wife and nste a 
Wife. 1 ' 

IT Jerry Collier's controversy with Conerreve, &c. on the subject of the 
drama, is too we!! knowu to require further 001 

ive to heavy-tv— d Christians." Th» veritable titie ol a 

book one I n | ' likely enourti to he so aeain. — Mr. Simeoc m 

I vvi.rks." He is ably rip. 

tI :— but I say ftr 

o-nre. for according to Johnny in full congregation, '* No hopes for Oiem ass 

hwehs." 



710 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Instruct how hard the medium 'lis to hit 
'Twixl too much polish and too coarse a wit. 

A vulgar Bcribbler, certes, stands disgraced 
In tin- nice age, when all aspire to taste; 
The dirty language, and the noisome jest, 
Which pleased in Swift of yore, we now detest; 
Proscribed not only in the world polite, 
But even too nasty for a city knight! 

Peace to Swift's faults! his wit hath made them pass, 
Unmatcb'd by all, save matchless Hubibrnsl 
Whose author is perhaps the first we m el, 
Who from our couplet lopp'd two final feet; 
Nor less in merit than the longer line. 
This measure moves a favourite of the Nine. 
Though at first view eight feet may seem in vain 
Form'd, save in ode, to bear a serious strain, 
V> t Scotl has shown our wondering isle of late 
This measure shrinks not from a theme of weight, 
And, varied skilfully, surpasses far 
Heroic rhyme, but most in love and war, 
Whose fluctuations, tender or sublime, 
Are curb'd too much by Ions-recurring rhyme. 

But many a skilful judge abhors to see, 
What few admire— irregularity. 

This some vouchsafe to par. Ion; but 'tis hard 
When such a word contents a British bard. 

And must the bard his g'.owing thoughts confine, 
Lost censure hover o'er some faulty line! 
Remove whate'er a critic may suspect, 
To gain tile paltry suffrage of "correct?" 
Or prune the spirit of each daring phrase, 
To fly from error, not to merit praise? 

Ye who seek finish'd models, never cense, 
By d-ay and night, to read the works of Greece. 
But our good fathers never bent their brains 
To heathen Greek, content with native strains. 
The few who read a page, or used a pen, 
Were satisfied with Chaucer and old Ben ; 
The jokes and numbers suited to their taste 
Were quaint and careless, any thing but chaste; 
Yet whether right or wrong the ancient rules, 
It will not do to call our fathers fools! 
Though you and I, who eruditely know 
To separate the elegant and low, 
Can also, when a hobbling line appears, 
Detect with fingers in default of ears. 

Tardior ut paulo graviorque veniret ad aures, 
Spondeos stabiles in jura pa tern a recepit 
Commodus et patiens; non ut de sede secunda 
Cederet ant quarta socialiter. Hie et in Acci 
Nobilibua trimetris apparel rarus, et Enni. 
In Bcenam inissog magno cum pondere versus, 
Ant operas ceteris nimium, curaque carentis, 
Ant ignoratse preinit artis crimine turpi. 

Non quivis videt imtnodulata poemnta judex; 
Et data Romania venia est indigna poetis. 
Idcircone vager, Bcribamque licenter? an omnes 
Visuros peccata putem mea; tutus, et intra 
Spem veniie cautus? vitavi denique culpam, 
Non laudem merui. Vos exemplaria Grtcca 
Nocturna vwsate manu, versate diurna. 
At vestri proavi Plautinos el numeros et 
[,audavere sales; nimium patienter utrumque, 
Ne dicam stulte, mi rati; si modo ego et vos 
Scimus iuurbanum lepldo seponere rlicto, 
Legitimumque sot 1 digitis cnllemus et aure. 

I uoium tragica genus invenis 
Dniter, et piaustris vexisse poemata Thcspis, 
>iu e caneranl agerentque peruncti ftecibus era 
I'ost himc persona! dallieque repertor honestte 
dKschylus, et modicis instravit pulpita t ignis, 
Kt uocuit magnumque loqui, nitique cutnumo. 

9ii(.cessil veins lii~ comcedia, non sine multa 



In sooth I do not know or greatly care 
To learn who our first English strollers were; 
Or if, till roofs received Ihe vagrant art, 
Our muse, like that of Thespis, kept a cart. 
Hut this is certain, since our Shakspeare's days, 
There's pomp enough, if little else, in plays; 
Xnr will Melpomene B cend her throne 
Without high heels, while plume, and Bristol stone. 

Old comedies still meet with much applause, 
Though too licentious for dramatic laws: 
VI least, we moderns, wisely, 'tis confest, 
Curtail, or silence, the lascivious jest. 

■Whate'er their follies, and their faults beside, 
Our enterprising bards pass naught untried; 
Nor do they merit slight applause who choose 
An English subject for an English muse. 
And leave to minds which never dare ii.vent 
French flippancy and German sentiment. 
Where is that living language which could claim 
1'oetic mere, as philosophic, fame, 
If all our bards, more patient of delay, 
Would stop, like Pope, to polish by the way? 

Lords of the quill, whose critical assaults 
O'erthrow whole quartos with "heir quires of faults 
Who soon detect, and mark where'er we fail, 
And prove our marble with too nice a nail! 
Democritus himself was not so bad; 
'.:• only thought, but you would make, us madl 

But, trul li to say, most rhymers rarely guard 
Against that ridicule they deem so hard; 
In person negligent, they wear, from sloth, 
Beards of a week, and nails of annual growth; 
Reside in garrets, fly from those they meet, 
And walk in alleys, rather than the street. 

With little rhyme, less reason, if you please, 
The name of poet may be got with ease, 
So that not tuns of helleboric juice 
Shall ever turn your head to any use; 
Write but like Wordsworth, live beside a lake. 
And keep your bushy locks a year from Blake;* 
Tien print your book, once more return to town. 
And boys shall hunt your hardship up and down. 

Am 1 not wise if such some poets' plight, 
To purge in spring (like Baycs) before I write? 
If this precaution soflen'd not my bile, 
I know no scribbler with a madder style; 

Laude; sed in vitium libertas e.tcidit, et vim 
Dignam lege regi ; lex est accepta, cborusque 
Turpiter obticuit, suhlato jure nocendi. 

Nil intentatum nostri liquere poets; 
Nee minimum meruere decus, vestigia Ora-ca 
Aussi deserere, et celebrsre domestics facta 
Vei i] ii pretextas, vel qui docuere togatas. 
Nee virtute for,»t clarisve pntentius arinis. 
Uuam lingua, Latimn, si non offenderet unum 
q'ttenque poctarum lima' labor, et mora. Vos. 6 
Potnpilius sanguis, carmen repii hendite, quod non 
Multa dies et multa litura coercuit, atque 
Pncsectum decies non castigavit ad unguem. 

Ingenium niisera quia fortunatius arte 

Credit, et exeludit s; in os llelicone poetas 

Democritus; bona pars non ungues ponere curat 
Non barbain: secreta petit loca, balnea vitat. 
Nanciscetur eniro pretium nomenque poetas, 
Si tribus Anticyris caput insanabile nonquam 
Tom iri Licinn commiserit. O ego Isevns, 
Qui purgor bilem sub verui temporis horam ! 
Non alius faceret mcliora poemata: venun 
Nil tn 'it i est: ergo fungar vice cutis, acutuin 



> I otl«T paid, an : 

bim.be meoa] asenator, having a h ecr iju.il.licuien ilmu one half cf to* 
head* he crop . i it in ii | endnnce. 



IILNTS FROxM HORACE. 



717 



nut since (perhaps my feelings are too nice) 
( cannot purchase fame at such a price, 
I'll labour gratis as a grinder's wheel, 
And, blunt myself, give edge to others' steel, 
Nor write at all, unless to teach the art 
To (hose rehearsing for the poet's part ; 
From Horace show the pleasing paths of song, 
Ami fmm my own example, what is wrong. 

Though modern practice sometimes differs quite, 
'Tis just as well to think before you write; 
Let every book that suits your theme be read, 

So shall you trace it to the fountain-head. 

He who has learnt the duty which hi; owes 
To friend and country, and to pardon foes; 
Who models his deportment as may best 
Accord with brother, sire, or stranger guest; 
Who takes our laws and worship as they are, 
Nor roars reform for senate, church, and bar; 
[n practice, rather than loud precept, wise. 
Bids not his tongue, but heart, philosophize; 
Such is the man the poet should rehearse, 
As joint exemplar of his life and verse. 

Sometimes a sprightly wit. and tale well told, 
Without much grace, or weight, or art, will hold 
A longer empire o'er the public mind 
Than sounding trifles, empty, though refined. 
Unhappy Greece! thy sons of ancient days 
The muse may celebrate wit!: perfect praise, 
Whose generous children narrow'd not their hearts 
With commerce, given alone to arms and arts. 
Our boys (save those whom public schools compel 
To " long and short" before they're taught to spell) 
From frugal fathers soon imbibe by rote, 
"A penny saved, my lad, 's a penny got." 
Babe of a city birth! from sixpence take 
Two thirds, how much will the remainder make? — 
"A groat." — "Ah, bravo! Dick hath don.' t lie sum! 
He'll swell my fifty thousand to a plum." 

They whose young souls receive this, rust betimes, 
'Tis clear, are fit for any thing but rh; 
And Locke will tell you, that the father's r i lt 1 1 1 
iVho hides all verses from his children's sight; 

Reddere qua> ferrum va'et, exsors ipsa secandi: 
Munus et officium, nil scribens ipse, doi 
Unde parentur opes; quid alai f rraetque poetam; 
Quiil decent, quid non; quo virtus, qm 

Scribehdi recto, sapere est et principium et Pons. 
Rem tibi Socratiae poterunt ostendere charts: 
Vcrbaqne provisam nun non in vita sequentur. 
Qui didicit patrke quid debeat, et Qjuid amicis; 
Quo mi a more parens, quo (rater amandus, et ln-spes ; 
Quod sit conscfipti, quod judicis efficjutn; qua 
Partes in helium missi ducis; ille profecto 
Reddere persona? scil convenientia cuique. 
Respicere exemplar vita morumque jubebo 
Doctum imitatorem, et vivas hinc ducere voces. 

Interdiim speciosa locis, mora t a que n cl ■ 
Fabula, null ins; veneris, sine poudere it arte, 
Valdius oblectat populum, raeli usque moralur, 
Quam versus inopes rerum nugaeque canors. 

Craiis ingenium, Graiis dedii ore rotundo 
Musa loqni, prater laudem nullius avaris, 
Romani pueri longis rationibus assi in 
Discunt in parti's centum didocere: dicat 
Filius Albini, ?i de qiiincunce remota est 
(Jncia, quid snperat? poterat dixisst — Trims. Eu! 
Rein poterls servare tuam. Redit unria : quid lit? 
Semis. An ha>c aminos Brugo et cura peculi 
Cum semel imbuerit, sporaraus carmina frigi 
Posse linendd ccdro, et levi Bervanda oupresso? 

Aut prrtdesso voimit, ant delectare pa 
Aut simui et juennda •■! iponea dicer 
Quidquid precipies, esto brevis: ul cito dicta 
Percipianl animi dociles, teneantque i 
Oinue supervacuum plena de pectore manat. 
3 O 



For poets (says this sage, and many more,*) 
.Make sad mechanics with their lyric lore; 
And Delphi now, however rich of old, 
Discovers little silver and less gold, 
Because Parnassus, though a mount divine, 
Is poor as /re.-,i '" Ml Irish mine,) 

Two objects always should the poet move, 
Or one or both.— to please or to improve. 
Whate'er you teach, be brief, if you design 
For our remembrance your didactic line; b 

Redundance places memory on the rack, 
For brains may be overloaded, like the back. 

Fiction does best when taught to look like truth, 
And fairy fables bubble none but youth: 
Bxpect no credit for loo wofld'rous talcs, 
Since Jonas only springs alive from whales! 

Young men with aught but elegance dispense, 
Maturer years require a little sense. 
To end at once:— that bard for all is fit 
Who mingles well instruction with his wit; 
For him reviews shall smile, for him o'erflow 
The patronage of Paternoster-row; 
His book, with Longman's liberal aid, shall pass 
i Who ne'er despises books that bring him brass); 
Through three long works the taste of London lead, 
And cross St. George's Channel and the Tweed. 

But every thing has faults, nor is 't unknown 
That harps and fiddles often lose their tone, 
And wayward voices, at their owner's call 
With all his best endeavours, only squall; 
Dogs blink their cover, flints withhold their spark, 
And double-barrels (damn them!) miss their mark. J 

Wh ire frequent beauties strike the reader's view 
We must not quarrel for a blot or two; 
Hut pardon equally to books or men, 
I'h.' slips of human nature, and the pen. 

Yet if an author, spite of foe or friend, 
Despises all advice too much to mend, 
r. it ever twangs the same discordant string, 
(Jive him no quarter, howsoe'er he sing. 
Let jllavar.l's fate o'ertake him, who, for once 
Pioduccd a play too dashing for a dunce: 

Ficta volnptatis causa, sint proxima veris: 
Nee quodcunque volet, pnscat sibi tabula crcdi: 
Neu pransae 1. .-111111' rivum ptiernin extrahal alvo. 

Centurice seniorum agitant expertia frngis: 
prcetereunt austera poematn Rha is. 

Oiiino tulit punctual, qui IllisCUit utile dulci, 

l.ictor, in delectando, pariterque monendo. 

Hie meri't era liber Sosiis; hie et mare transit. 

Et longun to scriptori prorogat revum. 

Sunt dclicta tami'ii, quibua igrrovisae velimtis; 
Nam neque chorda spnuin reddit quern vult manus 

et mens, 
Poncentique gravem persspe remittit acutum; 
semper fcriel quodcunque minabitur arcus. 
Verum ubi plura nitenl in carmine, non ego paucii 
Offender maculis, quaa aut incuria fudit, 



* t have not ll.ir original by inf. bnt'he Il.-ilian translation runs as follows* 
— " K una ■ ■ 

nio figliuolo coltiri 1 to talento." A little furtlief 

!' ar^cnlo." — f.u'n- 
eoxtofu dti Fant. '... I'iiictmn cd'tion. 

t " Iro paliperior :" this is Ihi I with Ulysses for a 

pour.,1 of kill's fry, which he lost, and halt a dozen teeth besides.— Se« Otly$ 
sty, h. IS. 
J The Irish gold mine of Wicklow, which yieldsjust ore enough to two* 

* AsMi I i' mer.lo wbom hew-asunder 

htd Homer (datim hi m t ) caUt* — ft may be pratuiMd 

ly or any tainc: may be damned in "t,c by poetical license; and, 

•o plead so illustrious a p 

II For the sYry of Billy I!' . ies's Life of Gai- 

eve ii i« '• It.." ill ' -'the momeDt it 

u^s knowrn to he In- ;.<■!, and the bo.jks.llei relused to t ie 

the customary' m for the oopyrighl 



■718 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



At first none deem'd it his, but when his name 
Announced the fact — what then ? — it lost its fame. 
Though all deplore when Milton deigns to doze, 
In a long work 'tis fair to steal repose. 

As pictures, so shall poems be; some Btand 
The critic eye, and please when near at hand; 
Rut others at a distance strike the sight; 
This seek? the shade, but that demands the light, 
Nor dreads the connoisseur's fastidious view, 
But, ten times scrutinized, is ten times new. 

Parnassian pilgrims! ye whom chance or choice 
Hath led to listen to the muse's voice, 
Receive this counsel, and be timely wise; 
Few reach the summit Which before you lies. 
Our church and state, our courts and camps, concede 
Reward to very moderate heads indeed! 
In these, plain common sense will travel far; 
All are not Erskiues who mislead the bar; 
But poesy between the best and worst 
No medium knows; you must be last or first: 
For middling poets' miserable volumes, 
Are damn'd alike by gods, and men, and columns. 

Again, my Jeffrey! — as that sound inspires, 
How wakes my bosom to its wonted ftresl 
Fires, such as gentle Caledonians feel, 
When Southerns writhe upon their critic wheel. 
Or mild Eclectics,* when some, worse than Turks, 
Would rob poor Faith to decorate "good works." 

Aut humana pamm cavit nattira. Quid ergo? 
Ut script i >r si peccat idem libraries usque, 
Quamvis est monitus, venia caret; ut citharcBdua 
Ridetur, chorda qui semper aberral eadem: 
Sic mihi, qui multtim cessat, fit Chcerilus ille, 
Quern his terve bonum cum risu miror; et idem 
Indignor, quahdoque bonus dormi tat Homerus 
VeruiM operi tongo fast est obrepure somnum. 

fjt pictura, poesis: et erit qute, si propius stes, 
To eapict magis; et quxdam, si longius abstes; 
Hffic amat obscurum; volet hec sub luce videri, 
Judicis argutum qua; non formidat acumen ; 
Hire placuit semel ; hajc decies tepetita placebit. 

O major juvenum, quamvis et Mice paterna 
Fineeris ad rectum, et per te BKpis; hoc tihi dictum 
Tolle meiiior: certis medium et tolerahile rebus 
Recte concedi : consiiltus juris, et actor 
Oausarum medipcris abest virtute diserti 
Messalie, nee scit quantum Cassellius Aulusi 
Sed tamen in pretio est: mediocribus esse poetis 
Non homines, non di, non concessere columns. 
Ut gratas inter mensas symphonia discors. 
Et crasBum unguentum, el Sardo cum melle papaver 
Ofiendunt, poterat iluci quia ccena sine istis 

Sic animis natum inventumque | ma juvandis, 

Si paulum a summo decessit, vergit ad iiiiuui. 

Ludere <i u i nescit, campestribus abstinel armis, 
Indoctusque pike, piscive, trochive, quiescit, 
Ne spissa: risuiu tollant impune coronae: 



» To the Eclectic or Christian Reviewers I have to return thanks for the 
fervour of that charily which in 1*011 induced Ibem to express a h 'pe, ihat a 
thing then published by me rniirht lead to certain consequences, which, al- 
though natural enough, surely came but rashly from reverend lips. I refer 
them to their own pages, w lure they congratulated themselves on the pros- 
pect of a tilt between Mr. Jeffrey and myself, from which some 
was to accrue, provided one or boih were knocked on the head. Having 
survived two years and a naif Ihnse "Elegies" wlii.-ii they were kindly pre- 

taring to review, I have no peculiar erusto to give them " so joyful a iron- 
le," except, indeed, "upon eoinpii'sioii, Hal ;" but if. as David says in the 
"Rivals," it should come to "bloody sword and gun fighting," sve " wont 
run, will we, Sir Lucius?" I do not know what I had done 'o these Ec- 
lectic gin Ili-men : my works an- tte-ir lawful peruuisite. 10 be hevl D 
like Agag. if it should seem meet unto them; but why they sh 
such a hurry to kill off their author, I am ignorant. "The race is not 
always to the swift nor the ha'tle to the strong:" and now, as these Chris- 
tians have " smote mt on One cheek, 9 1 hold theni up the other ; and in re- 
turn Ibr 'heir good wishes, give them an opportunity of repeating ihem. Had 
anyothersel '' uch entiments, 1 should have smiled, and 

,,e Ihem to the 'recording angel," but from the Pharisees of Chris'ianily 
see brethren, that, publican and 

I am. t Would no' have treated "mine enemy's dog thus." To 

ih in it. n the supe ly of my brotherly love, if ever the Reverend 

Messrs. Simeon or n imad in should be engaged in sucn a conflict as that in 
i fall, I hope they may escape with being "wing- 
is'* o lv, and that lleav iaide may be at hand to extract the ball. 



Such are the genial feelings thou canst claim. 

My falcon flies not at ignoble game. 

Mightiest of all Dunedin's beasts of chase' 

For thee my Pegasus would mend bis pace. 

Arise, my Jeffrey I or my inkless p n 

Shall never blunt its edge on meaner men; 

Till thee or thine mine evil eye discerns, 

Alas! I cannot "strike at wretched kernes." 

Inhuman Saxon ! wilt thou then resign 

A muse and heart by choice so wholly thine? 

Dear, d — d conlunner of my BChoolboy songs. 

Hast thou no vengeance for my manhood's wrongs* 

If unprovoked thou once couldst bid me bleed, 

Hast thou no weapon fur my daring deed? 

What I not a word !— and am 1 then so low? 

Wilt thou fm hear, who never spare'. I a file? 

Hasl thou no wrath, or wish to give it vent? 

No wits fur nobles, dunces by descent ? 

Nu jest on "minors," quibbles on a name, 

Nor one facetious paragraph of blame? 

Is it for this on Ilion I have stood, 

And thought of Homer less than Holyrood? 

tin shore of Euxine or ,<£gean sea, 

My hate untravell'd, fondly tum'd to thee. 

Ah! let me cease; in vain my bosom burns, 

From Corydon unkind Alexis} turns: 

Thy rhymes are vain ; thy Jeffrey then forego, 

Nor woo that anger which be will not show. 

What then? — F.liria starves some lanker son, 

To write an article thou canst not shun: 

Some less fastidious Scotchman shall be found, 

As bold in Billingsgate, though less renown'd. 

As if at table some discordant dish 
Should shock our optics, such as frogs for fish; 
As oil in lieu of butter men decry. 
And poppies please not in a modern pie; 
If all such mixtures then be half a crime, 
We must have excellence to relish rhyme. 
Mere roast and boil'd no epicure invites; 
Thus poetry disgusts, or else delights. 

Who shoot not flying rarely touch a gun; 
Will he who swims not to the river run? 
And men unpractised in exchanging knocks 
Must go to Jackson ere they dare to box. 
Whate'er the weapon, cudgel, fist, or foil, 
None reach expertness without years of toil; 
Hut fifty dunces can, with perfect ease. 
Tag twenty thousand couplets when they please. 
Why not? — shall I, thus qualified to sit 
For rotten boroughs, never show my wit? 
Shall I, whose fathers with the quorum sate, 
And lived in freedom on a fair estate; 
Who left me heir, with stables, kennels, packs, 
To nil their income., and to tirirc its tnr ; 
Whose firm and pedigree have scarce a fault, 
Shall I. I say. suppress my attic salt? 

Thus think "the mob of gentlemen;" but ycu, 
Besides all this, must have some genius too. 
lie this voir seller judgment, and a rule. 
And print not piping hot from Southey's school, 

Qui nescit, versus tamen audet fingere ! Quid ni 7 

Liber et ingenuus prsesertitn census equestrem 

Summam nummi nun, vitioque remotus ab omiti. 

Tu nihil invita dices faciesve Minerva: 

Id tihi judicium est. ea mens; si quid tamen olun 

Senpseris, in Metii descendant judicis aures, 

Ft patris, et nostras nonumque prematur in annum 

Membranis intus pnsitis, slelere licebit . 

Quod non edideris; nescit vox missa reverti. 

By 1 vest res homines s.-u-er interpresque deorum 
Cedibus el virtu fffido deterruit Orpheus: 



1 iuveuies aliuin, si te Lie fastidit, Ales. 



HINTS FilO.M HORACE. 



71!) 



Who (ere another Thalaba appears;, 

I trust, will spare us fur at* least nine years. 

And hark'ye, Sou they!* pray — but don't be vext — 

Hum all your last three works— and ball* the next. 

But why tins vain advice? once publish'd, books 

Can never be recall'd — from pastry-cooks ! 

Though "Madoc," with " Pucelle,"f instead of Punch, 

May travel back to Quito on a trunk 1} 

Orpheus, we learn from Ovid and I.enipriere, 
Led all wild beasts hut woman by the ear; 
And had he fiddled at the present hour, 
We'd seen the lions waltzing in the Tower J 
And old Amphion, such were minstrels then, 
Had built St. Paul's without the aid of Wren. 
Verse too was justice, and the bards of Greece 
Did more than constables to keep the p 
Abolish'd cuckoldom with much applause, 
Cail'd county meetings, and enforced the laws, 
Cut down crown influence with reforming scythes, 
And served the church without demanding tubes; 
And hence, throughout all Hellas and the El::-:, 
Each poet was a prophet and a priest, 
Whose old-establish'd board of joint controls 
Included kingdoms in the cure of souls. 

Next rose the martial Homer, epic's prince, 
And fighting's been in fashion ever since; 
And old Tyrt.rus, when the Spartans warr'd, 
(A limping leader, but a lofty bard,) 
Though wail'd Ithouie had resisted long, 
Reduced the fortress by the force of son;.'. 

When oracles prevail'd, in times of old, 
In sons alone Apollo's will was told. 



* Mr. Southey has lately tied another canis'er to hi* tail in the " Curse of 
Kelnini." manure the neglect of Madoc, tx., and has in one instance had a 
wonderful effect. A literary friend of mine, walkins out one 
in; last summer, on the eleventh bridge of the Pal liu<tnn canal, was alarm- 
ed by the cry of "one in jeopardy :'' he rushed along, collet ,1 a body of 
Irish haymakers (supping on buttermilk in an a ck), procured 

three nike?. one eel-spear, and a landing-net, and at laal ' ! . resi i refei 

pulled out— his own publisher. The u for ever, and 

>i was a larje quarto wherewith he bad taken the leip, which | 

inquiry, to have been Mr. Southey s last work. Its "alacrity of sinking" 

was so great, that it has never since been heard of, |h 

that it is at this moment concealed at Alderman Birch's pastry premises, 

CnrnhiU. Be this as it may, the coroner's inquest brought in a verdict of 

" Fein de bibliopola"agaius't a " quarto unknown ;" and cirrut.. 

deuce being since slron? against the "Curse ,,l K 

words are an ejart description), it will be tried by its ; 

Grub-street.— Arthur, Alfred, Davideis, Richard Cttur de I. inn. Exodus, 

1 ■- ;waid. Calvary, Fall 

n rhumb the Great, are the names of the twelve jurors. The 
Judges an- Pye, Bowles, and the bellman of SI 

VOcales. pro and DOB, will bee;nployed as are now engaged in Sir K. Rurdetta' 
celebrated cau-e in the Scotch court. The public anxiously await the result, 
and all line publishers will bo subprenaed as « i 

Hut Mr. Southey has published the "Curse of Kebama:" an inviting tit! 
to qnibblers. By the by, it is , ■ 

i-e Soutbey,*to allow the boob) Ballantyne to entitle th 
h Annual Rejister (of which, by the 
gnu! n *tkal triumvirate of the day." But, on seen I t 
•r-.-.at degree of praise to be the one-eyed leaden of the blind, l 

thl .is we-il keep to themselves "Scott's thirty thousand enpi 
which inns' -i !lv discou-.til ; 

should seem, is the " Ix-pidus" of this poetical triumvirate. 1 am 
prised to see him in such good company. 

1[ Such thir.js we know are neither rich nor rare, 

But wonder how- the devil /tc came there." 
The trio are well defined in the sixth proposition of Euclid : " Because, 
in the triangles DRC, ACB, I)B is equal to .V 

pal to the two AC, CB, each to each, and the 
\ngle Ds'iC is equal to the an-le ACB: theref i qual 1 1 the 

base AB, and tne trianjle I)BC (Mr. S 
the l«s to 'he •rrra'tr. which is OkV»ui ; 
>. will find the rest of the theorem hard by his 

to cross the river; 'i is the first turnpike I' other side " Pons Asinorum."* 

t V tlburerl " Pucelle" isn-^t quite so immaculate as Mr. Soutl 
of Arc." and vet I am afraid the Frenchman i 

ry too on his side— ('hey rarely ja ' r patriotic m inS'rel, 

is in praise of a I . whose tide 

Of Witch WOnl I DC crre-c! with the change of the fir,', letter. 

ir B. Burgees'* Richard, the tenth book of whit 'i I reid a' Malta, 
nn a trunk of Eyres, If). Cooktspur street. If this be doubted, I shall buy a 
portmanteau to quote from. 



• Thisl.a'in has sorely pu77.lcd the University of Edinburgh. Ballintyne 
a i,l itmeanl lulhey claimed it as half En- 

ish; Scott swore it was the " Brig o' S',rlin_- ;" he had just • 
ivef it. At last [I 

it meant uotbin more nor less than the "counter of A- 
ble's shop." 



Then if voir verse is what all verse should be. 
And gods were not ashamed on't, why should we? 

The muse, like mortal females, nitty bit wood , 
In turns she'll seem u Papbian or a pn 

- a biile when first she feels alliight, 

Mild tis the same upon the' Bocond night; 
Wild as the wife .if alderman or peer, 
Now for Ins grace, and bow a grenadier I 
Her eyes beseem, her heart belies, her zone, 
Ice iti a crowd, and lava when alone. 

If verse be studied with some show of art. 
Kind Nature always will perform her part, 
Though without genius, and a native vein 
Df wit, we loathe tin artificial strain; 

Vet art and nature juin'd will win the prize, 
Unless they act like us and our allies. 

The youth who trains to ride or run a race 
Must bear privation with unruffled face, 
lie cail'd to labour when he thinks to dine, 
And, harder still, leave Wenching and his wine. 
Ladies wh i sing, at least who sin:; at siL'ht, 
Have follow'd Music through her farthest iltght; 
But rhymers tell you neither more nor less, 

i a pretty poem fir the press;" 
And that's enough; then write and print so fast;— 
[f Satan take the hindmost, who'd be hist? 
They storm the types, they publish, one and all, 
Tiny leap the counter, anil they leave the stall. 
Provincial maidens, men of high command, 
Yea, baronets have iuk'd the bloody hand I 

i cannot quell them; Pollia play'd this prank, 
(Then Phoebus (ir.-t found credit in a bank!) 
Not till the living only, but the dead, 
Fool on, as fluent as an Orpheus' head t - " 
Dainn'd all their days, they posthumously thrive — 
Dug up from dust, though buried when alive! 
Reviews record this epidemic crime, 
Those "Books "1" Martyrs" to the rage for rhyme, 
Al:i<! woe worth the scribbler! often seen 
In Morning Post or Monthly Magazine. 

lurk his earlier lays; but soon, hot-prest, 
Behold a quarto — Tutts must tell the rest. 

Dictus oh hoc Imiire titrres. rabidosque leones ; 
Dictus et Amphion, Tbebans conditor areis, 
Saxa uiovere sono testudi'nis, et prece blanda 
Ducere qoo vellet: fuit luce sapientia quondam. 
Publics privatis Becernere; sacra profanis; 
i , ibitu prohibere vago; dare jura maritis; 
Oppida moliri; leges incidere ligno. 
Sic honor et noiuen divinis vatibus atqtte 
Carminibus venit. Post hos insignis Homerus 
Tyrtteusque mares aminos in Martia bella 

:ii : dicta per cai a 
Et vine monstrata via est: et gratia regum 
I'n ri is tent.'ita mollis: ludusque repertus, 
Et lo'iL'oi'iiii operum finis: ne forte pudori 
t^it ttlii Muss l> r.e Bolers, et cantor Apollo. 

Natttra fieret laudabile carmen, an arte, 
tlii -it nn est: ego oec studium sine divite vena, 
le quid i>rosit video ingenium ; alteriua sic 
Altera noscil opem res. et conjurat amice. 
Qui stiidet optatam cursu contingere metaio, 
Multa tulit fecitque puer; sudavit, el alsit; 
Abstinuit Venere ft vino: qui Pytbia rautat 
Tibicen, didicit prius, extimuitque magistrum. 

Nunc satis ,'st i!i\i~se: egO Intra p"tn.it.i pan so: 

• extremum Bcabies; mihi turpe rclinqul est, 
Et, quod non didici, sane nescire fateri. 



§ Turn quoqne marmorea captit a cervice revussura 
Gureite c . QEagrius Hflbrni, 

I' a. e' frijida linftia; 
Ah. miscrim Eurydicen ! anima furiente vaabat; 
Eurydicen loto refcrebant flumiue ripac— Gurfv- iv. 



1-20 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Then leave, ye wise, the lyre's precarious chords 

To muse-mad baronets or madder lords, 

Or country Crispins, now grown somewhat ; 

Twin Doric minstrels, drunk with Doric ale ! 

Hark to those notes, narc 

The cobbl ?r laai ■■ 5* to Capsl 1 ■ 

Till, lol thai modern Midas, as he hears, 

A Ids an l 11 grOV Hi tO hi I a*fl ! 

lives one druid, who prepares in time 
"Gainst future feuds Jhs pour revenge of rhyme; 
Hacks his dull memory, and his duller muse, 
T» publish faults which friendship should 
If friendship".- nothing, self-regard might teach 
More polish'd Usage of ins parts of speech. 
Bui what is Bhamc, or what is aught, to bim? 

He vents lus spleen his whim. 

Some fancied slight has roused his lurking hate, 
Some folly cross'd, some jest or s une d< bate; 
Up to his den Sir Scribbler hies, and 
The gaiher'dgaU is voided in lampoon. 
Terhaps at some pert speech you've dared to frown, 
Perhaps your poem may have pleased the town; 
J[" BO, alas! His nature in the man — 
May heaven forgive you, for \u- never ran! 
Then be it so; ami may his withering bays 
Bloom fresh in satire, though they fade in praise! 
While his lost songs no more shall steep and stink, 
The dullest, fattest weeds on Lethe's brink. 
But springing upwards from the sluggish mould, 
I>e, (what they never were before) be sold 1 
Should some rich bard (but such a monster now, 
In modern physics, we can scarce allow) 
Should some pretending scribbler of the court, 

Some rhyming peer— there's plenty f>f the sortj — 
All but one poor dependent priest withdrawn, 
(Ah! too regardless of his chaplain's yawn!) 



* I beg Nathaniel's pardon ; he is not a cobbler ; it is a tailor, bul begged 

:ii io sink the profession in hia preface in two pair of panta 

psha ! — of cantos, which be wished the public to try on ; bul tl 
pair mi let it out. and so far saved the expense of an advertisement tn his 
country customers.— Merry's *■ Moorfield's whine" n aa nothing to all this. 
The ,k Delia Cruscans" were people of some education, ami no | 
hut these Arcadians ("Arcades »mbo"— bumpkhis bo'h) send oui 
♦ive nonsense without the small* si alloy, and Leave all the slim * and small- 
clothes in the parish unrepaired, to patch up Elegies on Enclosures and 
l'a't'is tn Gunpowder. Sitting on a sho| board, they d< scribe fields of batUe, 
when the only blood thej ever so w was shed from the finger; and an " Es- 
say on War*' is produced by the ninth part of a " ne t. ' 

"And own thai nine such poets mane a Tate." 
Did Nathan ever read that line of Pope? and if he did, why not take it as 
his motto? 

t This well-meanin? gentleman has spoiled some excellent shoe makers, 
a> ) in .-n iitvt'L-.-.-irv to the poetical undoing of many of the industrious poor. 
Nathaniel Blonra'fii I 1 and his brother Bobl y haves tall Somersetshire sing- 
ing; nor has the malady confined itself to one county. Pra*t loo (who Once 
,. 1 caugh.1 the contagion of patronage, and decoyed a poor fel- 
low named Black, ti into poetry; bul tie died during Ur 
one child, and two volumes ot "B m iiute. The girl, if 

. .•. and come forth as a Bhoe-inaking Sappho, 
may do well ; but the " tragedies" are as rickety as if tbey bad *■■■-< a tin' 
offspring of an Earl era Seakmtan prize poet. The patrons of Ihii poor 

1 rabh For his end, and it ought to bean ind 
fence. Rut this is the least they have done, for, by a refinement of barbari- 
ty, thi-v have made the (late) man posthumoi 
whal h-_- would have had sense enough nevi M print I no If, I 
rakers of u Remains" come under tne statufa 1 aim "1 lurrection men." 
What does it signify whether a poor, dear, dead Muck up in 

Surgeons' or in Stationers 1 Hall ? Is it so bad to unearth his bones as his 
blunders? Is it not 1 ma he < ! !>. than hi 

ortaVO? " We know what we are, but we know nut what we 
and it is to he b ipe I we DOVer shall kn< w, if a man who h >> p tSSi ' tbroui li 
life with a sort of eclat is to find himself a mountebank on the o her side 

• f Styx, and made, like poor Joe Blackett, the laugh ing-stOCk •■[ purgatory. 
The plea of publication u to provide for the chil'l ; now, might not some of 
Mlis "Sutor ultra ( I 

tion withoul inveigling Pratt into biography ? And then lus inscription split 
rtitn so many modicums!-- To the Dutchess of So-much, the Right Hon. 
fio-and-So, and Mm. and Mi are, fee, &c." — why, 

tins is doling out the "soft milk of dedication" in cil Is.— there is but a quart, 
and he divides it anion; a dozen. Whv. Pratt, I a put! left ? 

Dost thou think six families of distinction can share this ho quiet?— There is 
a child, a I ion ; send the girl to her grace, the volumes to 

the grocer, an I the dedication to the devil. 

X Here win Mr. Gilford allow me to introduce once more to his notice 
kV aofe survivor, tl iltimtu Romanorum," the la I ol the "Cruscan- 

!"— " Edwin ' tl our Lad I inial ml : liere he 

* iivels a^ in 'he days oi "wsu said BaviaJ the Correct" I though* 



Condemn the i ite to recite 

Their last dramatic work Dy canrile'light, 

her turn each rueful leaf, 
Dull as his sermons, but nol half so briefl 
Vet, si ici 'tia promised at the rector's death, 
fir 'il risk no living for a little breath. 
Then spouta and foams, and cries at every lino 
[The Loril forgive him 1) '"Bravol grand 1 divine!' 
Hoarse \\it!i those praises (which, by flatt'ry fed. 
Dependence barters for. her bitter bread,) 
[»-■ strides and stamps along with creaking boot, 
Till tli" bis emphatic fboi ; 

Then sits again, then rolls bis pious *-yi\ 
\< when the dying vicar will not diel 
\or feels, forsooth, emotion at his heart; — 
Bui all disemblera overact their part. 

Ye who aspire to build the lofty rhyme, 

1101 ail who land your false "sublime;" 
But if some friend shall hear your work, and say, 
11 Expunge that stanza, lop that line away,*' 

* * * Pi carmina condes, 

Nunquara te fallant animi sub vulpe latentes. 

Cluintilio si quid recitares, Corrige, sodes, 
Hoc (aiebat) et hoc: melius te posse negares, 
Bis t irque expertum fhistra, delere jubebat, 
Et male tornatos incudi reddere versus. 
Bi d fendere delictum quam vertere rnalles, 

Nullum ultra verbum, aut opt ram insumebat inaneni 
Uniu sine rivali teque et lua solus a mares. 



Fitzgerald had been the tail of poesy, hut, alas I he is only the penult 
mate. 

A FAMILIAR F.HSTT.F Tn THF EDITOR OF THE 
MORNING (. HRONH LE. 

H Whal reams of pa| er, Ro ids nf ink," 

Do si me men spoil, who i e»er think ! 

And so perhaps ypu 11 say of n,e, 

In which your reanN ra niaj agree. 

S'ill I write on, and teh you why; 

Nothing 1 ■■ ' deny, 

Rut may instruct or en*- 1 

Wi'houl the risk of giving pain. 

And should you doubl « ha I 

The name of Camden 1 insert, 

V\ ho novels read, and oft maintain^ 

Ilr here and there some knowledge gaia'd* 

Then w hy nol l Indulge my pen, 

Tho;ieh I r;o fame or pi ofi! 

Ye! may amuse your idle men ; 

of \> horn, though some may be severe, 

Others may read without a sneer ? 

'i t us mijfii premised I nexl proceed 

To give you w ha1 I red mj tn ed. 

An ii ■■ hal bllowa to die] 'ay 
1 'iinours of the passing day. 

ON SOME MODERN QUACKS AND REFORMIST? 

In tracinif nf the human mind 

'I in ugh .til its various counaa, 
Though strange, 'tis true, we often find 

It knows not its resources: 
Ail men through life assume a part 

For which no talents they possets, 
Yet wonder that, 'vith all their art. 

They meet no better with success. 
T is thus we see, through life's career, 

s > few rxci\ in their pn fi 
Whereas, would each nian but appear 

In what 's within his own possession, 
We should not see such daily quacks 

(For quacks there are in every art) 
Attempting, by their strange attack?, 

To meliorate the mind and heart. 
Nor mean 1 here the s'aee alone, 

Where some deserve th' applause they meet ; 
For quacks there are, an 1 they well known, 

In either (muse, who hold a seat. 
Reform *a the order of the day, I hear, 

To which I cordially asseulr 
But then let this reform a| 

And ev'ry c!as> of men cement. 
For if you hut reform a few. 

And other, have to their pUl lent, 
I fear you will hut little do, 

And find your time and pains misspent 
Let each man to his poet assign^ 

By Nature, take his part to act, 
And then few causes shall we find 

To call each man we meet— a quack.* 



HINTS FROM HORACE. 



72] 



And, after fruitless eil'irts. you return 
IVithout amendment, and lie answers, "Burn I" 
That instant throw your paper in the Sre, 
Ask no! his thoughts, or follow his desire; 
Cut if (true bard!) you scorn to condescend, 
And will not alter w rial ifend. 

If yon will breed this bastard of your brains,*— 
We'll have no words— I've only ln>t my pains. 

Yet, if you only prize your favourite thought 
As critics kindly do, and authors ought; 
If your cool friend annoy you now and then, 
And cross whole pages with \u< plaguy pen; 
Mo matter, throw yoflr oruanieiits aside— 
Detter let hi in than all the world deride, 
Give light ti> passages too much in shade, 
Nor let a doubt obscure one verse you've made; 
Vour friend's "a Johnson," not in leave one word, 
However trirlinjr, which may s< ;^sn absurd; 
Such erring triilrs lead to serious ills, 
And furnish food fur critics,} <»r their quills. 

As the Scotch fiddle, with its touching tune, 
Or the sad influence of the angry moon, 
All men avoid bad writers' ready tongues, 
As yawning waiters fly} Fitzscribble's li 
Vet on he mouths — ten minutes— tedious each 
As prelate's homily or placeman's speech; 
Long as the last years of a lingering lease, 
When riot pauses until rents increase. 
While such a minstrel, muttering fustian, strays 
O'er hedge and ditch, through unfrequented ways, 

Vir honus et prudens versus reprehendet inertes: 
Culpabit et d tiros; incomptis allinet atruin 
Transverse calamo signum ; ambitiosn recidet 
Omamonta ; parum Claris lucem dare c 
Amort ambigue dictum; mutanda notabit; 
Fiet Aristarchus: nee dicet, Cur ego amicum 
Oflendam in nugis? hce nugte seria dti 
In mala derisum semel e.xccptumque sinistre. 

I't mala quern scabies ant inorli is regius urguet, 
Ant fanaticus error et iracunda Diana, 
Vesanum tetigisse timent fugiuiique poetam, 
Clui Bapiunt ; agitaot pueri, iucautique sequuntur. 
Ilic dum siililimi's versus ructatur, el errat 
Pi veluti merulis intentus decldil auceps 
In pateum, fbveamve; licet, Succurrite, Inngum 
Clamet, lo cives! non sit qui tollere curet. 
Pi quia cunt opera ferre, et demittere funem, 
(Am scis an prudens hue - atque 

Bnrvari nolit? Dicam: Siculique poetas 
Narrabo intcritum. Dens immortalis baberi 
Dum cupit Ehnpedoctes, ardentem frigidus .Ktnam 
Insiluit: sit jus liceatque perire pnetis: 
Invitum ipii servat, id. on facit nccidenti. 
Nee Bfcmel hoc fecil ; nee, si retrnctus erit. jam 
Piet homo, et ponel fnmosse mortis amorem. 
Nee saiis apparet cur versus factitet; utrum 
Minxerit in patrios cineres, an triste bideutal 
Moverit incestiis; certe fnrit, ac velut ursus, 



• RnstarJ nf umirfiraiiti. — Minerva being tl 
anti a variety of equally unaccountable parturitions vy<au earth, such as .Ma- 
doc, &c &c. &c. 

T " A crust for tlte critics." — Ha^ci. in the BtheanoL 

t An 1 the B waiters" are tt.e only fortunate i eopte w tin can " fly" from 
them ; all the rest, viz. the lad subscribers to the ■' Literary F 

■. sy, ir s : t 'Hi* 'he recitation without a hope of exclaim- 
lag, " sic" (thai is, !•/ 'iKiXmi Filz, with bad vviue or worse p 
nrvavit Aoolio"' 



If by some chance he walks into a well, 

And sh ttr with stentorian yell, 

"A ri pc! help, Christians, as ye hope for irrace!" 

man, man, in.r child will stir a pace: 
For there his carcase lie might freely fling, 
From frenzy, or the humour of the thing. 

ppen'd to more hards than one 

v.m Budgi Us story, and have done. 

' rhymester, for no good, 
hi - cum- be much misundi 
When teased with ci tinual claims, 

r ■ i 1 ! like Cato,"§ leapt into the Tha 
And th refore be it lawful through the town 

For any hard to poison, li'iiiL'. or drown. 
.-• the intended suicide r, ceives 
Small thanks from him who loathes tin- life he leaves; 

ill to say, mad poets must not lose 
The gl iry of thai death they freely choose. 
IVor is it certain that sum" sorts of vet 
Prick not the poet's conscience as a curst-; 

i rams on Sunday he was founa 
<>r got a child on consecrated ground! 
And hence is haunted with a rhyming ra^-e— 
IVar'd like a bear just bursting from his cage. 
It' free, all fly his versifying lit. 
Fatal at once to simpleton or wit. 
But Mm, unhappy! whom he seizes, — him 
He flays wuh recitation limb by limb; 
Probes to the quick where'er be makes his breach, 
And gorges like a lawyer or a leech. 

Objeclos caves valuit si frangcre datbros, 
Itidnctum doctutnque fugal recitator acerhus. 
0.uem vero arripuit, tenet, occiditque legendo, 
•Non missura cutem, n i? i plena cruoris, hirudo 



5 On his I ords: What Calo did and Addison ap 

i it he haa. 
it would not have men lie had invited his daughter on the 

name Mater party, but Mi-- B escaped this last pa- 

lernal attention. Thus fell tbi ' and the enemy of 

1 wi'h," tec. he censured as low, I bee leave to refer to Ibe 
ing still lower; and if any res late." Minx- 

erit m parries cineres," &c into a decent couplet, I will insert sa.d couple-! 
in lieu ut the present 



if."— Mle. Racier. M !r. .ie Pevijne, 
iputeon ihe meaning of this i 
a tract considerably longer than the p R ,, printed ai the 

Of M> !,lne lit- Sevunt 's ! 

08. Presuming that all who 

s, particularly as so many who can no< ham 
taken ihe same liberty. I should have held my " fanl'm. 

Iher, had not my respect for the wilt Fourteenth 1 ! 

i these illustrious authorities. 1st, 

Boileau i "II eat .lilhcile de trailer des snjets qui no! a la portee <le tout le 

re qui vous lea rendi ui s'appelle s'appro- 

: n ydonne." Zdly, Batteux: " Mais fl est 

bien difficile ledonner des mils propresct individuels aux etrvs puremenl 

Sdly, Dr.cier | lemenl ca 

...■-filter." Mde. de Sevigue's opinion 

. 
en remarquabla, aucune do cea (tiverses 
I 
forwards, " Le lumineux Dumarsais" made his apt i 

■ ' coociuer tout lea 
dissentime i 

' m on this 

weighty a:l',ir. ai il , ,, r _-„„,. 

more eonsequrnce than astronomical calculations on II 

' I " '■'. 5. p e 

« ta M. G. from sayins my more on the matter. A ts Iter poet iLanBoiicaa, 

and at least as good a 

"A little lenrnii "..ne;." 

At"! by this comparison of coi , i how a good daa 

may be rendered -j -erilous lo the proprietors. 



3o^ 



96 




[There were several editions of the Hours of Idleness published in England ; but no ono of 
them, until that of 1632, contained all the pieces which properly belonged to that collection 
The following, when added to those in front of the book, make up the complete number.] 



f)N A DISTANT VIEW OF THE VILLAGE AND 
SCHOOL OF HARROW ON THE HILL. 

Ob! milii pneteritos referat si Jupitsr minus. 

rug I, .Kneiii, lib. 9, SCO. 

1. 

Ve scenes of my childhood, whose loved recollection 
Embitters the present, compared with the past ; 

Where science first dawn'd on the powers of reflection, 
And friends-hips were formM too romantic to last; 

o # 

Where faney yet joys to retrace the resemblance 
Of comrades in friendship and mischief allied ; 

How welcome to me your ne'er-fading remembrance, 
Which rests in the bosom, though hope is denied 1 
X 
Again I revisit the hills where we sported, 
The streams where we swam, ami the fields where 
we fought; 
The school where, loud warn'il by the bell, we resorted, 
To pore o'er the precepts by pedagogues taught. 
4. 
Acain I behold where for hours I have ponder'd, 
As reclining, at eve, on yon tombstone I lay ; 
Or round the steep brow of the churchyard I wander'd, 
To catch the last gleam of the sun's setting ray. 
5. 
I once more view the room with spectators surrounded, 

Where, as Zanga, I trod on Alonssd o'erthrown ; 
While to swell my young pride such applauses re 
sounded, 
I fancied that Mossop himself was outshone: 

6. 

Or, as Lear, I pour'd forth the deep imprecation, 

Ry my daughters of kingdom and reason deprived; 
Till, fired by loud plaudits and self-adulation, 
I regarded myself as a Garrick revived. 
7. 
Ye dreams of my boyhood, how much I regret you! 

Unfaded your memory dwells in my breast ; 
Though sad and deserted, I ne'er <nn forget you; 
Your pleasures may still be in fancy posseSt. 
8. 
'1 o Ida full of; may remembrance restore me. 

While fate shall the shades of the future unroll! 
Biere darkness o'orshadows the prospect before nie, 
More dear is the beam of the past to my soul. 
0. 
But it. through the course of the years which await me. 

Some new scene of pleasure should open to view. 
t will say, while with rapture the thought shall 
elate me, 
••Oh! such were the days which my : «fancy knew." 

1800. 



TO D. 
1. 
In thee I fondly hoped to clasp 

A friend, whom death alone could sever; 
Till envy, with malignant grasp, 
Detach'd thee from my breast for ever, 
o 
True, she. has forced thee from !ny bieast; 

Vet in my heart thou keep'st thy seat; 
There, there thine image still must rest, 
Until that leart shall cease to heat. 
3. 
And, when the grave restores her dead, 

When life again to dust is given, 
On thy dear breast I'll lay my bead — 
Without thee, where would be my heaven ? 
February, lc'03. 



TO EDDLESTON. 
1. 
Let Folly smile, to view the namps 

Of thee and me in friendship twined; 
Yet Virtue will have greater claims 
To love, than rank with vice combined. 
2. 
And though unequal is thy fate. 

Since title deck'd my higher birth; 
Yet envy not this gaudy state; 
Tin ue is the pride of modest worth. 
3. 
Our souls at least congenial meet. 

Nor can thy lot my rank disgrace; 
Our intercourse is not less sweet, 
Sine* worth of rank supplies the place. 

November, 1802. 



REPLY TO FOME VERSES OF J. M R. TIGOT.ESQ 

ON THE CRUELTY OF HIS MISTRESS. 
1. 

Why, Pigot, complain 

Of this damsel's disdain, 
Why thus in despair do you fret? 

For months you may try. 

Vet. believe me, a sigh 
Will never obtain a coquette. 
2. 

Would you teach her to love? 

For a time seem to rove ; 
At first she may frown in a pet; 

Rut leave her a whilo, 

She shortly will smile, 
And then you may kiss your coquette 



IIUUKS OF IDLENESS. 



72 



3. 

For such are the airs 

Of these fanciful fairs, 
Thny think all our homage a debt; 

Yet a partial negb t 

Soon takes an effect, 
And humbles the proudest coquette. 

4. 

Dijsemhle your pain, 

And lengthen your chain, 
And seem her hauteur to regret; 

If again you shall sigh, 

She no more will deny 
That yours is the rosy coquette. 

5. 

If still, from false pride, 

Your pangs she deride, 
This whimsical virgin forget; 

gome other admire, 

Who will melt with your fire, 
Anil laugh at the little coquette. 

0. 

For me, I adore 

Koine twenty or more, 
And love thrni most dearly; but yet, 

Though my heart they enthral, 

I'd abandon them all, 
Did they act like your blooming coquette. 

No longer repine, 

Adopt this design, 
And break through Ivr slight-woven net ; 

Away with despair, 

No longer forbear, 
To fly from the captious coquette. 

8. 
Then quit her, ray friend ! 
Your bosom defend, 
Ere quite with her snares you're beset: 
Lest your deep-wounded heart, 
When incensed by the smart, 
Should lead you to curse the coquette. 

October 27tA, 1806. 



TO THE SIGHING STREPIION. 
1. 

Your pardon, my friend, 

If my rhymes did offend, 
Your pardon, a thousand times o'er; 

From friendship I strove 

Your pangs to remove, 
But I swear I will do so no more. 
o 

Since your beautiful maid 

Your flame has repaid. 
No more I your folly regret; 

file's now the most divine. 

And 1 bow at the shrine 
Of this quickly reformed coquette. 
3. 

Yet still, I must own, 

I should never have known 
From your verses, what else she deserved 

Your pain seein'd so great, 

1 piti id your rate, 
As your fair was so devilish reserved 



Since the balm-breathing kiss 
Of Ibis magical miss 
Can such wonderful transports produces 

Since the " woild you forget, 

When your lips once have met," 
M\ counsel Will get but abuse. 
5. 

You say when " 1 rove, 

I know nothing of love;" 
'Tis true, 1 am given to range: 

If I rightly remember, 

I've loved a good number. 
Yet i!i re'.-, pleasure, at least, in a change. 

G. 

I will ne.t advance, 

By the rules of romance. 
To humour a v, hrmsical fair; 

Thousrh a Bmile may delipht, 

Yel a frown won't affright, 
Or drive' me to dreadful despair. 



While my blood is thus warm 
I ne'er shall reform, 

To mix in the Platonists' school; 

Of this I am sure. 

Was my passion so pure, 
Thy mistress would think me a fool. 

8. 

And if I should shun 

Every woman for one, 
Whose image must till my whole breast— 

Whom I must prefer. 

And sieh bit for her— 
What an insult 'twould be to the rest I 

9. 

Now, Strephon, good bye; 

I cannot deny 
Your passion appears most absurd; 

Such love a< yon plead 

Is pure love indeed. 
For it only consists in the word. 



to miss fk;ot. 
1. 

I'.li/a, what fools are the Mus=elman sect. 

Who to women deny the soul's future existence; 
Could they see thee. Eliza, they'd r*wn their defect. 
And this doctrine would meet with a general resist- 
ance. 

o. 

Had their prophet possess'd half an atom of sense, 
He ne'er would have » < D from paradise diiven. 

Instead of his houris, a flimsy pretence, 

With women alone he had peopled his heaven. 
3. 

Yet still to increase your calamities nmrc. 

Not content with depriving your bodies of IfMIl, 

He allots one | r husband to share amongst four!— 

With souls you'd dispense] but this lust, who could 
hear it? 

4. 
His rdigicn to please neither party is made; 

On husbands 'tis hard, to the w ives the most unuvil 
Still I can't contra diet, what so oft has been said, 
" Though women are angels, vet wedlock's the drviL* 



724 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



LINES WRITTEN IN "LETTERS OP AN ITALIAN 
NUN AND AN ENGLISH GENTLEMAN. BY J. J. 

ROUSSEAU. FOUNDED ON FACTS." 

"Away, away! jrour flattering arts 
May now betray souk- s-nip'-r hearts; 
Ami you "ill smile at tiieir believing, 
And they shall weep at your deceiving." 

NSW r ER TO THE FOREfiOING, ADDRESSED TO MISS . 

Dear, simple girl, those flattering arts. 

From which Chou'dat guard frail female hearts, 

Exist hut in imagination, — 

Mere phantoms of thine own creation; 

For he who views that witching grace, 

That perfect form, that lovely face, 

With eyes admiring, oh! helieve me, 

He never wishes to deceive thee: 

Once in thy polish'd mirror glance, 

Thou 'It there descry that elegance 

Which from our sex demands such praises, 

But envy in the other raises: 

Then he who tells thee of thy beauty, 

Believe me, only does his duty: 

Ah! fly not from the candid youth; 

It is not flattery,— 'tis truth. 

July, 1S04. 



THE CORNELIAN. 
1. 
No specious splendour of this stone 

Endears it to my memory ever; 
With lustre only once it shone. 
And blushes modest as the giver. 
2. 
Some, who can sneer at friendship's ties, 

Have for my weakness oft reproved me ; 
Yet still the simple gift I prize,— 
For I am sure the giver loved me. 
3. 
He ofler'd it with downcast look, 

As fearful that I might refuse it; 
I told him when the gift I took. 
My only fear should be to lose it. 
4. 
This pledge attentively I view'd. 

And sparkling as I held it near, 
Me> bought one drop the stone bedew'd,' 
And ever since I've loved a tear. 
5. 
Still, to adorn his humble youth, 

Nor wealth nor birth their treasures yield, 
But he who seeks the flowers of truth, 
Must quit the garden for the field. 
6. 
Tis not the plant uprear'd in sloth, 

Which beauty shows, and sheds perfume; 
The flowers which yield the most of both 
In Nature's wild luxuriance bloom. 
7. 
Had Fortune dided Nature's care. 
For once forgetting to be blind. 
His would have been an ample share. 
If well-proportion'd to his mind. 
8. 
But had the goddess clear'.y seen, 

His form had fix'd her fickle breast; 
rler countless hoards would his have been, 
And none remain'd to give the rest. 



ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY 
Cousin to the jiutlior, and very dear to lain.. 

1. 

Hush'd are the Winds, and still the evening glow 

Not e'en a zephyr, wanders through the grove, 
Whilst I return to view my Margaret's tomb, 

Ami scatter flowers on the dust I love, 
o 
Within ibis nanow cell reclines her clay, * 

That clay where once such animation beam'dj 
The King of Terrors seized her ;is his prey, 

Not worth, nor beauty, have her life rcdeem'd 
3. 
Oh! could that King of Terrors pity feel, 

Or Heaven reverse the dread decrees of fate I 
Not here the mourner would his grief reveal, 

Nor here the Muse her virtues would relate. 
4. 
l!i!t wherefore weep? her matchless spirit soars 

Beyond where splendid shines the orb of day; 
And weeping angels had her to those bowers 

Where endless pleasures virtue's deeds repay. 
5. 
And shall presumptuous mortals heaven arraign. 

And, madly, godlike providence accuse? 
Ah! no, far fly from me attempts so vain, 

I'll ne'er submission to my God refuse. 
fl. 
\'< t is remembrance of those virtues dear. 

Yet fresh the memory of that beauteous face; 
Still they call forth my warm affection's tear, 

Still in my heart retain their wonted place. 



TO EMMA. 

1. 

Since now the hour is come at last, 

W In n you must quit your anxious lover; 

Since now our dream of bliss is past. 
One pang, my girl, and all is over. 
o t 

Alas! that pang will be severe, 
Which bids us part to meet no more, 

Which tears me far from one so dear, 
Departing for a distant shore. 

3. 
Well: we have pass'd some happy hours, 

And joy will mingle with our tears; 
When thinking on these ancient towers, 

The shelter of our infant years; 
4. 
Where from the gothic casement's height, 

We view'd the lake, the park, the dale, 
And still, though tears obstruct our sight, 

We lingering look a last farewell. 
5. 
O'er fields through which we used to run, 

And spend the hours in childish play; 
O'er shades where, when our race was done 

Reposing on my breast you lay; 
C. 
Whilst I, admiring, too remis?, 

Forgot to scare the hov'ring tlies, 
Yet envied every fly the kiss 

It dared to give your slumbering eyes l 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



725 



See still the little painted bark, 

In which I row'd you o'er the lake; 
Sec there, high waving o'er the park, 
Ths elm 1 clamber'd for your sake. 
8. 
These times are past— our joys are gone, 

You leave me, leave this happy vale; 
These seem a I must retrace atone; 
Without thee what will they avail 7 
9. 
Who can conceive, who has not proved, 

The anguish of a last embrace? 
IVIien, torn from all you fondly loved, 
You hid a long adieu to peace. 
10. 
This is the deepest of our woes, 

For this these tears our cheeks bedew; 
This is of love the final close, 
01), God, the fondest, last adieu! 



TO M. S. G. 

1. 

Whene'er I view those lips of thine, 
Their hue invites my fervent kiss; 
Yet I forego that bliss divine, 
Alas! it were unhallow'd bliss. 
o 
Whene'er I dream of that pure breast, 
How could I dwell upon its snows? 
Yet is the daring wish represt, 
For that,— would banish its repose. 
3. 
■A glance from thy soul-searching eye 

("an raise with hope, depress with fear; 
Yet I conceal my love, and why? 
1 would not force a painful tear. 
4. 
I ne'er have told my love, yet thou 

Ilasl seen my ardent flame too well; 
And shall I plead my passion now, 
To make thy bosom's heaven a hell? 
5. 
No! for thou never canst be mine, 

United by the priest's decree; 
By any ties but those divine, 
Mine, my beloved, thou ne'er shalt be. 
G. 
Then let the secret fire consume. 

Let it consume, thou shalt not know; 
Willi joy 1 court a certain doom, 
Rather than spread its guilty glow. 
7. 
I will not ease my tortured heart, 

By driving dove-eyed peace from thine; 
Rather than such a sting impart. 
Each thought presumptuous I resign. 
8. 
Yes' yield those lips, for which I'd brave 

More than I hern shall dare to tell; 
Thy innocence anil mine to save, — 
I bid thee now a last farewell. 
0. 
fes! yield that breast, to seek despair, 
And hope no more thy soft embrace. 
Which to obtain my soul would clan?, 
All, all reproach, but thy disgrace. 



10. 
At least from guilt shalt thou be free, 
No matron shall thy shame reprove; 
Though cureless pangs may prey on me, 

No martyr shall thou be to love. 



TO CAROLINE. 
1. 

Tmink'st thou I saw thy beauteous eyes, 
Suffused in tears, implore to stay; 

And heard ui ved thy plenteous sighs, 

Which said far more than words can say? 
o_ 
Though keen the grief thy tears exprest, 

When love and hop,' lay both overthrown; 
Yet still, my girl, this bleeding breast 
Throbb'd with deep sorrow as thine own. 
3. 
But when our cheeks with anguish glow'd, 
When thy sweet lips were join'd to mine, 
The teais that from my eyelids tlow'd 
Were lost in those that fell from thine. 
4. 
Thou could'st not feel my burning cheek, 

Thy gushing tears had quench'd its Hame 
And as thy tongue essay'd to speak, 
In sighs adone it breathed my name. 
5. 
And yet, my girl, we weep in vain. 
In vain our fate in sighs deplore; 
Remembrance only can remain. — 
Hut that will make us weep the more. 
6. 
Again, thou best beloved, adieu I 

Ah' if tllOU canst o'ercome regret, 
Nor let thy mind past joys review,— 
Our only hope is to forget! 



TO CAROLINE. 
1. 
When I hear you express an affection so warm, 
Ne'er think, my beloved, that I do not believe; 
For your lip would the soul of suspicion disarm, 
And your eye beams a ray which can never deceive 
o 
Yet still, this fond bosom regrets while adoring, 

That love, like the leaf, must fall into the sear, 
That age will come on, when, remembrance, deplorir.g 
Contemplates the scenes of her youth with a tear. 

n. 

That the time must arrive, when, no longer retaining 
, Their auburn, those locks must wave thin to the 

brei 
When a few silver hairs of those tresses remaining. 
Prove nature a prey to decay and disease. 
4. 
'Tis this, my beloved, which spreads gloom o'er m» 
feat 
Though I ne'er shall presume to arraign the decreo 
Which God has pri claim'd as the fate of his creature* 
In the death which one day will deprive you of me 

Mistake not, sweet of emotion, 

No doubt can the mind of your b>ver invade: 

He worships each look with «UCh fnith'.u! devi-tiM 
A smile can enchant, or i ."ar can dissuads. 



720 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



But as death, my beloved, soon or late shall o'ertake us, 
And our breasts which alive with such sympathy 
glow, 
Will Bleep in the grave till the blast shall awake us, 
When calling the dead, in earth's bosom laid low: 
7. 
Oh! then let us drain, while we may, draughts of 
pleasure, 
Which from passion like ours may unceasingly flow: 
Let us pass round the cup of love's bliss in full measure, 
And quaff the contents as our nectar below. 

JS05. 



TO CAROLINE. 
1. 

On 1 when shall the grave hide for ever my sorrow? 
Ohl when shall my soul wing her flight from this 
clay 1 
The present is hell, and the coming to-morrow 
But brings with new torture, the curse of today. 
2. 
From my eye (lows no tear, from my lips fall no curses. 
I blast not the fiends who have hurl'd me from bliss; 
For poor is the soul which bewailing rehearses 
Its querulous grief, when in anguish like this. 
3. 
Was my eye, 'stead of tears, with red fury flakes 
bright'ning, 
Would my lips breathe a flame which no stream could 
assuage, 
On our foes should my glance lauch in vengeance its 
lightning, 
With transport my tongue give a loose to its rage. 
4. 
But now tears and curses, alike unavailing, 

Would add to the souls of our tyrants delight ; 
Could they view us our sad separation bewailing, 
Their merciless hearts would rejoice at the sight. 
5. 
Yet still, though we bend with a feign'd resignation, 
Life beams not for us with one ray that can cheer; 
Love and hope upon earth bring no more consolation, 
In the grave is our hope, for in life is our fear. 
6. 
Oh! when, my adored, in the tomb will they place me, 
Since in life, love and friendship forever are fled? 
If again in the mansion of death I embrace thee, 
Perhaps they will leave unmolested the dead. 



THE FIRST KISS OF LOVE. 
" 'A Bap6*iT0{ o« ^opticus 
'Epuru fiovvov fix* 1 ' " 

Jlnacrcon. 
1. 
\way with those fictions of flimsy romance! 

Tnose tissues of falsehood which folly has wove! 
3ive me the mild beam of the soul-breatbing glance, 
Or the rapture which dwells on the first kiss of love. 
2. 
Vv. rhymers, whose bosoms with phantasy glow, 

Whose pastoral passions are made fol tin' grove, 

Fiom what hirst inspiration your sonnets would flow. 

Could you ever have tasted the first kiss of love! 



If Apollo should e'er his assistance refuse, 

Or the Nine be disposed from your service to rove 
Invoke them no more, bill adieu to the muse. 

And try the effect of the first kiss of love. 
4. 
I hate you, ye cold compositions of art: 

Though prudes may condemn me, and bigots reprove, 
I court the effusions that spring from the heart 

Which throbs with delight to the first kiss of love 

5. 

Your shepherds, your flocks, those fantastical themes 

Perhaps may amuse, yet they never can move: 
Arcadia displays but a r.'L'inn of dreams; 

What are visions like these to the first kiss of love? 
C. 
Qfh! cease to affirm that man, since his birth, 

From Adam till now, has with wretchedness strove 
Some portion of paradise still is on earth, 

And Eden revives in the first kiss of love. 
7. 
When age chills the blood, when our pleasures are 
past — 

For years fleet away with the wings of the dove — 
The dearest remembrance will still be the last. 

Our sweetest memorial the first kiss of love. 



TO A BEAUTIFUL QUAKER. 
Sweet girll though only once we met, 
That meeting I shall ne'er forget; 
And though we ne'er may meet again 
Remembrance will thy form retain. 
I would not say, "I love," but still 
My senses struggle with my will: 
In vain to drive thee from my breast. 
My thoughts are more and more represt, 
In vain I check the rising sighs, 
Another to the last replies: 
Perhaps this is not love, but yet 
Our meeting I can ne'er forget. 

What though wc never silence broke, 

Our eyes a sweeter language spoke; 

The tongue in flattering falsehood deals, 

And tells a tale it never feels: 

I' ceil the guilty lips impart, 

And hush the guilty mandates of the heart; 

But soul's interpreters, the eyes. 

Spurn such restraint, and scorn disguise. 

As thus our glances oft conversed, 

And all our bosoms felt rehearsed, 

No spirit, from within, reproved us, 

Say rather, "'twas the spirit moved us." 

Though what they utter'd I repress, 

Yet I conceive thou'lt partly guess; 

For as on thee my mi mory ponders, 

Perchance to me thine also wanders. 

This for myself, at least, I'll say, 

Thy form appears through night, through day 

Awake, with it my fancy teems; 

In sleep, it smiles in fleeting dreams; 

The vision charms the hours away. 

And bids me curse Aurora's ray 

For breaking slumbers of delight 

Which make me wish for endless night. 

Sinee, oh! wbate'er my future fate, 

Shall joy or woe my steps awai', 

Tempted by love, by storms beset, 

Thine image I can ne'er forget. 



Alas! again no more we meet. 
No more our former looks repeat ; 
Then let me breathe this parting prayer, 
The dictate of my bosom's care: 
"May Heaven so guard my lovely Quaker, 
That anguish can ne'er o'ertake her; 
That peace and virtue ne'er forsake her, 
But bliss be aye her Heart's partaker! 
fill! may the happy mortal fated 
To be, by dearest ties, related, 
For her each hour new joys discover, 
And lose the husband in the lover! 
May that fair bosom never know 
What 'tis to feel the restless woe 
Which stings the soul, with vain regret, 
Of him who never can forget! 



TO LESIUA. 



I. 
uesbia! since far from you I've ranged, 

Our souls with fond affection glow not: 
you say 'tis I, not you, have changed, 

I'd tell why,— but yet I know not. 
o. 
Four polish'd brow no cares have crost; 

And, Lesbia! we are not much older, 
Since trembling first my heart I Inst, 

Or told my love, with hope grown bolder. 

'■i. 

Sixteen was then our utmost age, 

Two years have lingering past away, love! 
And now new thoughts our minds encage. 

At least I feel disposed to stray, love 1 
4. 
'Tis I that am alone to blame, 

I, that am guilty of love's treason; 
Since your sweet breast is still the same, 

Caprice must be my only reason. 
5. 
I do not, love! suspect your truth, 

With jealous doubt my bosom heaves not; 
Warm was the passion of my youth, 

One trace of dark deceit it leaves not. 

0. 
No, no, my flame was not pretended, 

For, oh! I loved you most sincerely; 
And — though our dream at last is ended — 

My bosom still esteems you dearly. 
7. 
No more we meet in yonder bowers; 

Absence has made me prone to roving; 
But older, firmer hearts than ours 

Have found monotony in loving. 

8. 
Your cheek's soft bloom is unimpair'd. 

New beauties still are daily bright'uing, 
Your eye for conquest beams prepared, 

The forge of love's resistless lightning. 

9. 

Arm'd thus, to make their bosoms bleed, 
Many will throng to sigh like me, love! 

More constant they may prove, indeed : 
Fonder, alas! they ne'er can be, love! 



LINES ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG LADY. 

Astheau'hnr iras discharging hil pistols in a garden, two ladies passing 
alarmed by the sound of a bullet hissing near then* 
to one of w horn the following ttuBu were addressed the next murn'rg 
1. 

Doubtless, sweet girl, the hissing lead, 
Wafting destruction o'er thy charms, 

And hurtling o'er thy lovely bead, 
Has fill'd that breast with fond alarnu 

Surely some envious dl men's force, 

Vex'd to behold such beauty here, 
Impel I'd tli,' bullet's viewless course, 

Diverted from its first career. 
3. 
Yes. in that nearly fatal hour 

The ball obey'd some hell born guide 
But Heaven, with interposing power 

In pity turn'd tire death aside. 

4. 

Y( t. as perrhanre one trembling tear 

Upon that thrilling bosom fell; 
Which I, th' unconscious cause of fe&, 

Extracted from its glistening cell: 
5. 
Pay, what dire penance can atone 

For such an outrage done to thee? 
Atraign'd before thy beauty's throne, 

What punishment wilt thou decree? 
G. 
Might I perform the judge's part, 

The sentence I should scarce deplon? : 
It only would restore a heart 

Which but bclong'd to thee before. 

•> The least atonement I can make 
Is to become no lonser free; 
Henceforth l breathe but fir thy sake 
Thou shalt be all in all to me. 
8. 
Hut thou, perhaps, mayst now reject 

Such expiation of my guilt: 
Come then, some other mode elect; 
Let it be death, or what thou wilt. 
9. 
Choose then, relentless! and I swear 

Nattght shall thy dread decree prevent- 
Yet hold— one little word fnrbear! 
Let it be aught hut banishment. 



LOVE'S LAST ADIEU. 
"Att r5', au /it <ptvyti." 

Jinacreon 
1. 
Tiik roses of love clad the garden of life. 

Though nurtured 'mid weeds dropping pestilent dew 
Till Time crops the leaves with unmerciful knife, 
Or prunes them for ever in love's last adieu I. 
'J. 
In vain with endearments we soothe the sad hran. 

In vain do we vo,w for an ace to be true; 
The chance of an hour may command us to pail. 
Or death disunite us in love's la.-t adieu! 
3. 
Still Hope, breathing peace through the grief-swih'eo 
breast, 
Wi!t whisper, "Our meeting we yet may ren*w 



728 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



With this dream of deceit hall oar sorrow's represt, 

Nor taste we the poison o!" hue's last adieu I 
4. 
ph! mark you yon pair: in the sunshine of youth 
Love twined round their childhood his (lowers as 
they grew ; 
Tliey flourish awhile in the season of truth, 
Till chill'd by the winter of love's last ailieu! 

Bweet lady I why thus doth a tear Bteal its way 

Down a cheeK which outrivals thy bosom in hue? 
JTel why do I ask? to distraction a prey. 

Thy reason has perish'd With love's last adieu! 
(i. 

Oh! who is yon misanthrope, shunning mankind 1 
From cities to caves of the forest lie flew: 

There, raving, he how is his complaint to the wind; 
The mountains reverberate hue's last adieu I 

Now hate rules a heart which in love's easy chains 

Once pas-ion's tumultuous blandishments knew; 
Despair now inflames the dark tide of his veins; 

He ponders in frenzy on loves last adieu! 
8. 
How he envies the wretch with a soul wrapt in steel 

His pleasures are scarce, yet his troubles are few, 
Who laughs at the pang that he never can feel, 

And dreads not the angui3h of love's last adieu! 
9. 
Youth flies, life decays, even hope is o'ercast; 

No more with love's former devotion we sue: 
He spreads his young wing, he retires with the blast; 

The shroud of affection is love's last adieu 1 
10. 
In this life of probation for rapture divine, 

Astrea* declares that some penance is due; 
From him who has worshipped at love's gentle shrine, 

The ate cement is ample in love's last adieul 
11. 
Who kneels to the god on iiis altar of light 

Must myrtle and cypress alti rnately strew: 
His myrtle, an emblem of purest delight ; 

His cypress, the garland of love's last adieu! 



IMITATION OF TIBULLUS. 

"Sulpiciaad Cerinthnm.''— Et'4. Quart. 
CRUEL Cerinthus! does the fell disease 
Which racks my breast your fickle bosom please? 
Alas! I wish'd but to o'ercome the pain. 
That I might live for love and you again: 
But now I scarcely shall bewail my fate: 
By death alone I can avoid your hate. 



TRANSLATION FROM HORACE. 

ODE 3, LIB. 3. 
1. 

The man of firm and noble soul 
No factious clamours can control; 
jve threat'ning tyrant's darkling brow 

Can swerve him from his just intent: 

Uaiee the warring waxes which plough, 

H> Atister on the billows spent, 
To curb the Adriatic main, 
Would awe his ftx'd determined mind in 



• The fiodiK** cf J us' ice. 



Ay, and the red right arm of Jove, 
Hurtling his lightnings from above. 
With all his terrors then unfurl'd, 

He would unmoved, unawed behold: 
The dames of an expiring world, 

Again in crashing chaos roll'd, 
In vasl promiscuous ruin hurl'd, 
Might light his glorious funeral pile: 
Hill dauntless midst the wreck of earth he'd smile 



FUGITIVE PIECES. 



ANSWER TO POME F.LEGANT VERSES SENT BY 
A FRIEND TO THE AUTHOR, COMPLAINING 
THAT ONE OF HIS DESCRIPTIONS WAS RA 
THER TOO WARMLY DRAWN. 

" Rut if an old lady, knight, print, or | l.ysician, 
Should condemn me for printing a s< cond • 
If _- "! Madam Squiiilum my work should abuse, 
May 1 venture to give her a smack of my nnise ?» 

• .You Bath Guide, p. 169. 

Candoir compels me, Pecher ! to commend 
The verse which blends the censor with the friend. 
Your strong, yet just, reproof extorts applause 
From me. the heedless and imprudent cause. 
For this wild error which pervades my strain, 
I sue inr pardon,— must. I sue in vain? 
Th.: wise sometimes from Wisdom's ways depart; 
Can youth then hush the dictates of the heart? 
Precepts of prudence curb, but can't control, 
'I'm' fierce emotions of the flowing soul. 

When love's delirium haunts the glowing mind, 
Limping Decorum lingers far behind: 
Vainly the dotard mends her prudish pace, 
Outstrip! and vanquish'd in the mental chase. 
The young, the old, have worn the chains of love. 
Let those who ne'er confined my lay reprove: 
Let those whose souls contemn the pleasing power 
Their censures on the hapless victim shower. 
Ohl how I hate the nerveless, frigid song, 
The ccasel iss echo of the rhyming throng, 
W'lmse labour'd lines in chilling numbers flow. 
To paint a pang the author ne'er can knowi 
The artless Helicon I boast is youth; — 
My lyre, the heart; my muse, the simple truth. 
Far be't from me the "virgin's mind" to "taint.' 
deduction's dread is here no slight restraint. 
The maid whose virgin breast is void of guile 
Whose wishes dimple in a modest smile. 
Whose downcast eye disdains the wanton leer, 
Firm in her virtue's strength, yet not severe — 
She whom a conscious grace shall thus refine 
Will ne'er Ije "tainted" by a strain of mine. 
But for the nymph whose premature desires 
Torment the bosom with unholy fires, 
No net to snare her willing heart is spread; 
She would have fallen, though she ne'er had reaa 
For me, 1 fain would please the chosen few, 
Whose souls, to feiling and to nature true, 
Will spare the childish verse, and not destroy 
The light effusions of a heedless boy. 

1 seek not glory from the senseless crowd ; 
Of fancied laurels I shall ne'er be proud; 
Their wannest plaudits 1 would scarcely prize, 
Their sneers or censures I alike despise. 

November 26, 1806. 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



729 



ON a CHANGE OF MASTERS AT A GREAT 
PUBLIC SCHOOL. 
Where are those honours, Ida I once your own, 
When Probus fiil'd your magisterial throne? 
As ancient Rome, lasl falling to disgrace, 
Ilaild a barbarian in her Catsar's place, 
So you, degenerate, share as hard a fate, 
And seat Pomposus where your Probus sate. 
Of narrow brain, yet of a narrower soul, 
Pomposus holds you iii his harsh control; 
Pomposus, by no social virtue eway'd, 
With Aorid jargon, and with vain parade; 
With noisy nonsense, and new-fangled rules, 
Such as were ne'er before enforced in schools 
Mistaking pedantry for learning's laws, 
He governs, sunction'd hut by self-applause. 
With him the same dire fate attending R me, 
Ill-fated Ida I soon must stamp your doom: 
Like her o'erthrown, for ever lost to fame. 
No trace of science Left you hut the name. 

July, 1805. 



CHILDISH RECOLLECTIONS. 

" I cannot but remember such things were, 
And were most dc\r to me." 

When slow Disease, with all her host of pains, 
Chills the warm tide which flows along the veins; 
When Health, affrighted, spreads her rosy wing, 
Ami Hi. s with every changing gale of spring; 
Not to thi> aching frame alone confined, 
Unyielding pangs assail the drooping mind: 
What grisly forms, the spectre-train of woe, 
Bid shuddering Nature shrink beneath the blow, 
With Resignation wage relentless strife, 
While Hope retires appall'd and clings to life. 
Yet less the pang when through the tedious hour 
Remembrance sheds around her genial power, 

Calls hark the vanish'd days to rapture given, 

When love was bliss, and Beauty form'd our heaven ; 
Or, dear to youth, portrays each childish scene, 
Those fairy liowers, where all in turn have been. 
As when through clouds that pour the summer storm 
The orb of day unveils his distant form, 
flilds with t'aiut beams the crystal dews of rain, 

And dimly twinkles o'er the watery plain; 
Thus, while the future dark and cheerless gleams, 
The sun of memory, glowing through my dreams, 
Though sunk the radiance of his former blaze, 
To scenes far distant prints his paler rays; 
Still rules my senses with unbounded sway, 
The past confounding With the present day. 

Oft does my heart indulge the rising thought, 
Which still recurs, unlook'd for and unsought; 
My soul to Fancy's fend suggestion yields, 
Am\ reams romantic oV.' her airy fields; 
Scenes of my youth, develop'd, crowd to view, 
To which I long have hade a last adieu! 
Seats of delight, inspiring youthful themes; 
Friends lost to me for aye except in dreams; 
Some who in marble prematura ly sleep, 
Whose forms I now remember but to weep; 

Some who yet urge the same scholastic course 
Of early science, future fame the source; 

Who, still contending in the studious race, 

In quirk rotation till the Senior place! 

These with a thousand visions now unite, 

To dazzle, though they please, my aching sight. 

Ida! blest spot where her reign, 

How Joyou I ioin'd thy youthful train! 

3 1' 97 



Bright in idea gleams thy lofty spire, 
Again 1 mingle with thj playful quire; 

Our tricks of mischief, every childish game, 

Unchanged by tin r distance, seem the same; 

Through winding paths, along the glade, 1 trace 

Tin- social smile of ev'ry welcome face; 

My wonted haunts, my scenes of joy and woe, 

Each early boyish friend or youthful foe, 

Dor t'euis dissolved, lut not my friendship past: — 

I bless the former, and forgive the last 

Hours of my youth! when, nurtured in my breast. 

To love a stranger, friendship made me blest: — 

Friendship, the dear peculiar bond of youth, 

When every artless bosom throbs with truth; 

til by wor>'.\y wisdom how to feign, 
And check each impulse with prudential rein; 
When all we feel, our honest souls disclose — 
lu love to friends, in open hate to tors; 

IVjb varnish'd tales the lips of youth repeat, 

No dear-bought knowledge purchased by deceit. 

Hypocrisy, the gift of lengthen'd years, 

Matured by age, the garb of prudence wears. 

When now III" boy is ripen'd into man, 

ilis careful sire chalks forth some wary plan ; 

Instructs his son from candour's path to shrink, 

Smoothly to speak, and cautiously to think; 

Still to assent, and never to deny — 

A patron's praise can well reward the lie: 

And who, when Fortune's warning voire is heard, 

Would lose his opening prospects for a word? 

Although against that word his heart rebel, 

And truth, indignant, all his bosom swell. 

Away with themes like this' lol mine the task 
From Battering fiends to tear the hateful mask; 

I. el keener bards delight in satiie's sting; 
My fancy soars not on Detraction's wing: 
'luce, and bul one.', she aini'd a deadly blow- 
To hurl defiance on a secret foe; 
But when that foe, from feeling or from shnmw. 
The cause unknown, yet still to me the same, 
Warn'd by some friendly hint, perchance, retired. 
With this submission all her rage expired. 
From dreaded pangs that feeble foe to save, 
She hush'd her young resentment, and forgave; 
Or, if my muse a pedant's portrait drew, 
Pomposus' virtues are but known to few: 

1 never fear'd the young usurper's nod. 
And be who wields must sometimes feel the rod 
If since on (,'ranta's failings, known to all 
Who share the converse of a college hall, 
sin' sometimes trifled in a lighter strain, 

T is past, and thus she will not sin ai-ain. 
Soon must her early song for ever cease. 
And all may rail when I shall rest in peace. 

Here flrsl remember'd he the joyous hand 
Who hail'd me chief, obedient to command; 

Who joined with me ill every boyish sport — 

Their iirst adviser, and their last resort; 

Nor shrunk beneath the upstart pedant's frown. 

or all the sable glories of his gown; 

Who, thus transplanted from his father's school 

Unfit to govern, ignoranl of rule — 

Succeeded him whom all unite to praise, 

Tin- dear preceptor of my early days; 

Probus, the pride of science, and the boast, 

To Ida now, alas! for ever lost. 

Wiih hon I'-r yean we Bearch'd the classic pops, 

And fear'd the master, though we loved the sag* 

Retired at la i j el pi ncefui ••rat 

I ainmg's labour is tie bleit ret I eat 



no 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Pompnsus fills his magisterial chair; 
Pompoaua governs, — but, my muse, forbear: 
Contempt, in silence, lie the pedant's lot; 
[lis nam.' and precepts be alike forgot; 

his mention shall my verse degrade, 
T'> him my tribute is already paid. 

High, thro' those elms with hoary branches crown'd, 
Pair Ida's bower adorns the landscape round; 
There Science, from her favour'd scat, surveys 
The vale where rural Nature claims her praise; 
To her awhile resigns her youthful train, 
Who move in joy, and dance along the plain; 
In scattered groups each favour'd haunt pursue; 
Repeat old pastimes, and discover new; 
Flush'd with bis rays, beneath the noontide sun, 
In rival bands between the wickets run. 
Drive o'er the sward the ball with active force, 
Or chase with nimble feet its rapid course. 
Hut Ihese with slower steps direct their way 
Where Brent's cool waves in limpid currents stray; 
While yonder few search out some green retreat, 
And arbours shade them from the summer heat: 
Others again, a pert and lively crew, 
Some rough and thoughtless stranger placed in view, 
With frolic quaint their antic jests expose, 
And tease the grumbling rustic as he goes ; 
Nor rest with this, but many a passing fray 
Tradition treasures for a future day: 
"'Twas here the gather'd swains for vengeance fought, 
Ami here we earn'd the conquest dearly bought; 
Here have We tied before superior might, 
And here renew'd the wild tumultuous right." 
While thus our souls with early passions swell. 
In lingering tones resounds the distant bell; 
Th' allotted hour of daily sport is o'er, 
And Learning beckons from her temple's door. 
No splendid tablets grace her simple hall, 
But ruder records till the dusky wall; 
There, deeply carved, behold ! each tyro's name 
Secures its owner's academic fame; 
Here mingling view the names of sire and son — 
The one long graved, the other just begun ; 
These shall survive alike whet, son and sire 
Beneath one common stroke of fate expire : 
Perhaps their last memorial these alone, 
Denied in death a monumental stone. 
Whilst to the gale in mournful cadence wave 
The sighing weeds that hide their nameless gr?"t. 
And here my name, and many an early friend's, 
Along the wall in lengthen'd line extends. 
Though still our deeds amuse the youthful race. 
Who tread our steps, and fill our former place, 
Who young obey'd their lords in silent awe, 
Whose nod commanded, and whose voice was law, 
And now in turn possess the reins of power, 
To rule the little tyrants of an hour; — 
Though sometimes with the tales of ancient day 
They pass the dreary win tele's eve away — 
" And thus our former rulers stemm'd the tide, 
And thus they dealt the combat side by side; 
Jus! ir, this piacc the mouldering walls they scaled, 
Noi bolts nor bars against their strength avail'd; 
Here I'robus came, the rising fray to quell. 
And here he falter'd forlh his last farewell; 
Anil lure one riiirlit abroad they dared to roam, 
While bold I'oinposus bravely stay'd at home;" — 
While th is they speak, the hour must soon arrive, 
Win m names ..| these, like ours, alone survive 



Vet a few years, one general wreck will whelm 
The faint remembrance of our fairy realm. 

Dear honest race, though now we meet no more, 
due la>t long look on what we were before — 
Our lirst kind greetings, and our last adieu — 
Drew tears from eyes unused to weep with you. 
Through splendid circles, fashion's gaudy world, 
Where folly's glaring standard waves unfiirl'd, 
I plunged to drown in noise my fond regret, 
And all 1 sought or Imped was to forget. 
Vain wish! if chance some w ellrcineiiiber'd face, 
Some old companion of my early race, 
Advanced to claim his friend with honest joy, 
, my heart proclaim'd me slill a boy ; 
The glittering scene, the fluttering groups around, 
Were quite forgotten when my friend was found; 
The smiles of beauty — (for, alas! I've known 
What 'tis to bend before Love's mighty throne)— 
The smiles of beauty, though those smiles were den; 
CoUld hardly charm me when that friend was near' 
My thoughts bewilder'd in the fond surprise, 
Thi' woods of Ida danced before my eyes; 
I saw the sprightly wanderers pour along, 
I saw and join'd again the joyous throng; 
Panting, again I traced her lofty grove, 
Vud friendship's feelings triumph'd over love. 

Vet why should I alone with such delight 
Retrace the circuit of my former flight? 
Is there no cause beyond the common claim 
Endear'd to all in childhood's very name? 
Ah! sure some stronger impulse vibrates here, 
"Which whispers friendship will be doubly dear 
To one who thus for kindred hearts must roain, 
And seek abroad the love denied at home. 
Those hearts, dear Ida, have I found in thee — 
A home, a world, a paradise to me. 
Stern death forbade my orphan youth to share 
The tender guidance of a father's care: 
Can rank, or e'en a guardian's name, supply 
The love which glistens in a father's eye? 
For this can wealth or title's sound atone, 
.Made by a parent's early loss my own? 
What brother springs a brother's love to seek? 
What sister's gentle Lias has prest my cheek? 
For mo how dull the vacant moments rise, 
To no fond bosom Unk'd by kindred ties! 
Oft in the progrjsi of some fleeting dream 
Pi eternal smiLs collected round me seem; 
While still tlio viaions to my heart are prest, 
The voice of love will murmur in ray rest: 
I hear— 1 wake— and in the sound rejoice; 
I hear again — but ah! no brother's voice. 
A hermit, 'midst of crowds, I fain must sir j , 
Alone, though thousand pilgrims fill the r&/\ 
While these a thousand kindred wreatfc? ejil'Mn'j, 
I cannot call one single blossom n-itie: 
What then remains? in solitude to £r.'«.i. 
To mix in friendship or to sigh alone? 
Thus must I cling to some endearing hand. 
And none more dear than Ida'b toual band. 

Aloii7,o! best and dearest of my friends, 
Thy name ennobles him who thus commends; 
From this fond tribute thou canst gain no praise 
The praise is his who now that tribute pays. 
Oh! in the promise of thy early youth, 
If hope anticipate the words of truth, 
Some loftier bard shall sing thy glorious name, 
To build his own upon thy deathless fame. 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



731 



Friend of my heart, and foremost of the list 

Of those with whom I lived supremely blest, 

Oft have we drain'd the font of ancient lure; 

Though drinking deeply, thirsting still the more. 

Vet when confinement's lingering hour was done, 

Our sports, our studies, and our souls were one: 

fogether we impell'd the flying hall; 

Together waited in our tutor's hall; 

Together join'd in cricket's manly toil, 

Or shared the produce of the river's spoil ; 

Or plunging from the green declining shore, 

<> ir pliant limbs the buoyant billows bore; 

In every element, unchanged, the same, 

All, all that brothers should be but the name. 

Nor yet are you forgot, my jocund boy ! 
Davos, the harbinger of childish joy ; 
For ever foremost in the ranks of fun, 
The laughing herald of the harmless pun; 
Yet with a breast of such materials made — 
Anxious to please, of pleasing half afraid; 
Candid and liberal, with a heart of Bteel 
In danger's path, though not untaught to feel. 
Still I remember in the factious strife 
The rustic's musket aim'd against my life: 
High poised in air the massy weapon hung, 
A cry of horror burst from every tongue; 
Whilst I, in combat with another foe, 
Fought on, unconscious of th' impending blow; 
Your arm, brave boy, arrested his career — 
Forward you sprung, insensible to fear; 
Disarm'd and baffled by your conquering hand, 
The grovelling savage roll'd upon the sand: 
An act like this can simple thanks repay? 
Or all the labours of a grateful lay? 
Oh no! whene'er my breast forgets the deed, 
That instant, Davos, it deserves to bleed. 

Lycus! on me thy claims are justly great: 
Thy milder virtues could my muse relate, 
To thee alone, unrivall'd, would belong 
The feeble efforts of my lengthen'd song. 
Well canst thou boast to load in senates fit— 
A Spartan firmness with Athenian wit: 
Though yet in embryo these perfections shine, 
Lycus! thy father's fame will soon be thine. 
Where learning nurtures the superior mind, 
What may we hope from genius thus refined! 
When time at length matures tiiv growing years, 
How wilt thou tower above thy fellow peers I 
Prudence and sense, a spirit bold and free, 
With honour's soul, united beam in thee. 

Shall fair Eoryai.cs pass by unsung? 
From ancient lineage, not unworthy, sprung: 
What though one sad distention bade us part, 
That name is yet embalm'd within my heart; 
Yet at the mention does that heart rebound, 
And palpitate responsive to the sound. 
Envy dissolved our ties, and not our will: 
We once were friends,— I'll think we are so still. 
A form unmatch'd in nature's partial mould, 
A heart untainted, we in thee behold: 
Yet not the senate's thunder thou shalt wield, 
Nor seek for glory in the tented Held ; 
To minds of ruder texture these be given— 
Thy soul shall nearer soar it* native heaven. 
Haply in polish'd courts might be thy seat, 
lint that thy tongue could never forge deceit; 
The eourtier'S supple bow and sneering smile, 
The (low of compliment, the slippery wile, 



Would make that breast with indignation burn, 
And all tin; glittering snares to tempt thee spurn. 
Domestic happiness will stamp thy fate; 
Sacred to love, unclouded e'er by hate; 
The world admire thee, and thy friends adore; 
Ambition's slave alone would toil for more. 

Now last, but nearest of the social band, 
See honest, open, generous Cleon stand; 
With scarce one speck to cloud the pleasing scene. 
No vice degrades that purest soul serene. 
On the same day our studious race begun, 
On the same day our studious race was run ; 
Thus side by side we pass'd our first career, 
Thus side by side we strove for many a year; 
At last concluded our scholastic life, 
We neither conquer'd in the classic strife; 
As speakers each supports an equal name, 
And crowds allow to each a partial fame: 
To soothe a youthful rival's early pride, 
Though (.'Icon's candour would the palm divide, 
Yet candour's self compels me now to own 
Justice awards it to my friend alone. 

Oh! friends regretted, scenes for ever dear, 
Remembrance hails you with her warmest tear I 
Drooping, she bends o'er pensive Fancy's urn, 
To trace the hours which never can return ; 
Yet with the retrospection loves to dwell, 
And soothe the sorrows of her last farewell I 
Yet greets the triumph of my boyish mind. 
As infant laurels round my head were twined 
When Probus' praise repaid my lyric song, 
Or placed me higher in the studious throng, 
Or when my first harangue received applause, 
His sage instruction the primeval cause, 
What gratitude to him my soul possest, 
While hope of dawning honours fill'd my breast I 
For all my humble fame, to him alone 
The praise is due, who made that fame my own. 
Oh! could I soar above these feeble lays, 
These young effusions of my early days, 
To him my muse her noblest strain would give: 
The song might perish, bit the theme must live. 
Vet why for him the needless verse essay? 
His honour'd name requires no vain display: 
Iiy every son of grateful Ida blest, 
It finds an echo in each youthful breast; 
A fame beyond the glories of the proud, 
Or all the plaudits of the venal crowd. 

Ida, not yet exhausted is the theme, 
Nor closed the progress of my youthful dream. 
How many a friend deserves the grateful strain, 
What scenes of childhood still unsung remain I 
Yet let me hush this echo of the past, 
This parting song, the dearest and the last; 
And brood in secret o'er those hours of joy, 
To me a silent and a sweet employ. 
Hut thou my generous youth, whose tender years 
Are near my own, whose worth my heart reveirS 
Henceforth affection sweetly thus began, 
Shall Join our bosoms and our souls in one; 
Without thy aid, no glory shall be mine; 
Without thy dear advice, no great design ; 
Alike through life esteem'd, thou godlike boy, 
In war my bulwark, and in peace my joy." 

To him Euryaltis: — "No day shall shame 
The risinj glories which from this I claim 
Fortune may favour, or the skies may frown 
But valour, suite of fate, obtains renown. 



732 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Vet, ere from hence our eager steps depart, 

One boon I beg, the nearest to my heart: 

My mother, sprung from Priam's royal line, 

Like thine ennobled, hardly less divine,^ 

Not Troy nor king Acestes' realms restrain 

Her feeble age from dangers of the main; 

Alone she came, all Belfisli fears above, 

A bright example <>f maternal love. 

Unknown the secret enterprise l brave, 

Lest grief should bend my parent to the grave; 

Prom this alone no fond mlieus 1 seek, 

No fainting mother's lips have press'd my check; 

By gloomy night and thy right ham! I vow 

Her parting tears would shake my purpose now: 

Do thou, my prince, her failing age sustain, 

In thee her much-loved child may live again; 

Her dying hours with pious conduct liless, 

Assist her wants, relieve her fond distress. 

So dear a hope must all my soul inflame, 

To rise in glory, or to fall in fame." 

Struck with a filial care so deeply felt, 

In tears at once the Trojan warriors melt: 

Faster than all, lulus' eyes o'erllow ; 

Such love was his, and such had been his woe. 

"All thou hast ask'd, receive," the prince replied; 

"Nor this alone, hut many a gift beside. 

To cheer thy mother's years shall he my aim, 

Creusa's* style but wanting to the dame. 

Fortune an adverse wayward course may run, 

But bless'd thy mother in so dear a son. 

Now, by my life!— my sire's most sacred oath— 

To thee I pledge my full, my firmest troth, 

All the rewards which once to thee were vow'd, 

If thou shouldst fall, on her shall he bestow*d." 

Thus spoke the weeping prince, then forth to view 

A gleaming falchion from the sheath he drew; 

J.vcaon's utmost skill had graced the steel, 

For friends to envy and for foes to feel; 

A tawny hide, the Moorish lion's spoil, 

Slain 'mid the forest, in the hunter's toil, 

Mnestheus to guard the elder youth bestows, 

And old Alethca' casque, defends his brows. 

Arm'd thence they go, while all th' assembled train, 

To aid their cause, implore the gods in vain. 

More than a hoy, in wisdom and in grace, 

lulus holds amid the chiefs his place: 

His prayer he sends; hut what can prayers avail, 

Lost in the murmurs of the sighing gale! 

The trench is pass'd, and, favour'd by the night, 
Through sleeping foes they wheel their wary flight. 
When shall the sleep of many a foe he o'er? 
Alas! some slumber who shall wake no more! 
Chariots and bridles, mix'd with arms, are seen; 
And flowing flasks, and scatter'd troops between: 
Bacchus and Mars to rule the camp combine; 
A mingled chaos this of war and wine. 
"Now," cries the first, "for deeds of blood prepare, 
With me the conquest and the labour share: 
Her.; lies our path; lest any hand arise, 
Watch thou, while many a dreaming chieftain dies: 
I'll carve our passage through the heedless foe. 
And clear thy road with many a deadly blow." 
His whispering accents then the youth repress'*!, 
And piereed proud l'.hamnes through his panting breast 
Btretch'd at his ease, th' incautious king reposed; 
Debauch, and not fatigue, his eyes had closed: 
To Turnus dear, a prophet and a prince, 
His omens more than augur's skill evince; 



I'm mother of Iu''n, lost on On' night when Troy itm taken. 



But he, who thus foretold the fate of all, 
Could not avert his own untimely fall. 
Next Remus' armour-bearer hapless fell, 
And three unhappy slaves the carnage swell: 
The charioteer along his courser's 
Expires, the steel his sever'd neck divides; 

And, la>t, his lord is nuuiber'd with the dead: 
Hounding convulsive, flies the gasping head ; 

From the Bwoli'n veins, the blackening torrents pour. 
Stain'd is the couch and earth with clotting gore. 
Young Lamyrus and Lamus next expire, 
Ale! gay Serranus, lill'd with youthful fire: 

Half the long night in childish games was pass'd; 

LtlU'd by the potent grape, he slept at last: 
Ah! happier far had he the morn survey'd, 
And till Aurora's dawn his skill display'd. 

In slaughter'd folds, the keepers lost in sleep, 
His hungry fangs a lion thus may steep; 
Mid the sad flock, at dead of night, he prowls, 
With murder glutted, and in carnage rolls: 
Insatiate still, through teeming herds he roams; 
In seas of gore the lordly tyrant foams. 

Nor less the other's deadly vengeance came, ' 

But falls on feeble crowds without a name: 
His wound unconscious Fadus scarce can feel, 
Vet wakeful Rhssus sees the threatening steel. 
His coward breast behind a jar he hides, 
And vainly in the weak defence confides; 
Full in his heart, the falchion search'd his veins, 
The reeking weapon hears alternate stains; 

Through wine and hi 1, commingling as they flow 

One feeble spirit seeks the shades below. 

Now where Mcssapus dwelt they bend their way, 

Whose fire emits a faint and trembling ray; 

There, unconfin'd, behold each grazing stei d, 

Unwatch'd, unheeded, on the herbage feed; 

Brave Nisus here arrests his comrade's arm, 

Too flush'd with carnage-, and with conquest warm :— 

"Hence let us haste, the dangerous path is pass'd; 

Full foes enough to-night have breathed their last' 

Soon will the day those eastern clouds adorn ; 

Now let us speed, nor tempt the rising morn." 

What silver arms, with various art emboss'd, 
What bowls and mantles in confusion toss'd, 
They leave regardless! yet one glittering prize 
Attracts the younger hero's wandering eyes; 
The gilded harness Rhamnes' coursers fit, 
The gems which stud the monarch's golden belt? 
This from the pallid corse wa« quickly torn, 
Once by a line of former chieftains worn. 
Th' exulting boy the studded girdle wears, 
Messapus' helm his head in triumph bears; 
Then from the tents their cautious steps they bend, 
To seek the vale where safer paths extend. 

Just at this hour a band of Latian hor?H 
To Turnus' camp pursue their destined course: 
While the slow foot their tardy march delay, 
The knights, impatient, spur along the way: 
Three hundred mail-clad men, by Volscens led, 
To Turnus with their master's promise sped; 
Now they approach the trench, and view the walls. 
When, on the left, a light reflection falls; 
The plunder'd helmet, through the waning' night, 
Sheds forth a silver radiance, glancing bright. 
Volscens with question loud the pair alarms :— 
"Stand, stragglers! stand! why early thus in arms? 
From whence, to whom?"— He meets with no repiy. 
Trusting the covert of the night, thev fly ; 



HOURS OF IDLENESS. 



733 



ITie thicket's depth with hurried pace they tread, 
While round the wood the hostik. squadron spread. 

With brakes entangled, scarce a path between, 
Dreary and dark appears the sylvan scene: 
Enryalua his heavy spoils impede, 
The boughs and winding turns his steps mislead; 
But Nisus scours along the forest's maze 
To where Latinus' steeds in safety graze, 
Then backward o'er the plain his eyes extend, 
On every side they serk his absent friend. 
"O God! my boy," he cries, "of me bereft, 
In what impending perils ait thou left!" 
Listening he runs — above tlie waving trees, 
Tumultuous voices swell the passing in 
The war-cry rises, thundering hoofs around 
Wake the dark echoes of the trembling ground. 
Again he turns, of footsteps hears the noise; 
The sound elates, the sight his hope destroys: 
The hapless boy a ruffian train surround. 
While lengthening shales his weary way confound; 
Him with loud shouts the furious knights pursue, 
Struggling in vain, a captive to the crew. 
What can his friend 'gainst thronging numbers dare ? 
Ah! must he rush, his comrade's fate to share? 
What force, what aid, what stratagem essay, 
Back to redeem the Latian spoiler's prey ? 
His life a votive ransom nobly give. 
Or die with him for whom he wish'd to live? 
Poising with strength his lifted lance on high. 
On Luna's orb he casts his frenzied eye: — 
'"Goddess serene, transcending every star! 
Queen of the sky whose beams are seen afar! 
By night heaven owns thy sway, by day the grove. 
When, as chaste Dian, here thou deign'st to rove; 
If e'er myself, or sire, have sought to grace 
Thine altars with the produce of the chase, 
Speed, speed my dart to pierce yon vaunting crowd, 
To free my friend, and scatter far the proud." 
Thus having said, the hissing dart lie flung ; 
Through parting shades the hurtling weapon sung; 
The thirsty point in Sulmo's entrails lay, 
Transfix'd his heart, and stretch'd him on the clay: 
He sobs, he dies, — the troop in wild amaze, 
Unconscious whence the death, with horror gaze. 
While pale they stare, through Tagus' temples riven, 
A second shaft with equal force is driven: 
Fierce Volscens rolls around his lowering eyes; 
Veil'd by the night, secure the Trojan lies. 
Burning with wrath, he view'd his soldiers fall. 
"Thou youth accurst, thy life shall pay for all!" 
Quick from the sheath his flaming glaive he drew, 
And, raginu, on the boy defenceless tlew. 
Nisus no more the blackening shade conceals. 
Forth, forth he starts, and all his love reveals; 
Aghast, confused, his fears to madness rise. 
And pour these accents, shrieking as he flies: 
"Me, me— your vengeance hurl on me alone; 
Here sheathe the steel, my blood is all your own. 
Ye starry spheres! thou conscious Heaven! attest! 
He could not — durst not — In! the guile confeat] 
All, all was mine, — his early fair suspend; 
He only loved too well his hapless friend: 
Spare, spare, ye chiefs! from him your ra?e remove; 
Ilis fault was friendship, all his crime was love." 
He pray'd in vain; the dark assassin's sword 
Pierced the fair side, the snowy bosom gored; 

Lowly to earth inclines his plu :1a I crest, 

And sanguine torrents mantle o'er his breast: 
As some young rose, wh tnts the air, 

(Languid in death, expires beneath the share; 
3p2 



Or crimson poppy, Fiukjng with the shower, 

gently, fall- .. fading flower; 
Thus, sweetly drooping, beni big lovely head, 
And lingering beauty hovers rouud ti.c dead. 

But fiery Nisus stem*- the battle's tide, 
Revenge Ins leader, and despair his guide; 
Volscens he seeks amid the gathering host, 
Voted us must soon appease his comrade's ghost; 
Steel, flashing, pours on steel, foe crowds on foui 
Rage nerves his arm, fate gleams in every blow; 
in vain beneath unnumber'd wounds he bleeds, 
Nor wounds, nor death, distracted Nisus heeds; 
In viewless circles wheel'd, his falchion flies, 
Nor quits the hero's grasp till Volscens dies; 
Deep in his throat its end the' weapon found, 
The tyrant's soul fled groaning through the wound. 
Thus Xisus all his fond affection proved — 
Dying, revenged the fate of bun he loved ; 
Then on his bosom BOUgbt Ilis wonted place. 
And death was heavenly in bis friend's embrace] 

Celestial pair! if aught my verse can claim, 
Wafted on Time's broad pinion, yours is famel 
Aires on ages shall your late admire, 
No future day shall see your names expire, 
While stands the Capitol, immortal dome! 
And vanquished millions hail their empress, Com';! 

ANSWER TO A BEAUTIFUL POEM, WRITTEN 
BY MONTGOMERY, AUTHOR OF "THE WAN 
DERER IX SWITZERLAND," &c. &c. ENTITLED 
"THE COMMON LOT." 
1. 
Montgomery ! true, the common lot 

Of mortals lies in Lethe's wave; 
Yet some shall never be forgot — 
Some shall exist beyond the grave, 
o, 
"Unknown the region of his birth," 

The hero* rolls the tide of war; 
Yet not unknown his martial worth, 
Wltich glares a meteor from afar. 
3. 
His joy or grief, his weal or woe, 
Perchance may 'scape the page of fame; 

Yet nations now unborn will know 
The- record of his deathless name. 
4. 
The patriot's and the poet's frame 

Musi share the C( non tomb of all: 

Their glory will not sleep the same; 
'l"i,il will arise though empires fall. 
5. 
The lustre of a beauty's eye 

Assumes the ghastly stare of death; 
The fair, the brave, the good must Jie, 
Ami sink the j awning grave beneath. 
C. 
OnO re the speaking eye revive**. 

Still beaming through the lover's strain* 
For Petrarch's Laura still survives: 

She died, but ne'er will die again 
7. 
The rolling seasons pass away, 

And Ti , untirimr. waves his wing; 

Whilst honour's laurels ne'er decay, 

Itut bloom ill fresh unfading spring. 



■ iculjr hem is here Vli li . oiti of ■lir.im, i«* 

moon, EUwtrd the Black Prim w ilbe ' ami of KM 

borough, Frederick' I Sweden. Ax. an Aoafl 

iartoeverj muct placea of their birth arakacosSl 

a very uuUI proportiaa. of tin ir aJunr<-n 



7M 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



8. 
All, nil must sleep in grim repose, 

Collected in the silent tomb; 
The old and yotfrig, with friends and foes, 

Festoring alike in shrouds, consume. 
9. 
The mouldering marble lasts its day, 

Jfel falls at length an useless fane; 
To ruin's ruthless fangs a prey, 

The wrecks of pillar'd pride remain. 
10. 
What though the sculpture be destroyed, 

From dark oblivion meant to cuard? 
A bright renown shall bo enjoy'd 

By those whose virtues claim reward. 
11. 
Then do not say the common lot 

Of all lies deep in Lethe's wave; 
Some few who ne'er will be forgot 

Shall burst the bondage of the grave. 



TO THE REV. J. T. BECHER. 
1. 
t'E\R Becher, you tell me to mix with mankind: 

I cannot deny such a precept is wise; 
Put retirement accords with the tone of my mind: 
I will not descend to a world I despise. 

Eid the senate or camp my exertions require, 

Ambition might prompt me, at once, to go forth; 
When infancy's years of probation expire. 
Perchance I may strive to distinguish my birth. 
3. 
The fire in the cavern of Etna conceal'd 

Still mantles unseen in its secret recess: 
At length in a volume terrific reveal'd. 
No torrent can quencli it, no bounds can repress. 
4. 
Oh! thus, the desire in my bosom for fame 

Bids me live but to hope for posterity's praise. 
Could I soar with the phoenix on pinions of flame, 
With him I w : ould wish to expire in the blaze. 
5. 
For the life of a Fox, of a Chatham the death, 
What censure, what danger, what woe would I 
brave ! 
Their lives did not end when they yielded their brcatli 
Their glory illumines the gloom of their grave. 
G. 
Yet why should I mingle in Fashion's full herd? 

Why crouch to her leaders, or cringe to her rules? 
Why bend to the proud, or applaud the absurd? 
Why search for delight in the friendship of fools? 
7. 
I have tasted the sweets and the bitters of love; 

In friendship I early was taught to believe; 
My passion the matrons of prudence reprove; 
1 have found that a friend may profess, yet deceive. 
8. 
1 o me what is wealth? it may pass in an hour, 
I.' tyrants prevail, or if Fortune should frown. 
To me what is title?— the phantom of power; 
To me what is fashion ?— I seek but renown. 
9. 
Otctit is a stranger as yet to my soul, 
l still am unpractised to varnish the truth; 



Then why should I live in a hateful control? 
Why waste upon folly the days of my youth? 



TO MIcS CHAWORTH. 
1. 
Oh! had my fate been join'd with thine, 
As once this pledge appear'd a token, 
These follies had not then been mine, 
For then my peace had not been broken. 

To thee these early faults I owe, 
To thee, the wise and old rewoving: 

Tie > Know my sins, but do not know 

'Twas thine to break the bonds of loving. 
3. 
For once my soul, like thine, was pure. 

And all its rising tires could smother; 
And now thy vows no more endure, 

BcStOW'd by thee upon another. 
4. 
Perhaps his peace I could destroy, 

And spoil the blisses that await him ; 
Yet let my rival smile in joy, 

For thy dear sake I cannot hate him. 
5. 
Ah! since thy angel form is gone, 

My heart no more can rest with any; 
But what it sought in thee alone, 

Attempts, alas! to find in many. 
6. 
Then fare thse well, deceitful maid, 

'Twere vain and fruitless to regret thee; 
Nor Hope, nor Memory, yield their aid, 

But Pride may teach me to forget thee. 

Yet all this giddy waste of years, 

This tiresome round of palling pleasures; 
These varied loves, these matron's fears, 

These thoughtless strains to Passion's measures' 
8. 
If thou wert mine, had all been hush'd: — 

This cheek, now pale from early riot, 
With Passion's hectic ne'er had flush'd, 

But bloom'd in calm domestic quiet. 
9. 
Yes, once the rural scene was sw?et, 

For Nature seem'd to smile before thee; 
And once my breast abhorr'd deceit, 

For then it beat but to adore thee. 
10. 
But now 1 seek fnr other joys; 

To think would drive my soul to madness; 
In thoughtless throngs and empty noise 

I conquer half my bosom's sadness. 
11. 
Yet, even in these a thought will steal, 

In spite of every vain endeavour; 
And fiend3 ntighl pity what 1 feel, 

To know that thou art lost for ever 



REMEMBRANCE. 

'Tis done!— I saw it in my dreams: 

No more with Hop" the future beams; 
My days of happiness are few: 

Chill'd by misfortune's wintry blast. 

My dawn of life is overcast, 

Love, Hope, and Joy, alike adieu! — 
Would I could add Remembrance too! 



806. 



(735) 



jfHtorrilttucoujs Itoenis, 



THE BLUES. 

A LITERARY ECLOGUE. 



" Nimium ne crele C0l0li. w — I'trg-'l. 
O trust not, ve beauiiful creatures, to hue, 
Though your hair were as red as your stocJii}igs are blue* 



ECLOGUE FIT. ST. 
London. — Before the Door of a Lecture Room. 
Enter Tracy, meeting I.nkel. 
Ink. You're loo late. 
Tra. Is it over ? 

Ink. Nor will he this hour. 

But the benches are cramm'd like a garden in flower, 
With the pride of our belles, who have made it the 

fashion ; 
So instead of "beaux arts," we may say "la belle pas- 
sion;" 
For learning, which lately has taken the lead in 
The world, and set all the fine gentlemen reading. 
Tra. I know it too well, and have worn out my 
patience 
With studying to study your new publications. 
There 's Vamp, Scamp, and Mouthy, and Wordswords 

and Co. 
With their damnable— 

Ink. Hold, my good friend, do you know 

Whom you speak to? 

Tra. Right well, boy, and so does " the Row ;" 

You're an author— a poet — 

Ink. And think you that I 

Can stand tamely in silence, to hear you decry 
The Muses? 

Tra. Excuse me ; I meant no offence 

To the Nine; though the number who make some pre- 
tence 
To their favours is such— but the subject to drop, 
I am just piping hot from a publisher's ship, 
(Next door to the pastry-cook's; so that when I 
Cannot find the new volume I wanted to buy 
On the bibliopole's Bhelves, it is only two paces, 
As one finds every author in one of those places,) 
Where I just had been skimming a charming critique, 
So studded with wit, and so sprinkled with Creek! 
Where your friend— you know who— lunl just got such 

a threshing, 
That is, as the phrase goes, extremely "refreshing." 
What a beautiful word ! 

/„/,-.' Very true; 'tis so soft 

And so cooling— they use it a little too oft; 
And the papers have got it at last— but no matter. 
So they've cut up our friend then I 

Tra. No' 'eft llilT1 a tatter— 

ot a ras of his present or past reputation, 

Which they call a disgrace to the ace and the nation. 

Ink. I'm sorry to heat this; for friendship, you 

know — 

Our poor friend I— but I thought it would terminate so. 

Out friendship Is such, I'll read nothing to shock it. 

you don't happen to have the Review iii your pocket? 

Tra. No; I left a round do/en of authors and others 



(Very sorry, no doubt, since the cause is a brothel'*) 
All scrambling and jostling, like so many imps. 
And on fire with impatience to get the next glimpse. 

Ink. Let us join them. 

Tra. What, won't you return to the lecture? 

ink. Why, the place is so crainrn'd, there 's not room 
for a spectre. 
Besides, our friend Scamp is to-day so absurd— 

Tra. How can you know that till you hear him? 

Ink. I heard 

Quite enough; and to till you the truth, my retreat 
Was from his vile nonsense, no less than the heat. 

Tra. I have had no great loss then ? 

Ink. Loss!— such a palaverl 

I'd inoculate sooner my wife with the slaver 
Of a do<; when iimic rabid, than listen two hours 
To the torrent id' trash Which around niin he pours, 
Pump'd up with such effort, disgorged with such labour. 

That come — do not make me speak ill of one's 

neighbour. 

Tra. I make you ! 

Ink. Ves, you! I said nothing until 
You compell'd me, by speaking the truth 

Tra. To speak Hit 

Is that your deduction? 

Ink. When speaking of Scamp, ill, 

I certainly follow, not set an example. 
The fellow's a fool, an impostor, a zany. ., 

Tra. And the crowd of today shows that one fool 
makes many. 
Rut we two will be wise. 

Ink. Pray, then, let us retire. 

Tra. I would, but 

Ink. There must be attraction much higher 

Than Scamp, or the Jews'-harp he nicknames his lyre, 
To call you to this hotbed. 

Tra. 
A fair lady 

Ink. A spinster? 

Tra. 

Ink. 
The heiress? 

Tra. The angel! 

Ink. The devil! why, man I 

Pray get out of this hobble as fast as you can. 
You wed with Miss Lilac! 't would be your perdition: 
She's a poet, a chymist, a mathematician. 

Tra. I say she 's an angel. 

Ink. Say rather an angle. 

If you and she marry, you'll certainly wrangle. 
I say she's a Blue, man, as blue as the ethet, 

Tra. And is that any cause for not coming together! 

Ink. Humph! I can't say I know any happy alliance 
Which has lately sprung up from a wedlock with 

science. 
She's so learned in all things, and fond of concern- 
in" 
Herself in all matters connected with learning. 

That 

Tra. What? 

Ink. I perhaps may as well hold my tongue i 

Hut there's five hundred people can tell you ycu *I» 
wrong. 



I own it— 't is true — 



Miss Lilac! 



The Blue I 



73G 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Tra. You forget Lady Lilac's as rich as a J(;w. 

Ink. l> it miss or the cash of mjHiinia you pursue? 

Tra. Why. Jack, III be firpirifwith you— something 
of both. 
riie girl s a fine *.''''• 

/,,/,-. And you feel nothing loth 

To lie~r good lady-mother's reversion; and yet 
Her life is as good as your own, I will bet. 

Tra. Let her live, and as long as she likes; I de- 
mand 
Nothing more than the heart of her daughter ami 
ham). 

Ink. Why, that heart's in the inkstand— that hand 
on the pen. 

Tra. Apropos — Will you write me a song now and 
then '.' 

Ink. To what purpose? 

Tra. You know, my dear friend, that in prose 
My talent is decent, as far as it goes; 
But in rhyme 

Ink, You're a terrible stick, to be sure. 

Tra. I own it; and yet, in these times, there's no lure 
For the heart of the fair like a stanza or two; 
And so, as I can't, will you furnish a few? 

Ink. In your name ? 

Tra. In my name. I will copy t'uem out, 

To slip into her hand at the very next rout. 

Ink. Are you so far advanced as to hazard this? 

Tra. Why, 

Do you think me Bubdued by a Blue-stocking's eye, 
Bo far as to tremble to tell her in rhyme 
What I've told her in prose, at the least, as sublime? 

Ink. As sublime! If it be so, no need of my Muse. 

Tra. Hut consider, dear lukel, she 's one oi the 
" Blues." 

Ink. As sublime! — IVTr. Tracy — I've nothing to say. 
Stick to prose — As sublime!! — but I wish you good 
day. 

Tra. Nay, stay, my dear fellow — consider — I 'm 
wrong: 

own it; but prithee, compose me the song. 

Ink. As sublime! ! 

Tra. I but used the expression in haste. 

Ink. That may be, Mr. Tracy, but shows dajnn'd 
bad taste. 

Tra. I own it— I know it — acknowledge it — what 
Can I say to you more ? 

Ink. I see what you'd be at: 

You disparage my parts with insidious abuse, 
Till you think you can turn them best to your own 
use. 

Tra. And is that not a sign I respect them ? 

Ink. Why that 

To be sure makes a difference. 

Tra. I know what is what; 

And you, who 're a man of the gay world, no less 
Than a poet of t'other, may easily guess 
That I never could mean by a word to offend 
A <ienius like you, and moreover my friend. 

Ink. No doubt; you by this time should know what 
is due 
'to a man of— but come — let us shake hands. 

Tra. You knew, 

And you know, my dear fellow, how heartily I, 
Whatever you publish, am ready to buy. 

/•.'.. That's my bookseller's business; I care not for 
sale; 
indeed the best poems at first rather fail. 
7'here wcr« Renegade's epics, and Botherby's plays, 
And my own grand romance 

Tra Had its full share of praise. 



I myself saw it puffd in the "Old Girl's Review." 

I,,';. What Review? 

Tra. 'TiS lie- Cnglisn " Journal de Trevoux ;* 

A clerical work of our Jesuits at home. 
Have you never yet seen it? 

Ink, That pleasure's to come 

Tra. Make haste then. 

Ink. Why so? 

Tra. I have heard people say 

That it threaten'd to give up the ghost t'other day. 

Ink. Well, that is a sign of some spirit. 

Tra. No doubt 

Shall you be at the Countess of Fiddlecome's rout? 

Ink. I've a card, and shall go; but at present, us 
Boon 
As friend Scamp shall be pleased to step down from 

the moon, 
(Where he Beems to he soaring in search of his wits,) 
And an interval grants from his lecturing fits, 
I'm engaged to the Lady Bluebottle's collation, 
To partake of a luncheon and learn'd conversation: 
'Tis a sort of reunion for Scamp, on the days 
Of bis lecture, to treat him with cold tongue and praise. 
And I own, for my own part, that 'tis not unpleasant. 
Will you go? There's Miss Lilac will also be present. 

Tra. That "metal's attractive." 

Ink. No doubt — to the pocket. 

Tra. You should rather encourage my passion than 
shock it. 
But let us proceed; for I think, by the hum 

Ink. Very true; let us go, then, before they can 

come, 

Or else we'll be kept here an hour at their levy, 
On the rack of cross questions, by all the blue bevy, 
liark ! Zounds, they'll be on us; I know by the drone 
Of old Botherby's spouting, ex-cathedra tone. 
Ay! there he is at it. Poor Scamp! better join 
Your friends, or he '11 pay you beck in your own coin. 

Tra. All fair; 'tis but lecture for lecture. 

Ink. Thai 's clear. 

But for God's sake let's go, or the bore will be here. 
Come, come; nay, I'm off. \F.iit Inkel. 

Tra. You are right, and I'll follow; 

'Tis high time for a " Sic me servarit. Apollo." 
And yet we shall have the whole crew on our kibes. 
Blues, dandies, and dowagers, and second-hand scribes, 
All flocking to moisten their exquisite throttles 
With a glass of Madeira at Lady Bluebottle's. 

[Exit Tracy. 



ECLOGUE SECOND. 

An Apartment in the House of Lady Bluebottle. — 
A Table prepared. 

Sir Richard Bluebottle, solus. 
Was there ever a man who was married so sorry? 
Like a fool, I must needs do the thing in a hurry. 
My life is reversed, and my quiet destroy'd ; 
My days, which once pass'd in so gentle a void. 
Must now, every hour of the twelve, be employ'd: 
The twelve, do I say ?— of the whole twenty-four, 
Is there one which I dare call my own any more? 
What with driving, and visiting, dancing and dining, 
What with learning, and teaching, and scribbling, and 

shining, 
In science and art, I'll be curst if I know 
Myself from my wife; for although we are two, 
Yet she somehow contrives that all things shall be 

done 
111 a stv e that proclaims us eternally one. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



737 



Hut the tiling of all things which distresses me more 
Chan the bills of the week (though they trouble me 

son i 
Is the numerous, humorous, backbiting crew 
Of scribblers, wits, lecturers, while, black, and blue, 
Who are brought to my house as an inn, to my eosl 
- -For the bill here, it semis, is defray'd by the host- 
No pleasure! no leisure! no thought for my pains, 
But to hear a vile jargon which addles my brains; 
A smatter and chatter, glean'd out of reviews, 
By the rag, tag, and bobtail, of those they call " Blues ;" 
A rabble who know not— but soft, here they come! 
Would to God I were deaf! as I'm not, I'll be dumb. 

Enter List Bluebottle, Miss Lilac, T,\nv Blue- 
mount, Ma. Botherby, iN-KEr,, Tituy, Miss V-./.\- 
ring, and others, with Scamp the Lecturer, $c. iyc. 

Lady Blueb. Ah! Sir Uichard, rood morning; I've 
brought you some friends. 

Sir Rich, (botes, and afterwards aside.) If friends, 
they're the first. 

Lady Blueb. But the luncheon attends. 

I pray ye be seated, " sans cerenwnic." 
Mr. Scamp, you're fatigued; take your chair there, 
next me. [ They all sit. 

S<r Rich, (aside.) If he does, his fatigue is to come. 

Lady Blueb. Mr. Tracy- 

Lady Bluemount — Miss Lilac — bo pleased, pray, to 

place ye ; 
And you, Mr. Botherby— 

Both. Oil, my dear Lady, 

I obey. 

Lady Blueb. Mr. Tnkel, I ought to upbraid ye; 
?0U were not at the lecture. 

Ink. Excuse me, 1 was ; 

3ut the heat forced me out in the best part— alas! 
And when — 

Lady Blueb. To be sure it was broiling; but then 
You have lost such a lecture! 

Both. The best Of the ten. 

Tra. How can you know that? there are two more. 

Both. Because 

I defy him to beat this day's wondrous applause. 
The very walls shook. 

Ink, Oh, if that be the test, 

I allow our friend Scamp has tins day done his best. 

Miss Lilac, permit me to help you;— a wing? 

Miss Li I. No more. Sir, I thank you. Who' lectures 
next spring? 

Both. Dick Dander. 

Ink. That is, if lie lives. 

Miss Lit, And why not ? 

Ink. No reason whatever, save that he's a sot. 
Lady Rlueinountl a glass of Madeira? 

Lady Bfticin. With pleasure. 

Ink. How does your friend Wordswords, that Winder- 
mere treasure? 
Does he stick to his lakes, likes the leeches he sings, 
And their gatherers, as Homer sung warrio/s and 
kings ? 

Lady Blueb. He has just got a place. 

[ n k. As a footman ? 

Lady Bluem. For shame! 

Nor profane with your sneers so poetic a name. 

Ink. Nay, I meant him no evil, but p : lied his mas- 
ter; 
For the poet of pedlars 't were, sure, no disaster 
To wear a new livery; th" mure, as 't i~ not 
The first tune he hasturn'd both his creed and his coat. 

98 



repeat. If Sir George 
' friend Like!; we all 



Lady Bin cm. I i 

could nit hear- 

Lady I i r mind oa 

know, my dear, 
T is his way. 

Sir Rich. But this place 

Ink. Is perhaps like friend Scamp's, 

A lecturer's. 

Lady Blueb. Excuse mi — 'tis one in "the Stamp!:" 
lie is made a collector. 

Tin. Collector! 

Sir 1. lluw? 

/.//. What ? 

Ink. I shall think of him oft when I buy a new hat: 
There his works will appear 

Lady Bluem. Sir. they reach to the Ganges. 

/■//,-. I shan't go SO far— I can have them at Granges.* 

Lady Blueb. I Ih tie! 

■Mi~sl.il. And for shame ! 

Lady Bluem. You're too bad. 

Both. Very good 

Lady Bluem. How cooil ? 

Lady Blurb. He means naught — 'tis his phrase. 

Lady Bluem. He grows rude. 

Lmly Blueb. lie means nothing; nay, ask him. 

Lady Bluem. l'ray, sir! did you mean 

What you say ? 

Ink. Never mind if he did; 'twill be seen 

That whatever he means won't alloy what he says. 

Both. Sir! 

Ink. I'ray be content with your portion of praise; 
'T was in your defence. 

Beth. If you please, with submission, 

[ can make out my own. 

(nk. It would be your perdition. 

While you live, my dear Botherby, never defend 
Yourself or your works; but leave both to a friend. 
Apropos— Is your play then accepted at last ? 

Both. At la<t .' 

Ink. Why I thought— that 's to say— there had past 
A few greenroom whispers, which hinted — you know 
That the taste of the actors at best is so so. 

Both. Sir, the green-room's in rapture, and so 's the 
committee. 

In!;. Ay — yours are the plays for exciting our "pity 
And fear," as the Greek sa>s: for " purging the mind," 
I doubt if you'll leave us an equal behind. 

Both. I have writti ll tin; prologue, and meant to have 
pray'd 
For a spice of your w it in an epilogue's aid. 

Ink. Well, time enough yet, when the play's to be 
play'd. 
Is it cast yet? 

Both. The actors are fighting for parts, 

As is usual in that must litigious of arts. 

Lady Blueb. We'll all make a party, and go thc/r*< 
night. 

Tra. And you promised the epilogue. lukel. 

Ink. Not quite 

However, to sa»e my friend Botherby trouble, 
I'll do what I can, though my pal.is must Be double. 
Tra. Why so? 

Ink. To do justice to what goes before. 

Both. Sir, I'm happy to say, I've no lears on that 
score. 
Your parts, Mr, Inkel, are 

Ink. Never mind mine, 

Stick to those of your play, which is quite yoi*r own liua 



• Grange is or was a famous pastrycook and frnilc.tr in HcatfbUf 



738 



BYKOX'S WORKS. 



Lady Btucm. You're a fugitive »ni.r, I think, sir, 

of rhymes .' 
ink. Ym, ma'am; ax* - a fugitive reader aoinetlmea, 
On Wordaword -. fJJi In it a nee, i 1 1 Idom all rht, 
dr dii Mouifiy, hia friend, without taking to Bight, 
/ ; i pour taate ii loo common ; but lime 

ami posterity 
111 thi area) men, and thii age'i aeverlty 
Bocorne ii reproai it 

Ink. I 've no aort of objection, 

Bo i m nol of the party to take the infection, 

Pol hap you have do ibi thai they ever 

will Inki- > 

i Noi at .ill ; on the contrary, thoae of the lake 
[lave taken already, and itlll « ill conl Inue 
To take who) they oan, from a groat to I guinea, 
(if penaion or place; but the luhjocl 'a a bore, 
Bluem Will, Mr, the t line 'a coming, 

ink. imp I do hi } "ii (eel nore? 

What say you to ' 

S amp Tliey have merit, I own ; 

Though theit tem'a abaurdity keepa ii unknown. 
Ink. Then why not unearth it in one of your lectures 1 
• ii la only time pa I which cornea under my 
sii let urea, 
Lady ii'nr'i Come a truce with all tartneai : thejoj 
of my hi 1 1 1 
I- in ane Nature'! triumph o'er all thai la art. 

Wiiil Nature ' Ot I Blink pi arel 

Both. And down Aristotle. 

Lady Blum. Sir George thinka exactly with Lady 
Bluebottle; 
Ami my Lord Seventy-four, who protecti our dear 

Bard, 
Ami who gave him hla place, haa the 
For the poet, who, tinging ol pedlara and aaaea, 
Haa found out the way to dispense with Parnaeaua. 
'I'm. \inl you, Scampi 

Scamp. I needa muat confess I 'm embnrraea'd, 

Ink. Don't call upon Bcainp, who*a already ao 
haraaa'd 
IViiii old Khoolt, and aaw tthoak, and no seAoaZs, and 
ail tckools. 
Tra. Well, one thing is oertaln, that mm du I be 
foola, 
I should like to Know who. 

/„/;. Ami l should not be sorry 

To Know who are net."- it would save ua aome worry. 
Lady Blu$b. A truce with remark, and let nothing 
control 
This "feast of our reason, and flow of the soul." 
Oh, my dear Mr. Botherby! sympathise ' I 
Now feel such a rapture, I 'm ready to By, 
I feel ao elastic "Bobuoyantl »o buoyant r* 
Ink. Tracy I opon the window. 

7',,, I Wish hor much Joy on 'l. 

Beta. For God's sake, my Lady Bluebottle, check nut 
This gentle emotion, so seldom our lot 
Upon earth. Give it way ; 'I la an Impulse which lifts 

Our spirits fro anh; the sublimes) of gifts; 

for winch poor Prometheus waa chain'd to hla moun- 
tain. 
Tis the i ca of ail sentiment feeling's true foun- 
tain : 
"Pis the vision of Heaven upon Earth: 't is the taa 
fif the soul i 't is the selling of shades as they pass, 
Ann making them substance; 't is something divine .--- 
ink shall i help you, my friend, to a little mi re « Ine 



I i,, wiih llio umds. 



Both. I thank you ; not any more, sir, till I dine. 

Ink. Apropo Ii" you d With Sir Humphrey )o 

day .' 

Tra. I Should think wit li Dnkr Humphrey was mole 
in your w ay. 

Ink. it iiii-iii be of yore ; bu) we authors now look 
To the knight, as a landlord, much more than iho 

Duke. 
The truth is, cadi writer now quite at hi- eaae is, 
And (except with hia publiaher] dlnca where In 

Itut 'tis now nearly flvc, ami I mii-l I" the Talk. 

'I'm. Ami l "ii take a turn with you there till 'lis 

dark. 
Anil you, Scamp — 

Scamp, Excuse me; I muat to my mites, 

For my lecture next week. 

ink. i le in,i>i M i j ii 1 1 u horn he quotes 

Out of " Elegant Extracts." 

i.nihj Blueb. Well, now we break up; 

But remember Miss Diddle invites us to sup. 
Ink. Then ai two hours past midnight we 'II all meet 
again, 
For the sciences, snmiu idi.s, hulk, and champagne I 
Tra. And the sweel lobster salad I 
Both. l honour that meal ; 

For 'ii* then thai our feclinga moat genuinely leejl. 
Ink. True; feeling istruest then, far beyond que*. 
tiou : 
I wish to tin- goda 'i waa the same with digestion 1 
I .inly ltiiirti. Pshaw I never mind that; for one mo- 
mont of feeling 

Is worth - God knows w hat. 

ink. 'Tie al least worth concealing 

For ilsilf, or what follows liul heic comes yoiu 

carnage, 
Sir Rich, (aside.) I wish all these people «,.- 

» nli imj in. ii riaj [I'.jcunt 



Tin: 
THIRD ACT OF .MAX I'll III), 

in I i: ORIGINAL Ml \er, 

AS FIRST SENT TO THE PUBLISHER, 



ACT in. 

Si BNI I. — .7 Hull in tin- I'mti'r of Minfrcd. 
Manhii n nnd IIiuman. 

Jbfan. w ii.it is the hour 1 

ll,r. Il w ants Imt one 'ill sunset 

And promises a lovely twilight. 
Man, Say, 

\ie :ill IIimil's so ilisposeil of ill the tower 

As I directed .' 
iirr. All, my lord, are ready : 

Here is the key ami I 

Man. it is well ; 

Thou mayat retire. [Exit Hsautax 

J\lan. [iitonc.) There is a calm upon Die— 

Inexplicable stillness I winch till now 

Dili not belong to what I knew ol life. 
If that 1 did not know philosophy 

To i f ail our vanitica the motlieat, 

The merest word that evet fool'd the ear 

F i mil the schoolman's Jargon, i should dean 

The golden secret, the sough) "Kalon" found 
And seated In my soul, it will no) las' 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



780 



But it is wrii to ii.iv/. known it. though but i: 

It liiili enlarged my though'! with a new sense, 
Ami I within my tablets would note down 
That there is wch a feeling Who ii iii re J 

lifciilrr HeRMAH, 

ihr. My lord, the Abbot of St. Maurice cravei 
i\. greet your pi cscnce. 

Enter Uu Abbot op St. Mai Rti a. 

Abbot, Peace be with C t Manfred! 

Mnn. Thanks, holy father I welcome to theae walla; 
Thy presence honours them, aud blessea 

Who dwell W itlllll thrill. 

Abbot, Would il rt ere so, Count; 

Liu t I would fain confer with thee alone. 

Man. Herman r.-t irr. What would my reverend 
guest ? | Exit i , i , m - % 

Abbot. Thus, without prelude;— Age and seal, my 
office, 
And good intent, must plead my privilege; 
Our iic-ir, though not acquainted, neighbourhood 
May also be my herald. Humours strange, 
And of unholy nature, are abroad, 
And busy with thy name— a noble name 
For centuries; may he who bears it now 
Trnnsinit it unimpair'dl 

Man. Proceed,—] listen. 

Abbot 'Tie said thou holdesl convene with the 
things 
Which are forbidden to the search of man; 
That with the dwellers of the dark ab 
The many evil and unheavehly Bpirits 
Which walk the valley of the shade of death, 
Thou eommunest. I know thai with mnitkiud, 
Thy fellows iii creation, thou dost rarely 
Exchange thy thoughts, ami that thy solitude 
Is as an anchorite's, w ere it bul holy, 

Man. Anil what are they who do avouch those 
things? 

Abbot. My pious brethren tin- scared peasantry — 
Even thy OWn vassals— who do look on thee 
With most unquiet eyes. Thy life's in peril, 

Man. Take it. 

Abbot, i come to save, and not destroy — 

I would not i>rv Into thy secret soul; 
But if then things be sooth, there still is time 
For penitence and pity: reconcile thee 
With the true church, and through the church to 
beavi n. 

Man. I bear thee. This \; my reply: whate'er 

I may have hern, or am. iloth rrst hit worn 

Heaven and myself. I shall noi choc i g mortal 
To be my mediator. Have l slnn'd 
Against your ordinances? prove and punish!* 
Abbot. Then, hear and tremble! For the headstrong 
wretch 
Who in the mail of innate hnrdili md 
Would shield himself, and battle Tor his 
There is the stak ■ earth, and i th etor 

nal 

Man. Charity, most reverend father, 
Becomes thy lips so much more than this menace, 
Tnat ! would rail thee hark to il ; but say, 
What wouMsi tl with I 

Abbot, ii may be there are 

rhings that would shake thee bul i keep them back, 
And give thee till lo-morrow to repent. 
Than If thou doat not all devote thyself 



» |i ir*ll it, u fa.' »• Ih'u, tho original mailrr of Ihr 

Tt,ir\i Act has MOO 1 1 



land thee,— welL 

III! B. 



I'OP""""*- : - 'h gift of all thv land. 

i o the uu nastery 

JMbm. I in.,. 

Abbot. Rxpeol no mercy ; i have 

There is n gift foi thee within this casket. • '"P- 
| M \m i: 1 1> tpens I ikM a li^*" 

and burnt pais tm ■ 
II"! Ashtarothl 

'. iriuiMiii .•; _' a* fallout: 

The raven sits 

( in the raven stone, 
And his black u Ing Ihts 

1 1 vi the milk-v. hite bone ; 
To and fro, at the night « indi blow, 

The cores - of tbe a ii Basin iv. i 
And there nli ne, nn the raven 

Tin ra\ in Haps his dill ky w ill 

Tiii letters creak -and ins ebon beak 

i !rooki to lb lie hollow sound ; 

And thi~ is the tune i>> the light of the moon 

Tn which Hie witches dunce their round, 
Merrily, mi mi lu'frUy, 

Met rily, men il) , speeds the bail : 
The dead in their shrouds, and the demons in clouds), 

Flock to the w itches' carnli al, 

Abbot, l fear thee not honi u hi m ■ 
Avaunl th r, • ■ v 1 1 our' help, hoi without literal 

Man, Convej this man to the Bhrcckhorn to its 

1 1 ak — 

To its extrt) st peak watch with him then 

i'i now till sunrise; let him gaze, and know 

lir ne'er again will be so near to heaven, 

Bul harm him not J and, whru the Minnow hr.aks, 

Sri him down safe In in* cell awny with hiinl 
Aoh, Had i not battel bi inn his bret liren Loo, 

Convent and all, to bear him <• pan) ' 

Man. \o, this will serve lot the present. Take him 

up. 
Aik. Come, friar! now nn exorcism or two, 
\i,.i we shall fly tho lighter. 
AsuTABOTU ditappiarl with the Abih.t, tinging at 

' mil : 

A prodigal son and a maid lo te, 

Vri a widow re-wedded within the year; 
Ami a worhUy monk mid a pregnant nun, 
Are things w bii h i ; pt u. 

Ma an 
jlfan. Why would this fool break In "'« ma, and 
(orce 
My an to prni I fbntai tical ' no matter, 
It was in. i i.i heart sickens 

\,, i v ■'. : , |j x ',| foreboding on my soul ; 
lint ii i* r 1 1 in calm as s sullen i s 
\fter the hurricane: the winds nrs still, 
i',i i the ■ nltl v<\. iw all hi It and heavily, 
And there Is danger In them. Such n 

m, life hath been a combat, 

\ii,i every tl "• id; till I am scan .1 

in th. Immortal pari of - What now ? 

• r Hi ii -Ms. 

/.'.r. My lord, you bade wail on you at luiUM 

il.. --inks behind tl..' i inula. 

Mall. Doth 111' KO? 

I will look on him. 



» " H . ttM Orrumn word 

lad »*t< 



740 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



[Manfred advances to fie window of the hall. 
! is or'.i !* the idol 
Of early nature-, :>:i : rne <• i:.'orou 
Of undiseased ssrtnkind, the giant Bona 
Of the p.attrr-K.e of angels, with a sea 
More Beautiful than they, which did draw down 
The erring spirits who can ne ef return.— 
Most glorious orb! that werl a worship, ere 
The mystery of thy making was reveal'dl 
Thou earliest minister of the Almighty, 
Which gladden'd, on their mountain tops, the hearts 
Of the Chaldean Bhepherds, till tiny pour'd 
Themselves in orisons! thou material God! 
And representative of the Unknown — 
Who chose thee for his shadow! thou chief stat ! 
Centre of many stars! which mak'st our earth 
Endurable, ami temperest the hues 
And hearts of all who walk within thy rays! 
Sire of the seasonal Monarch of the climes, 
And those who dwell in them! for, near or far, 
Our inborn spirits have a tint of thee, 
Even as our outward aspects; — thou dost rise, 
And shine, and set in glory. Fare thee well! 
I ne'er shall see thee more. As my first glance 
Of love and wonder was for thee, then take 
My latest look : thou wilt not b;-am on one 
To whom the gifts of life and warmth have been 
Of a more fatal nature. He is gone: 
I follow. [Exit Manfred. 

Scene II.. — The Mountains — The Castle of Manfred at 
some distance — A Terrace before a Tower. — Time, Twi- 
light. 
Herman, Manuel, and other Dependants of Manfred. 
Her. 'Tis strange enough; night after night, for 
years, 
He hath pursued long vigils in this tower, 
Without a witness. I have been within it,— 
So have we all been oft-times; but from it, 
Or its contents, it were impossible 
To draw conclusions absolute of audit 
His studies tend to. To be sure, there is 
One cnamber where none enter; I would give 
The fee of what I have to come these three years, 
To pore upon its mysteries. 

Manuel. 'T wore dangerous: 

Content thyself with what thou know'st already. 

Her. Ah! Manuel! thou art elderly and wise, 
And couldst say much; thou hast dwelt within the 

cas'le — 
How many years is 't ? 

Manuel. Ere Count Manfred's birth, 

I served his father, whom he naught resembles. 
Her. There be more sons in like predicament. 
But wherein do they differ? 

Manuel. I speak not 

Of features or of form, but mind am! habits: 
Count Sigismund was proud, — but gay and free— 
A warrior and a reveler; he dwelt not 
With books and solitude, nor made the night 
A gloomy vigil, but a festal time. 
Merrier than day; he did not walk the rocks 
And forests like a wolf, nor turn aside 
From men and th'-ir delights. 

Ihr. Beshrew the hour, 

But those were jocund times! I would tha. such 
Would visit the old walls asain; they look 
As if they had forgotten them. 



* Th^ soliloquy, ami a rreal p:,rt of the subsequent scene have been re. 
i ped m tLe p r etcut Turin of the drama. 



Manuel. These walla 

Must change tieir chieftain first. Oh' I have seen 
strange things in these few years. f 
Her. Come, be friendly 

me some, to while away our watch: 
I've heard thee darkly -peak of an event 
Which happen'd hereabouts, by this same tower. 

JU '. Thai was a night indeed! I do remember 
'T was twilight, as it may be now, and such 
Another ev< nihg; — yon red cloud, which rests 
On Signer's pinnacle, so rested then, — 
So like it that it might be the same; the wind 
Was faint and gusty, and the mountain snows 
Began to glitter with the climbing moon; 
Count Manfred was, as now, within his tower, — 
How occupied, we knew not, but with him 
The sole companion of his wanderings 
And watchings— her, whom of all earthly things 
That lived, the only thing he seem'd to love, 
'is he, indeed, by blood was bound to do, 

The Lady Astarte, Ins 

Ilrr. Look — look — the tower — 

The tower's on fire. Oh, heavens and earth! what 

sound, 
What dreadful sound is that? [J] crash like thunder 
Manuel. Help, help, there! — to the rescue of the 
Count — 
The Count's in danger,— what ho! there! approach! 
[The Servants, f'assa/s, and Peasantry approach 
Stupificd with terror. 
If there be any of you who have heart 
And love of human kind, and will to aid 
Those in distress— pause not — but follow me — 
The portal's open, follow. [MaHDSl goes in 

Her. Come— who follows ? 

What, none of ye ? — ye recreants! shiver then 
Without. I will not see old Manuel risk 
His few remaining years unaided. [Herman goes in 

/ assal Hark !— 

No— all is silent — not a breath— the flame 
Which shut forth such a blaze is also gone; 
What may this mean? let's enter! 

Peasant. Faith, not I, — 

Not that, if one, or two, or more, will join, 
I then will stay behind; but, for my part, 
I do not see precisely to what end. 

Vassal. Cease your vain prating — come. 
Manuel, {speaking within.) 'Tis all in vain- 

He 's dead. 

Her. (within.) Not so — even now mr thought he moved 
Rut it is dark— so bear him gently out — 
Softly — how cold he is! take care of his temples 
In winding down the staircase. 
Re-enter Manuel and Herman, bearing Manfred in 

their arms. 

Manuel. Hie to the castle, some of ye, and bring 

What aid you can. Saddle the barb, and speed 

For the leech to the city— quick! some water there I 

Her. His cheek is black — but there is a faint beat 

Still lingering about the heart. Some water. 

f They s/irink/c Manfred with water; after a pause 
he gives some signs cf life. 
Manuel. He seems to strive to speak— come— checrly, 
Count! 
He moves his lips — canst hear him? I am old 
And cannot catch faint sounds. 

[Herman inclining his head and listening. 
Her I hear a word 



I Altered, in the present form, to " Some strange things in them, Herman.' 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Or two— but indistinctly— what is next? 
What's to he done? let's bear bim to the castle. 
[Manfred motions iriih his hand not to remove him. 

Manuel, lie disapproves — and 'twere of no avail — 
lie changes rapidly. 

Her. 'Twill soon be over. 

Manuel Oh! what a death is this! that I should live 
To shake my ur.iv hairs over the last chief 
Of the house of Sigismund— And BUCh a death I 

Alone— we hum' not bow — unshrived — un tended — 
With strange accompaniments and fearful sums— 
I shudder al th<' Bight— but must not leave him. 
Manfred, (speaking faintly andskmly.) Old man! 
'T is not so difficult to die. 

[ M iNFKBS, having said this, expires. 
Her. His eyes are fix'd and lifeless. — lie is l' .""■ 
Manuel. Close them. — .My old hand quivers.— Uc de- 
parts — 
Whither? X dread to think— But he is gonel 



TO MY DEAR MARY ANNE. 
'the FOLLOWING lines are the earliest written by 

LORD EYKuN. THEY WERE ADDRESSED TO MISS ( !I A 
\voRTH, AFTERWARDS MRS. MUSTERS, IN 1804, ABOUT 
> VEAIt BEFORE IIKR MARRIAGE.] 

ADIEU to sweet Mary fur ever! 

From her I must quickly depart: 
Though the fates us from each other sever, 

Sull her image will dwell in my heart. 

The flame that within my heart burns 
If unlike what in lovers' hearts glows; 

The !>>ve which for Mary I feel 
Is far purer than Cupid bestows. 

I wish not your peace to disturb, 

I wish not your joys to molest; 
Mistake not my passion for love, 

"1'is your friendship alone I request. 

Not ten thousand lovers could feel 
The friendship my bosom contains; 

It will ever within my heart dwell, 
While the warm blood flows through my veins. 

May the Ruler of Heaven look down. 
And my Mary from evil defend! 

Max she ne'er know adversity's frown, 
.May her happiness ne'er have an end 1 

Once more, my sweet Mary, adieu I 
Farewell! I with anguish repeat, 

For ever I'll think upon you. 
While this heart in my bosom shall beat. 



TO MISS CIIAWORTH. 
Oh Memory, torture me no more, 

The present's all o'ercast; 
My hopes of future bliss are o'er. 

In mercy veil the past. 
Why brim tbo-e images to view 

I henceforth m i-t 
Ah! why those happy hours renew, 

That never can be mine ? 

Pasi pleasure doubles preserrt pain, 
To Borrow adds regret, 

Regret ami hope are both in vain, 
I ask but to— forg( t. 




Hills of Annesley, blralT-Snd barren, 
Wliere my thoughtless chiluM*^od stray'd, 

How the northern tempests warring 
Howl above thy tufted shade! 

o 

Now no more, the hours beguiling, 
Former favourite haunu I see; 

Now no more my Mary smiling 
Makes ye seem a heaven to me. 



1=01. 



3 Q 



1605 



THE PRAYER OF NATURE. 

Father of Light 1 great God of Heaven I 
Hear'st thou the accents of despair? 

Can guill like man s be e'er forgiven ? 
Can vice atone for crimes by prayer? 

Father of Light, on thee I call ! 

Thou see'st my soul is dark within; 
Thou who can'st mark the sparrow's fall, 

Avert from me the death of sin. 
No shrine I seek to sects unknown; 

Oh point to me the path of truth! 
Thy dread omnipotence I own ; 

Spare, yet amend, the faults of youth. 
Let bigots rear a gloomy fane, 

Let superstition hail the pile, 
Let priests, to spread their sable reign, 

With tales of mystic rites beguile. 
Shall man confine his Maker's sway 

To Gothic domes of mouldering stone? 
Thy temple is the face of day; 

Earth, ocean, heaven thy bounuless thron* 
Shall man condemn his race to hell 

Unless they bend in pompous form 
Tell us that all, for one who fell, 

Must perish in the mingling storm? 
Shall each pretend to reach the skies, 

Yet doom his brother to expire, 
Whose soul a different hope supplies, 

Or doctrines less severe inspire? 
Shall these, by creeds they can't expound, 

Prepare a fancied bliss or woe? 
Shall reptiles, grovelling on the ground. 

Their er^at Creator's purpose know? 
Shall those, who live for self alone. 

Whose years float op. in daily crime — 
Shall they by Faith for guilt atone, 

And live beyond the bounds of Time? 
Father! no prophet's laws I <crk, — 

Thy law's in Nature's works appear; — 
I own myself corrupt and weak, 

Yri win I pray, for thou win hear ! 
Thou, who canst guide the wandering star 

Through trackless realms of ether's .-pare. 
Who calm'BI the elemental war, 

Whose hand from pole to pole I trace: 
Thou, who in wisdom placed me lure, 

Who, when thou wilt, can take me bene* 

Ah : whilsl I tread tin- earthly Bphere, 

I Ixtend to me thy w > le defence. 
To Thro, my Rod, to Tie <■ i cal! 

Whatever w eal or w oe betide, 
By thy command I rise or fall, 

In thy protection i confide. 
If. when this dusi t.> dusl restored 

My -iuI shall float on sjrv ••mg, 



42 



BYUON'S WORKS. 



How shall thy glorious name adored 

Inspire her feeble voici ■•> sing! 
Bui, if this fleeting ^flrit share 

With clay 11' grave's eternal bed, 
While I i fu »"t throbs I raise my prayer, 

Thp*2'' doora'd no more to quit the dead. 
^a«fjl'liee I breathe my humble strain, 

Grateful for all thy mercies past, 
Ami hope, my God, to thee again 

This erring life may fly at last. 

20<A Dec. 1S0G. 



ON REVISITING HARROW. 

rSome years ago, when at Harrow, a frienil of the author engraved on a 
•articular spot the names of both, with a few additional words, as a ma- 
norial. Afterwar.ls, on receiving some real or imagined injury, the au- 
thor destroyed the frail record before he left Harrow. On revisiting the 
olace in lt07, he wrote under it the following stanzas.] 

1. 
Here once engaged the stranger's view 

Young Friendship's record, simply traced ; 
Few were her words, — but yet, though few, 
Resentment's hand the line defaced. 
o 
Deeply she cut — but, not erased, 

The characters were still so plain. 
That Friendship once return'd and gazed, — 
Till Memory hail'd the words again. 
3. 
Repentance placed them as before; 

Forgiveness join'd her gentle name; 
So fair the inscription seem'd once more. 
That Friendship thought it still the same. 
4. 
Thus might the Record now have been ; 
But, ah, in spite of Hope's endeavour. 
Or Friendship's tears, Pride rush'd between, 
And blotted out the line for ever! 



•AMITIE EST L' AMOUR SANS AILES. 
1. 
Why should my anxious breast repine, 

Because my youth is fled ? 
Days of delight may still be mine ; 

A flection is not dead. 
In tracing back the years of youth, 
One firm record, one lasting truth 

Celestial consolation brings: 
Bear it, ye breezes, to the seat, 
Where first my heart responsive ben.t, — 

"Friendship is Love without his wings!" 
• 2. 

1 hrough few, but deeply chequer'd years, 

What moments have been mine! 
Now, half obscured by clouds of tears, 

Now, bright in rays divine; 
Howe'er my future doom be cast, 
My soul, enraptured with the past, 

To one idea fondly clings; 
Friendship! that thought is all thine own, 
Worth worlds of bliss, that thought alone, 

"Friendship is Love without his wings'" 
3. 
Where yonrter yew-trees lightly wave 

Their branches on the gale. 
Unheeded heaves a single grave, 

Which telU the common tale ; 



Round this unconcious schoolboys stray 
Till the dull knell of childish play 

From yonder studious mansion rings; 
Bui here whene'er my footsteps move, 
My silent tears too plainly prove 

"Friendship is Love without his wings!" 
4. 
Oh Love! before thy glowing shrine 

My early vows were paid ; 
My hopes, my dreams, my heart was thine, 

Hut these are now decay'd ; 
For thine are pinions like the wind, 
uf thee remains behind, 

Except, alas! thy jealous stings. 
Away, away! delusive power, 
Thou shalt not haunt my coming hour; 

"Unless, indeed, without thy wings I" 

5. 
Seat of my youth! thy distant spire 

Recalls each scene of joy; 
My bosom glows with former fire, — 

In mind again a boy. 
Thy grove of elms, thy verdant hill, 
Thy every path delights me still, 

Each flower a double fragrance flings; 
Again, as once, in converse gay, 
Each dear associate seems to say 

" Friendship is love without his wings !" 

C. 
My Lycus! wherefore dost thou weep? 

Thy falling tears restrain ; 
Affection for a lime may sleep, 

l!ut, oh, 't will wake again. 
Think, think, my friend, when next we meet 
Our long-wish'd interview, how sweet I 

From this my hope of rapture springs; 
While youthful hearts thus fondly swell, 
Absence, my friend, can only tell, 

"Friendship is Love without his wings!" 

7. 
In one, and one alone deceived, 

Did I my error mourn ? 
No — from oppressive bonds relieved, 

I left the wretch to scorn. 
I turn'il to those my childhood knew, 
Willi feelings warm, with bosoms true. 

Twined with my heart's according strings; 
And till those vital chords shall break, 
For none but these my breast shall wake, 

"Friendship, the power deprived of wing* J 1 

8. 
Ye few! my soul, my life is yours. 

My memory and my hope; 
Your worth a lasting love insures, 

Unfetter'd in its scope; 
From smooth deceit and terror sprung, 
Willi aspect fair and lioney'd tongue, 

Let Adulation wait on kinjs. 
With joy elate, by snares beset, 
We, we, my friends, can ne'er forget 

"Friendship is Love without his wings." 

0. 

Fictions and dreams inspire the bard 

Who rolls the epic song ; 
Friendship and Truth be my reward, 

To me no bays belong; 
If laurc ll'd Fame but dwells with lies. 
Me the enchantress ever flies, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



743 



Whose heart and not Whose fancy sings: 
Simple and young, I dare nut feign) 
June be the rude yet heartfelt strain, 

"Friendship is Love without his wings 1" 

December, 1806. 



TO MY SUV. 
1. 
dcos*. flaxen locks, those eyes of blue, 
Rrighl as thy mother's in their hue; 
Those rosy lips, whose dimples play 
And <mile to steal the heart away, 
Recall a scene of former joy, 
And touch thy Father's heart, my Boy! 

And thou canst li>p a father's name — 
Ah, William were thine own the same, 
No self-reproach — hut, let me cease — 
My care for thee shall purchase peace; 
Thy mother's shade shall smile in Joy, 
And pardon all the past, my Boy. 

3. 
Iler lowly grave the turf has prest. 
And thou hast known a stranger's breast. 
Derision sneers upon thy birth, 
And yields thee scarce a name on earth; 
Yet shall not these one hope destroy,— 
A Father's heart is thine my Boy! 

4. 
Why, let the world unfeeling frown. 
Must I fond Nature's claim disown? 
Ah, no — though moralists reprove, 
I hail thee, dearest child of love, 
Fair cheruh, pledge of youth and joy — 
A Father guards thy birth, my Boy! 

5. 
Oh, 'twill be sweet in thee to trace 
Ere ase has wrinkled o'er my face, 
F.re half my glass of life is run, 
At once a brother ami a son ; 
And all my wane of years employ 
In justice done to thee, my Boy! 

G. 
Although so young thy heedless sire, 
Voulh will not damp parental fire; 
And, weit thou still less dear In me. 

While Helen's form revives in thee, 

The breast, whicl) heat to former joy, 
Will ne'er desert its pledge, niv !: (J I 

tot. 



RPITAPU ON JOHN ADAMS, OF SOUTHWELL, 

A CARRIER, WHO DIED OF DRUNKENNESS. 

John Adois lies here, of the parish of Southwell, 
A Carrier, who carried his can to his mouth well; 
He earned so mueli, ami he curried so fast, 
lie' could enrry no more— so was carried at last ; 
For, the liquor he drank, being too much for one, 
lie could not enrry otf, — so he's now earri-on. 

Sept.. 1P07. 

FRAGMENT. 

[The following lir.es form the conclusion of a piem written by Lord By. 
ion under the melancholy impression that he should soon die.] 
FoRrsET this world, my restless sprite, 
Turn turn thy thoughts to heaven: 



direct thy flight, 

known. 

't\'s Throne,— 
ver: 



There must < 

It" i rn rs are forg - 

To Ingots and hi Sects 

Bow down ii Iheath th' Alh 

To him address thy trembling , 
lie, u hn is merciful and just, 
Will nol reject a child of diut. 

Although lo~ meanest care. 

Father of Light! to thee I call, 

My soul is dark within ; 
Tl who canst mark the sparrow fall, 

Avert the death of sin. 
Thou, win i canst guide the wandering star, 
Who calm's I th • elemental war. 

Whose mantle is yon boundless sky, 
My thoughts, my words, my crimes forgive ; 
And, since 1 soon must cease to live, 

Instruct me how to die. 

1807 



TO MRS. ***, 

ON BE1NO ASKEO MY R EASON FOR QUITTING ENOLA ND 
IN THE SfRINO. 

When man, expell'd from Eden's bowers, 
A moment linger'd near the gate. 

Each scene recall'd the vanish'd hours, 
And bade him curse his future fate. 

But wandering on throng!) distant climes, 
He learnt to hear his load, of grief; 

Just gave a siL'h to other times, 
And found in busier scenes relief 

Thus, Alary, will it he witli me, 

Ami 1 mas! view thy charms no more; 

For, while I linger near to thee, 
I sigh for all 1 knew before. 

In flight I shall be surely wise, 
Escaping from temptation's snare; 

I cannot view my paradise 
Without the wish of dwelling there. 

Dec. 2, isoa 



A LOYF.SOMG. 
Tn ******* 

Remind me not, remind me not, 
Of those beloved, those vanish'd hours 
When all my soal was given to thee 
Hours that may never be forgot, 
Till time unnerves our vital powers, 
And thou and I shall cease to be. 

Can I forget— canst thou fi 
When playing with thy golden hair, 

How quick thy fluttering heart did movt 
oil. by my soul, I see thee yet. 
With eyes so languid, breast so fur. 
And ii|>s, though silent, breathing love. 

When thus reclining on ny breast. 

Those eyes threw bark a irlance so sweel 
As half reproarh'd yet raised desire. 
And still we near and nearer prest, 
Am! still our glowing lip* would ineei 
As if in kis • ; to expire. 

And then those pensive eyes would clo«» 
And hid their lids ( arh otleu MOk 
I'eillns the azure orbs belo'V 




BYRON'S WORKS. 



While their long lashes' dark^"B K |oss 
ly^ofiliiaiii cheek, 
e sinoolh'd on snow. 



I dreaml lasl "' M »« '" VP rp ' ,,rn ' d ' 

.•»!i lo -:i v, t hat very dream 

, hi it-< phantasy 
in if for othej hearts 1 burn'd, 
For uvea tli:it ne'er like thine could beam 
In rapture's wild reality. 

Then tell me not, remind me not, 
Of hours which, though for ever gone, 
can still a pleasing dream restore, 
Till Hi 'ii and I Bhall be forgot, 
Ami senseless as the mouldering stone 
Which tiils that we shall be no more. 



STANZAS 



******* 



i'iikre was a limn, I need not name, 
Since it will ne'er forgotten be, 

When all our feelings were trie same 
As still my soul hath been to thee. 

And from that hour when first thy tongue 
Confess'd a love which equall'd mine, 

Though many a uri if my heart hath wrung 
Unknown and thus unfelt by thine, 

None, none hath sunk so deep as this — 
To think how all that love hath flown; 

Transient as every faithless kiss, 
But transient in thy breast alone. 

And yet my hart some solace knew. 
When late I heard thy ips declare, 

In accents once imagined trup. 
Remembrance of the days that were. 

Yes! my adored, yet most unkind! 

Though thou wilt never love again, 
To me 'tis doubly sweet to find 

Remembrance of that love remain. 

Yes! 't is a glorious thought to me, 

Nor longer shall my soul repine, 
Wha'.e'er thou art or e'er shalt be, 
Thou hast been dearly, solely mine! 



TO *****. 



Ann will thou weep when I am low? 

Sweet lady! speak those words ajain: 
Yet if they grieve thee, say not so— 

1 would not give that bosom pain. 

My neart is sad, my hopes are gone. 
My blood runs coldly through my breast; 

Ami when I perish, thou alone 
Wilt Blgh above my place of rest. 

And yet methinks, a gleam cf peace 
Doth through my cloud of anguish shine; 

Snd for Awhile my sorrows cease, 
To know thy heart hath felt fur mine. 

Oh 'ady! blessed be that tear- 
It falls for one who cannot weep: 

tlucn precious drops are doubly dear 
To 'le.se whose eye" no tear can steep. 



Sweet lady ! once my heart was warm 
With every feeling boA as thine; 

But beauty's self hath ceased to charm 
A wretch created to repine. 

Yet wilt thou weep when I am low? 

Sweet lady! speak those words Bgata; 
Yet if they grieve thee, say not so — 

I would not give that bosom pain. 



EO\G. 

Fir.i. the goblet airain, for I never before 

Felt the glow which now gladdens my heart to its 

core ; 
Let us drink!— who would not ?— since, through life « 

varied round, 
In the goblet alone no deception is found. 

I have tried in its turn all that life, can supply; 
1 have bask'd in the beam of a dark-ffolling eye; 
1 have loved!— who has not?— but what heart can de- 
clare 
That pleasure existed while passion was there ? 

In the days of my youth, when the heart 's in its 

spring, 
And dreams that affection can never take wing, 
I had friends!— who has not? — but what tongue will 

avow ? 
That friends, rosy wine! are so faithful as thou? 

The heart of a mistress some boy may estrange. 
Friendship shifts with the sunbeam— thou never canst 

change : 
Thou grow'st old — who does not?— but on earth what 

appears. 
Whose virtues, like thine, still increase with its years? 

Yet if blest to the utmost that love can bestow, 

Should a rival bow down to our idol below, 

We are jealous! — who's not? — thou hast no such al 

loy ; 
For the more that enjoy thee, the more we enjoy. 

Then the season of youth and its vanities past, 
For refuge we fly to the goblet at last; 
There we find— do we not?— in the flow of the soul, 
That truth, as of yore, is confined to the bowl. 

When the box of Pandora was open'd on earth, 

And Misery's triumph commenced over Mirth, 

Hope was left, was she net?— but the goblet we kiss, 

And care not for hope, who are certain of bliss. 

Long life to the grape! for when summer is flot n 

The age of our nectar shall gladden our own : 

We must die — who shall not ? — May our sins bt for 

given, 
And Hebe shall never be idle in heaven. 



STANZAS 

TO * * *, ON LEAVING ENGLAND. 

•Tis done— and shivering in the gale 
The bark unfurls her snowy sail; 
Anil whistling o'er the bending mast. 
Loud sings on high tie.' fresh'ning blast; 

And I musl from this land be goi c, 

Because I cannoi love hut one. 

lint could I be what I have been, 
And could 1 see what I have seen— 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



74! 



Could I repose upon the breast 
Whirl) mice ihv warmest wishes nlest — 
I should not Beek another zone 
Because I oannot love but one. 

'Tie long since I beheld that eye 
Wiin h gave me bliss or misery; 
And I have striven, but in vain, 
Never to think of it again ; 
For though I By from Albion, 
1 still can only love but one. 

As some lone bird, without a mate, 
My weary heart is desolate; 
I look around, anil cannot trace 
One friendly smile or welcome Tare, 
And even in crouds am still alone 
Because I cannot love but one. 

And I will cross the whitening foam, 
And I will seek a foreign home; 
Till I forget a false fair fare, 
I ne'er shall find a resting-place; 
My own dark thoughts I cannot shun. 
But ever love, and love but one. 

The poorest veriest wretch on earth 
Still finds some hospitable hearth, 
Where friendship's or love's softer glow 
May smile in joy or soothe in woe; 
Hut friend or leutan 1 have none, 
Because I cannot love but one. 

I go— but wheresoe'er I flee, 
There's not an eye will weep for oie ; 
There's not a kind congenial heart. 
Where 1 can claim the meanest part; 
Nor thou, who hast my hopes undone, 
Will sigh, although I love but one. 

To think of every early scene, 

Of what we are, and what we've been. 

Would whelm some softi* hearts with woe — 

But mine, alas! has stood the blow; 
Yet still beats on as it begun, 
And never truly loves but one. 

^nd who that dear loved one may be 
Is not for vulgar eyes to see, 

Anil why that early love was crost, 
Thou know'st the best, I feel the most; 

But few that dwell beneath the s in 
Have loved so long, and loved but one. 

I 've tried another's fetters too. 
With charms perchance as fair to view; 
And I would fain have loved as well, 
But some unconquerable spell 
Forbade my bleeding breast to own 
A kindred care for aught but one. 

T would soothe to take one lingering view. 
And bless thee in my last adieu; 
Yet wish I not these eyes to weep 

For him that wanders o'er the deep; 

His home, his hope, his youth are gone, 
Vet still he loves, ami loves but one. 



LINES TO Mil. ITODGSON. 

■h RnnJi, June 30th, IS09. 
1. 

Here*. I Hodgson, we are coing, 
< i ir embargo 's oil' at last, 

Favour. i ' \\ i n 7 

Beml ;h ■ cam 1 1 oVr the mast, 



From aloft : -; reaming, 

llurk I the farewell tun is Bred : 

Women screeclung, tars blaspheming, 
Tell us that our time's expired, 
ii.re 's a rascal 
Come to task all. 

Prying from the cusl -bouse; 

Trunks unpacking, 
' es cracking, 
Not a coi tier for a mouse 
'Scab's unsearch'd amid the racket, 

F.re we sail on board the Packet. 



Now our boatmen quit their mooring, 
And all hands i ■ 1 1 1 ~- 1 ply III- oar ; 

Baggage from the quay is lowering, 

We're impatient— push from shor". 
"Have a care! that case holds liquor-* 

Slo'i the boat — I 'in sick — oh Lord '"' 
"Sick, ma'am, damme, you'll be si-k-r 

Ere you've I n an hour on board' 

Tims are screaming 

Men and women, 
Gemmen, ladies, servants, Jacks; 
Here entangling, 

All are wrangling, 
Stuck together close B8 wax. — 

Such the general noise ami racket, 

Ere we reach the Lisbon Packet. 

3. 

Now we've reaeh',1 her, lo ! the captaia, 
Gallant Kidd, commands the crew; 

Passengers their berths are clapl in. 
Some to grumble, some to spew. 

"Heyday I call yon thai a cabin? 

Why, 'tis hardly three feel square; 
Not enough to stow Queen Mab in — 

Who the deuce ran harbour Mere?" 
" Who, sir ? plentv — 

Nobles twenty 

Did at once my vessel fill." — 
"Hid they?" 1 
How you squeeze us ! 

Would to Qod they did so still: 

Then I 'd scape the heal and racket 
Of the good ship, Lisbon Packet." 

4. 
Fletcher! Murray! Bob I where are you; 

Btretch'd along the deck like i 
Bear a hand, you jolly tar, you' 

Here's a rope's-end for the tio^. 

Ilobhouse muttering fearful en' 

As the hatchway down he rolls. 
Now his breakfast, now his verses, 
Vomits forth— and damns our souls. 
" Here "s a stanza 

On Bragann— 
Help!"— "a couplet?"— "No, a cup 

< if warm water—" 
" Whit \s the matter ?" 
■• Zounds ' mj in <t 't i oming up, 

I shall not survive ttu rnrket 

Of tins brutal Lisbon Pot kel," 



Now at length we're off for Turks) 
Lord knows when we lonll come i«ea 
foul and tempests murky 
linsMp >1« in a i i:i. k. 



740 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



But, siiire life at most a jest is, 

As philosophers allow, 
Btill to laugh by fur the best is; 
Then laugh on — as I do mow. 
J. .-1111:11 at all thing*, 
Ureal and small things, 
Bick or well, at sea or shore; 
While we 're quaffing, 
Let 's have laughing — 
Who the devil rare* for more? 
y Mm- jf null wini.'l and who would lack it, 
Even on board the Lisbon Packet 1 



LINES IN THE TRAVELLERS' COOK AT OR- 
CHOMENUB. 

IN THIS BOOK A TRAVELLER HAD WRITTEN: — 

"Fair Albion smiling, sees her son depart 
To trace the birth and nursery of art: 
Nnbla his object, glorious is his aim: 
lie comes to Athens, and lie writes hit name." 

ia.1BA.TB WHICH LORD BVRON INSERTED THE FOLLOWING 

REPLY :— 

Thb modest bard, like many a bard unknown, 

•ymes on our nr/nes, but wisely hides his own: 
Hut yet whoe'er be be, to say no worse. 
His name would bring more credit than his verse. 



uui. 



OS MOORE'S LAST OPERATIC FARCE 

A FARCICAL EPIGRAM. 

Sept. 14, 

Goon plays are scarce, 

Bo .Moore writes farce: 
The poet's fame grows brittle — 

We knew before 

That Little's Moore, 
But now 'tis Monro that's Utile. 



EPISTLE TO MR. HODGSON', 

IN ANSWER TO SOME LINES EXHORTING HIM TO BE 
CHEERFUL AND TO "BANISH CARE." 

Kewstcad Abbey, Oct. II, 181 1. 
"Oh! banish care" — such ever be 
The motto of thy revelry! 
Perchance of mine, when wassail nights 
Krnew those riotous delights, 
Wherewith the children of Despair 
Lull the lone heart, anil "banish care." 
But not in morn's reflecting hour, 
When present, past, and future lower, 
When all I loved is changed or gone, 
Mock with such taunts the woes of one, 
Whose every thought— but let them pass 
Tlmu know'st I am not what I was. 
Bat, above all, if thou wouldst hold 
Place in a In-art that ne'er was cold, 
My all the powers that men revere, 
By all unto thy bosom dear, 
Thy joys below, thy hopes above, 
Speak,— apeak of anything but love. 

Tvero ang to tell, and vain to hear, 
The trf t of one who scorns a tear; 
Ami there is little in that tale 
Which better bosoms would bewail. 

Bllt mine has sull'er'd inure than well 

T would suit philosophy to tell. 



I've seen my bride another's bride, — 
Have - en ii ir Beated by his side, — 
Have seen the infant, which she bore, 
Wear the SWeel smile the mother wore 
When she and I In youth have smiled 
As fond and faultless as her child; — 
Have seen her eyea, in cold disdain, 

Ask if 1 felt no secret pain. 

And / have- acted well my part, 

And made my cheek belie my heart, 

Retum'd the freezing glance she gave, 

Yet fell the while that woman's slave; — 

Have kiss'd, as if without di 

The babe which ooght t<> have been mine, 

And stiow'd, alas! in each caress 
Time had not made me love the less. 

Biit let this pass— I'll whine no mure 
again an eastern shore ; 

The world befits a busy brain, — 

I 'II hie me tO its haunts again. 

But if, in some succeeding year, 

When Britain's " May is in the sere," 

'II; in lieai'st of one, whose deep'ning crinvct 

Suit with the sablest of the times. 

Of one, whom love nor pity sways, 

Nor hope of fame, nor good men's nraiso 

One, who in stem ambition's pr.de, 

Perchance hot blood shall turn aside, 

One rank'd in some recording page 
With the Worst anarchs of the • ■■ 
Ilim wilt thou know— and knowing pause, 
Nor will the effect forget the cause. 



ON LORD THURLOWS rOEMS. 

DEDICATED TO MR. ROGERS. 

May, 1<?13 

1. 

When Tlmrlow this damn'd nonsense sen'., 

(1 hope I am not violent,) 

Nor men nor gods knew what he meant. 

2. 
And since not ev'n our Rogers' praise 
To common sense his thoughts could raise — 
Why would they let him print his lays? 

3. 



5. 

To me, divine Apollo, grant— 01 
Hermi Ida's first and second canto, 
I 'in tilting up a new portmanteau; 

0. 
And thus to furnish decent lining, 
My own and others' bays I'm twining- 
So, gentle Tlmrlow, throw me thine in. 



TO LORD TIIURLOW. 

"I hj my branch of laurel down. 
Then thus to form Apnlln'i crown 
Let every other tiring Ins own." 

Ijjrd Thwlouti Lina U Mr ftyicn 

1. 

" I lay my branch of laurel doirn." 

Thou "lay thy branch of laurel down!" 
Why, what thou 'st stole is not enow 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



747 



And, were il lawfully thine own, 
Does Rogers want it most, or thou? 

Keep to thyself thy withcr'd bough, 
Or send i back to Doctor Donne — 

Wire justice done to both, I trow, 
He'd have but little, and thou— none. 

" Then thus to form Jlpolh's crown." 
A crown! why, twist it how you will, 
Thy ebaplet must be foolscap still. 
When next you visit Delphi's town, 

Inquire among your fellow-lodgers, 
They Ml tell you Phoebus pave his crown, 

Borne years before your birth, to Rogers, 
3. 
"Let every other bring hi.t own.'" 
When coals to Newcastle are carried, 

And owls sent to Athens as wonders. 
From his spouse when the Regent's unmarried, 

Or Liverpool weeps o'er his blunders; 
When Tories and Whigs cease to quarrel. 

When Castleresgh's wife has an heir, 
Then Rogers shall ask us for laurel, 

And thou shall have plenty to spare. 



TO THOMAS MOORE. 

WRITTEN THE EVENING BEFORE HIS VISIT, IN COMPANY 
WITH LORD BYRON, TO MR. I.EIOII HUNT IN COI.D BATH 
FIELDS PRISON, MAY 19, 1813. 

Oh you, who in all names can tickle the town, 
Anacreon, Tom Little, Tom Moore, or Tom lirown, — 
Por hang me if I know of whieh you may most brag, 
Your Quarto two-pounds, or your Two-penny Post 
Bag; 
****** 

Rut now to my letter— to yonra 'tis an answer — 
To-morrow be With me, as soon as you ran, sir, 
All ready and dress'i! f. >r proceeding to spunge on 
(According to compact) the wit in the dungeon — 
Pray Phoebus at length our political malice 
May not get us lodgings within the same' palace I 
I suppose that to-night you 're engaged with some 

codgers, 
And for Sotheby's Blues have deserted Sam Rogers, 
\nd I, though with cold I have nearly my death got, 
Must put on my breeches, and wait on the lleathcote. 
But to-morrow, at four, we will both play the Sr.urra, 
And you 'II be Catullus, the Regent Mainurra. 



FRAGMENT OF AN EPISTLE TO THOMAS 
MOORE. 

June, 1814. 
1. 

"What say /?'' — not a syllable further In prose; 
I'm your man "of all measures," dear Tom,— so, here 

goes ' 

Here goes, fir a swim on the stream o* old Time, 
On those buoyant supporters, the bladders of rhyme. 
If our weight breaks them down, and we sink in the 

flood, 
We are smother'd, at least, in respectable mud, 
Where the Divi rs of Bathos lie drown'd in a heap. 
And Sou they 'S last Pawn has pillow'd his sleep; — 
Tint " Felo de se" who, half drunk with his malmsey, 
Wj 'k'd out of his depth and was lost in a calm sea. 



Singing "Glory to God" in a spick and span stanza 
The like (since Tom Sternhold was choked) nev«t 

man saw. 

2. 
The papers have told you, no doubt, of the fussew, 
The Rites, and the gaping* to get at these Rucscs, — 
Of his Majesty's suite, up from coachman to Hot 

man, — 
And what dignity decks the flat face of the great 

man. 
I saw him, last week, at two balls and a party, — 
[■'or a prince, Ins demeanour was rather too hearty. 
Vou know, ice are used to quite different graces. 



3. 
The Czar's look, I own. was much brighter and brisker 
It ii t then le> is sadly deficient in whisker; 
And wore hut a starless blue coat, and in kersey- 
-mere breeches whisk'd round, in a waltz with tbc 

Jersey, 
Who, lovely as ever, scem'd just as delighted 
With majesty's presence as those she invited. 



THE DEVIL'S DRIVE. 

[Of this strange, wild poem, which extendi to about two hundred and ifty 
lines, the only copy that Lord Byron, I believe, ever wrote, ho presented 
to Lord Holland. Though with a good deal of vigour and imagination, si 
ii, fur Hit- mint part, rather clumsily executed, wanting the point and con- 
densation of (hose clever verses of Mr. Oolerldgv which Lord Byron, adopt* 
ing a notion long prevalent, has attributed to Professor Porson. There ara, 
however, some of Uie stanzas of "The Devil's Drive" well worth pr» 
serving.] — Moore. 

I. 

The Devil return'd to hell by two, 

And he staid at home till five ; 
Where he dined on some homicides done in ragout. 

And a rebel or so in an Irish stew, 
And sausages made of a self-slain Jew, 
And bethought himself what next to do; 

"And," quoth be, "I'll take a drive. 
I walk'd in the morning, I'll ride to-night; 
In darkness my children take most delight, 

And I'll see how my favourites thrive. 
2. 
" And what shall I ride in ?" quoth Lucifer, then— 

"If I follow'd my taste, indeed, 
I should mount in n wagon of wounded men, 

And smile to see them bhsi <L 
But these will be furnish'd again and again, 

And at present my purpose is speed ; 
To see my manor as much as I may, 
And watch ili.it no souls shall be poach'd amy. 

3. 
" I have a state-coach at Carlton Douse, 

A chariot in Seymour-place ; 
But they're lent to two friends, who make me 
amends 

By driving my favourite pace: 
And tiny handle tlutr reins with such a gra.^e, 
I have something for both at the end of lie iriaee. 

4. 
"So now for the earth to take my chance." 

'lien up to the earth sprung he; 
And making a jump from Moscow to France 

He stepp'd across the sea, 
And rested his hoof on n turnpike road. 
No very grcit way from a bishop's abode 



M8 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



But first as he flew, I forgot to say, 
That he hover'd a moment upon his way 
To look upon Leipsic plain J 

And so sweet to his eye was its sulphury glare, 
And BO soft to his ear was Hie cry of despair, 

That be perch'd on a mountain of slam: 
And he gazed with delight from its growing height, 
Nor often on earth had he seen such a sight, 

Nor uis work done half so well: 
For the field ran so red with the blood of the dead, 

That it blueb'd like the waves of hell ! 
Then loudly, and wildly, and long laugh'd he: 
"Mcthinks they have here little need of met" 



But the softest note that soothed his ear 

Was the: sound of a widow sighing; 
And the sweelest sight was the icy tear, 
Which horror froze in the blue eye clear 

Of a maid by her lover lying — 
As round her fell her long fair hair : 
And she look'd to heaven with that frenzied air 
Which seeni'd to ask if a God were there I 
And, stretch'd by the wall of a ruin'd hut, 
Willi its hollow cheek, and eyes half shut, 

A child of famine dying: 
And the carnage begun, when resistance is done, 
And the fall of the vainly living 1 
***** * 

10. 
But the Devil has reach'd our ciiffs so white, 

And what did he there, 1 pray ? 
If his eyes were good, he but saw by night 

What we see every day; 
But he made a tour, and kept a journal 
Of all tin: WOBdrOue sights nocturnal, 
And he sold it in shares to the Men of the Rote, 
Who hid pretty well— but they cheated him, though! 

11. 
The Devil first saw, as he thought, the Mail, 

Its coachman and his coat; 
So instead of a pistol he cock 'd his tail, 

And seized him by the throat: 
"Aha," quoth he, "what have we here? 
•Tis a new barouche, and an ancient peer!" 
So he sat him on his box again, 

And bade him have no fear, 
But be true to his club, and staunch to his rein, 

His brothel, and his beer; 
"Next to seeing a lord at the council board, 

I would rather see him here." 

****** 

17. 
The Devil gat next to Westminster. 

And he turn'd "to the room" of the Commons ; 
But he heard, as he proposed to enter in there, 

That "the Lords" had received a summons; 
And ne thought as &" quondam aristocrat," 
He might peep at the peers, though to hear them 

wire fiat ; 
And he walk'd up the house so like one of our 

own, 
That they say that he stood pretty near the throne 

18. 
lie saw the. Lord Liverpool seemingly wise, 

The Lord Westmoreland certainly silly, 
And Johnny of Norfolk— a man of some size— 
And Chatham, so like his friend Billy; 



And he saw the tears in Lord Eldon's eyes, 
Because the Catholics would not ii?e. 
In spite of his prayers and his prophecies; 
And he heard— which set S;itan llimselfa staring — 
A certain chief justice say something like swtar 

ing. 
And the Devil was shock'd — and quoth he, " I 

must go, 
For I find we have much better manners below. 
If thus he harangues when be passes 1 1 1 >• border 
I shall hint to friend Moloch to call him to order. 
December, 1813. 



ADDITIONAL STANZAS, TO THE ODE TO 
NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 

17. 

There was a day — there was an hour, 

While earth was Caul's — Gaul thine — 
When that immeasurable power 

Unsated to resign 
Had been an act of purer fame 
Than gathers round Marengo's name 

And gilded thy decline, 
Through the long twilight of all time, 
Despite some passing clouds of crime 

18. 
But thou forsooth must be a king 

And don the purple vest, 
As if that foolish robe could wring 

Remembrance from thy breast. 
Where is that faded garment? where 
The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear, 

The star — the string — the crest ? 
Vain froward child of empire ! say, 
Are all thy playthings suatch'd away? 

19. 
Where may the wearied eye repose, 

When gazing on the great; 
Where neither guilty glory glows. 

Nor despicable stale ? 
Yes— one— the first— the last— the best— 
The Cincinnatus of the West, 

Whom envy dared not hate, 
Bequeath'd the name of Washington, 

To make man blush theic was but one I 

Jpril, 1811 



TO LADY CAROLINE LAMB. 

And say'st thou that I have not felt, 

Wlii!>t thou wert thus estranged from me? 
Nor know'st how dearly I have dwelt 

On one unbroken dream of thee? 
But love like ours must never be, 

And I will learn to prize thee less; 
As thou hast fled, so let ine flee. 

And change the heart thou niay'st not bless 

They'll tell thee, Clara! I have seem'd, 

Of late, another's charms to woo. 
Nor sigh'd, nor frown'd, as if I deem'd 

Thai thou wert banish'd from my view. 
Clara! this struggle— to undo 

What thou hast done loo well, for me 
This mask before the babbling crew— 

This treachery— was truth to ihec! 






MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



719 



I have not wept while thou wert gone, 

Nor worn one look of sullen woe; 
But sought, in many, all that one 

(Ah! need I name her?) could bestow. 
It is a duty which I owe 

To thine— to thee— to man — to God, 
To crush, to quench this guilty glow, 

Ere yet the path of crime he trod 

Cut since my breast is not so pure, 

.Since still the vulture tears my heart. 
Let me this agony endure, 

Not thee— oh! dearest as thou art! 
In mercy, Clara! let us part. 

And I will seek, yet know not how, 
To shun, in time, the threatening dart ; 

Guilt must not aim at such as thou. 

Hut thou must aie! me in the task. 

And nobly thus exert thy power; 
Then spurn me hence — 'tis all I ask — 

Ere time mature a guiltier hour; 
Ere wrath's impending vials shower 

Remorse redoubled on my head ; 
Ere fires unquenchably devour 

A heart, whose hope has long been dead. 

Deceive no more thyself and me, 

Deceive not better hearts than mine; 
Ah! shouldst thou, whither wouldst thou flee, 

From woe like ours — from shame like thine? 
And, if there be a wrath divine, 

A pang beyond this fleeting breath. 
E'en now all future hopes resign, 

Such thoughts are guilt— such guilt is death. 



STANZAS FOR MUSIC. 
1. 
I speak not, I trace not, I breathe not thy name. 
There is grief in the sound, there is gui'.-t in the fame; 
But the tear which now burns on my cheek may im- 
part 
The deep thoughts that dwell in that silence of heart. 

2. 
Too brief for our passion, too long for our peace, 
Were those hours— can their joy or their bitterness 

cease? 
We repent — we abjure — we will break from our 

chain, — 
We will part, — we will fly to— unite it again! 

3. 
Oh! thine he the gladness, and mine he the guilt! 
Forgive me, adored one!— forsake, if thou wilt; — 
But the heart which is thine shall expire undebased, 
And man shall not break it — whatever tliou mayest. 

4. 
And stem to the haughty, but humble to thee, 
This soul, in its bitterest blackness, shall be; 
And our days seem as swift, and our moments more 

sweet. 
With thee by my side, than with worlds at our feet. 

S. 
One sigh of thy sorrow, one look of thy love, 
Shall turn me or fix, shall reward or reprove; 
And the heartless may wonder at all I resign— 
Thy lip shall reply, not to them, but to nte*, 

May, 1814. 



ADDRESS INTENDED TO BE RECITED AT TUB 
CALEDONIAN MEETING. 

Who hath not glow'd above the page where fame 
Hath tix'd high Caledon's uneonquer'd name; 
The mountain land which spurn'd the Roman chain 
And baffled back the flery created Dane, 
Who.-,: iiriiiht claymore and hardihood of hand 

No foe could I tun — OS tyrant eOUld command? 
That race is gone— but still their children breathe, 
And glory crowns them With redoubled Wreath: 
O'er Gael and Saxon mingling banners slime. 
And England I add their stubborn strength to thine. 
The blood which flow'd with Wallace flows as free, 
Hut now 'tis only shed for fame and thee! 
< ill ' pass not by the northern veteran's claim, 
But give Support— the world bath given him famel 

The humbler ranks, the lowly brave, who bled 
While cheerly following where the mighty led, 
Who sleep beneath the undistinguish'd sod 
Where happier comrades in their triumph trod, 
To us bequeath — 'tis all their fate allows — 
The airelesa Offspring and the lonely spouse: 
She on high Albyu's dusky hills may raise 
The tearful eye in melancholy gaze. 
Or view, while shadowy auguries disclose 
The Highland seer's anticipated woes, 
The bleeding phantom of each martial form 
Dim in the cloud, or darkling in the storm; 
While sad, she chants the solitary song, 
The soft lament for him who tarries long — 
For him, whose distant relics vainly crave 
The Coronach'* wild requiem to the brave. 

'Tis Heaven— not man— must charm away the woe 

Which hursts when Nature's feelings newly flow • 

Vet tenderness and time may rob the tear 

Of half iis bitterness for one so dear; 

A nation's gratitude perchance may spread 

A thnmless pillow for the widow'd head; 

May lighten well her heart's maternal care, 

And weau from penury the soldier's heir. 

.May, 1814. 



ON THE PRTNCE REGENT'8 HETCRNING THE 
PICTURE <>[•' SARAH, COUNTESS OF JERSEY 
TO MRS. MEE. 

When the vain triumph of the imperial lord. 

Whom servile K e ohey'd, and yet ahhorr'd, 

cave to the vulgar gaze each glorious bust, 

Thai left a likeness of the brave or just; 
What most admired each scrutinizing eye 

Of all that deck'd that posting pageantry? 

What spread from face to face that wondering all? 

The thought of Hiatus — for his was not there! 
That absence proved his worth,— that absence fiiM 
His memory on the longing mind, unmix'd; 
And more decreed his tdory to °ndure, 
Than all a gold Colowua could secure. 

If thus, fair Jersey, our desiring gaze 
Search for thy form, in vain and mute amaze, 
Amid those pictured charms, whose loveliness. 
Hriirlit though they be. thine own had render'd less 
If he. that vain old man, whom truth admits 
Heir of his father's ilirfuie and thatlcr'd wits, 
If hia corrupted eye an. I wither'd heart 
CouM with thy gentle Image hear depart, 

That tasteless shame be Ms, Mid ours the grief. 
To gaze on Beauty's band without its chief: 



750 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Yet comfort still one selfish thought imparts, 
We lose the portrait, but preserve our hearts. 

What can his vaulted gallery now disclose? 
A garden with all flowers — except the rose; — 
A fount that only wants us living stream; 
And night, with every star save Dian's heam. 
Lost to our eyes the preset! forms shall be, 
That turn from tracing them 'o dream of thee ; 
And more on that recall'd resemblance pause, 
Than all he shall not force on our applause. 

Long may thy yet meridian lustre shine, 
With all that Virtue asks of Homage thine: 
The symmetry of youth — the grace of mien — 
The eye that gladdens— and the brow scene; 
The glossy darkness of that clustering ha.-, 
Which shades, yet shows that forehead mor, than fair! 
Each glance that wins us, and (he life that throws 
A spell which will not let our looks repose, 
Hut turn to gaze again, and find anew 
Some charm that well rewards another view. 
These are not lesseu'd, these are still as blight, 
Albeit too dazzling for a dotard's si.'lit ; 
And these must wait till every charm is gone 
To please the paltry heart that pleases none, 
That dull cold sensualist, whose sickly eye 
In envious dimness pass'd thy portrait by; 
Who rack'd his little spirit to combine 
Its hate of Freedom's loveliness, and thine. 

July, 1814. 



TO BELSHAZZAR, 

J. 

Bui.snAZZ.vR ! from the banquet turn, 
Nor in thy sensual fullness fall : 

Behold! while yet before thee burn 
The graven words, the glowing wall. 

Many a despot men miscall, 

Crown'd and anointed from on high; 

But thou, the weakest, worst of all — 
Is it not written, thou must die? 
o^ 

Go ! dash the roses from thy brow- 
Gray hairs but poorly wreathe with them; 

Youth's garlands misbecome thee now, 
More than thy very diadem, 

Where thou hast tarnish'd every gem : — 
Then throw the worthless bauble by. 

Which, worn by thee, ev'n slaves contemn; 
And learn like belter men to die. 
3. 

Oh! early in the balance weigh'd, 
And ever light of word and worth, 

Whose soul expired ere youth decay'd, 
And left thee but a mass of earth. 

To see thee moves a scorner's mirth: 

But tears in Hope's averted eye 
Lament that even thou hadst birth- 
Unfit to govern, live, or die. 



HEBREW MELODIES. 

m the valley of waters we wept o'er the day 
When the host of the stranger made Balem his prej ; 
And our heads on our bosoms all droopingly lay, 
And our hearts were so full of the land far away. 

The song they demanded in vain— it lay still 
n out souls as the wind that hatn died on the hill, 



They called for the harp, but our blood they shall spill. 
Ere our right hand shall teach them one tone of their skill. 

All stringlesi.lv hung on the willow's sad tree 
As dead as her dead leaf those mute harps must bo; 
Our hands may be fetter'd, our tears Still are free, 
For our God and our glory, and Sion ! for thee. 

October, 1814 



They say that Hope is happiness. 
But genuine Love must prize the past; 

And Memory wakes the thoughts that bless — 
They ruse the first, they set the last 

And all that Memory loves the most 

Was once our only hope to be; 
And all that hope adored and lost 

Hath melted into memory. 

Alas! it is delusion all, 

The future cheats us from afar, 
Nor can we In- what we recall, 

Nor dare we think on what we are. 

October, 1814. 



LINES INTENDED FOR THE OFENING OF"TJB 
SIEGE OF CORINTH." 

In the year since Jesus died for men, 

Eighteen hundred years and ten, 

We W™re a gallant company, 

Riding Ver land, and sailing o'er 6ea. 

Oh! but we went merrily! 

We forded the river and clomb the high hill, 

Never our steeds for a day stood still ; 

Whether we lay in the cave or the shed, 

Our sleep fell soft on the hardest bed; 

Whether we couch'd in our rough capote, 

On the rougher plank of our gliding boat. 

Or stretch'd on the beach, or our saddles spread 

As a pillow beneath the resting head, 

Fresh we woke upon the morrow : 

All our thoughts and words had scope, 

We had health, and we had hope, 
Toil and travel, but no s rrow. 
We were of all tongues a.r I creeds; — 
Some were those who coun ,..-d beads, 
Some of mosque, and some of church, 

And some, or I mis-say, of neither; 
Yet through the wide world might ye search, 

Nor find a inotlier crew nor blither. 

But some are dead, and some are gone, 
And some are scatter'd and alone, 
And some are rebels on the hills* 

That look along Epirus' valleys, 

Where freedom still at moments rallies, 
And pays in blood oppression's ills; 

And some are in a far country, 
And some all restlessly at home; 

But never more, oh! never we 
Shall meet to revel and to roam. 

But those hardy days flew cheerily, 

And when they now fall drearily, 

My thoughts, like swallows, skim the malt. 

And bear my spirit back again 

Over the earth, ami through the air, 

A wild bird, and a wanderer. 



« The 1 
lowed mi.) lla'C Inn 

of Ibe bands column 



■- n'ly hard of Defl i*!> (one nf the Aniiruts niv- jit 
be iii mvolt upi n the n itintsina, al Ihehead of «n» 
i tliat couulxy ill times of l-cuble. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



751 



"Tis this lhat ever wakes my strain, 

And oft, too oft, implores again 

Tlu; few who may endure my lay. 

To Follow me bo for away. 

Stranger— wilt thou follow now. 

And sit with me on Acro-Corii ath's brow? 

December, 1815. 



EXTRACT PROM AiV UNPUBLISHED TOEM. 

Coii.n I remount the river of my years. 

To Hie tir.st fountain of our smiles ami tears 

1 would not trace again the Btream of lionra 

Between their oat worn banks of wither'd flowers, 

Itut bid it flow as now — until it glides 

Into the number of the nameless tide* 

****** 

What is this death?— a quiet of the heart? 
The whole of that of which we are a part? 
For life is but a vision — what I see 
Of all which lives alone is life to me, 
And being so — the absent are the dead. 
Who haunt us from tranquillity, and spread 
A dreary shroud around us, and invest 
With sad remembrancers our hours of rest. 

The absent are the dead— for they are cold, 
And ne'er can be what once we did behold; 
And they are changed, and cheerless,— or if yet 
The unforgotten do hot all forget, 
Since thus divided — equal must it be 
If the deep barrier be of earth, or sea ; 
It may be both— but one day end i'. must 
In the dark union of insensate dust. 

The under-earth inhabitants— are they 
But mingled millions decomposed to clay? 
The ashes of a thousand ages spread 
Wherever man has trodden or shall tread ? 
Or do they in their silent cities dwell 
Each in his incommunicative cell? 
Or have they their own language? and a sense 
Of breathless being? darken'd and intense 
Jls midnight in her solitude?— Oh Earth I 
Where are the past ?— and wherefore had they birth ? 
The dead are thy inheritors — and we 
But bubbles on thy surface; and the key 
Of thy profundity is in the grave, 
The ebon portal of thy peopled cave, 
Where I would walk in spirit, and behold 
Our elements resolved to things untold, 
And fathom hidden wonders, anil explore 
The essence of great bosoms now no more. 
****** 

October, 181G. 



TO AUGUSTA. 
I. 

My sister! my sweet sister! if a name 
nearer and purer were, it should be thine. 
Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim 
No tears, but tenderness to answer mine. 
Go where I will, to me thou art the same — 
A loved regret which 1 would not resign. 
There yet are two things in my destiny, — 
4 world to roam through, and a homo with thee, 
it. 
The first were nothing— had I still the last 
It were the haven of my happiness; 
But other claims and other ties thou hnst, 
And mine is not the wish to make them less. 



A strange doom is Ihy father's son's, and past 

Recalling, as it lies b yond redress; 

Reversed for him our grandsire's* fate of yorc,- 
He had no rest at sea, m:r 1 on shore. 
in. 

If ray inheritance of Btonns bath been 

In other elements, and on the rocks 

Of perils, overlooked or unforeseen, 

I have BUBtain'd my share of worldly shocks, 

The fault was mine; nor do 1 seek to screen 

My errors with defensive paradox; 

I have been cunning in mine overthrow. 
The careful pilot of my proper woe. 

IV. 

Mine were my faults, and mine be their reward. 
My whole life was a contest since the day 

Thai gave being, save me that which marr'd 

The gift,— a fate, or will, that walk'd astray; 
And 1 at times have found the Struggle hard, 
And thought of shaking off my bonds of clayi 
But now I fain would for a time survive, 

If but to see what next can well arrive. 
v. 
Kingdoms and empires in my little day 
I have outlived, and yet I am not old; 
And when I look on this the petty spray 
Of my own years of trouble, which have roll'd 
Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away: 
Something— I know not what— does still uphold 
A spirit of slight patience; — not in vain, 

Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain. 

VI. 

Perhaps the workings of defiance stir 
Within me, — or perhaps a cold despair, 
Brought on when ills habitually recur, — 
Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air, 
(For even to this may change of sou! refer, 
And with light armour we may learn to bear,) 
Have taught me a strange quiet, which was not 
The chief companion of a calmer lot. 

VII. 

I feel almost at times as I have felt 

In happy childhood ; trees, and flowers, and brooks 

Which do remember me cf where I dwelt 

Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books, 

Come as of yore upon me, and can melt 

My heart With recognition of their looks; 

And even at moments I could think I see 

Some living thing to love— but none like theo. 
vm. 
Here are the Alpine landscapes which create 
A fund for contemplation; — to admire 
Is a brief feeling of a trivial dale; 
But something worthier do such scenes insjnrei 
Here to he lonely is not desolate. 
For much I view which I could most desiie, 
And, above all, a lake I can behold 

Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old. 

IX. 

Oh that thou wert hat with me!— but I grow 
The fool of my own wishes, and forget 
The solitude which I have vaunted so 
Has lost its praise in this but one regret; 



• Admiral Pyron tva* remarkable for nev?r mnkinr a voyage without 
lie was known to the sailer* by the facetious uanio of "forf 
weather Jack." 

11 Put thnurh it were tempe«t-tn*t, 
Still hii bark could not be lost." 
He returned safely from the w r,rk of the Waeer. (in Anjon'i Tnrvre,) »»* 
lly circun ii.-ivigated the world, n.any yea*t af'er at ccuuuavMr 
of a similar expedition. 



T52 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



There may he others tvnich I less may show ;— 
I am not »f the plaintive mood, and yet 
I feel an ebb in my philosophy, 

And the tide rising in my altcr'd eye. 
I, 
I did remind thee of out own dear lake,* 
By the Old hall which may be mine no more. 
Leman's is fair; bat think not I forsake 
The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore: 
Sad havoc Time must with my memory make 
Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before; 
Though, like all things Which I have loved, they are 

Resign'd for ever, or divided far. 

XI. 

The world is all before me; T but ask 
Of Nature that with which she will comply — 
It is but in her summer's sun to bask, 
To mingle with the quiet of her sky, 
To see her gentle face without a mask, 
And never gaze on it with apathy. 
She was my early friend, and now shall be 
My sister — till I look again on thee. 

XII. 

I can reduce all feelings but. this one: 
And that I would not;- for at length I see 
Such scenes as those wherein my life begun, 
The earliest— even the only paths for me — 
Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun, 
I had been better than I now can be; 
The passions which have torn me would have slept; 
T bad not BUtier'd, and thou hadst not wept. 

XIII. 

With false ambition what had I to do? 
Little with love, and least of all with fame; 
And yet they came unsought, and with me grew. 
And made me all which they can make— a name. 
Yet this was not the end I did pursue ; 
Surely I once beheld a nobler aim. 
Hut all is over— I am one the more 

To batlled millions which have gone before. 
xiv. 
And for the future, this world's future may 
From me demand but little of my care ; 
I have outlived myself by many a day; 
Having survived so many things that were; 
My years have been no slumber, but the prey 
Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share 
Of life which might have fill'd a century, 

3efore its fourth in time had pass'd me by. 
xv. 
And for the remnant which may be to come 
I am content; and for the past I feel 
Not thankless,— for within the crowded sum 
Of struggles, happiness at times would steal, 
And for the present I would not benumb 
My feelings farther.— Nor shall I conceal 
That with all this I still can look around 

\nd worship Nature with a thought profound. 

XVI. 

For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy heart 
( know myself Secure, as thou in mine; 
We were and are— 1 am, even as thou art — 
Beings who ne'er each other can resign; 
ft is the samr, together or apart. 
From life's commencement to its slow decline 
We are entwined— let death come slow or fast, 
fhn tie which hound the first endures the last! 
October, 1816. 

• The lake of Newstead Abbey. 



TO THOMAS MOORE. 

1. 

My boat is on the shore, 

And my hark is on the sea; 
But, before I go, Tom Moore, 

Here's a double health to thee! 
o. 
Here's a sigh to those who love me, 

And a smile to those who hate; 
And, whatever sky 's above me, 

Here's a heart lor every fate. 
3. 
Though the ocean roar around me, 

Vet it still shall bear me on; 
Though a desert should surround me, 

It hath springs that may be won. 
4. 
Were 't the last drop in the well. 

As I gasp'd upon the brink, 
Ere my fainting spirit fell, 

"fis to thee that I would drink. 
5. 
Willi that water as this wine. 

The libation I would pour 
Should In!— peace With thine and mine. 

And a health to thee, Tom Moore. 

July, 1817 



STANZAS TO THE RIVER PO. 
I. 

River, that rollest by the ancient walls 
Where dwells the lady of my love, when she 

Walks by thy brink, and there perchance recalls 
A faint and fleeting memory of me; 



What if thy deep and ample stream should he 

A mirror of my heart, where she may read 
The thousand thoughts I now betray to thee. 

Wild as thy wave, and headlong as thy speed! 
3. 
What do I say?— a mirror of my heart! 

Are not thy waters sweeping, dark, and strong! 
Such as my feelings were and are, thou art; 

And such as thou art were my passions long. 
4. 
Time may have somewhat tamed them, — not for eves 

Thou, overflow'st thy banks, and not for aye 
Thy bosom overboils, congenial river! 

Thy floods subside, and mine have sunk away, 
5. 
Hut left long wrecks behind, and now again, 

Borne in our old unchanged career, we m:ve; 
Thou tendest wildly onwards to the main, 

And I— to loving one I should not love. 
6. 
The current I behold will sweep beneath 

filer native walls, and murmur at her feet; 
Her eyes will look on thee, when she shall breathe 

The twilight air, unharm'd by summer's heat. 
7. 
She will look on thee, — I have look'd on thee, 

Full of that thought; and, from that moment, ne'ei 
Thy waters could I dream of, name, or see, 

Without the inseparable sigh for her! 



t The Countess Guicciolj 



MISCEL1 ANEOUS POEMS. 



753 



His bright ryes will bo Imaged in (by stream, — 

Yes! they will meet the wave 1 gaze on now: 
Mine cannot witness, even in a dream, 

That happy wave repass me in its Howl 
9. 
The wave that bears my tears returns no more: 

Will she return hv whom that wave shall sweep? — 
Both tread thy banks, both wander on thy shore, 

I by thy source, she by the dark-blue deep. 
10. 
But that which keepeth us apart is not 

Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth: 
But the distraction of a various lot, 

As various as the climates of our birth. 

11. 
A stranger loves the lady of the land, 

Born far beyond me mountains, hut his b'ood 
Is all meridian, as if never fann'd 
By the bleak wind tnat chills the polar flood. 
12. 
My blood is all meridian ; were it not, 

I hail not left my clime, nor should I be, 
In spite of tortures ne'er to be forgot, 
A slave again of love,— at least of thee. 
13. 
Tis vain to struggle — let me perish young — 
Live as I lived, and love as I h~ve loved; 
To dust if I return, from dust I sprung. 
And then, at least, my heart can ne'er be moved. 

June, loll). 



SOXXET TO GEORGE THE FOURTH 



OK THE REPEAL *» 



■/~RD EDWARD FITZGERALD'S FOR. 
tlTL'RE. 



To be tne father of the fatherless. 
To stretch the hand from the throne's height, and 

raise 
His offspring, who expired in o'her days 
o make thy sire's sway by a kingdom less, — 
"/lis is to be a monarch, and repress 
Envy into unutterable praise. 
Oismiss thy guard, and trust thee to such traits, 
For who would lift a hand, except to bless? 
Were it not easy, sire? and is't not sweet 
*o make thyself beloved"? and to be 
Omnipotent by mercy's means? for thus 
Thy sovereignty would grow but more complete; 
despot thou, and yet thy people free. 
And by the heart, not hand, enslaving us. 

August, 1819. 



FRAXCESCA OF RIMINI. 
Translation from the inferno or dante, 

CANTO FIFTH. 

'The land whrrc I was born sits by the seas, 
Upon that shore to which the To descends, 
With all his followers, in search of peace. 

Love, which the gentle heart soon apprehends. 
Seized him for the fair person which was ta'en 
From me, and me even yet the mode oHcnds. 

I.i. ve, who to none beloved to love acain 
Remits, seized me with wish to phase, so strong, 
That, as thou seeet, yet, yet it doth remain. 

Love to one death conducted us along, 
3 R 100 



ii. 



But C'aina waits for him our life who ended:" 
Th :se were the accents utter'd by Iter tongue.— 

Since lirst I li.-ten'd to these souls offended, 
I fiow'd my visigc and so kept it till — 

( then ) j 
"What thitik'st thou?" said the bard; / when j 
unbended, 
And recommenced: " Mas! unto 

How many sweet thoughts, what strange ccstacies 
Led rh el heir ei ii fortune to fulfil !" 
And then I lurn'd unto their side my eyes, 
And said, "Franceses, thy s.el destinies 
Have made me sorrow till the tears arise. 
Bui tell me, in the season of sweoi su-lis. 
By uliat and how thy lovo to passion rose, 
So as his dim desires to recognise?" 
Then she to me: "The greatest of all woes 
I recall to mind } 
Is to ( remind us of \ our happy days 

{ this ) 
In misery, and ) that ) thy teacher knows. 
But if to learn our passion's first root preys 
Upon thy spirit with such sympathy, 

( relate J 
I will (do* even ( as he who weeps and says.— — 
We read one day lor pastime, seated nigh, 
Of Lancilot, how love enchain'd him too. 
We were alone, quite unsuspiciously. 
Ilut oft our eyes met, and our cheeks in hue 
All o'er discolour'd by that reading were; 

I orcrthrew ) 
Cut one point only wholly j us o'erthrew; j 
I desired ) 

When we read the ( long-sigh'd for ) smile of her, 
\ a fervent i 
To be thus kiss'd by such / devoted | lover, 
He who from me ca- be divided ne'er 
Kiss'd my mouth, trembling in the act all over. 
Accursed was the book and he who wrote I 

That day we did no further leaf uncover. 

While thus one spirit told us of their lot. 
The other wept, so that with pity's thralls 
I swoon'd as if by death I had been smote. 
And fell down even as a dead body falls." 

March, 1820. 



BTANZAS, 

TO nER WHO BEST CAN UNDERSTAND THEM. 

Be it so! we part for ever! 

Let the past as nothing be;— 
Had I only loved thee, never 

Hadst thou been thus dear to me. 

Had I loved and I bus been slighted. 
That I better could have borne ;- 

Love is quell'd, when unrequited, 
By the rising pulse of scorn. 

Pride may cool what passion heated. 
Time will tame the wayward will; 
But the heart in friendship cheated 

Throbs With WOe'S most maddening lurill 

Had I loved, I now might hate thee. 

In the hatred Bolace -.eric. 
Might exult t.i execrate thee, 

And, in words, my vengeance vnv4«. 



• In »nnieof tlif edition!, h It M diio,*in allien M faro;*— in «*xniial ill 
'Arm "rnine" aiwl "ilninf." wh.eli I know oil hc«* *. 4«cl4 
Ask Foecolo. The d — d editiou* drive me noil 



754 



flYRON'S WORKS. 



But there is a silent sorrow, 

Which c:in find no vent in speech, 

Winch disdains relief to borrow 

From the heights that BOflg can reach. 

Like a clankless chain enthralling, — 
Like the sleepless dreams that mock, — 

Like the frigid ice-drops falling 
Ftom the surf surrounded rock. 

Such the cold and sickening feeling 

Thou bast caused this heart to know, 
Stnbh'd the deeper by concealing 

From the world its bitter woe. 

Once it fondly, proudly, deemed thee 
All that fancy's self could paint. 

Once it honour'.! and esteem' J. thee, 
As "its idol and its saint 1 

More than woman thou wast to me; 

Not as man 1 look'd on thee;— 
Why like woman then undo roe I 

Why " heap man's worst curse on me." 

Wast thou but a fiend, assuming 
Friendship's Bmile, and woman's art, 

And in horrow'd beauty blooming, 
Trifling with a trusted heart! 

By that eye which once could glisten 

With opposing glance to me ; 
By that ear which once could listen 

To each tale 1 told to thee:— 

By that lip, its smile bestowing, 

Which could soften sorrow's gush;— 

By that cheek, once brightly glowing 
With pure friendship's well-feigned blush; 

By all those false charms united, — 
Thou hast wrought thy wanton will, 

And, without compunction, bliirhted 
What "thou wouldst not kindly kill." 

Yet I curse thee not in sadness, 
Still, I feel how dear thou wert; 

Oh! I could not— e'en in madness- 
Doom thee to thy just desert! 

Live! and when my life is over, 
Should thine own he lengthen'd long, 

Thou may'st then, too late, discover 
By thy feelings, all my wrong. 

When thy beauties all are faded,— 
When thy flatterers faun no more,— 

Ere the solemn shroud hath shaded 
Some regardless reptile's store,— 

Ere that hour, false syren, hear met 
Thou may'st feel what I do now, 

Wlljle my spirit, hovering near thee, 
Whispers friendship's broken vow. 

But 'tis useless to upbraid thee 
With thy past or present state; 

What thou wast, my fancy made thee, 
What thou art, I know too late. 



TO THE COUNTESS OF BLESSINGTON. 

1. 

Toe have ask'd for a verse :— the request 
In n rhymer 'twere strange to deny; 

(tut my Ilippoc.ene was but my breast, 
And my feelings (its fountain) are dry. 



Were I now as I was, I had sung 
What Lawrence has painted so well ; 

But the strain would expire on my tongue, 
And the theme is too soft for my shell. 

3. 

I am ashes where once I was fire. 

And the hard in my bosom is dead; 
What I loved I row merely admire. 

And my heart is as gray as my head. 
4. 
My life is not dated by years — 

There are moments which act as a plough, 
And there is not a furrow appears 

But is deep in my soul as my brow. 

5. 

Let the young and the brilliant aspire 
To sing what I gaze on in vain: 

For sorrow has torn from my lyre 
Tile string which was worthy the strain. 
April, ld'J3. 



STANZAS 

WRITTEN ON THE ROAD BETWEEN FLORENCE AND PISA 
1. 

On, talk not to me of a name great in story; 
'1'he days of our youth are the days of our glory 
And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-aml-twenty 
Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty, 
o 

What are garlands and crowns to the brow that is 

wrinkled? 
'Tis but as a dead flower with May dew besprinkled. 
Then away with all such from the head that is hoary! 
What care I for the wreaths that can only give glory 7 

3. 

Oh Fame! if I e'er took delight in thy praises, 
'T was less for the sake of thy high-sounding phrases. 
Than to see the bright eyes of the dear one discover 
She thought that I was not unworthy to love her. 

4. 

There chiefly I sought thee, there only I found thee; 
Her glance was the best of the rays that surround tbeei 
When it sparkled o'er aiighl that was bright in my story, 
I knew it was love, and I felt it was glory. 

December, 1821. 



IMPROMPTU. 

ON LADY BLESSINGTON EXI'KESSINO HER INTENTION Of 

TAKINO THE VILLA CALLED " IL PARADISO," 

NEAR GENOA. 

Beneath lilessington's eyes 

The rcclaim'd Paradise 
Should be free as the formal from evil J 

But if the new Eve 

For an apple should grieve, 
What mortal would not play the Devil?* 

Jjpril, 1S23. 



• TtA fin..., ■ i- witi i'"i dread] iipnlii Ithhfl I totnmeaj 

Taking it Into (hi i head that this villa hail bean fixed Ion for his vvurai 

deuce, they said, " 11 Diavolo e aiicca citrate, m 1'araJljo. '-/i/u. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



75! 



TO A VAIN LADY. 

Ah. heedless girl! why thus disclose 
What ne'er was meani for other cars? 

Why thus destroy thine own repose 
And dig the source of future tears ? 

Oh, thou wilt weep, imprudent maid, 
While lurkiiiL' envious foes will smile. 

For ;ill the follies thou bast said 
Of those who spoke but to beguile. 

Vain girl! thy ling'ring woes are nigh, 
If thou believ'st vfhat striplings say: 

Oh, from the deep temptation fly, 
Nor fall the specious spoiler's prey. 

Dost thou repeat, in childish boast, 

Tlii> words man utters to deceive? 

Thy peace, thy hope, thy all is lost, 

If thou canst venture to believe. 

While now amongst thy female peers 
Thou tell'st again the soothing tale, 

Canst thou not mark the rising sneers 
Duplicity in vain would veil ? 

Those tales in secret silence hush, 
Nor make thyself the public gaze: 

What modest maid without a blush 
Recounts a flattering coxcomb's praise? 

Will not the laughing hoy despise , 
Hit who relates each fond conceit — 

Who, thinking Heaven is in her eyes, 
Yet cannot see the slight deceit ? 

For she who takes a soft delight 

These amorous nothings in revealing. 

Must credit all we say or write, 
While vanity prevents concealing. 

Cease, if you prize your beauty's reign I 

No jealousy bids me reprove: 
One, who is thus from nature vain, 

I pity, but I cannot love. 

Januury 15, 1807. 



FAREWELL TO THE MUSE. 

Thou Power! who hast ruled me through infancy's 

days, 
* Young offspring of Fancy, 't is time we should part ; 
Then rise on the gale this the last of my lavs, 
The coldest effusion which springs from my heart. 

This bosom, responsive to rapture no more. 
Shall hush thy wild notes, nor implore thee to sm:; 

The feelings of childhood, which taught the'.' to soar, 
Are wafted far distant on Apathy's wing. 

Though simple the themes of my rude flowing Lyre, 
Yet even these themes are departed for ever; 

No more beams the eyes which my dream could in- 
spire. 
My visions are flown, to return, — alas, never I 

When drain'd is the nectar which gladdens the bowl, 
How vain is the eftort delight to prolong! 

When cold is the beauty which dwelt in my soul, 
What ma!_'ic of Fancy can lengthen my song? 

Can the lips sing of hove in the desert alone. 
Of kisses and smiles Which they now must resign? 

Or dwell with delight on the hours that are flown? 
Ah. no! for those hours can no longer be mine. 



Can they speak of the friends that I lived but to loveJ 
Ah, surely affection ennobles the strain! 

l.ut how can toy numbers ill sympathy move 

When I scarcely can hope to behold them again? 

Can I sing of tli' deeds which my Fathers have done, 
And raise my loud harp to tlie fame of my -ires? 

For glories like theirs, oh, how faint is my tone! 
For Heroes' exploits how unequal III) tills! 

Un touch 'd, then, my Lyre shall rtiplj to the blast — 
"J' is liii.-h'd ; and my feeble endeavours are o'er; 

And those who have heard it will pardon the past, 
When they know that its murmurs shall vibrate no 
more. 

And soon shall its wild erring notes he forgot, 

an and love is o'ercast : 
Oh! blest had my fate I" on and happy my lot, 
Had the iii si strain of love been the dearest, the last. 

Farewell, my young Muse! since we now can ne'er 

meet ; 

If our songs have been languid, they surely are few; 
Let as hope that the present at least will be sweet — 
The present— which seals bur eternal Adieu. 

1-07. 



TO ANNE. 



Oh! Anne, your offences to me have been grievous; 

1 thought from my wrath no atonement could save 
you ; 
But woman is made to command and deceive us — 

I look'd in your face, and I almost forgave you. 

I vow'd I could ne'er for a r..oment respect you. 
Yet thought that a day's separation was long: 

When we met, 1 determin'd again to suspect you — 
Your smile soon convinced ine suspicion was wrong 

I swore, in a transport of young indignation, 
With fervent contempt evermore to disdain you: 

I saw you — my anger became admiration; 
And now, all my wish, all my hope s to regain you 

With beauty like yours, oh, how vain the contention. 

Thus lowly I sue for forgiveness before you; — 
At once to conclude such a fruitless dissension, 

lie false, my sweet Anne, when I case to adore you 
January ltj, 1,-07. 



TO THE SAME. 

On say not, sweet Anne, that the Fates have decree* 
'1'he heart which adores you should wish to dissever! 

Such Fates were to me mosl unkind ones indeed,— 
To bear me from hue and from beauty for ever. 

Your frowns, lovely girl, are the Fates which alone 
Could bid me Irorn fond admiration refrain; 

By these, every h"pe. every wish were o'erthtown, 

Till smiles should restore me to rapture again. 

As the ivy and oak, in the fi rest entwined, 
The rage of the tempest united must veathei, 

Mv love ami my life «ere by nature design'd 

To flourish alike, or to perish together. 

Then say not, sweet Anne, that the fates have «• 

' ere,, I, 

Your lover should bid yon a luting adieu, 

Ti'.l Fate can ordain that Ins bOBOTn shall alee.i, 
His soul, his existence, are centred in you. 

an 



r50 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



TO THE AUTHOR OF A SONNET BEGINNING, 

• ' <tAD IS MY VERSE,' YOU SAY, ' AND YET NO TEAR.'" 

Tiiy verse is "sad" enough, no doubt: 
A devilish deal more sad than witty) 

Why we should weep 1 can't Slid out, 
Unless for thee we weep in pity. 

Vet there is one I pity more ; 

And much, alaa! I think he needs it: 
For he, I 'm sure, will suffer sore, 

Who, to his own misfortune, reads it. 

Thy rhymes, without the aid of magic, 
May once, he read— but never after: 

Yet their effect's by no means tragic, 
Although by far too dull for laughter. 

But would you make our bosoms bleed, 
And of no common pang complain — 

If you would make us Weep indeed, 
Tell us, you'll read them o'er again. 

March 3, 1807. 



ON FINDING A FAN. 

In one who felt as once he felt, 

This might, perhaps, have fann'd the flame; 
But now his heart no more will melt, 

Because that heart is not the same. 

As when the ebbing flames are low, 
The aid which once improved their light. 

And bade them burn with fiercer glow, 
Now quenches all their blaze in night. 

Tims has it been with passion's fires — 
As many a boy and girl remembers — 

While every hope of love expires, 
Extinguish'd with the dying embers. 

The first, though not a spark survive, 
Some careful hand may teach to burn; 

The la*t, alas! can ne'er survive; 
No touch can bid its warmth return. 

Or, if it chance to wake again, 
Not always doom'd its heal to smother, 

It sheds (so wayward fates ordain) 
Its former warmth around another. 



1807. 



TO AN OAK AT NEWSTEAD.* 

Youno Oak! when I planted thee deep in the ground, 
I hoped that thy days would be longer than mine; 

That thy dark-waving branches would flourish around, 
And ivy thy trunk with its mantle entwine. 

Such, sucn was my hope, when, in infancy's years, 
On the land of my fathers I rear'd thee with pride: 

Itiey are past, and I water thy stem with my tears,— 
Thy decay not the weeds that surround thee can bide. 



» Lord Byron, on his first arrival at Newste-ad, in I79S, planted an oak 
in 'h" garden, and nourished tin- fancy, thai as the tree flourished so should 
nt. iii; r-visii'mi theahhev, during liiri Grm ie Ruthyeo'a residence there, 
hi- found the oak choked up by weeds, and almost destroyed ; — hence these 
lines. Shortly after Colonel Wildman, the present proprietor, took possee- 
lion, he one day noticed it and said to the servant who was with him, " Here 
m a fine young oak ; bat it must be cut down as it grows in an improper 
place "— '* I fiope not, sir, H replied the man J l ' for it's the one th«t my 
•ord wis so fond ■■(. because he set it himself." The Colonel h.i.. rt se, 

taken every possible care of it. It is already inquired after, by Strangers, as 

u The 2fcyrcn. Onk, n and promises to share, in after times, the ccdebrity ot 
Uuksrsrare's BMllberre, and Pope's w How.— Moore 



I left thee, my Oak, and, since that fatal hour, 
A stranger has dwelt in the ball of my sire: 
Till manhood shall crown me, not mlna is tha powe. 

Hut his, wif.se neglect may have bade thee expiit 

Oh! hardy thou wert — even now little care 
Might revive thy young head, and thy wounds geni. 
. beat: 

But thou wert not fated affection to share — 
Fur who could suppose that a stranger would feei 

Ah. droop not, my Oak! lift thy head for awhile; 

Ere twice round yon Glory this planet shall run. 
The hand uf thy Master will leach thee to smile, 

When Infancy's years Of probation are done. 

Oil. live then, my Oak! tow'r aloft from the weeds, 
That elog thy young growth, and assist thy decay 

For still in thy bosom are life's early sen's. 
And still may thy branches their beauty display 

(Hi! yet, if maturity's years may be thine, 
Though /shall lie low in the cavern of death. 

On thy leaves yet the day-beam of aires may shine 
Uninjured by time, or the rude winter's breath. 

For centuries still may thy boughs lightly wave 
O'er the corse of thy lord in thy canopy laid; 

While the branches thus gratefully shelter his grave, 
The chief who survives may recline in thy shade. 

And as he, with his boys, shall revisit this spot, 
lie will tell them in whispers more softly to treat! 

Oh! surely, by these I shall ne'er be forgot: 

Remembrance still hallows the dust of the dead. 

And here, will they say, when In life's glowing prime 
Perhaps he has pour'd forth his young simple lay, 

And here must he sleep, till the moments of time 
Are lost in the hours of Eternity's day. 

1S07 



DEDICATION TO DON JUAN.f . 

I. 

Bob Sobthey! you're a poet— Poet-laureate, 

And representative of all the race, 
Although 'tis true that you turn'd out a Tory at 

Last, — yours has lately been a common case, — . 
And now, my Epic Renegade! what arc ye at? 

With all the Lakers, in and out of place ? 
A nest of tuneful persons, to my eye 
Like "four and twenty Blackbirds in a pye ; 

ii. 
" Which pye being open'd, they besran to sing," 

(This old song and new simile holds good,) 
"A dainty dish to set before the King," 

Or Regent, who admires such kind of food ; — 
And Coleridge, too, has lately taken wing, 

But like a hawk encuinber'd with bis li^od, — 
Explaining metaphysics to the nation — 
I wish be would explain his explanation. 

in. 
You, Bob! are rather insolent, you know, 

At being disappointed in your wish 
To supersede all warblers here below, 

And he the only Blackbird in the dish; 



t This " Dedication" was rarrpreaaed, in 1819, with Lord ISvron's reluctan 

consent; but, shortly after his death, i's existence became notorious, m con- 

equence of an aniele in the Westminster Review, generallf at 

iir loti it Hobhonse; and, for several venre, the verses have been selling in 

i u * t roa Isida It could, therefore, serve no purpose to excluj* 

| thein on Ihe present occasion.— A/oorA 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



75: 



And then you overstrain yourself, or so, 

Ami tumble downward like the flying fish 
Gasping on deck, because you soar too high, Bob, 
And fall, for lack of moisture quite a dry, Bob! 

IV. 

And Wordsworth, in a rather long "Excursion," 

(I think tin- quarto bolds five hundred pages,) 
His given a sample from the vasty version 

Of ins new system to perplex the sag 
"i" i- poetry— at least by bis assertion, 

And may appear so when the dog-star rages — 
And he who understands it would be able 
To add a story to the Tower of Babel. 

v. 
You — Gentlemen I by dint of ion? seclusion 

from better company, have kept your own 
At Keswick, and, through still continued fusion 

Of one; another's millds, at last have grown 
To deem as a most logical conclusion. 

That Poesy has wreaths for you alone; 
There is a narrowness in such a notion, 
Which makes mo wish you'd change your lakes for 
ocean. 

VI. 

I would not imitate the petty thought, 
Nor coin my self-love to so base a vice. 

For all the glory your conversion brought, 
Since gold alone should not have been its price. 

You have your salary; was't for that you wrought? 
And Wordsworth has his place in the Excise.* 

You're shabby fellows — true — but poets still, 

And duly seated on the immortal hill. 

VII. 

Your bays may hide tin boldness of your brows — 
Perhaps some virtuous blushes; — let them go — 

To you I envy neither fruit nor boughs — 
And for the fame you would engross below l 

The Bald is universal, and allows 

Scop.' to all such as feel the inherent glow: 

Scott, Rogers, Campbell, Moore, and Crabbe, will try 

'Gainst you the question with posterity. 

v;it. 
For me, who, wandering with pedestrian Muses, 

Contend not with you on the winged steed, 
1 wish your fate may yield ye, when she chooses, 

The fame you envy, and the skill you need; 
And recollect a poet nothing loses 

In giving to his brethren their full meed 
Of merit, and complaint of present days 
Is not the certain path to future praise. 

IX. 

He that reserves his laurels for posterity 

(Who does not often claim the bright reversion) 
Has generally no great crop to spare it, he 

Being only injured by his own assertion; 
And although here and there some glorious rarity 

Arise like Titan from the sea's immersion, 
The major part of such appellants go 
To— God knows where— for no one else can know. 

x. 
If. fa'Ien in evil days on evil tongues, 

MiSton appeal'd to the Avenger, Time, 
If Time, the Avenger, execrates his wronrrs, 

And makes the word " Miltonic" mean "sublime" 



* Wo: ' [M — t' is. I Ihink, ill tint or 

the Elds,- I •>o«dale , s table. • 

eharla'an an-! political pnnaite licks up ihr crumbs with a hardened alac- 
rity; the converted Jacobin I e, c clownish syco- 
phant of the nor*' prejudices *>f the ajristocracv, 

3r 2 



lie deign'd not to belie his soul in songs, 

Nor turn his very talent to a crime, 
lie did not lothe the Sue to laud the Son, 

But closed the tyrant-hater in- b - 

XI. 

Tliink'st thou, could he— the blind Old Man— arise 
Like Samuel from the grave, to fr< cze once more 

The I'! I of i i arena uiih bis propuecius, 

Or be alne again— again all hoar 

With lime and trials, and those helpless eyes, 

And heartless daughters— worn — ami pale — \&t> 

poor; 
Would he adore a sultan ? I ■ 
The intellectual eunuch Castlcreagh ?•} 

XII. 

Cold-blooded, smooth-faced, placid miscreant I 

Dabbling its sleek young hands in Erin's gore, 

And this for wider carnage tauglii to pant, 
Transferred to gorge upon a sister si 

The vulgaresl tool that tyranny could want, 

With just enough of talent, and no more. 
To lengthen fetters by another lix'd, 
And oiler poison long already mix'd. 

XIII. 

An orator of such set trash of phrase 

Ineffably — legitimately \ ile, 
That even its grossest flatterers dare not praise, 

Nor foes — all nations— condescend to smile, — 
Not even a sprightly blunder's spark can blaze 

From thai I.xion grindstone's ceaseless toil. 
That turns and turns to give the world a notion 
Of endless torments and perpetual motion. 

XIV. 

A bungler even in its disgusting trale, 
And botching, patching, leaving still behind 

Something of which its masters are afraid, 
States to be curb'd, ami thoughts to be confined 

Conspiracy or Congress to be made — 
Cobbling at manacles for all mankind — 

A tinkering slave-maker, who mends old chains, 

With God and man's abhorrence for its gains. 

XV. 

If we may judge of matter by the mind. 

Emasculated to the marrow It 
Hath but two objects, how to serve, and bind. 

Deeming the chain it wears even men may fit, 
Eutropius of its many masters,— blind 

To worth as freedom, wisdom as to wit, 
Fearless — because no feeling dwells in ice 
Its very coura s to a vice. 

xvt. 
Where shall I turn me not to virxr its bonds, 

For I will never fed them;— Italy! 
Thy late reviving Roman soul ,|, ■ , 

i' neatfa the lie this State-thing breathed o'er the*" 

Thy Clanking chain, and Erin's jet green wounds, 
Have Voices— tongues to cry aloud for me. 

Europe has slaves— allies— kings— armies still, 
And Bouthey lives to sing them \ery ill. 



t u Pa'e, but not cadaverous;**— Mil'rn's two , Idcr .!,,:/>. »,-rs are tain t> 

have roblet hlro Ol . im in the 

[ his house, &c. Ac . tola as a 

parent tod 1 scholar, mint has . rnmrcrea 

him :„ Lear. See i in Ihii I, Lite of 1 , 
vjr'' iii tin- cditiou before me.) 

}0r,— 

" Would hf ml side 'nto a hnrk 

a-riotr* 
I doubt if u Laureate" an t *• 1 r.uu.t* I : n.uit §aj t as Den 

Jonion did toSj > at— 

" I. .' 
lay v. 
JoABOn answered.—" t, Ben " Svlve<'er aoisew 

ed,— " That is not rh] in. > lotono; "bail e> ••»• • 



758 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



Meantime— Sir Laureate— I proceed to dedicate, 
In honest simple verse, this song to you, 

And, if in flattering strains I do not predicate, 
'Tis that I still retain my "bull" and blue;" 

My politics as yet are all to educate: 
Apostasy's so fashionable, too, 

To keep one creed's a task grown quite Herculean; 

Is it not so, my Tory, ultra- Julian ?* 
Venice, September IG, 1818. 



FRAGMENT 

ON THE BACK OF THE POET'S MS. OF CANTO I. 
OF DON JUAN. 

I woexn to heaven that I were so much clay. 
As I am blood, bone, marrow, passion, feeling — 

Because at least the past were pass'd away— 
And for the future— (but I write this reeling, 

Having got drunk exceedingly to-day, 
So that I seem to stand upon the ceiling) 

i say— the future is a serious matter— 

And so— fur God's sake— hock and soda-water! 



PARENTHETICAL ADDRESS.f 

BY DR. PLAGIARY. 

Balf stolen, with acknowledgments, to he spoken in an inarticulate voice 
by Master P. at the opening of the next new theatre.— Stolen parts mark- 
ed with the inverted commas of quotatiou — thus " ". 

"When energising objects men pursue," 

Then Lord knows what is writ by Lord knows who. 

" A modest monologue you here survey," 

Hiss'd from the theatre the "other day," 

As if Sir Fretful wrote " the slumberous" verse, 

And gave his son " the rubbish" to rehearse. 

"Yet at the thing you'd never be amazed," 

Knew you the rumpus which the author raised; 

"Nor even here your smiles would be represt," 

Knew you these lines— the badness of the best. 

"Flame! fire! and flame!!" (words borrowed from 

Lucretius,) 
"Dread metaphors which open wounds" like issues! 
•And sleeping pangs awake— and— but away" 
(Confound me if I know what next to say.) 

* Lo Hope reviving re-expands her wings," 

And Master G— recites what Doctor Busby sings! — 
"If mighty things with small we may compare," 
(Translated from the grammar for the fair !) 
Dramatic "spirit drives a conquering car," 
And buro'd poor Moscow like a tub of " tar." 
This spirit Wellington has shown in Spain." 
To furnish melodramcs for Drury Lan<i. 
" Another Marlborough points to Blenheim's story," 
And George and I will dramatize it for ye. 

' In arts and sciences our isle hath shown" 
(This deep discovery is mine alone.) 
"Oh British poesy, whose powers inspire" 
My verse— or I'm a fool— and Fame's a liar, 

* Thee we invoke, your sister arts implore" 

With "smiles," and "lyres," and " pencils," and much 
more. 



These, if we win the Graces, too, we gain 

Disgraces, tool "inseparable train!" 

"Three who have stolen their witching airs from 

Cupid" 
(You all know what I mean, unless you're stupid.) 
"Harmonious throng" that I have kept in petto, 
Now to produce in a "divine ststetto"!! 
"While Poesy," with these delightful doxies, 
"Sustains her pari" in all the "upper™ boxes I 
"Thus lifted gloriously, you'll soar along," 
Borne in the WSt balloon of Busby's song; 
"Shine in your farce, masque, scenery, and play" 
(For this last line George had a holiday.) 
"Old Drury never, never soar"d so high," 
So says the manager, and so says I. 
" Bui hold, you say, tins self-complacent boast;" 
Is this the poem which the public lost? 
" True — true — that lowers at once our mounting 

pride ;" 
But lo ! — the papers print what you deride. 
"'Tis ours to look on you — you hold the prize," 
"I'is twenty guinea*, as they advertise! 
" A double blessing your rewards impart" — 
I wish I had them, then, with all my heart. 
"Our twofold feeling owns its twofold cause," 
Why son and I both beg for your applause. 
" When in your fostering beams you bid us live," 
My next subscription list shall say how much you give : 

Oelobcr, l£ 12. 



• I allude not In our friend Landor's hero, the traitor Count Julian , but to 
GiMiou's hero, vulgarly yclept •' The Apostate." 

T Among the addresses sent in lo the Drury Lane Committee, was one by 
Ur Dnatrf entitled "A Monologue." of which the above is a parody.— 



[Instead of the lines to Inez, which now stand in the First Canto of Child* 
Harold, Lord Myron had originally written the foilowing:J 

1. 

On never talk again to me 

Of northern climes and British ladies; 
Ir has not been your lot to see, 

Like me, the lovely girl of Cadiz. 
Although her eye be not of blue, 

Nor fair her locks, like English lasses, 
How far its own expressive hue 

The languid azure eye surpasses! 
2. 
Prometheus-like, from heaven she stole 

The fire, that through those silken lashes 
In darkest glances seems to roll, 

From eyes that cannot hide their flashes: 
And as along her bosom steal 

In lengthen'd flow her raven tresses, 
You'd swear each clustering lock could feel. 

And cuil'd to give her neck caresses. 
3. 
Our English maids are long to woo, 

And frigid even in possession; 
And if their charms be fair to view, 

Their lips are slow at Love's C n »>fi»ee'09 
But born beneath a orighter sun, 

For love ordain'd the Spanish main is, 
And who, — when fondly, fairly won, — 

Enchants you like the Girl of Cadiz? 
4. 
The Spanish maid is no coquette, 

Nor joys to see a lover tremble. 
And if she love, or if she hate, 

Alike she knows not to dissemble 
Her heart can ne'er be bought or sold— 

How e'er it beats, it beats sincerely; 
And, though it will not bend lo gold, 

'Twill love you long and love you dearly 



The Spanish girl th;it meets your love 

Ne'er taunts you with a mock denial, 
For every thought is bent t'> prove 

Her passion in the hour of trial. 
When thronging foemen menace Spain, 

Hie dares the deed and shares the danger; 
And should her lover press the plain. 

She hurls the spear, her love's avenger. 
& 
And when, beneath the evening star, 

She mingles in the gay Bolero, 
Or sings to her attuned guitar 

(If Christian knight or Moorish hero, 
Or counts her heads with fairy hand 

Beneath the twinkling rays of II sper, 
Or join devotion's choral hand, 

To chaunt the sweet and hallow'd vesper;— 
7. 
In eacli her charms the In art must move 

Of all who venture to behold her; 
Then let not maids less fair reprove 

Because her bosom is not colder: 
Through many a clime 't is mine to roam, 

Where many a soft and melting maid is, 
But none abroad, and few at home, 

May match the dark-eyed <»irl of Cadiz. 



FAREWELL TO MALTA. 

Adieu, ye joys of La Valetle! 

Adieu, sirocco, sun, and sweat ! 

Adieu, the palace rarely entered ! 

Adieu, ye mat sii :- « hi re — 1 *ve ventur'dl 

Adieu, ye cursed streets of stairs ! 

(How suieiy he who mounts you swears!) 

4dieu, ye merchants often failing! 

Adieu, thou mob forever railing! 

Adieu, ye packets— without letters! 

Adieu, ye fools— who ape your betters 1 

Adieu, thou daraned'Bt quarantine, 

That gave me fever, and the spleen ! 

Adieu that stage which makes us yawn, Sirs, 

Adieu his Excellency's dancers! 

Adieu to Peter— whom no fault 's in, 

Hut could not teach a colonel waltzing: 

Adieu, ye females fraught with graces I 

Adieu i id coats, and redder faces ! 

Adieu the supercilious air 

Of all that strut " en militaire '." 

I go — but Cod know? when, or why. 

To smoky towns and cloudy sky, 

To things (the honest truth to say) 

As bad— hut in a different way.— 

Farewell to these, but not a lieu, 
Triumphant sons of truest blue! 
While either Adriatic shore, 
And fallen chiefs, and fleets no more, 
And nightly smiles, and daily dinners, 

Proclaim you war and women's winners. 
Fardon my Muse, who apt to [irate is. 
And take my rhyme— because 'tis "gratis." 

And now I 've got to Mrs. Fraser, 
Perhaps you t hi -i k I mean to praise her— 
Am! were [ vain enough to think 
My praise was worth this drop of ink, 
A line — or two — were no hard matter. 
As hera indeed, t need not flitter: 



But she must be content to shine 
In better praises than in mine, 

With lively air, and often Virt, 
And fashion's ease, without its art, 
Ilrr h"iirs can Mule glide along. 
Nor ask the aid of idle song. — 

And now, O Malta! since thou'et got us, 
Thou little military hotbousel 
I'll not offend with words uncivil. 
And wish thee rudely at the Devil, 
Put only stare from out my casement. 
And ask, for what is such a place meant! 
Then, in my solitary nook, 
Return t'i scribbling, or a book, 
Or lake my physic while I'm able 
(Two spoonfuls hourly by the label,) 
Prefer my nightcap to my beaver, 
And l.less the yods— I've got a fever 1 

Jiliiy 20, 1811. 



Endorsement to the Deed of Separation, in the 
J}pril of 1810. 

A YEAR ago you swore, fond she ! 

'To love, to honour,' and so forth : 
Such was the vow you pledged to me. 

And here 's exactly what 'lis worth. 

To Penelope, January 2, 1821 
This day, of all our days, has done 

The worst for me and you. — 
'Tis just siz years since we were one. 

And fee since we were tico. 



Wno kill'd John Keats? 
• I,' Bays the Quarterly, 
Su savage and Tartarly ; 

"Twos one of my feats.' 

Who shot the arrow? 
' The poet-priest Milman 
(So ready to kill man,) 

Or Sou they or Barrow. 



PONG FOR THE LUDDITES. 



As the Liberty lads o'er the sea 
Bought their freedom, and cheaply, with blooa. 
Su we, boys, we 
Will die fighting, or lire free — 
And down with all kinis but King Luddl 



When the well that we weave is compb is 
And the shuttle exchanged for the sword. 
We will fling the winding-sheet 

O'ei the d »po1 at our feet, 

And dye it deep in the gore he has pour'* 
in. 

Though blark as his heart its hue. 

Since his veins are corrupted to mud, 
Fet this is the dew 
Which the tree shall renew 

01 Liberty, planted By Lh II ! 



f 



7G0 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



THE CHAIN I GAVE. 

(fen. the Turkish.) 

7 tie chain I gave "as fair lo view. 

The lute I added sweet in sound; 
The heart thai ofler'd 1 >» > 1 1 1 was true, 

And ill deserved the fate it found. 
Those gifts were eharm'd by secret spell 

Tny truth in absence to divine; 
And they have done their duty well,— 

Alas! they could not teach line thine. 
Thai chain was firm in every link, 

Hut not to bear a Btranger's touch ; 

That lute was sweet — till thou couldst think 

In other hands its notes were such. 
Let him w ho from thy neck unbound 

The chain which shiver'd in his gra*,), 
Who saw that lute refuse to sound, 

Restring the chords, renew the clasp. 
When thou wert changed, they alter'd too; 

The chain is broke, the music mute. 
*Tis past— to them and thee adieu- 
False heart, frail chain, and silent lute. 



SUBSTITUTE FOR AN EPITAI'ir. 
KiNn Reader! take your choice to cry or laugh; 
Here Harold lies— hut Where's his Epitaph? 
If such you seek, try Westminster, and view 
Ten thousand just as fit for him as you. 

Athens. 



EPITAPH FOR JOSEPH BLACKETT, LATE POET 
AMI) SHOEMAKER. 
Stranoi:r! behold, ihterr'd together, 
The souls of learning and of leather. 
Poor Joe is gone, hit left his all: 
You II find his relics in a stall 
His works were neat, and often found 
Well stitch'd, and with morocco bound. 
Tread lightly— where the hard is laid 
lie cannot mend the shoe lie made; 
Yet is he happy in his hole, 
With verse immortal a-' his sole. 

But still to business he held fast, 
And stuck to Plici-lms to the last. 
flten who shall say so good a fellow 
Was only "leather and prunella?" 
For character— he did not lack it ; 
At'.d if he (lid, 'twere shame to "Black-it." 
Malta, Mai/ lu, 181L 

SO WE'LL GO NO MORE A ROYING. 

i. 
So we '11 fro no more a roving 

So late into the night, 
Though the heart he still as loving, 

And the moon be still as bright. 
n. 
for the sword outwears its sheath, 

And the soul wears out the breast, 
Ami the heart must pause to breathe, 

And love itself have rest. 
III. 
rhnugh the niu'ht was made for loving 

Ami the day returns too soon, 
Vet \vi 'I! go no more a roving 

SV the light Of fie RVXHI 



ON HEARING THAT LADY BYRON WAS ILL. 

And thou wert sad— yet I was not with tnee; 

And thou wert sick, and yet I was not near; 
Methought that joy and health alone could lie 

Where I was not— and pain and sorrow here 1 
And is it thus?— it is as 1 foretold, 

And shall he more so; for the mind recoils 
Upon itself, and the wreck'd heart lies cold, 

While heaviness collects the shatter'd spoils. 
It is not in the storm nor in the strife 

We feel benumb'd, ami wish to be no more. 

But in the after-silence on the shore, 
When all is lost, except' a little life. 

I am too well avenged! — but 'twas my riiht; 

Whale'er my sins might he, thou wert not sent 
To lie the Nemesis who should requite — 

Nor did Heaven choose 60 near an instrument. 
Mercy is for the merciful! — if thou 
Hast been of such, 't will be accorded now. 
Thy nights are banisll'd from the realms of sleep!— 

Yes ! they may flatter thee, but thou shall feel 

A hollow agony which will not heal. 
For thou art pillow'd on a curse too deep; 
Thou hast sown in my sorrow, and must reap 

The bitter harvest in a woe as real ! 

I have had many foes, but none like thee; 

For 'gainst the rest myself I could defend, 

And be avenged, or turn them into friend; 
But thou in safe implacability 
Hadst naught to dread — in thy own weakness 

shield..!, 
And in my love, which hath but too much yielded. 

And spared, for thy sake, some I should noj 
spare — 
And thus upon the world— trust in thy truth— 
And the wild fame of my ungovern'd youth — 

On thincs that were not, and on things that are- 
Even upon such a basis bast HlOU built 
A monument, whose cement hath been guilt 1 

The moral Clytemnestra of thy lord, 
And hew'd down, with an unsuspected sword, 
Fame, peace, and hops — and all the bitter life 

Which, but for this cold treason of thy heart. 
Might still have risen from out the grave of strife, 
And found a nobler duty than to part. 

But of thy virtues didst thou make a vice. 
Trafficking with them in a purpose cold. 
For present anger, and for future gold— 
And buying others' grief at any price. 
And thus once enter'd into crooked ways, 
The early truth, which was thy proper praise, 
Did not still walk Inside thee— hut at times, 
And with a breast unknowing its own crimes. 
Deceit, averments incompatible, 
Equivocations, and the thoughts which dwell 

In Janus-spirits- -the significant eye 
Which learns to lie with silence— the pretes* 
Of Prudence, with advantages annex'd — 
The. acquiescence in all things which tend, 
No natter how, to the desired end — 

All found a place in thy philosophy. 
The means were worthy, and the end is won- 
I would not do by thee as thou hast done I 

September 1610. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



7G1 



TO * * *. 

Brr once I dared to lift my eyes — 

To lift my eyes to thee; 
And since that day, beneath the skies _ 

No other sights they see. 

In vain sleep shuts them in the night — 

The night grows day to me; 
Presenting idly to my sight 

What still a dream must he. 
A fatal dream — for many a har 

Divides thy fate from mine; 
Aik. still my passions wake and war. 

But peace be still with thine. 



MARTIAL, Lib. I. Epio. I. 

Hie est, qtiem te?is, ille, quemre quiria, 
Tola nutus in orbe partialis, &c. 

He unto whom thou art so partial, 
Oh, readert is the well-known Martial. 
The Epigrammatist: while living, 
Give him the fame thou wouhlsi be giving; 
So shall he hear, and feel, and know it- 
Post-obits rarely reach a poet. 



EriGRAM. 
In digging up your bones, Tom Paine 

Will. Cobbet has done well; 
You visit him on earth again, 

lie '11 visit you in hell. 



TO DIVE& 

A FRAGMENT. 

Unhappy Dives: in an evil hour 
'Gainst Nature's voice seduced to deeds accurst! 
Once Fortune's minion, now thou feel'st her power; 
Wrath's vial on thy lofty head hath burst. 
In Wit, in Genius, as in Wealth the first. 
How wond'rous bright thy blooming morn arose! 
But thou wert smitten with 111' unhallow'd thirst 
Of Crime unnamed, and thy sad noon must close 
In scorn, and solitude unsought, the worst of woes. 

1811. 



VERSES FOUND IN A BUMMER-HOUSE AT 
HALESOWEN. 

When Dryden's fool, "unknowing what he sought," 

His hours in whistling spent, "for want of thought," 

This guiltless oaf his vacancy of sense 

Supplied, and amply too, by innocence; 

Did modern swains, [lOSSess'd of Cymon*B powers, 

In Cymon's manner waste their leisure hours, 

Th' offended guests would not, with blushing, see 

These fair green walks disgraced by infamy. 

Severe the fate of modern fools, alas! 

When vice and folly mark them as they pass. 

Like noxious reptiles o'er the whiten'd wall. 

The filth they leave still points out where they crawl. 



FROM THE FRENCH. 

rtioLE, beauty and poet, has two little crimes; 
She o-Hkes her own face-, and does not make her 
rhymes. 

101 



NEW DUET. 

To the hint of " Why, how now, saucy Jade?" 

Witv, how now, saucy Tom? 

If yon thus must ramb'e, 
I will publish some 

Remarks on .Mister Campbell. 

ANSWER. 

Why. how now. Parson Bowles? 

Sure the priest is maudlin ! 
(To lite public) How can you, d — n your souls 

Listen to his twaddling? 



EPIGRAMS. 

On, Castlereagh! thou art a patriot now; 
Calo died for his country, so didst thou: 
He perish'd rather than see Rome enslaved. 
Thou iMitt'st thy throat that Britain may be saved 

So Castlereagh has cut his throat!— The worst 
Of this is, — that his own was not the first. 

So He has cut his throat at last!— Tie 1 Who! 
The man who cut his country's long ago. 



THE CONQUEST. 
I. 
The Son of Love and Lord of War I sing; 

Him who made England bow to Nonnandy, 
Ami left the name of conqueror more than king 

To his unconquerable dynasty. 
Not fann'd alone by Victory's fleeting wing. 

He rear'd his bold and brilliant throne on bight 
The Bastard kept, like lions, his prey fast, 
And Britain's bravest victor was the last. 

March 8-9, 1821 



VERSICLE3. 



I reap the " Christ abel ;" 

Very well: 
I read the "Missionary;" 

Pretty — very : 
I trieil at " Hderim;" 

Ahem! 
I read ■ sheet of "Marg'ret of Jlnjou f 

Can ijnu ? 
I turn'd a page of Scott's "Waterloo;" 

Pooh 1 pooh! 
I look 'd at Wordsworth's milk-white" RylstoneDoef* 

Ilillo! 

etc. &.C. &C. 



EriC RAM, 

FROM THE FRENCH Or RTLIIIERIS. 

If, for silver or for gold. 

You could melt ten thousand pimples 

Into half a dozen dimples, 
Then your f;ire we might behold, 

Looking, doubtless, much more snugly • 

Yet even then 't would b« d — ■! uglv 



702 



BYRON'S WORKS. 



TO MR. MURRAY. 
To hook the reader, you, John Murray, 

Have publtsh'd " Anjou's Margaret," 
Which won't be sold olf in a hurry, 

(At least, it has not been as yet ;) 
And then, still furlher to bewilder 'em. 
Without remorse you set up "Ilderim;" 

So mind you don't get into debt. 
Because as how, if you should fail. 
These books would be but baddish bail. 
And mind you do not let escape 

These rhymes to Morning Post or Perry, 

Which would be very treacherous— very. 
And get me into such a scrape ! 

For, firstly, I should have to sally, 

All in my little boat, against a Galley; 
And, should I chance to slay the Assyrian wight, 
Have next to combat with the female knight. 
March 25, lai7. 



EPISTLE FROM MR. MURRAY TO DR. POLI- 
DORI. 

Dear Doctor, I have read your play, 
Which is a good one in its way, — 
Purges the eyes and moves the bowels, 
And drenches handkerchiefs like towels 
With tears, that, in a flux of grief, 
Afford hysterical relief 
To shatter'd nerves and quicken'd pulses. 
Which your catastrophe convulses. 

I like your moral and machinery; 
Your plot, too, has such scope for scenery 
Your dialogue is apt and smart; 
The plays's concoction full of art ; 
Your hero raves, your heroine cries, 
All stab, and every body dies. 
In short, your tragedy would be 
The ver> thing to hear and see: 
And for a piece of publication, 
If I decline on this occasion. 
It is not that I am not sensible 
To merits in themselves ostensible; 
But— and I grieve to speak it — plays 
Are drugs— mere drugs, sir — now-a-days. 
I had a heavy loss by " Manuel," — 
Too lucky if it prove not annual,— 
And Sotheby, with his "Orestes," 
(Which, by the by, the author's best is,) 
Has lain so very long on hand, 
That I despair of all demand. 
I've advertised, but see my books, 
Or only watch my shopman's looks; — 
Still Ivan, Ina, and such lumber, 
My back-shop glut, my shelves encumber. 

There's Byron too, who once did better 
Has sent me, folded in a litter, 
A sort of— it 's no more a drama 
Than Darnley, Ivan, or Kehama ; 
80 aiter'd since last year his pen is, 
I think he's lost his wits at Venice. 
In ehort, sir, what with one and t'other, 
1 flare not venture on another. 
I write in haste; excuse each blunder; 
Tne coaches through the streets so thunder. 
My room's so full— we've Gilford here 
Reading MS., with Hookman Frere, 



Pronouncing on the nouns and particles 
Of some of our forthcoming Articles. 

The Quarterly— Ah, sir, if you 
ll<\0 but the genius to review I — 
A smart critique upon St. Helena, 
Or if you only would but tell in a 
Short compass what— but, to resume: 
As I was saying, sir, the room — 
The room's so full of wits and bards, 
Crabbes, Campbells, Crokers, Freres, and Wards 
And others, neither bards nor wits; — 
My humble tenement admits 
All persons in the dress of gent., 
From Mr. Hammond to Dog Dent. 

A party dines with me to-day. 
All clever men, who make their way; 
Crabbe, Malcolm, Hamilton, and Chantrey, 
Are all partakers of my pantry. 
They're at this moment in discussion 
On poor De Stael's late dissolution. 
Her book, they say, was in advance— 
Pray Heaven, she tell the truth of France 1 
Thus run our time ami tongues away. — 
Hut, to return, sir, to your play: 
Sorry, sir, but I cannot dial, 
Unless 'twere acted by O'Neil. 
My hands so full, my head so busy, 
I'm almost dead, ami always dizzy; 
And so, with endless truth and hurry, 
Dear Doctor, 1 am yours, 

John Mi.rkat 



EPISTLE TO MR. MURRAY. 

My dear Mr. Murray, 
You're in a riamn'd hurry 

To set up this ultimate Canto; 
But (if they don't rob us) 
You 'II see Mr. Qobhouse 

Will bring it safe in his portmanteau. 

For the Journal you hint of, 
As ready to print oil', 

No doubt you do right to commend it; 
But as yet I have writ oir 
The devil a bit of 

Our " Beppo :"— when copied, I 'II send it. 

Then you've ***'s Tour,— 
No great things, to be sure, — 

You could hardly begin with a less work; 
For the pompous rascallion, 
Who don't speak Italian 

Nor French, must have scribbled by guess-work 

You can make any loss up 
With "Spence" and his gossip, 

A work which must surely succeed; 
Then Queen Mary's Epistle-Craft, 
With the new " Fytte" of " Whistlerraft," 

Must make people purchase and read. 

Then you 've General Gordon, 
Who girded his sword on. 

To serve with a Muscovite master 
And help him t;> polish 
A nation so owlish, 

They thought shaving their beards a lisnsrei 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



7C3 



For the man, " poor and shrewd," 
With whom you 'd conclude 

A compact without more delay, 
Perhaps some such pen is 
Siill extant in Venice; 

But please, sir, to mention your pay. 

Venice, January 8, 1818. 



TO MR. MURRAY. 

Btraiun, Tonson, Lintot of the times. 
Patron and publisher of rhymes. 
For thee the bard up Pindus climbs, 
My Murray. 

To thee, with hope and terror dumb, 
The unfledged BIS. authors come: 
Tliou primes! all — and sellcst some — 
My Murray. 

I'pnn thy table's baize so green 
The last new Quarterly is seen, — 
But where is thy new Magazine, 
My Murray? 

Along thy sprucest book-shelves shine 
The works thou decmest most divine — 
The "Art of Cookery," and mine. 
My Murray 

To'jrs, Travels, Essays, too, I wist. 
Ami Pennons to thy mill bring grist; 
And then thou hast the " Navy List," 
My Murray. 

And Heaven forbid I should conclude 
Without " the Board of Longitude," 
Although this narrow paper would. 
My Murray ! 

Venice, March 25, 1818. 



TO THOMAS MOORE 
What are you doing now. 

Oh Thomas Moore? 
Wbat are you doing now, 

Oh Thomas Moore ? 
Sighing or suing now. 
Rhyming or wooing now, 
Billing or cooing now, 

Which, Thomas Moore ? 

But the Carnival's coming, 

Ota Thomas Moore 1 
The Carnival's coining, 

Oh Thomas Moure I 
Masking and humming, 
Fifing and drumming, 
Guilarring and slrui ing. 

Oil Thomas Moore I 



STANZAS. 

When a man hath no freedom to fight for at home. 
Let him combat for that of his neighbours; 

Let him think of the glories of Greece and of Rome, 
And get knock'd on the head for his labours. 

To do good to mankind is the chivalrous plan, 

And is always as nobly requited; 
Then battle for freedom wherever you can, 

And, if not shot or liang'd, you'll get knighted. 



EriTAPH FOR WILLIaM PITT. 
With death doom'd to grapple 

Beneath tins cold Blab, he 
Who lied in the Chapel 

Now lies in the Abbey. 



ON MY WEDDING-DAY. 

Hkrr's a happy new year I but with reason 
I beg you ll permit me to say — 

Wish me many returns of the season, 
Bui as few as you please of the day 



EPIGRAM. 

The world is a bundle of hay, 
Mankind are the asses who pull; 

Each tugs in a different way, 
And the greatest of all is John Bull. 



THE CHARITY BALL. 

[Ou hearing thai Lady Fyrnn had been I'atrowss of a Hall id a:d of mm 

charity at Hiuckley.] 

What matter the pangs of a husband and fa the.' 

If his sorrows in exile be great or be small, 
So the Pharisee's glories around her she gather, 
And the saint patronizes her "charity ball I" 

What matters— a heart which, though faulty, wm 
feeling, 

Be driven to excesses which once could appal — 
That the sinner should suffer is only fair dealing. 

As the saint keeps ber charity back for " the ball I* 



EPIGRAM, 

ON THE BR A SI BR S' COMPANV HAVING RESOLVED TO PRE- 
SENT AN ADDRESS TO Ql'EEN CAROLINE. 

The brasiers, it seems, are preparing to pass 
An address, and present it themselves all in brass;— 
A superfluous pageant— for, by the Lord Harry I 
They'll find where the) are going much more thaa 
they carry. 



TO MR. MURRAY. 

For Orford and f.>r Waldegrave 

Vmi give much more than me you gave; 
Which is not fairly to behave. 

My .Murray. 

Because if a live dog, 'tis sail. 

Be Worth a lion fairly sped, 
A live lord must be worth t:ro dead, 
My .Murray. 

And if, as the opinion goe9. 
Verse hath a better sale than prose— 
Irenes, 1 tbould have more than those. 
My Murray. 

But now this sheet is nearly rramm'd, 
So. if you trill, I shan't be ihamm'ii, 
And if you Won't, you may be damn'd 
My Murray. 



7G4 BYRON'S WORK'S. 


ON THE BIRTH OF JOHN WILLIAM RI'/ZO 


in. 


HOPPNKR. 


Like Chiefs of Faction, 


His father's sense, his mother's grace, 


His life is action— 


In linn, 1 hope, will always lit so; 


A formal pactum 


With— still to keep him in pood rasi; — 


That curbs Ins reign 


The health ami appetite of Ki/./.io. 


Obscures Ins glory, 




Despot no more, he 


=» 


Such territory 




(lints with disdain. 


STANZAS, TO A HINDOO AIR. 


Still, still advancing. 


fThe«* Terra were written by Lord Byron a little before he ten Italv for 


With banners glancing. 


Greece. They were meant to suit the Hindostanee air—" Alia Malla j'un 


His power enhancing. 


•a," which the Countess Guiccioli was feed of singing.] 


lit: must move on — 


On !— my lonely— lonely— lonely— Pillow! 


Repose but cloys hint. 


Where is my lover? where is my lover? 


Retreat destroys him, 


Is it his bark which my dreary dreams discover? 


Love brooks not a degraded throne. 


Far — far away! and alone along the billow? 


IV. 


Oh! my lonely— lonely— lonely— Pillow 1 


Why roust my head ache where his gentle brow lay ? 


Wait not, fond lover! 


How the long night flags Invelessly and slowly. 


Till years are over, 


And my head droops over thee like the willow. — 


And then recover, 




As from a dream. 


Oh I thou, my sad and solitary Pillow! 


While each, bewailing 


Send me kind dreams to keep my heart from oreaking. 


The other's failing, 


In return fur the tears I shed upon thee waking; 


Willi wratli and railing. 


Let me not die till he comes back o'er the billow.— 


All hideous seem — 


Then if thou wilt— no more my lonely Pillow, 


While first decreasing, 


In one embrace let these arms again enfold him, 


Yet not quite ceasing. 


And then expire of the joy— but to behold him! 


Wait not till teasing 


Oh! oiy lone bosom!— oh! my lonely Pillow' 


\H passion blight : 




If once diminisli'il, 
Love's reign is (inish'd — 




STANZAS. 


Then part in friendship,— -and bid good r.ijtn. 


[" COULD LOVE FOR EVER."J 


V. 


I. 


So shall Affection 


Cot't.D Love for ever 


To recollection 


Kun like a river, 


The dear connexion 


And Time's endeavour 


Bring hack with joy: 


He tried in vain — 


You had not waited 


No other pleasure 


Till, tired or hated. 


With this could measure; 


Your passions sated 


And like a treasure 


II, 'gan to cloy. 


We 'd hug the chain. 


Your last embraces 


But since our sighing 


Leave no cold traces— 


Ends not in dying, 


The same fond faces 


Ami form'd for flying. 


As through the past; 


Love plumes his wing; 


And eyes, the mirrors 


Then for this reason 


Of your sweet errors. 


Let 's love a season ; 


Reflect but rapture— not least, though last. 


iu\. let that 6eason be only Spring, 
ii. 
When lovers parted 


VI. 


True, separations 


Feel broken-hearted; 


Ask more than patience; 


And, all hopes thwarted, 


What desperations 


Expect to die; 


From such have risen 1 


A few years older, 


Put yet remaining. 


Ah! how much colder 


What is 't but chaining 


They might behold her 


Hearts which, once waninir. 


For whom they sigh! 


Heal 'saiust their prison ? 


When link'd together, 


Time can but cloy love. 


In every weather, 


And use destroy love: 


They pluck Love's feather 


The winged boy. Love, 


From out his wing — 


Is but for boys— 


He 'II stay for ever, 


You 'II find it torture 


Rut sadly shiver 


Though sharper, shorter, 


vVithou' his plumage, when past the Spring. 


To wean, and not wear out, your Jofi. 


the 


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